WULAI, NEW TAIPEI CITY, TAIWAN

2016-04-18, 18:29, JASON

BUDGET

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Taiwan is one of those places where I'm rediscovering my roots a bit. Every time I come back I'm always impressed by the next city.

A quick history lesson: there were indigenous people on the Taiwan island before the Chinese arrived. They have an equivalent status and recognition as Native Americans do in the U.S., that is, they're largely neglected by the government, outnumbered by a foreign majority (in our case, the Han Chinese), and have struggled to get recognition from the present government. However, given a small land mass, Taiwan still has a dozen different ethnic groups inhabiting the island. Of these, the Atayal, one of the largest ethnic groups, is located in the northern area. Wulai (in Mandarin: 烏來) is a small town located in the New Taipei region that has many Atayal folk -- in fact, to the point where the city name is a translation of Wulai dialect. It makes a good day trip from Taipei proper, so after arriving at 5:10 in the morning in Taipei Taoyuan Airport, I made my way directly to the small village.

Here's how you go. Take a KuoKuang (國光) bus -- public, I believe 1819 -- to Taipei Main Station, which houses the MRT. From there, take the MRT down to XinDian station (新店), and pick up the 849 bus towards WuLai. Sit on the right for a view, granted your bus isn't filled with aunties like mine was. I wanted to snap some pictures on the drive up but was too embarrassed to reach across the auntie next to me, who was also sitting next to the window. So, in a strive to be an ice breaker and not a maker, I had a chat with her as I tried and failed to take a picture out the window. Just take my word that the scenery on the way up was beautiful. You go along the river, and get to see some low-rise housing and country life in Taiwan. If you're dead beat from the flight then you can sleep as Wulai is the last stop. Most of the shops in the village start opening at around 10 to 11 for lunch and tourists, so getting in at about 8-8:30 in the morning allows you to do some nice mountain hiking and sightseeing before going off to the main city.

When you embark, you walk about 5 minutes and cross a bridge with ethnic patternation to it -- a red, white, diamond sort of thing. After this, the bridge leads directly to the beginning of Wulai Old Street (烏來老街). If you get in early, there won't be much open but I think a quiet street has something magical about it. It's that sleepy, "morning after" vibe that you can find everywhere in some local flavor, from a quiet English Village to Soi Cowboy in Bangkok (seriously!). Some shops are beginning to set up but a majority are still fast asleep. There are a few stray dogs -- like in any Taiwanese city -- strolling, alongside some people. Continuing on, I pass through to a 711 and get some water and a lovely tea egg. The lady at the counter greets me, seeing my big backpack. She asks me where I'm from, we have a good exchange, and I ask her for directions to the Wulai Waterfall (烏來瀑布). 

Usually, there is a small pushcart that can transport you up the hill 1.5km so you're closer to the waterfall. Any other transport I would not have taken, but the transport here is a special kind. Back when Wulai was a mining town, these carts became a quick and efficient way to transfer building materials. Implemented by the Japanese. They used to be pushed by people manually, but in the 70s they installed a mechanical version used for labor, and, eventually they became a tourist attraction and part of the experience of going to Wulai. You had to sit on the carts if you went. Unfortunately, since Wulai is susceptible to heavy typhoon rains, the old pushcarts were out of order, so you really had no choice but to walk up the mountain. But, in about 17 degree weather, the walk is great, and not too long. You get to stroll down "Lover's Lane" and as you head up, you can see the train tracks on your right. The climb is not to steep, and even with a huge backpack it was bearable.

As I am traveling alone, I think most people are a bit curious. They wonder where I'm from, and because my standard Mandarin isn't perfect, they think I'm a foreigner. I tell them I'm ABC (American Born Chinese) and the standard seems to lower. One lady asked me if I was from Hong Kong (my accen't isn't that bouncy, is it??) and another one asked me if I was Japanese (do you get a lot of Japanese Mandarin speakers here??) Another point is, usually I'm used to having someone to rely on to do stuff with. When you're alone, you lean on yo SELF. This is especially true for pictures, since I don't like just scenery in my pictures, I like to have people. So, there are a series of shots done by other people. They're pretty great. The first one is on my way up to the waterfall. There is an 80 smoething year old making his way down, and I approach him. He's as you'd expect: utterly confused about the concept of a camera phone and where to press. I tell him to get the background in with some of the forest, and this is what I get: 

But, I like how it's a bit imperfect. It captures a special moment in time, both on behalf of the photographer and me.

The walk up to the waterfall is breathtaking. A sharp cliff on your right, steep and green mountains on your left. There are a lot of picture opportunities, but looking back on my film, it just looks like a lot of green mountain action. Once I see the railroad tracks heading up, I know I'm close. 

You can't really miss the waterfall unless you're absolutely not paying attention. It's the first thing you both hear, see (one or the other, we're not able-bodyists here), and to some degree, smell, when you walk up. You'll hit the train stop as well which is the cutest train stop ever. These pushcarts weren't long by any means, probably the longest held only 20 people. You can see from the design how Japanese inspired it was: cute overhang to protect from rain, cute two-bench seats that you sit by while the train pulls up next to you, cute writing font, cute wooden construction.. just.. KAWAII. 

And after you walk past the train station, you approach the waterfall. It's really nice, but difficult to capture the bigness of it. I asked a guy who owned the shop across the street if I could bother him for a picture. He kindly agreed, and we started chatting. We had a short conversation about where I came from, a bit about the ethnic statue in front of me, and he told me next time to bring my friends to WuLai to enjoy the village. Super friendly. Actually, friendliness was a trend of most people in Wulai. He had a really interesting look. Maybe he was Atayal. Anyway, here is his attempt at capturing the waterfall: 

As I'm taking some pictures of the waterfall, the clouds peer in over the mountain and begin shittin on my life. I take out my umbrella and decide to walk to the nearby waterfall museum for shelter. Upon going in, a stray dog follows me and just waits by the door, inside the museum. It's my spirit animal, accompanying me for my museum trip. The museum talks about the history of the Wulai push cart: it's uses, development, etc. At the end, you hit a sign saying that it's currently in disrepair due to the typhoon, which crushed the tourism industry slightly. A lady sweeping the museum talks to me about how it hasn't been in repair for the past almost-a-year. She then tells me, if I'm down for it, to keep following down the road to check out a suspension bridge as well as a local indigenous village. I take her advice.

Most of the trail on the way up is just walking along the road side, next to the trucks and cars. There are times where you cross through tunnels and the sides of mountains, and it's a very scenic walk through the countryside. There are waterfalls scattered across, as well as 'overhangs' of trees dripping water from the previous rain. The air is really fresh, especially on a cloudy day. At one point, I wasn't sure if I went in the right direction, but eventually I came across the Black Suspension Bridge. 

After the bridge, I'm not sure as to whether or not I'm supposed to cross the bridge then take the trail, or keep going along the road (before crossing). The lady at the museum said most of the road was blocked off from the typhoon, so I walked along the main road. But, halfway through, I see this old couple just hiking on the other side of the gorge -- they had gone on the trail that was blocked. So, I looped back, broke the rules, and started hiking behind them. At one point, when they had stopped and I passed them, I asked if I could keep going and they said yeah. It was walkable, just a bit difficult. Turns out, it wasn't too bad to walk aside from the occasional puddle and burden of the backpack, but at one point I had to swing around some tree tied by a "warning" banner, that was right around the cliff. I think life is worth more than finding a village so I admitted defeat from a tree.

I walked back to the main town, a lot more lively now as it was nearing lunch time. After seeing the museum, I decided to check out the little train departure area (near the waterfall was the disembark stop), and snapped a picture of the trains, in disrepair. The station itself had been overrun with vegetation too, providing a cool 'train station in disrepair' look. 

OK. Onto the hot springs.

At first, I was awkward. It's mostly aunties and uncles there, which I like since they are body positive. Some people taking their lunch next to the pool, some just lying there, some cooking nearby. I was hesitant at first about what to do, but you know, as you travel alone you just give a big "F it" to feeling shy and I ask this lady about how this works: do I have to rinse off first? Which pools are good? What do I do? She's nice enough to explain all the parts to me, and then I just start taking off my clothes. There's a pool by the river, and a couple of other ones near the riverbanks. It's relaxing: all you do sit by the pool and look out across the river at the village. It's pretty much an open source jacuzzi with more mineralage, and after getting out you feel quite good.

There is one part of a pool that is right along the river, and by the time I had gotten in the tide had overtaken the spring and so the river water was flowing in. The water was freezing, but I thought it was part of the experience, and if you sat close enough to the actual spring vent then it was lukewarm. I don't know if it was the current, or the temperature, though, but after I got out I was super dizzy and had to sit down for a bit, and felt like I was breathing in cold air even though it was hot outside... anyway. After getting out there was an auntie just drying off, so I ask her to take a picture. She gladly agrees: 

After that, I plan on having some lunch. Atayal cuisine is known to be unique since they take a lot from the local animals in the area. As such, things like mountain boar are popular. Another famous dish is bamboo with rice in it, that gets steamed with a certain flavor. There are other things like millet wine as well, and special mountain veggies (wasn't actually called that; had a legitimate name). The assistant was some queer-chic person who was serving me major androgyny, I loved it. She also talked asked me a bit of myself, and we had a short conversation about the area, and what else there is to see in the area. Then, it must have been a friend of hers or something, but they wanted to be my FB friend and take pictures with me, so I had an authentic Asian selfie experience with a stranger, as well as made a few friends along the way. 

There's only one old street, and you pretty much have to pass by it to get to the bus stop if you want. So, being still a bit hungry and having some food options to explore now that the Old Street had opened up, I began walking inwards again, along the same path I came in on. My first stop was right next to the restaurant I had just eaten at. I think the two shops were connected. All I did was buy some of the millet wine for which they were famous for. There's lots of different flavors, but I'd say it's a stronger rice-wine flavor with a hint of alcohol. If you get the plum wine flavor like I did, it has a very distinct taste that I can't explain (i.e. like explaining Coke). I left the bottle with them so I didn't have to carry it around. After, I continued onwards to have a bit more of the pork, but this time in sausage form. Right across from the shop you can just hang out overlooking the river and enjoy your pork greatness in a variety of flavors. As a basic bitch, I got OF: original flavor.

Plus, the guy making the sausages was a hottie. I didn't know Taiwan produced so many of them, even in the momre rural parts. After that, I was thinking to myself, hmm, let's go for a hike, since there are some trails around the mountains. So, what I have to do is walk back down the Old Street and have all the old shop owners see me again. It was a bit awkward, since they're just staring at me, but all still smiling. When I pass by the place where I bought wine as well as the restaurant, I stopped in for another conversation saying I wanted to go do some hiking trails. Phew, OK, that was over with. It's like those drawn out goodbyes where you keep following them.

After getting to the tourist center, I tell the lady the mountain I want to hike, and she gives me a frowny and says that the roads are all blocked and now are very hard to walk. I'm devastated. Not so much because I did not get to hike, rather, I would have to walk down the old street again to face the crowd. So, instead of doing that, I spot a really cool bridge that connects to the other side of the river and take that instead. It leads to the old village just along the other side of the banks, on top of the cliffs where, if you look down, you can see the hot springs 

The thing is, when you loop back around, you have to cross by the 'ethnic bridge' I talked about earlier, and loop back from the end with the sausage and walk down towards where I bought wine and had lunch. I might as well make this my last walk. By the end, shop owners are smiling and waving and beginning to recognize me since it wasn't a busy day. "Just look down," you know. I go and pick up the wine that I left off at the shop. On the way out, there is a museum about Atayal people and the tribe, and some of their hunting practice. It seems Taiwan has a small push for recognition of indigenous culture, but I'm not sure entirely about the status of that. There are, however, museums dedicated to this and most of the shop owners seem to be Atayal. It's a really cool museum: manageable in 30 minutes, with a description of their housing, lifestyle, culture, etc.

When I exit, I'm ready to leave. It'd been a long day. But, then I remember that I left my umbrella at the WATERFALL area I was at earlier that day, so it was just a 5x over walk of shame. I say my hellos. People must thinkn I'm totally strange now, as if the road'll change within the past 10 minutes when I walked down, or I wasn't decisive, or something. I make my way back up to the waterfall which takes about 30 minutes at a decent pace, but I'm glad to find my umbrella still there. On the way down, the 711 shop owner I saw at the beginning of the day sees me again and says, "Little brother, you've been here all day already and you're not bored yet??"

And, with that, I take my last walk down the Old street. I pick up that damn wine. I say hello to my new besties and I'm finally gone. Jumping back into Taipei city was almost a bit of a shock, as it was rush hour. The city was busling, esp. at the "King's Cross" station of Taipei: Taipei Main Station. Everyone was getting on their way, going home from work. The usual city bustle. Wulai seemed far away...

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