My company holds annual meetings of all its customers; globally, but with a special meeting for our customers in China. China can be a bit of a world onto itself, so their needs and concerns are significantly different than our other customers'. This year's meeting took place this week in Urumqi (oo-roo-moo-chee), in the extreme north-western Xinjiang province. This is my fourth city in China (after Beijing, Shanghai and Kunming) over the last three years, and by far the most unique one I've seen so far.
Instead of Chinese temples, the skyline is littered with the minarets of the Islamic mosques that fill the city. A city of contrasts (with endless rows of decaying post-revolutionary brick barracks next to ultra-modern new buildings and shopping centres), Urumqi has reminders everywhere of its role as a pivotal point in the "silk road". Unlike Beijing, where road signs are in Mandarin and English, here they're mostly in Mandarin and Arabic. 70% of the current population is of Han (eastern Chinese) origin. The 30% of the native population that remains (after massive troop migration by the Beijing government radically Han-ified the population) wears middle-eastern skull caps, is Muslim, speaks Arabic and continues to practice their traditional culture. So the area is a bizarre mix of slightly chilled-out Beijing culture and culture you would expect to find in any Kasbah in Marrakech, Cairo or Beirut. And you see both faces you would expect to see in Beijing as well as other faces you could easily come across in Iran, Marocco or Spain. The local music and dancing has a lot in common with other Arabic cultures as well (including women belly-dancing with snakes).
After completing our business, we took off in two tour buses into the mountains surrounding the city for an all-day trek through the desert. Once we left the city with its prolific sprinkler systems (a la Phoenix), it was clear that we were actually in the middle of an extraordinarily arid region. We then entered the Turfan Depression or Turpan Pendi, and that all changed. It is the lowest point in China-at its deepest it measures 154 m (505 ft) below sea level-and is the second-lowest place on Earth after the Dead Sea. It is part of an enclosed oasis, the main town of which is Turfan. The fertile land is farmed intensively; crops include cotton, silk, wheat, nuts, melons, and grapes-the region's wine is famous in China. The basin is irrigated both by natural springs and a series of ingenious man-made, underground tunnels that channel groundwater down from the mountains, and is filled with vineyards. Despite the mere 1 inch of rain they get per year, they are famous for their fruit production. The hills are filled with clay brick structures that are used only the dry grapes and turn them into raisins. The local markets are full of dozens of kinds of raisins, beautifully spread out across large tables (with free tasting!). I picked up 1 ½ kilo for about €4 (probably got robbed, but who cares). Our local customer presented us and our other customers with large boxes of grapes, apples and melons as a gift (which I unfortunately had to donate to hotel staff). To summarize, it's amazing that these people have successfully carved out a lifestyle for themselves under extreme conditions (besides the sparse rainfall, the temperature in the region varies between 5c and 40c from season to season). Yet another example of the triumph of the human spirit.
After tasting every kind of raisin in existence and stopping for a rest (sitting without shoes on raised carpeted platforms around a table), we then visited the historic 2000-year old ruins of the Uygur city Gaochang that included a 20-minute long bumpy donkey-cart ride to get there. This was one of the earliest meeting points for Islam, Christianity and Buddhism at one point and also combines elements of Indian and Persian cultures, as it was a stop on the Silk Route across Asia. It was a sprawling walled complex built of mud and straw bricks in the middle of the desert, and was quite impressive. The donkey jockey kept alternating his encouragement between the Chinese "Chu-a, Chua-a!" and the Ricky Martin lyrics "Go go go, aller aller aller!" from the 2002 World Cup theme song. Thank God there were a few shoe-shine boys working at the departure point so I could get the thick layer of fine dust off my black leather shoes. Price: 20 cents.
After a 12-hour day on the bus (where the narration was all in Chinese and the Sales V.P. and I sat in the back of the bus and slept most of the ride), we came back to town for a dinner show at the Urumqi World Bazaar. This appears to be a hugely popular phenomenon in every region of China, and allows Chinese tourists to feel like they "know" the minority culture of a region by virtue of having seen a singing and dancing characterization of it on stage over a regional meal. But it's a very "Hollywood" version of a much more complex reality. And of course downstairs there were the requisite shopping opportunities, where they essentially sell the same tourist crap available all over China. I did manage to find a few marble vases to add to my collection (bringing the total this trip to 10!).
So another beautiful and unique region added to my list of travel destinations. Now I've got to get back to finishing my Turfan grapes before heading back to Beijing this afternoon, and home on Sunday. By the way, there's a nasty travel irony here. I am half-way home from Beijing already, but I first have to fly 3 ½ hours to the east before I can fly back to Europe because there are no direct flights from here to anywhere outside China.
Portions taken from Microsoft ® Encarta ® Encyclopedia 2004. © 1993-2003 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.
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