Our Time with the Tribe: Luan Shan Forest Museum Tour – 鸞山森林博物館

by Charles DeBenedetto

View from the top of Luan Shan. Photo Credit: K.H.

I have never bought betelnuts before, and I feel nervous. They are known as east Asia’s chewing tobacco, and are famous for being sold by sexy “betelnut girls” who wear bikinis and sit behind glass windows in roadside shacks. Although betelnuts and rice wine are the only things officially on the menu, stories are often told of them selling other things too, for an extra price.

 

We stop the car by the shack, keep the engine on, and roll the windows down tentatively.

 

Instead of a “betelnut girl,” we are greeted by a small middle-aged woman with a bright smile. When we ask for some betelnuts, she asks, “rice wine, too? You’re part of the forest tour, aren’t you?” She is as hospitable as an auntie, and I want to laugh at how tense my girlfriend and I were.

 

In a little red plastic bag, she places a small bottle of rice wine and a tiny re-sealable bag of betelnuts, which are wrapped with spiced leaves to give her brand its unique flavor. She charges us one-hundred Taiwanese dollars, or about three US dollars. We drive off, and she waves and smiles before returning to her shack to sit and wait for more customers (she is wearing a short-sleeved shirt and shorts, not a bikini, by the way).

 

* * *

 

We are on the east coast of Taiwan, where two extremes meet: mountains many times taller than the Appalachians meet the infinite vastness of the Pacific Ocean. We drive across wide river valleys which are mostly rocky now, as the monsoon and typhoon rains have not come yet, but when they do, the rivers will expand exponentially. Eventually, we make our way to a small mountain village called Luan Shan. Many cars have parked along the dirt road, and a small crowd has gathered around a dark man in a cowboy hat. He coughs before beginning his introduction.

 

“Hello, everyone. In my mother tongue, my name is Ah-Li-Ung, but you can call me Ah-Liang. Today, you are here to participate in the Luan Shan Forest Museum Tour. But it’s not the kind of museum that you would normally imagine. This museum is entirely outdoors, and was made by Mother Nature.”

 

He continues with pride in his voice.

 

“This museum exists thanks to my teacher. He saw the other indigenous areas in Taiwan, like Alishan, and Zhi Ben Hot Springs, and he realized that sacred lands were being completely bought up by Han Chinese people to build fancy hotels and resorts. The tribes were losing their lands, and the wealth being accrued at those hotels and resorts were going into the pockets of the Han Chinese, and not the indigenous peoples. So my teacher shouldered tremendous financial debt, in order to purchase all of the land of Luan Shan, so that this land would always belong to our people: The Bu Nong Tribe. So to him we say, “Thank you!” In the Bu Nong language, it is “Wu Ni Nang!”

 

We echo his words, “Wu Ni Nang!”

 

With that, our tour begins. Ah-Liang saddles his metal horse (an ancient, half-dilapidated, smoke-spitting moped), and in our cars we follow him up and up the steep slope of Luan Shan. Trees with tiny white plum blossoms flank the road, and we can see well beyond the valley we came from to the Central Mountain Range. Stopping abruptly on a steep road, we reach our first destination, called “Trees That Can Walk.”

 

Our guide stands on a rock in front of the tree. It has roots that shoot high up into the air, taller than me, and in all directions. It looks as though it can walk on many tentacles, like a giant wooden octopus. Ah-Liang speaks again.

 

“The Bu Nong people did not always live on the rough terrain of Luan Shan. We used to live in the much more habitable and cultivable flatlands, until the Japanese colonial era, when our Japanese overlords “invited” us to live on the mountain and work as lumberjacks.” As an aside, he says, “I use the word ‘invited’ because it is the nicest way to put it…Anyway. This tree here is sacred to us, and we don’t actually know how old it is, because it does not have rings.”

 

Trees that can walk. Photo Credit: K.H.

I try to appreciate the strange beauty of the tree, but the people trying to take pictures of and with it distract me. My girlfriend and I wait until everyone else has gone before taking our own picture, and then jump back in the car.

 

Finally, we drive to the top of the mountain, where the Bu Nong tribe still resides today. Their houses are open-air, with thatch roofs, clay ovens, and wooden furniture. Upon walking into the village, we are given a pointed bamboo shank with a large chunk of raw boar meat pierced through it. Ah-Liang points to some seats by a fireplace, and we roast the meat over the fire. While I am watching the fat bubble on the boar meat, rice wine and ginger tea is served, and the children giggle at having the opportunity to take a sip from their parents’ cup of alcohol.

 

Roasting boar meat. Photo Credit: K.H.

Ah-Liang, in his cowboy hat, serving rice wine. Photo Credit: K.H.

 After our snack, we walk beyond the little tribe, to the entrance of a forest trail.

Ah-Liang speaks again. “I’m sure you have all brought your gifts. Before our people go to the woods to hunt, we leave an offering for our ancestors, to protect us, and help us to come home safely. I invite the men to come forward to leave their offerings.”

 

Carrying our rice wine and betelnuts, I walk over to a shrine of sorts, which is a large rock with small candles in the middle, and skulls of wild boars purposefully placed on a taller rock behind it. Another aside by Ah-Liang, “in the past we might have put some human skulls there, too, but today we’d probably be arrested for that!” Nobody laughs, but I kind of do.

I am a little bit reminded of Lord of the Flies. Photo Credit: erv-nsa.gov.tw

 I place my offerings with the others, and we then spend an hour walking around the woods, climbing through massive boulders that were seemingly karate-chopped in half by gods, and up trees that look like they belong in James Cameron’s “Avatar.” In the end, we safely return right by the shrine, having been protected by the ancestors who must have really enjoyed those bottles of rice wine and bags of betelnuts.

 

Casual tree climb. Photo Credit: K.H.

After our hike, we gather in a large, open air hut for lunch. “Our tribe members have been working hard all morning to prepare lunch for you. In the early morning, they wore head-lamps and picked wild plants to cook, and have been preparing a variety of traditional dishes. In our culture, the men always help with setting the table, so now I invite all of you useful men to get the dishes, place them on our table, and serve some food for the lovely ladies!”

 

He really emphasizes “useful,” which I think is hilarious. In Taiwan’s still rather patriarchal society, men are not often very useful at doing anything in the kitchen.

 

Serving food is no big deal for me, so I get up right away, but other men are slower to get going. Some of them grumble, while the women giggle and whisper things to their girlfriends like, “Take a picture! This is a once-in-a-lifetime experience!”

Lunch is served. Photo Credit: K.H.

Some of the food is familiar, like broccoli and bamboo shoots, while others I have never tried before, like wild fern and sushi rolls made with millet. After lunch, Ah-Liang brings out two long, heavy poles, and a large wooden goblet to make mochi, a sweet and chewy rice-based dessert.

 

To make mochi, the rice must be crushed repeatedly until it becomes an amorphous glob, which can then be broken into bite-sized pieces and coated with peanut powder or sesame powder. Two people, each with one of the long poles, must develop a rhythm where one pole smashes down into the rice at the exact moment that the other person’s pole comes up. This becomes difficult as the rice becomes globular and sticky, because the pole gets stuck in the rice and you need to exert extra force to get it back up again.

 

Ah-Liang and his indigenous friend demonstrate, and for them it looks effortless. After a while, he asks if any of the useful men would like to take a turn. “Useful” is still dripping with sarcasm.

 

I wait for many other people to try before finally picking up the massive mochi stick. My arms are twigs compared to my more muscular running legs, so with every downward lunge, I bend my knees, and with every pulling motion up, I stand up straight again. Ah-Liang laughs hysterically and says, “I’ve seen many people try to make mochi before, but I’ve never seen anyone use a squatting method!”

 

In Mandarin, to describe how that comment makes me feel, the correct phrase would be to say that “my face fell off.”

 

After all the men, women and children have all had a turn, Ah-Liang, in his dead-pan way, says “Wow, you were all pretty terrible at making mochi. That’s okay though, my friend and I were actually done making it before we even let you try.” God, I love this man, I think as I take a bite of the chewy, sweet mochi that I did not help to make at all.

I am not very useful. Photo Credit: K.H.

It doesn't look appetizing, but it is delicious. Photo Credit: K.H.

* * *

 

We have other activities after lunch as well, such as planting a tree, which might be in acknowledgement of all of the trees that the Japanese “invited” the Bu Nong people to cut down. Later, Ah-Liang teaches us how to sing “Eight Part Harmony,” a famous Bu Nong technique that is often performed in front of large crowds in Taipei City and internationally.

 

Finally, it is time to “share our hearts.” 

He asks, "What did you think of everything that we experienced today?"

 

At first, there is silence.

 

A little girl pipes up. “I just want to say that rice wine is delicious!”

 

Silence again.

 

A woman speaks next, saying something about environmental protection, but it sounds large and not very specific to Luan Shan.

 

Silence again.

 

Ah-Liang coughs. “Actually, I’d really like to hear a foreigner’s perspective.”

 

I cannot refuse. A little nervous to be publicly speaking in Mandarin, I say something like, “It’s difficult in Taiwan to find such a naturally beautiful place, and we must work together to preserve this place for the next generation.”

 

It's okay, but all I think about for the rest of the day and that night was what I should have said, or could have said, if I had more time to think.

Now I know. Here is what I wish I could have said to Ah-Liang, and to everyone else there that day:

 

I am from the northeast of America. My homeland is also a land that was sacred to indigenous peoples. But, long ago, they were also “invited” to move away, to faraway lands, and today, I have never even seen an indigenous person in my home state of New Hampshire. To learn about what their lives were like, you must go to a real museum, where the things they left behind are on display. I am so happy that here, at Luan Shan, there is no real museum. Instead, you are here. The forest museum is here, where the Bu Nong Tribe still lives, and passes on their culture. My country failed our indigenous peoples, but in Taiwan, the indigenous have hope.

 

But I cannot say that. My opportunity has passed. I hope Ah-Liang can forgive me.

 

* * *

 

In the end, Ah-Liang says, “Why do we have this tour? Part of it is to share our story with you. But part of it is also to give our next generation an opportunity to stay and work here. I may look old, but I am only twenty-four, and my first child was only just born recently. I need to be here, to help my tribe, so that our culture will never die out. And to everyone, I say ‘Wu Ni Nang!’”

 

A chorus replies, “Wu Ni Nang!”

 

“Do you still remember what ‘Wu Ni Nang’ means in the Bu Nong language?”

 

We all eagerly reply, “It means ‘thank you!’”

 

A sly smile crosses his face.

 

“Exactly! Well, I already said ‘thank you,’ so why are you all still here?”

Wu Ni Nang, Ah-Liang. Photo Credit: K.H.