Letter from China 6: Kashgar

Now this one's going to be a puzzle. I'm out of my depth here - we aren't in Han China any more and it shows. The majority of people here are Uighurs (more Turkic than Chinese, in feature,culture and language), and a lot of people have worse Chinese than mine. (an interesting but pleasing side-effect of my teaching job is that I find myself a lot better equipped to understand halting, ungramatical, tone-free Chinese than the Chinese tourists do - a useful skill here...)

So this isn't going to be a particularly informed entry. I'm fascinated by the culture here, but as I don't understand the non-Han majority and speak no Uighur at all, the most I can do is talk about the things I've seen.

It's also desperately, swelteringly hot. Not quite as bad as Turfan, but I've been out in it a heck of a lot more. (though to be scrupulously fair about this, it's a lot cooler in the shade - in south China it's just unescapably muggy everywhere - and dry heat means you feel less sweaty.) If any of you were wondering why I'm using my Snitch icon instead of the usual owl, the reason is that the thought of being covered in feathers in this heat makes me cringe.

( The trains! The trains! )

But that's not what I came to talk to you about.

( Kashgar )