For the tourist who has already experienced the exhilaration of those dizzying heights, and sufficient immersion in the city culture, and for others who may now be curious about the charms of rural Taiwan, there remains one of the loveliest and least toured areas of the island: a long river plain, cradled between the towering eastern foothills of Taiwan's central mountain chain and a smaller mountain spine that drops to the Pacific Ocean.
Originating in the east coast's biggest city, Hualien, the Eastern Mountain Railway tracks down this plain to its southern destination at Taitung. Beyond the out skirts of these two terminal cities, almost all traces of industrialization are left behind. For approximately 170 kilometers, the traveler can examine, uninterruptedly, the eternal pursuits of farmers and villagers—people whose homes and fields cluster about either side of the railway.
Seasons so sharply define the nature of rural life, that having previously traveled this area during a summer and watched the tending of a rice crop, golden brown and heavy with maturing grains, I decided on a springtime trip to see it anew.
Feeling more than a little nostalgic for the old days, when only a three-foot narrow gauge choo-choo line connected the two cities, and a small rail-motor served the small crowds commuting from village to village, I rather begrudgingly took my seat in an air-conditioned express that is the pride of the region's newly upgraded, wide-guage service. Admittedly, the ease of allocated seating does have its advantages. People previously had to scramble helter-skelter for available spots in the small train on which to sit or even lean. Nevertheless, as we pulled into Kuangfu station, I was delighted once again to see my old friend, the little silver and orange rail-motor, trundling out of the station on its narrow line beside us, rather spruced up for the new service image ... and certainly with fewer people on board. Tomorrow, I planned to take it instead of the express, because it would allow a leisurely getting-on and off at tiny stations. However, today the express would deliver us in good time to Juisui, a hot spring which was, in fact, the only acclaimed tourist spot ahead of us.
We left behind with Kuangfu, a larger town on the route, the last traces of industry. Our vistas were now open fields of sugar cane, ripe now and ready for harvest. Teams were busy hacking through each field by hand.
The remote countryside here, characterized by small, family farms, still sees little of the mechanization that is common to the island's major farm area, the vast and productive western coastal plain.
The harvesting teams were very industrious and efficient, with women heavily in the majority, a result of the younger men's recruitment by industry. For me, hailing from one of the world's major sugar producing areas, this seemed amusing. Cane harvesting is considered by my countrymen to be one of the most masculine of jobs, and visions of their dirty; ash-blackened bodies, clad only in work shorts and ragged vests, downing beers and glorying in their sweatiness, wandered through my mind, images ludicrously contrasting with the view being repeated every kilometer or so outside the train's windows. The women fieldhands' second consideration after their work, was obviously the preservation of their beauty from the sun's ravages. Wearing the ubiquitous Taiwan farmer's round-brimmed, bamboo leaf hats, they are shaded even more completely by addition of a floral scarf to conceal all but their eyes. Gloved and booted, these healthy if delicate-seeming ladies are now the backbone of their country's agricultural prosperity.
The express had now well and truly entered the corridor between the two mountain chains, which add a looming beauty to the manmade contours of the productive fields that stretch over every available inch of arable land in the undulating valley between. The lowest slopes show the hand of man, too—a patchwork of color—tea gardens, squat and sturdy and deep emerald, beside tall, leafy trees now sprouting springtime's tender greens. Bamboo stands were emerging now from winter-tan, shooting out afresh in greyish-green. Much higher up, the black mountain peaks bit into a forbidding sky, a lofty distance from the diminutive, peopled world below.
Farmhouses frequently caught my eye, nestling among fruit trees, stands of betel nut palms, and trellised vines with trailing blossoms. Explosive purple bougainvillaea ran amok across an occasional rooftop, touches of makeup to set off neat vegetable garden rows beside the houses. Every farmhouse has a cemented threshing patio before its front door. Whenever these were not in use for drying grains and sorting vegetables, they were occupied by groups of small children, tumbling and playing together.
We rumbled by one or two country schools, architected so they seemed extensions of the farmhouses. Classrooms and playgrounds were also decorated in many-colored, flowering vines and trees and shaded by tall, leafy date palms. It was lunch time now, and being Saturday, a halfday holiday, the children were already meandering across quiet roads and down the paths through the fields, themselves now emptying of older generations as everyone headed home for a well-earned lunch and short siesta.
At every railroad crossing, assorted groups waited, chatting and laughing, or just quietly smoking, watching us pass. A gentle-eyed water buffalo, covered with mud from his morning work in the fields, obviously shared the concerns of his master, who stood, equally muddy and patient and rather unnecessarily. I thought, holding the buffalo's rope. Only one or two farm trucks and a few motorcycles and bicycles were visible on the country lanes off the main highway.
We pulled into Juisui, and I traveled about three kilometers distance from the station to the Juisui Spa Guesthouse. An additional two kilometers brings the traveler to the Red Leaf River Spa Guesthouse. Both offer good accommodations in pretty surroundings. Their highlight, of course, is the hot spring baths. In fact, a close friend who considers himself a connoisseur of Taiwan's wonderful hot springs, rates Juisui at the top of his list because of the water's special purity. After I had spent an hour of relaxed wallowing, simmering somewhere not too far below the boiling point, his opinion seemed justified to me.
Juisui has other attractions besides its hot springs. Hugging the foothills of the central mountains, there is ample scope for those who love to climb. The Red Leaf River is fed here at its headwaters by a cascading rocky stream, a pretty sight for those who just like to sit and look. People-watching is particularly fascinating around the village of Red Leaf, a community consisting largely of members of the Taiya tribe, an aboriginal people. Nowadays, they are mostly occupied as farmers, like their fellow Taiwanese in the plains below. But their village shows a distinctive personality, with its extremely sociable people gathered everywhere in groups.
In one field, a farmer struggled in an ungainly manner with his buffalo and plough, as a group of ten or so men, women, and children looked on. Another man was chopping wood while atop his woodpile, three friends offered him moral support. The tribal people obviously place limited value on material aspects of their homes, and consequently these look rather ramshackle and untidy compared with the plainsmen's farmhouses in the valley. However, there is everywhere evident an emphasis on human relations: The villagers seem completely at ease and intimately friendly with each other, and they are very warm and welcoming to the visitor, an ambience that carries over even to the village dogs, which are uniquely relaxed and trustful, even with strangers.
A deer farm now operating on the village's slopes is run by a community cooperative trust. It specializes in the velvet from deer antlers, which makes a very expensive and, allegedly, highly efficacious aphrodisiac that is sold by herbalists.
Nights in Juisui are for sleeping deeply and peacefully, totally relaxed after a hot springs bath and completely undisturbed by sound, other than a breeze in the trees or the steady drip of a mountain rain. I awoke at first light, refreshed and eager for a new day of traveling.
I set out very early, intending this time to hike along a stretch of about 10 kilometers along the highway from Juisui through the undulating hills around Wuher to the small village of Sanminli, where (would rejoin the train. As I walked amid an unusually cool, misty, and overcast spring dawn, my thoughts ranged to another traveler who loved to wander rural landscapes ... I thought that Vincent Van Gogh would now be moved to reproduce the spectrum of color in this spring landscape—the fiery orange of a Japanese jasmine vine draping the roof and walls of a Christian church, the intense green of rice seedlings, carpeting the floor of the valley, the varying greens of the tea shrubs on the slopes ....
Wuher's comfortable reputation in Taiwan. On its hillsides, the row upen row of neatly clipped tea shrubs testify to the brand's success. Farmers in this area have also begun to harvest coffee, a rarer crop on the island. With city dwellers often preferring a cup of imported coffee to local tea these days, I here will surely be a growing local demand for home grown beans.
Wuher has two other claims to fame, both nonagricultural. At a high point in the area is a cement monument that advises its viewer that he is now standing right on top of the Tropic of Cancer. There is an entertaining story attached to this solemn structure. Several years ago, when overambitious local authorities were pushing Juisui's development as a tourist center, the Tropic of Cancer (at least its monument) was moved several kilometers down the road to the Juisui public park. However, vigorous representations from the outraged Wuher community succeeded in forcing the return of the world-renowned line to its rightful place on the globe.
Next to the Tropic of Cancer marker are two large and mysterious, prehistoric stone pillars, unearthed by archaeologists, that have an important place in the mythic history of the Ami mountain tribe. Several stories, all concerning twins, are told about them. In one, a mountain god's wife gives birth to very beautiful twins—a brother and sister called Tsy-lieh and Na-gao. When they reached maturity, they were both strong and independent, and this encouraged their parents to return to heaven to live. However, from birth, the twins had been hated and envied by a barren, rival god on another mountain. After their parent's departure, he sent a huge flood to wipe out the twin's community. Pleas for help from the twins reached their parents too late. By the time help arrived, all trace of the people and community had disappeared-all but the two stone pillars.
There was more traffic on the highway now, though, in fact, this is one of Taiwan's least crowded major access roads. A good highway along the coastline also connects Hualien and Taitung, and being of almost equal distance to this route, and offering frequently thrilling views, it is more often followed by tour busses and private cars. Nevertheless, right here seemed to me to be the most beautiful place in the world as I stopped for a moment to watch a farmer rolling up rice-seedling carpets from their seedbeds, then transport them to a ploughed and saturated paddy field for planting.
Further along the road, a group of women were scrubbing clothes by a channel of running water. In such situations, it is easy for a passerby to feel ashamed and embarrassed about her own idleness. Yet these busy people were anything but upset by my leisure. They were friendly and curious; an odd visitor offered unusual entertainment. Although they never stopped their work, the conversation flowed, or reaching levels of mutually incommunicative language, companionable silence and smiles sufficed. Since it was a Sunday, the children were out of school and often eager to accompany me a little way down the road before scampering off to important games.
At Sanminli, after a reviving snack, I easily located the railway station, and a half hour's wait ensued until the old "slow" train arrived. I feel sad that with the Eastern Mountain Railway's transformation, the beautiful, old, Japanese style wooden railway stations have disappeared. Flowering vines and trees abounded around these old, stained wood buildings. Obviously though, the villagers, but particularly the railway employees, do not share my sense of loss. Smartly outfitted in gold jackets and light-grey slacks, the station hands bustled around the sparkling, marble facade of the new structure at Sanminli and manipulated gleaming, chromeplated switches as an express glided through nonstop between platforms three and four.
One old timer waiting for the train was quite surprised by my wistful, nostalgic recollections of what he called that "old, damp, wooden waiting room." He reminded me how much more comfortable we were sitting in the new bucket seats-whose fashionable gold matched the attendant's jackets-than on the "hard, straight, wooden benches of the past." "And besides," he continued, "there are still lots of flowers out there." At that point, he hurried down the platform to chase away some goats, nibbling at the pretty azalea bushes.
Underway now in the old rail-motor, I sat by an open window as we slipped through a countryside green with growing tobacco. Despite the overcast sky, the women field workers were taking no chances and kept their complexions well wrapped in floral mufti.
We passed slowly through Wuli, a large market town and the approximate halfway point of the line. A little further on, the train crossed one of the many, wide, rocky river beds on this route. Crystal clear, metallic blue water runs in swift shallow currents from mountain headwaters deep in the central range. However, since the now takes up little space in the river bed, farmers take advantage of the vacant land, piling the surface rocks into windrows and clearing the sandy bed beneath for watermelon seedlings. Unless victimized by an unusually large flood, huge crops of sweet, succulent, red and yellow fleshed watermelons will be harvested through June and July. The work that goes into clearing these long sandy contours is humbling.
The stony grey band of the river bed makes the brilliant green prettiness of the Wuli countryside seem all the more striking. And on a not so distant mountainside towards the Pacific Coast, a waterfall cascades hundreds of feet, like thousands of silvery silk threads. The coastal mountains rise to their highest peaks here and are majestically reflected in the glassy surfaces of the flooded paddy fields. A nock of white ibis, startled by the noise of our train, now took shelter in a field more distant from the railroad and recommenced their search for tasty morsels in the mud.
I laughed to see a water buffalo loping along behind his owner. It had a supply of chewy grass strung over his back. Since the owner didn't appear to be carrying a lunchbox for himself, I concluded that his only concern was for the beast's welfare. There are many buffalos to be seen on this plain. Most are used for ploughing, but occasionally we passed an ageless ox-pulled cart. One sturdy animal pulled out of a family compound and headed oil, driverless, with four or five unconcerned passengers on board the cart. A small latecomer ran after them, using all his strength to pull at the cart and gain sufficient leverage to swing aboard. In one field, two farmers were ploughing, one using a buffalo, the other a walking tractor. A woman seated next to me and noticing my interest in this phenomenon, remarked that the buffalo will always be used by local farmers, because the beasts are quiet and orderly and the farmers like to listen to their transistor radios while ploughing.
At lunchtime, we crossed the line into Taitung County and soon pulled into the village of Chrshang. My companion, who was getting out here, advised me to quickly buy up one of the Chrshang lunchboxes being hawked by vendors on the platform. Chrshang, it seems, is famous throughout the whole of Taiwan for its rice-meat-vegetable packed lunches. I quickly jumped off and was actually quite surprised to find there were really almost no lunchboxes left for me to buy. Anyhow, being no connoiseur of Taiwan railway lunchboxes, I shall withhold my verdict on the contents.
A little further down the track, just before Kuanshan, Taitung County's second-largest town, the central mountain range appears to be cleft asunder by a large river bed. The great South Cross Island Highway takes off at this point and slowly winds its wc1y through mountain passes more than 3,000 meters high.
After Kuanshan, the train goes through a series of tunnels, and so I decided to take a bus for the rest of the journey into Taitung City.
The coastal mountains abruptly taper down here to barren, wind weathered cliff faces, which constitute one bank of a river bed. The last of the peaks, Dulan Mountain, is very imposing, and this day, with its dome rising above thin wispy clouds, it seemed very mysterious. Sacred to the area's mountain tribes, it has an aura for them perhaps similar to that of Mt. Fuji for the Japanese.
Hunting has always been forbidden in Dulan's forests. Emphasizing its mystique, heavy rains frequently wash semi precious colored stones down the mountain's water runnels, into the river, and out to sea. In time, many are washed up on the beaches so that collectors can make necklaces possessed of an undefined, but palpable, spirit.
The river's mouth spreads far and wide from Kuanshan, and the sea shimmers, a glassy mirror in the distance. The farmers have had generations of battles with the river's rocks, and over large tracts they seem to be winning. Rice paddies, painstakingly terraced with neatly piled rock dikes, are very productive. So many rocks are there that the householders have built high garden walls from them. Wherever the ground will not permit rice, vegetables or sugar cane are grown. Crops of mushrooms are raised in simple, rustic-looking thatched sheds, whose rectangular shapes softly contrast with the perfect roundness of steeple-peaked haystacks. This countryside is a natural outdoor art gallery.
A few kilometers down the road at Chulo, I strolled again over hilly downs. The terrain is unsuitable generally for rice, and orchards predominate in this area. Papaya trees seem unbelievably fertile, with 20 and more fat, ripening papayas hanging from each like so many pendulous breasts. Loquat plantations have a comic look, with brown paper bags protecting the clusters of bright golden fruit from insects... and me. Waiting for the summer to yield their bounty were plantations of dwarf mango trees, and running alongside them and up the hillsides were row after row of pineapples. A kind farmer, busy harvesting the ripest of his papayas, offered me the biggest, most golden one, and I feasted.
Munching my papaya, I happened across a herd of dairy cattie, also chewing. The grass must have been very good here as they were so fat and healthy. Their udders were huge, dripping with milk. I discovered that they were wards of an experimental dairy farm run by the ROC Department of Agriculture, which commenced operations in 1972 and has since built up a beautiful herd of 100 or so prime dairy cattie imported from the United States. Visitors are welcomed here to sample a bottle of creamy, chilled fresh milk. It went deliciously with the remains of my papaya.
It was milking time and close to sunset, so I rejoined the bus for the last leg into Taitung. On the outskirts of the city, our bus entered a long avenue of leafy trees, deep now in late afternoon shadow.
This avenue of camphor trees, 500 years old, seemed a filling terminal point for the agricultural region I had traversed, on a trip full of sights that took me back to a world so distant, and yet still present, in such a thriving place as this island.