Turpan (Tǔlǔfān) is considered as China’s Death Valley. At 154m below sea level, it’s the second-lowest depression in the world and the hottest spot in China. In July and August (exactly when I am here) the temperatures soar well above 40°C, forcing the locals and the crazy visiting tourists like me into a state of almost permanent heat shock. I actually almost did not want to leave my air-conditioned room in the very nice Silk Road Lodges, which are situated a bit outside town, but surrounded by beautiful vineyards, where - as I was told - I could pick grapes for free as much as I wanted. The building is quite new, but follows the local traditional architecture (photos). Despite the heat, the ground water and fertile soil of the Turpan depression has made this a veritable oasis in the desert, evidenced by the nearby centuries-old remains of ancient cities, imperial garrisons and Buddhist caves.
I did not do much the first day, except a small walk around the vineyards, picking some grapes and admiring the grape-drying-halls that were all over. In the evening, I went into town to a fancy traditional Uighur restaurant, on the shore of a small lake, recommended by the very nice manager of the hotel. The food was very nice. When I came out of the restaurant, I heard loud music and it turned out that in the little park around the lake, took place the Turpan Singing and Dancing Competition, which - of course - I needed to watch. It was something like "Britain has got talent" or "Deutschland sucht den Superstar" but for kids / teenagers. Lots of little boys and girls were singing and dancing and playing the drums (see some bit so sharp iPhone photos below). Sometimes quite good, sometimes just funny! I really enjoyed the atmosphere... In the end, we even had the privilege to see two members of the jury perform, it seems quite (at least locally) famous singers (photos).
As agreed during our lunch after the train ride from Kuche, the next day I went on an excursion with my new Chinese friends Wu Rui bin and Liu Feng mei, a couple travelling for two weeks (photo). I walked up to them at the Turpan train station (which is almost an hour away from town) to ask for help to get to the bus station. I had written the signs down on a sheet of paper, but fortunately, they both spoke a bit of English and offered to go together. The bus station was a 5 minute walk and really well-hidden... From the front, it looked like an office-building. On my own, I would never have found it... During lunch, we discussed a bit and I explained, with a very skilful little drawing, what I actually do for work... It was really ridiculous, but they finally understood. It is really difficult to explain what I am doing to someone who almost does not speak English. ;-) Wu Rui bin is a banker and Liu Feng mei a trained lawyer working for the government (she did not really explain what she was doing though...). They were quite funny and we had a great time together.
The including a number of sights in the area, notably the ancient city of Jiaohe,which was established by the Chinese as a garrison town during the Han dynasty. It’s one of the world’s largest (6500 residents lived here), oldest (1600 years old) and best-preserved ancient cities, impressive in its scale rather than in its details, where you can still see the remains of a large monastery and a 10m-tall pagoda surrounded by 100 smaller pagoda bases. Next station was the Bezeklik cave-complex (Bezeklik meaning ‘Place of Paintings’ in Uighur), which has a fine location (closer to the flaming mountains) and interesting history, though the caves are essentially empty. The site is famous for having many of its distinctive murals cut out of the rock face by German (!!!) archaeologists in 1905. Some few still remain, but they are not very impressive (and photos were prohibited). The "Flaming" Mountains, the midday appearance of which is compared to multicoloured tongues of fire, were immortalised in the Chinese classic "Journey to the West", when the Monkey King used his magic fan to extinguish the blaze. We then went to the "grape valley", another one of these super Chinese tourist "attractions", which charged a very unreasonable entry fee just to see grapes, which I have already seen around my hotel anyway. So my friends and myself decided to skip that and just to hangs out in the restaurant. We admired the various kinds of dried grapes and my friends bought 2 kilos (!!) as souvenir... Finally, we visited a very kitsch (as entirely newly built) museum dedicated to the uniquely Central Asian–style system of underground aqueducts called "karez" (very similar to what we had seen in Iran), but at least it was nice and cool down there and they had some nice stands selling all kind of Chairman Mao souvenirs (photos). The Emin-Minaret, a very nice Afghan-style structure built by Emin Hoja, a Turpan general, in 1777 was finally not included in the tour, but as it was not far from my hotel I convinced the driver to drop me off there.
The last day, when I again had a night train, I negotiated a late check-out and actually stayed in my room, as it was so hot that I really did not feel like doing anything... At least, I managed to sort out some photos and write up some of my blog, but also tried to catch up on world / EU news...
Photos at: https://www.icloud.com/photostream/#A6GdIshaZVCL
I did not do much the first day, except a small walk around the vineyards, picking some grapes and admiring the grape-drying-halls that were all over. In the evening, I went into town to a fancy traditional Uighur restaurant, on the shore of a small lake, recommended by the very nice manager of the hotel. The food was very nice. When I came out of the restaurant, I heard loud music and it turned out that in the little park around the lake, took place the Turpan Singing and Dancing Competition, which - of course - I needed to watch. It was something like "Britain has got talent" or "Deutschland sucht den Superstar" but for kids / teenagers. Lots of little boys and girls were singing and dancing and playing the drums (see some bit so sharp iPhone photos below). Sometimes quite good, sometimes just funny! I really enjoyed the atmosphere... In the end, we even had the privilege to see two members of the jury perform, it seems quite (at least locally) famous singers (photos).
As agreed during our lunch after the train ride from Kuche, the next day I went on an excursion with my new Chinese friends Wu Rui bin and Liu Feng mei, a couple travelling for two weeks (photo). I walked up to them at the Turpan train station (which is almost an hour away from town) to ask for help to get to the bus station. I had written the signs down on a sheet of paper, but fortunately, they both spoke a bit of English and offered to go together. The bus station was a 5 minute walk and really well-hidden... From the front, it looked like an office-building. On my own, I would never have found it... During lunch, we discussed a bit and I explained, with a very skilful little drawing, what I actually do for work... It was really ridiculous, but they finally understood. It is really difficult to explain what I am doing to someone who almost does not speak English. ;-) Wu Rui bin is a banker and Liu Feng mei a trained lawyer working for the government (she did not really explain what she was doing though...). They were quite funny and we had a great time together.
The including a number of sights in the area, notably the ancient city of Jiaohe,which was established by the Chinese as a garrison town during the Han dynasty. It’s one of the world’s largest (6500 residents lived here), oldest (1600 years old) and best-preserved ancient cities, impressive in its scale rather than in its details, where you can still see the remains of a large monastery and a 10m-tall pagoda surrounded by 100 smaller pagoda bases. Next station was the Bezeklik cave-complex (Bezeklik meaning ‘Place of Paintings’ in Uighur), which has a fine location (closer to the flaming mountains) and interesting history, though the caves are essentially empty. The site is famous for having many of its distinctive murals cut out of the rock face by German (!!!) archaeologists in 1905. Some few still remain, but they are not very impressive (and photos were prohibited). The "Flaming" Mountains, the midday appearance of which is compared to multicoloured tongues of fire, were immortalised in the Chinese classic "Journey to the West", when the Monkey King used his magic fan to extinguish the blaze. We then went to the "grape valley", another one of these super Chinese tourist "attractions", which charged a very unreasonable entry fee just to see grapes, which I have already seen around my hotel anyway. So my friends and myself decided to skip that and just to hangs out in the restaurant. We admired the various kinds of dried grapes and my friends bought 2 kilos (!!) as souvenir... Finally, we visited a very kitsch (as entirely newly built) museum dedicated to the uniquely Central Asian–style system of underground aqueducts called "karez" (very similar to what we had seen in Iran), but at least it was nice and cool down there and they had some nice stands selling all kind of Chairman Mao souvenirs (photos). The Emin-Minaret, a very nice Afghan-style structure built by Emin Hoja, a Turpan general, in 1777 was finally not included in the tour, but as it was not far from my hotel I convinced the driver to drop me off there.
The last day, when I again had a night train, I negotiated a late check-out and actually stayed in my room, as it was so hot that I really did not feel like doing anything... At least, I managed to sort out some photos and write up some of my blog, but also tried to catch up on world / EU news...
Photos at: https://www.icloud.com/photostream/#A6GdIshaZVCL
No comments:
Post a Comment