Sunrise at Alishan
by Tseng Hao-yu · Oct 2026
My dad has always loved Alishan. He has been there five times, and he has told me about its sunrise at least a hundred times. Last winter, he took me with him at last. To be honest, I wasn't excited. A long trip into the mountains just to watch the sun come up? I could watch it on my phone.
We stayed at a small hotel which was run by an old couple. At 3:30 in the morning, my dad woke me up. It was freezing outside, and I complained the whole way to the train station. The little red train, which has carried visitors up the mountain for more than a hundred years, was full of sleepy people in thick coats. No one talked much.
When we got to the top, it was still dark. Hundreds of people were standing in the cold, and all of them were looking east. We waited for almost an hour. My feet hurt and my nose was running. I already felt .
Then the sky began to change. First it turned dark blue, then purple, then orange. Below us, a sea of clouds covered the valleys, and the mountain tops looked like islands. When the sun appeared at last, the whole crowd fell into . A few seconds later, people cheered. I forgot about my cold feet. It was the most that I have ever seen.
On the way down, my dad didn't say "I told you so." He just smiled. Some things can't really be with a phone. You have to stand there in the cold and see them with your own eyes.