Monday August 3rd 2009, Taiwan International Youth Culture and Study Tour participants visited the state of the earth complex, the world’s tallest building called Taipei 101.

Taipei 101 is currently the world’s tallest building on earth with 509 m height. It is located in the East of Taipei (Xin-Yi district), the capital city of Taiwan. The tower consists of 101 stories above the ground. The top floor is at 439 m. The construction of Taipei 101 (Taipei International Financial Center previously) was started in 1999, and completed in 2004.

The total cost was about 1.7 billion US dollars. This tower has the world’s fastest elevators (double decker), which can get as fast as 63 km / h. The indoor observation deck is on the 89th floor (382m). The total weight of Taipei 101 is 700, 000 tonnes, which is such a mass that it could possibly make an earthquake. The structure is capable of withstanding the largest earthquakes.

The Taipei 101 Mall is a 6-story shopping mall inside the building. It takes 39 seconds to reach the 89th floor, meaning it operates at a speed of one kilometre per minute.

The former tallest building was the Petronas Towers in Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur with 452m height, which only held the record for 6 years (built in 1998). Participants tour various apartments in this historic building.

Earlier on during the weekend participants visited the headquarters of the famous International Humanitarian Taiwanese NGO, known as Tzu Chi Foundation as well as the Chiang-Kei-Shek Memorial Hall.

At Tzu Chi Foundation, according to officials, the foundation was established in 1966 by Venerable Dharma Master Cheng Yen on the impecunious east coast of Taiwan.

According to them, over 42 years the foundation has been contributing to better social and community services, medical care, education and humanism in Taiwan and around the world. From the first 30 members, housewives who saved two cents from their grocery money each day to help the poor, the foundation has grown to over five million members in 45 countries.

Master Cheng Yen firmly believes that suffering in this world is caused not only by material deprivation, but more importantly by spiritual poverty. She feels that the lack of altruistic love for others has been the root of many problems in the world. 

Tzu Chi’s missions focus on giving material aid to the needy and inspiring love and humanity to both givers and receivers. In addition to charity, the foundation dedicates itself in the fields of medicine, education, environmental protection, international relief work and the establishment of the world’s third largest marrow donor registry.

It also promotes humanistic values and community volunteerism. Through helping those in need, Tzu Chi volunteers take on the path of Bodhisattva practices, the way to Buddha hood.

At the Chiang-Kei-Shek Memorial Hall amazingly, this reporter saw an award presented to the late President of Taiwan Chaing Kei-Shek by the Gambia in October 1972, among a host of others. But it was the only award from the African region as displayed there.

Chiang Kai-shek was a Chinese military and political leader who led the Kuomintang (Chinese Nationalist Party) for five decades and was head of state of the Chinese nationalist government between 1928 and 1949.

Chiang Kai-shek was born on 31 October 1887 in Zhejiang, an eastern coastal province of China. At the age of 18, he underwent military training in a college in Japan.

In 1928, he led the suppression of the Chinese Communist Party.

In 1946, civil war broke out between the KMT and the Communists. In 1949, the Communists were victorious, establishing the People’s Republic of China. Chiang and the remaining KMT forces fled to the island of Taiwan.

There Chiang established a government in exile which he led for the next 25 years. This government continued to be recognised by many countries as the legitimate government of China, and Taiwan controlled China’s seat in the United Nations until the end of Chiang’s life.