“Burning down the house…”
The "pants" on the right with the burned CCTV building on the left
Every Tuesday and Thursday morning when I get off the subway at Jintaixizhao station, I see the CCTV tower right across the street. For those of you that don’t know, the CCTV tower is one of Beijiing’s newest architectural accomplishments. It houses the countries media powerhouse that is essentially run by the Chinese government. In February, during the Spring Festival, one of the buildings in the CCTV “complex” caught fire from fireworks being lit too close to the building. The building is completely charred now. Luckily, causalities were minimal. The building itself was a hotel, but it was still in construction. While it was not the primary CCTV Tower (the one that looks like a pair of pants), it was still part of the new CCTV construction.
The burned building up close with the"pants" on the right
I have to imagine this will open some people’s eyes. Spring Festival was very fun, but full of what seemed like thoughtless celebration. I am referring mainly to the use of fireworks. I’ll admit that I truly enjoyed the fireworks. In fact, I loved it. I still thought throughout that it was amazing no buildings were harmed as people lit rockets mere feet from doors. Turns out one of the newest buildings in China fell victim. It is a glaring symbol in the Central Business District of Beijing right now. Each morning and evening I walk on the sidewalk across from the towers, I see at least one-person snapping a photo of the charred building. Unfortunately, CCTV runs almost all of the media in China. Information on this or what happens because of it will most likely be largely unreported.
Stay tuned for a series of new posts on travels, my internship, and other fun things in China starting Monday or Tuesday next week!
Thanks for sharing this story. I loved your photos very much. Would you mind if I make one big vertical JPG file with both photos and upload it to Flickr with crediting you back with a link to this page? Just for the sake of spreading them.
Thanks again
Oh, stupid typo. Sorry for the crappy english.
Camillo, that is fine by me. Please just post a link here also to the flickr page. And please include a link and credit back to me and this page here. Thanks!