Saved by his underpants 
2003 Reader Submission
Pending Acceptance
Saved by his underpants (for Hon. Mention section)_
Taiwan has numerous high mountains, hundreds over 3000m in fact. These are often treacherous, with vertical cliffs hundreds of meters high in some place. Mountains everywhere, can be very unforgiving of the foolish or unwary. Some people pay for their folly with the ultimate price, some people are just extremely lucky.
A few years ago a young Swiss tourist arrived in Taiwan for a short hiking trip.
He was recorded as entering at customs but no one was aware of what he was doing after that because he was alone and he told no one at home or in Taiwan what his plans were.
What he did was travel directly from the airport to Hualian on the east coast, near the famed Taroko Gorge. Taiwan high mountains are traversed by ancient trails carved out by aborigine or later by early settlers. In places places like Taroko, with its sheer cliffs falling into the river valley below, this was the only the people could move around before the cross-island highway was carved out in the late 1950s.
Anyway, back to our Swiss friend. He had acquired a map in Switzerland of some of these old trials and had decided to walk one. But by not telling anyone where he was going he disobeyed a basic role of outdoors activity¡Xif he got into trouble no one would know.
Coming from Switzerland he was probably an experienced climber or hill walker and thought that he had nothing to worry about in Taiwan¡Xwrong, very wrong.
A week after he arrived a party of workers was repairing the cross-island highway. One of the workers noticed something fluttering high up on the cliff face a few kilometers away. He could have ignored it, but he went to his supervisor to borrowed a pair of binoculars (so the Swiss guy was lucky that he had good eyesight, was curious and there were binoculars available). Through these he looked in the direction of the distant fluttering object.
Much to his surprise he saw a foreign man right up there on the sheer cliff, obviously stuck. The fluttering object that had first attracted his attention was the man¡¦s white underpants, which he had torn open and spread out on the rock, with SOS written on them.
The authorities were informed and the young Swiss man was rescued.
The trail that the guy was attempting used to exist but has since become unpassable. It involves dangerous traverse of the sheer cliff face over a thousand meters above the valley floor. He had taken the ancient trail and had got into a situation where he could not go on or retreat. He couldn¡¦t climb back up and below him was a precipice falling hundreds of metres. The road was too far away for him to be heard or seen by passersby and in any case it is not heavily used. death. All he could do was wait and hope.
During the time he was stuck there no one knew where he was. After a few weeks without hearing from him his relatives might have reported him missing. There would be his entry record at the aiport and perhaps he could be traced to a hotel in Hualian. But then there would be no trace of him...... He would have died, starving most likly or fall trying a desperate last escape attempt when he was weak and confused. It is very unlikely that anyone would ever have found his remains. Very few people use these old trails any more, especially the ones which have over the years, because of the toll taken by the weather and earthquakes, become too dangerous.
He had been there for seven days and nights. Apart from the snacks he had taken with him when he set out which he had quickly used up he hadn¡¦t eaten. He was lucky that the week he was stuck was warm, otherwise he would have certainly died of exposure and that he was able to suck water dripping down the rock.
Every day he could see the odd vehicle pass along the cross-island highway far below and beyond. There was no way that people could hear his calls even if they stopped. At night he was alone on the cliff in total darkness. For most of the night hours no lights passed below as traffic because most of the traffic on the highway stops at night. Even when he saw the work party repairing the road below, they were too far away to hear him and he, one man in the middle of a massive cliff face, was invisible to the naked eye.
So, his escape was lucky indeed. He really should have died. He was saved by the curiosity of the workman. This was a complete fluke¡Xthat the workmen¡¦s eye should be caught by something fluttering far away on the cliff face, and that he should take a step further and try to find out it was by looking through a pair of binoculars. People in Taiwan tend to be quite lacking in curiosity and often in things that are happening around them. The Swiss man was so fortunate that this workman was very aware.
He was very lucky that the place where he became stranded was in view of the road, otherwise he would have had no chance.
Apart from being a bit dehydrated, sunburned and tired he was physically all right. After all his troubles, he was also fined for entering a restricted area without a permit. He looked tired and rather sheepish when his picture was in the paper.
After a few days recuperation he went back to Switzerland.
Submitted on 10/25/2003
Submitted by:
Kev Lax
Reference:
main Taiwan media, about 1996
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