ABSTRACT
We are 33 floors up and it is dark outside. We are at an evening gathering of an international scientific meeting and we feel we could be anywhere. Another tall building that we can see through the glass walls of the room is the highest building in the world, we are told. The city below seems curiously far away, out of reach. But where we are is somehow telling. This is the banqueting suite at the top of the Taiwan World Trade Centre, an economic pivot in the capital city of Taipei. We are delegates at the closing banquet of the 2nd International Barcode of Life Conference being held in this city. We chat to our neighbours around large round tables, full of delicious Taiwanese dishes. The room is beautifully decorated, the microphones for speeches are being set up, the local organizers are getting ready for the honours. Music and dancing starts, loudly, brashly – it all seems too uproarious for a scientific meeting. Taiwanese and American meeting organizers, executive scientific committee members from the Consortium for the Barcoding of Life (CBOL), and Director of the US-based Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, funders of CBOL, are called to the floor by the Taiwanese compère. They need to say a few words of address. A sense of good natured chaos characterises the small rituals that mark the end of the conference.
