For all its lovingly-preserved historic sites, Taiwan is also home to many old relics that are still awaiting rediscovery and restoration. This week, Taiwan can check one of these forgotten old sites off its restoration to-do list: a building once attached to a sanatorium that has just been turned into a cultural center.
In 1940, Taiwan was still under Japanese rule-- and tuberculosis was still a public health problem here. In that year, the Matsuyama Sanatorium in Taipei built a new dormitory for its president. As tuberculosis patients convalesced in the nearby sanatorium, its president enjoyed living in these handsome Japanese-style quarters.
The intervening decades haven’t been kind to the building. In addition to slow, natural decay, typhoons have left their mark, leaving what the local neighborhood chief describes as an abandoned wreck resembling a haunted house.
Taipei declared the building a municipal historic site in 2006. But it took time to work out compensation deals for the multiple owners of the land the building sits on. Then, in 2016, the city put NT$25 million (US$835,000) into restoring the place. The finished result, complete with a Japanese garden and koi pond, was revealed on Monday.
Deputy Mayor Tsai Ping-kun says the site will be used for cultural activities. Now, restorers’ attention has moved across the street, to the former dormitory for sanatorium employees.