A gunshot rings through a valley of Yushan National Park (玉山國家公園) in the middle of the night. A light from a motorcycle pierces the trees. Impossible. We're a dozen or more kilometers from the nearest stretch of pavement on a narrow trail that clings precariously to the side of a mountain; nobody could get here on a bike, certainly not at night. Another shot rings out and the light comes closer; it's not a motorcycle, but a man with a motorcycle light strapped to his head and a car battery slung around his neck. His name is Ming-chen and he's hunting wild boar.
Ming-chen is a member of Yushan National Park's trail maintenance crew, part of a detail of 15 or so Aborigines recently sent to build new footbridges along a section of the Patungkuan Old Trail (八通關古道) at an elevation of some 2,500m. He's been here for the past three weeks and in that time hasn't showered, changed clothes or -- even more inconvenient -- been able to use his cellphone. More happily, he has his meals prepared for him and a view from his workplace that is the envy of any penthouse-suite executive. Lodging is decided by the nature of his work. For the past few weeks it's been a spacious 2m-wide portion of the trail covered with large plastic sheets and dry-grass matting to serve as a bed for the entire crew. Other nights they'll sleep in one of the several mountain huts that dot the park. As the current project is halfway along a 12km stretch of trail, walking from a hut to the site and back would waste daylight, and if it's daylight they're working.
Half of Ming-chen's job is to lug bags of cement, metal grating and canisters of gasoline several kilometers uphill, unload, then walk back down and carry more. The other half consists of building whatever project the crew is working on and otherwise shoring up a trail that is forever sliding off the mountain. It's not unlike the fate to which Sisyphus was condembed, but Ming-chen can hunt at night -- although he's not supposed to.
Midnight encounter
"Do you like to hunt? You have to apply," he says, spitting out the last word with his betel nut. He pulls out a bottle from his bag, douses his motorcycle headlamp and rests his car battery in front of my tent. "Do you like Kaoliang? No need to apply," he says and offers the bottle and a betel nut.
We settle into a lengthy conversation on a frigid night atop Taiwan about wild boar, the law and religion. He's Bunun (布農) and lives in an Aboriginal village outside Tongpu (東埔), in the northwest corner of the national park. It's one of three inside park boundaries that are home to mostly Bunun Aborigines and most of the trail crew are Ming-chen's neighbors and relatives.
There are more than 40,000 Bunun in Taiwan, according to the Council for Aboriginal Affairs and several hundred reside within park boundaries. The Bunun have considered Jade Mountain home since their race began. Called Tongkusaniek in their native tongue, the mountain is the sacred birthplace of their ancestors and has been a hunting ground for millennia, providing much of their livelihood.
Hunting is important to Bunun men, Ming-chen says. Traditionally, the greater a man's hunting prowess, the greater his status among the tribe. The first web of trails in the area was made by the Bunun for hunting, but these have mostly disappeared as the need to hunt waned.
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