Tallest building and biggest ice cream (Taiwan Part I)

Visiting the small island of Taiwan just off the coast of China is not the most obvious stop, when travelling around the world in a limited amount of time. Our reason for doing so was to visit our friends JingBin, JiaLing and WeiChing with whom we studied in London. Since WeiChing was working during our stay, JingBin and JiaLing (picture 1, JingBin right) kindly showed us around Taiwan during our 5 day stay.

Taiwan is de facto an independent state. However, China does not recognize its independence but sees Taiwan as part of China. As a result, Taiwan is not recognized by most countries in the world as an independent state. Nor is it a member of the UN or other international organisations. The reason is that at the end of the Chinese civil war in the late 1940's the nationalist Chinese general Chiang Kai-Shek fled to the then Chinese island Taiwan conceding defeat to the communists under Mao. Mao wanted to take Taiwan as well but risked a clash with the US, which was supporting the Nationalists and Chiang in the civil war. Thus, Chiang was able to stay in Taiwan and during the past 50 years Taiwan has developed into a modern westernized society pretty much like Hong Kong. However, China has continued to claim that Taiwan is part of China and thus should not be recognized as an independent country.

A clear sign of the prosperity of Taiwan today is that the tallest building in the world is located in the capital, Taipei. At 508 meters the Taipei 101 (101 floors) is the landmark of the capital. We went to see the building one evening and had a great view of the capital from the top (brought there by the fastest elevator in the world - of course...). Furthermore, Taiwan has the 16th largest economy in the world!!

Of course we all know that prosperity is not reflected in the trivial question of who has the tallest building. A much more important question is - who has the tallest ice cream!!! On that account, this street stall in Taipei is a good bet - at least Anne Sofie seems to think so ;-)