Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Taipei Cycle Show 2008- words and pics (part 1).

I'm gonna try and keep these short and sweet... umkay? And yes, I'll have more of these later too.


The view outside my window of the San Want hotel in Taipei around 10:00PM on my first night in town. The city never really sleeps... it gets quieter, but never actually quiet.


I know it's a crappy picture, but this is the Taipei 101 (world's tallest building). You can barely see what looks like smoke billowing from the top. I don't know what it actually was, but it was creepy looking.


This really cool sculpture stands in front of the new convention center. It's huge! Probably over 100' tall. It's a really cool sculpture- it's on the cover of the current Bicycle Retailer and Industry News too.


The architecture is very cool and modern- my pics do it no justice. The metro rail passes right in front too.

The main reason I arrived in Taipei a day early was so that I could attend the annual Velo/ Wellgo party. I use a lot of Velo products from handlebar tapes/ grips to nearly all of my saddles. Stell Yu is an incredible woman and I have immense respect for her. She has built an empire in the industry and is still as genuinely humble as you can possibly imagine. So I arrived a day ahead of my co-workers so I could serve as the company representative for this annual party thrown by Stella and her sister company, pedal/ shoe maker, Wellgo (Xpedo).


Here, George Lai of Velo kicks the evening off. George is another great guy to know in this industry.


The highlight of the evening for me was the HanTang Yuefu traditional Chinese folk art performance group.


These women put on the most wonderfully elegant and beautiful performances you can imagine. I really enjoy traditional performances like these and I was greatly impressed by the show we were provided- it was simply amazing.


The evening wrapped up with a toast to the attendees (a few hundred people) from Stella. It was a great night shared with some wonderful people.

So my next post will be from the show floor- people, products and more... I promise.

Tim
(PS- And thank you for all the birthday wishes. It is sincerely appreciated. )

2 comments:

spokejunky said...

Don't know if you cruise ebay, but thought you might like this one. A 1972 Gran Criterium . I'm digging the braze on cable guides on the bb.

Kk said...

That hands sculpture rocks! How appropriate to have a disc floating in the middle for a bike show.

Thanx for showing us that. I can always count on you to look up.