Silk Route: Kashgar, Not China

Another rainy day in the courtyard and I'm sharing one of these little cute tables that are placed on raised platforms to have tea and lunch. There are three sweet Norwegian girls but one of the guys with a slight American accent really needed a shower instead of starting his brunch with rolled cigarettes and Bai Jiu. Not quite the best smell you can share at this table.

Not very intelligent statements like "oh, you can get yoghurt in Chengdu?" in that ridiculous tone won't exactly appeal you to the girls, okay? Again, goes to prove that you meet a lot of idiots on the road but for every one of them, you get so many more smart and kind people that look out for you, altitude sickness, chocolate supply and all.

Given today is the last day we'll finish off our China leg (I nearly said, "finish off China") I thought of sharing some of our trip to Taxkorgan. A beautiful day to start with, some stunning unforgettable scenery, top-off with the kind of impending stormy day to end the drive, which I love heaps.

Our road took us through towns cutting past Shufu to Taheman on the Karakorum Highway. Two mountains, Muztagata (7,546m) and Kongur Shan (7,719m) made me quite surprised that I could still marvel at their mountainous beauty despite having seen Everest. It's the same kind of raw display of heights yet different in their subtler forms of tones and awe-inspiring peaks. Maybe the clouds had something to do with it but being one that doesn't believe much in luck, I like to think that it's pure fate that got us there. Something about being at the right place, right time? I think this was it for me. Everything, a swirl of a cloud's tail, the level of rain, melting snow, a peek of sunlight. It was heaven. 

Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Tajikistan are all just over the range. It was mind-blowing. I suspect sometimes I may just never go back and get a house.

It's hard to believe or at least convince your brains that this is still China. We had our first Kyrgyz-men encounter and met a lot of Tajiks en route to the ancient Rock Fortress. The latter is pretty much a pile of rubble perched on top of a magnificent hill. What not with the surrounding mountains and flat land below, the mist in the air gave off a touch of Romanesque ruins to the place. Nobody knew or could share more on the place. Some poor behaving local Chinese "guards" who were not there at the entrance came honking their blasted Datsun-looking reason of a car at us to basically bully us into paying RMB50 each for entering what essentially consisted of free passing ruins. Doing what most common sense bearing travellers do, we walked on. That place probably had seen more important events and served as a military outpost for a while long while ago. Today, some Chinese officials decided it was totally an accepted albeit stupid decision to charge anyone who was interested to see a piece of bygone, unpreserved China.

It may seem as something of an oddity to the Hans on why we wanted to stay longer in the town, walked about to talk to Tajiks and not rush but trekked through muddy plains to visit real yurts, played with calves and baby goats, and enjoyed some tag and hide-and-seek with the Tajik kids. I just hated the way they, such as our driver, kept rushing us to finish off - say hurry? - our lunch and click a few photographs of the fortress and get out of the town? With a sad, resentful shake to his head, both of us, Sayaka-san and our incognito LP reviewer, M.K. headed off into the green plains.

Can you believe it? The actual author of the "author chose to remain anonymous to protect those who had helped him/her in the research for Turkmenistan" on the original copy of the LP on Central Asia was right there in front of us! I got him to autograph a piece of paper so I can stick it on my copy. One of those random things I love about travelling and meeting people. Funnily direct, interestingly smart, and exceptionally interrogative (rightly so for the job) and nice person.

The rivers were rich with an Ali Baba's tomb of jewels. Stones and pebbles of various stunning hues that will shame Tiffany's easily laid out on soggy river beds for all to see. Not being a geologist but playing one, this place is one big warehouse of minerals and artistic plains, weaved from melted snow and dust storms. The "Red Mountains" and "White Sand Peaks" were just another magnificent outlay of Mother Nature in this part of the world.

Our weather took a twisty turn to kick up a ballet of twirling hurricanes from the sand below us. Only moments ago, it was all blue and peaceful. Now the mountains dressed up looking like overwhelming towers of doom. In a strange way, it all looked very much how it should be. I just didn't want to change anything. Okay, maybe I wished our driver (who at this point was pissed off at us because we wanted to stay on the plains a bit longer) would drive a bit more carefully and give us time to shoot but heck, you just go with the flow (no pun) and this place had got to be one of the best places I had ever been with my camera.

The river was by now, running red like angry blood pouring down from the mountains. My hiking boots were soaked from trooper-ing through the rivers. Big pelts of cobalt rain hit our window screen and I left rocky Taxkorgan with a great feeling of Central Asia. This is not China. The Tajik-women were more open and less suspicious than their Uighur counterparts but they all bear a similar kind of solemn regal demeanour that just made these women so captivating. The language is completely detached from the Hans, it's a sad reality that Chinese guidebooks try to print that this part of the world is a "recognised Chinese territory". Beijing and Big Brother show no intellectual curiosity at whichever level in learning from and about and integrating with people of these wonderful heritage since the Silk Route opened up the Eastern-Western trading cultures.