“Sorry, but I just work here, I don’t live here,” said a salesperson as I made my way to a shop in a tiny mountain town in Taiwan in late June.
It’s a common refrain in Jiufen, just an hour’s drive from the Taiwanese capital of Taipei.
I looked intently at my Google Maps app before stepping into a small opening between two shops. It led me down a flight of stairs and snaked past several homes before hitting a narrow street.
I found my interview location quickly, mostly because Jiufen is so small that it’s hard to get really lost.
It’s also precisely because Jiufen is so small that the millions of tourists — primarily daytrippers — making their way through its tiny alleyways each year overwhelm the 1,600 residents living here. In 2023, the tourist zone where Jiufen is located welcomed nearly 4 million visitors.
Most would be headed for Jiufen, a historic gold-mining town known for its striking likeness to …