by Eddie Zhan
“Ding! Ding! Ding…” My alarm clock rings as annoyingly as the bells in NTU, which sound like something is on fire. I jump up from my bed and run to the clock, turning it off. “Jesus! It’s 7:30 and I have a class at 8.” Ever since going to college, I can’t fall asleep before 2 o'clock in the morning. The fact is that I want to go to sleep early and have a normal life as I did in high school, but I have roommates. I have to hurry: there is now less than 10 minutes for me to get to NTU through Roosevelt Road, sections 5 and 4. Now my Kymco and I are on the road and we both see something that can only be seen in Africa–“the stampede!” Ther e are countless cars, buses, and motorbikes. As a matter of fact, it’s worse than a stampede. We all know that in Africa a stampede runs,but our doesn’t. Belive it or not, the whole place looks just like a parking lot, except that there’s no charge. Anxious as I am, no kind of transportation on earth can get me through this congestion; by air, maybe, but not China Airlines. At times like this, I usually try to make myself calm down and analyze the situation, since here we have nothing else to do. As we know, Roosevelt is really a long long road. It is not just long, but a main road in Taipei City. In order to simplify and clarify, let’s set Chunghsiao as the x-axis, and Roosevelt as the y-axis. Then you can easily see that roads above our x-axis are named, for example, Chienkuo N. Rd., and those below Chien-kuo S. Rd.. Applying the same method, we also have xx-East-Rd. and xx-West-Rd. on the opposite side of the y-axis. So, if you are at point A (x1, y1) and you want to meet your girlfriend at point B (x2, y2), what would be the shortest and most convenient way? I believe you all have had this math question in high school. However, in real life we have more things to take into consideration. For instance, you may prefer one way because there are fewer buses and fewer, say, police officers. You may like to drive on that road because there is a supermarket where you can intentionally drop by to purchase one or two boxes of ice cream. And people are lazy; if there is some way that goes straight ahead from one place to another, people are likely to go there, for who would like to turn around and around and finally get lost? That is exactly the advantage of Roosevelt Rd. People livingin Hsintien can go by this road toward Shihlin and Tienmou without turning. Take a look at the map; it will show you. In addition, there are also several important places on this line, such as Kungguan, NTU, C.K.S. Memorial, NTU Hospital, etc. People also go to Shihlin Night Market and Yangmingshan by this road. So of course it jams! Nonetheless, that doesn’t provide enough evidence to prove why Roosevelt Rd. becomes a parking lot. Let’s go back to section 4. As mentioned, it is where NTU and Kungguan are, which has made this area crowded enough. Meanwhile the Kungguan area also has reversible lanes (調撥階段). That means if you take a bus from, say, Taipei Station to somewhere in the south, and you do not get off the bus in this reversible lane, then you have to pay double prices. Hence, lots of people get on and off here. Unlike others, Kungguan is a huge bus station. But why are there so many buses? It should be the map’s turn to tell you the answer. We can clearly see that in Taipei there are indeed many rivers and mountains, though they all look ugly and most of them are suffused with garbage and tombs. Anyway, people have to cross the bridges to get to the other side. At section 4, people have to cross to Yungho and Chungho. The river limits the possible ways to these two places, consequently, people have to get on or off different buses at Kungguan to different destinations. Another factor is our great school. It is so great that it takes a great amount of area. As a result, several roads that go from north to south end at NTU, such as Hsinsheng S. Rd., Chienkuo S. Rd., and Fuhsing S. Rd. And to the south of NTU there are boys’ dormitories. Behind them are a few professors’ dormitories, a small village, and a few cemeteries. We do not want to wake up these people, so by no means can we run over them. Someone therefore built a tunnel under them for people to go to Mucha. Other than that, there is only one way to pass the sleepers without knocking on their doors: Roosevelt Rd. Isn’t Roosevelt really something?! “Ding! Ding! Ding!” Again?! Am I not supposed to be on the road, analyzin g the traffic jam? Then, where in the world does the noise come from? Oh no! It’s my alarm clock! That means I’m still in bed. What a nightmare! a
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The Taida Student Journal has been active since 1995 with an ever-changing roster of student journalists at NTU. Click the above link to read about the authors Archives
May 2024
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