Mountains and Desert

After a long, stinky sleeper bus ride, it was pleasantly nice to take a personal car for the 7 hour drive up through the mountains to Tashkorgan. The drive was beautiful, as the skies were clear and the rocky mountains jutted up alongside the road. We stopped several times during the drive to get pictures of the mountains. Every time we would stop, the air was cooler and cooler. Coming from the desert, it seemed cold, especially since the wind was also blowing. But oh, the snow frosted mountains were worth it.

We only spent a night and day in Tashkorgan, but it was fun. The main population of the town is Tajik – which is a Turkish people group. Many have lighter brown hair and I saw some with green or blue eyes. They have their own language, but it is unwritten, so they also know Uyghur and/or Mandarin to communicate with others. Thankfully, I did not have to greet any ladies in the culturally acceptable way, since they kiss on the lips when they greet each other. That could have been…. Uh interesting?

in the Pamir Mountains

On the outskirts of town is an old stone fortress, built about 1300 years ago during the Tang Dynasty. It was fun exploring the ruins with Tim & Cara. Especially when we discovered an long -lost mummy. Just kidding. But we had fun pretending and those who were also visiting the site got a kick out of it. We even got asked for our picture. (which happened several times during the trip)

After driving back to Kashgar and spending one more night there, we set off on another  bus to our last stop, Hotan. Located in the desert area, Hotan was much warmer than the other places we visited. Actually it was quite hot there, but the people who live there looked like they wore the same amount of clothing as those who live in the cold mountain regions.

Many interesting things happened and many unique places visited during our short stay in the south desert. One of my favorites was the Carpet Factory. We watched as many ladies sat and handmade beautiful, intricate carpets by hand! Some were as small as one meter square and others stretched about 10 meters in length. The larger ones have as many as six women working on them at a time. All is done by hand: the different color silk threads are knotted into a pattern, cut roughly so they can do the next thread, after a few rows have been weaved, they use large shears to cut the threads to be one length. Several of the ladies have been weaving carpets for 15 years or more. Because they use silk as the threads, the carpets are very soft and smooth to the touch. And yes, I did buy a small one.

We also went to the Atlas Factory to see how their strangely unique material is made from start of finish. They begin with silkworms, which they boil so to loosen the silk threads of their cocoons, then the rough threads are spun into bundles, after it is refined a little, they die their random, rainbowish patterns in huge vats. After the threads are dyed, they are hooked up to a loom manned by a single person. And then there it is – the vibrant, chaotic fabric.

Another stop in Hotan was an ancient Muslim mosque in the Taklimakan Desert. The people there are Islamic, but they have mixed that faith with older folk beliefs. So their religion is lax form of Islam with much superstition. The path leading to this old mosque was strewn with burial plots of fallen warriors from an archaic battle and though Islam teaches not to worship any but Allah, many stop to pray to these dead heroes. Most are not avid follows of Islam; to them being Uyghur is to be Muslim, even if all that means is that they don’t eat pork.

We also visited a Jade Market – which was an experience. All’s well that ends well, but the way to the end can sometimes be unforgettable. Not understanding the language did not hinder me from seeing a near riot begin. For a time, it got quite heated. Thankfully most of those involved were on our side of the argument and we were able to leave with anybody getting hurt. It was kinda cool to see 40+ Uyghur men campaign for us, even to the point of pulling money out of their own pocket to pacify the crazy shopkeeper.

Yep, another unusual day in my life.