Extraordinary Journey on an Ordinary Train
by
Randy Johnson
Originally published in Orientations, September, 1975
One thing about the overland journeys in Taiwan -- they never end too soon. You start off expectantly enough, thinking mostly of the good times you're bound to have at the journey's end. If you're the good-natured sort, you might even be in fine spirits midway through the trip, regarding all that has gone on before as a fantastic, if somewhat humbling, experience. But by the time you finally disembark, you are a weary veteran. You have had not just a taste of the road -- you have swallowed it whole!
The unusual train journey from Chiayi, a town on the Taiwan's west coast, up over 7,000 feet to the village of Alishan, an old logging camp and mountain retreat, is no exception. Alishan is a well-known spot -- there is a beautiful Chinese folk song about it -- for not unlike the hill stations of former British colonies in Asia, it provides a place to escape the oppressive summer heat of the lowlands. Yet Alishan remains a bit off the beaten path, and is far from being the most developed mountain resort in Taiwan.
Several trains a day travel from Chiayi to Alishan on the old narrow-gauge logging line. Most of these are express trains, with comfortable reserved seats only. They are pulled by diesel engines, take only three and a half hours for the trip, and charge almost three times the ordinary train fare. The express trains, like the express buses in Taiwan, are for tourists who either don't know or don't mind paying more than everybody else, or for Chinese who are willing to spend significantly more for the privilege of traveling first class.
There is only one "ordinary" train to Alishan. That, at least, is what the railway authorities call it. To my mind, however, the ordinary train is the most extraordinary one of all. It is powered by an old coal burner, takes five hours to make the 72-kilometer journey, and has unreserved hardwood seating against the sides and standing room for anyone who cares to try. The ordinary train is for ordinary people who live along the route, or who want to escape the heat for a weekend and see the famous "Sea of Clouds" from Alishan. But, just like the train, Chinese people are anything but ordinary.
Having risen early to get in the ticket queue by 7:30 (the train leaves at 8:30), I eventually find the Alishan platform behind the Chiayi railway station. Since it's a Saturday, the platform is quite crowded, of course. When the train finally arrives, it looks like a scaled-down replica of an antique train. There are about ten cars, including two boxcars, each made of wood, badly weathered and painted what was once a bright red.
As the crowd presses noisily to the edge of the platform, I can foretell there will be a huge rush for seats. I get pretty excited myself at the prospect of standing up for five hours in this old crate. The train chugs to a hissing halt, fortuitously leaving a door directly in front of me! All hell breaks loose. I eagerly wait for the door to open, poised for the assault. I am a veteran of train scrambles, having received a Silver Star from the Japanese National Railroad, but on this train, the doors don't open. Meanwhile, passengers are flinging up the windows, shoving their bags in on the seats, and quickly plunging in after them.
I am momentarily stunned. A man beside me lunges for the door and tries desperately to slide it open. It jams. Together we shove and kick the door, yelling frantically as the car fills in through the windows. Finally, amid laughter from inside and cheers from outside, we barge through. But by now every seat has been filled with someone wearing a triumphant smile. My heart sinks.
Actually, as I discover, standing is not so bad -- at least for the first few hours. The best views are to be had from the tiny platforms between the cars, or in the doorways. The scenery, as in much of rural Taiwan, is magnificent. We climb through three climatic zones, from the coastal plains of bananas and sugar cane, through hill farms, past mountain orchards, and up to the cool forest. The train twists and turns, rocking and groaning over 114 bridges and through 49 dusty tunnels, all at a brisk 10 to 15 miles per hour.
The journey is an extraordinary five-hour plunge into the amazing Chinese mode of life. Students, farmers, working-class families trying to be tourists -- all crowd, squeeze and merge into, and hang out of the miniature cars, settle into a happy gray sludge of amalgamated community and ooze up the mountain in broken formation.
Some are sleeping, others are trying to. There is endless eating, chattering, arguing. Babies are crying, suckling, evacuating and being changed. There is fanning, stretching, scratching, removing clothing in the heat, then putting it back on in the cold. Those sitting on straight benches are valiantly ignoring the suffering of those who are standing, jostling and bumping for hours on end. Finally a few, succumbing to their own torture of sitting down for hours on end, rise and escape to the open air on the platforms -- giving way to the martyrs, the little girls whose arms have stretched above their heads for hours to clutch the railing, and who now sink unresolutely onto narrow seats.
Before me is a country woman with two large baskets of produce overflowing in the aisle; she is surrounded by four children scrapping for more bench space. Behind me, a modern mother nurses her baby whenever he starts screaming, which by midday is every 15 minutes. Hanging out of the doorway, I watch a mountain farmer lug his huge sack of grain onto a freight car, jump in as the train is pulling out, ride a few hundred yards, and then drop the sack off near a trail, and jump down as the train reaches top speed of 15 miles an hour.
The train stops at every mountain outpost -- perhaps 12 or 15 times -- loading and unloading provisions and taking on or leaving off a few passengers. These are the most interesting passengers, the mountain folk who make their entrances and exits between the terminals, while we tourists ride from end to end.
Along the way, local merchants hawk their wares at the train windows when we stop. At first it is litchi, then we move up to bananas; later they are selling peaches, plums, ginger root and greens. You can buy some quite good banana or coconut ice cream for pennies a cup from the discomfort of your own seat.
As the day drags on, the trash, sweat, and children settle to the wooden floor. In deadly squalor and urgent chaos, this little circus plods its way up the mountain, while its alter-ego plods back down, once a day; like two self-contained impressionist plays -- both cast and audience intact -- it is a scene from Brecht, played and replayed until they get it right. Meeting in the middle, they pause in a brief stupor to witness their unrecognizable mirror images, sprawling before them on the next siding. Then a bolt, as the trains pull out, and the play goes on.
Now high in the forest, we pause for a look at the sacred and imposing 3,000 year-old cedar tree. It seems to have borne the brunt of the years, being fairly lopped off at the top, but I am assured it is living still. At this point the train begins a new maneuver, zigzagging up the mountain -- now forward, now backward -- waiting at each level to switch from zig to zag.
Then, somehow, it happens -- the train pulls into Alishan. Here are several little gift shops, a railroad yard, and a splendid view of the mountains. One long, final hiss and the deed is done.
We shuffle onto the platform and into the crisp air of Alishan. No looking back now; there is the "Sea of Clouds" to look forward to. And of course, someday soon, the ride back down on the Ordinary Train.
