Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region

Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region
شىنجاڭ ئۇيغۇر ئاپتونوم رايونى
新疆维吾尔自治区

In the Northwest of China is a province largely populated by ethnically Muslim minorities, who are culturally more Central Asian than they are Chinese. This region is Xinjiang, 新疆, which translates literally to “new frontier”, and borders no less than eight different countries: Mongolia, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India.

Check out those borders!

Xinjiang is approximately one sixth of China’s total area

The first inhabitants of Xinjiang were Muslims of Central Asian origin, as well as descendants of traders from Arabia and Persia, because of the Silk Road passing through Xinjiang. These people are the Uyghurs, and have been a majority in Xinjiang for much of China’s history, though there are also Tajik, Kyrgyz and Kazakh groups, among others. Throughout the dynasties, the Han Chinese and the Muslims of Xinjiang, previously referred to as East Turkestan (because at one point they succeeded in forming an independent state, although it didn’t last very long) lived in relative peace. This was until the Qing Dynasty, the final dynasty and most brutal one for the Muslims.

Flag of the First East Turkestan Republic – a short-lived attempt at independence of the lands around Kashgar

Map of the Silk Road entering China through Xinjiang in the West

With the founding of the Republic of China in 1912, the Communists made promises to the people of Xinjiang, that they would help them form an autonomous Muslim state. However, promises such as “self-determination for the different racial and cultural groups” were largely just attempts at pacifying all the various minority groups in China, including Tibetans, Outer Mongolians, as well as the Muslims of Xinjiang.

Under the People’s Republic of China (PRC, 1949~), the government have been resettling many Han Chinese people in Xinjiang. It is worth mentioning here that Xinjiang has vast mineral deposits and more recently discovered oil reserves. The government claims their policies towards Xinjiang are grounded on bringing economic development, and not demographic change. However, with each influx of Han Chinese into Xinjiang, the native Uyghurs become more resentful, with increasing limits on resources such as water. Moreover, they believe the government is attempting to destroy their long-standing cultural history. I can see where they’re coming from; there are plans to destroy the oldest part of the ancient city of Kasghar, the reason given for this is protection against earthquakes. Somewhat transparent, if you ask me. How has the city survived so long upto now? Their building materials and methods have evolved to protect against earthquakes in a zone prone to them.

Anyway, although Xinjiang gained autonomy in 1955 (kinda similar to devolution in the UK), it’s been a region of tension in recent years. While the tension between the natives and the Han people rises, the government continue to make life harder for them through repressing religious expression by, for example, denying them the right to observe Ramadhan (month of fasting for Muslims).
Not surprising then, is it, that the resentment towards the government only increases? These issues have sparked riots across Xinjiang: in Urumqi, the capital city, as well as in Kashgar, a city in the south of the region, close to the border with Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. In 1940, Xinjiang’s population was comprised of only 6% Han, with 80% of the population being Uyghur. In 2012, the Han made up 50% of Xinjiang’s population. Urumqi specifically is now only 13% Uyghur, with 75% of Urumqi’s current population Han. Unlike much of Xinjiang, the population of Urumqi is predominantly Han Chinese.

As mentioned in a previous post, my travels for June included going to Kashgar. With riots in Kashgar being as recent as April of this year, my travel partner was thoroughly put off going when a teacher apparently very animatedly told her that going to Kashgar was a very bad idea, because, and I quote said teacher, “although I’d say it’s 95% going to be completely fine, just in case there is some altercation, I think it could be big”. Well, yeah. I think that applies anywhere. But that’s besides the point. Although Kashgar would have been an amazing trip, an experience of a lifetime, literally going out into the middle of a desert, living in a still largely medieval city, totally cut off from today’s modern lifestyle, there is just as much to see in the northern part of the province, and the provincial capital: Urumqi. And, well, the bottom line: better safe than sorry, right?

For this reason, we changed our tickets and are now flying to Urumqi…. but not flying back! The plan is to get the train from there to Turpan, and then to Hami. And then from Hami, possibly to Zhangye to see those awesome colourful mountains, depending on time constraints, or straight back to Beijing. That train journey will be about 24hours. It’s going to be hell absolutely awesome. What an experience.

Map of Xinjiang showing the locations of Kashgar, Urumqi, Turpan and Hami

I’ve already mentioned what we’ll miss out on in Kashgar, but to be honest, there’s so many places I still want to see in China, and I would have been happy going anywhere. The trip to Urumqi+ is going to be just as good, if not better, and here are a few reasons why:

1. As mentioned, while Kashgar’s population is still almost completely Uyghur, Urumqi’s population is now predominantly Han, meaning that we will be able to get around speaking Mandarin
2. It’s still in Xinjiang! So we still do get to see a totally different side to China, what with the culture of the native Uyghurs and all (I hope the traditional culture does still show through…!), while still having some familiarity in terms of language and Chinese culture (isn’t this ironic… I’m referring to Chinese culture as familiar?? Even more so, considering my own background, given that Xinjiang is a MUSLIM area?! Hehehe..)
3. While my previous plan was to fly from Beijing into Kashgar, and from Kashgar straight back to Beijing, meaning that I wouldn’t get to see much of the rest of Xinjiang (it’s huge, almost the same in size to Iran), this way means that our travel plans are much more flexible, allowing me to see more of Xinjiang, given the limited time I have.

Before I end this, there’s one interesting thing I read about while researching for this trip (researching aka avoiding writing my project. Writing this post is another avoidance tactic…)
Although the whole of China geographically spans four time zones, with Xinjiang itself spanning two zones, the official line is that Xinjiang is on the same time zone as the rest of China (GMT+8). There used to be five time zones within China, but in 1949 the Communist Party, in an attempt to make the country appear more unified, standardised the time across the country.

The five time zones of China, now all one. Sinkiang was the old romanized spelling for what is now Xinjiang

For reasons of practicality, a lot of residents follow an unofficial Xinjiang time (GMT+6), but some see this as a way of expressing their resistance against the central government, especially because the division tends to follow ethnic lines: Han vs. Uyghur. I don’t blame them, though! The agricultural working lifestyle that is prevalent in the far western provinces of Xinjiang for example (3.5hours behind Beijing), has to be done while the sun is out, regardless of what numerical time it is. And can you imagine how long the days are in Summer, with the sun still being out when it’s ‘midnight’? Or sunrise being at 10AM in Winter!

P.S. – I apologise for there being a lot of maps in this post, but I figured that if I were reading this before I came to China, I’d have no idea about all the places, or be able to visualise any of it. Having said that, I’m not assuming that everyone is as ignorant as I was/am, but I hope it helps someone anyway!

P.P.S – All the information in this post is from reliable sources. Reliable meaning not solely Wikipedia. Just kidding… Reliable meaning that I’m using them for this project of mine that I’ve been complaining about. My project is actually regarding the topic of Islam in China, so all I have to do now is replicate the number of words in this post (~1400) in my essay!

Bet you didn’t know that China had such a rich Islamic history, eh?
Or maybe you did, in which case, it was just me… (Again with the ignorance)
Personally, I think it’s fascinating, and I hope somebody out there learns at least one thing from this! 🙂

Get paid for being native English?

I received a phone call yesterday asking if I was interested in getting paid 150RMB for about 40 minutes of reading out English phrases. I accepted.

So at 5pm today, Beth and I (because they asked me to bring another female native English speaker, if I knew any) arrived at the address I was given, and were each led into a small room, equipped with a nice big TV screen and an Xbox Kinect. We only had to read out the English that appeared on the screen, in order for us to be recorded. The ‘phrases’ were more like commands someone might say to activate something, or as a search, for example:

• Open Youtube
• Batman The Dark Knight
• Find Justin Bieber’s new album
• Download Batman games
• Find all movies directed by Steven Spielberg
• Watch Batman trailers
• Find apps like Oxford English Dictionary
• I’d like to hear The One That Got Away
• Batman Arkham City
• Go to Facebook and sign in
• PG-13 only
• Gotham City Impostors
• Show me movies directed by Pedro Almodovar

You get the picture. Batman featured a lot, as did Superman, Spiderman, Modern Warfare 3, Fifa… Boys and their games, eh? There were 3 ‘sessions’ we had to complete, and each session consisted of 135 of the above types of ‘phrases’ that we needed to say aloud to be recorded. Amongst all of these, however, I was suddenly faced with ‘lmfao’. That caught me out. And just as I got back into them again, I was required to say “I’m sexy and I know it”. No comment.

Thankfully, there were no more of those, and there was also no one in the room with me, as we were left to complete the recordings in private. I was reassured afterwards, anyway: “just sign here to say that you understand we might use these recordings, but that we will protect your privacy blah blah blah…”. Yes, he actually ended that sentence by saying ‘blah blah blah’ to me. Oh well. This is China, and anything goes. I accepted the money, signed my name, and then proceeded to watch Beth, through the little bit of glass that allowed me to see into her room, doubled over on her chair laughing as the word ‘ridiculousness’ showed on her screen.

I’d take a job like that though – by simply being a native English speaker, born and raised in the UK, and getting paid for, talking, essentially? I’m sold!

On a totally different note, I now have a Xinjiang travel buddy, as Beth also bought a ticket (albeit one-way), after discovering my plans to go there! We were looking at some basic phrases of the Uyghur language which is spoken there, and which looks almost similar to Turkish, like ‘Yakshimasiz’ (how are you?), and new procrastination is going to be reading up and finding out about Kashgar and the surrounding area.

http://www.gonomad.com/destinations/0508/kashgar.html

Sounds exciting so far!

How cheap is food in China?

If I want more time in the day, does that mean sacrificing my sleep??!
Where does time go when you actually want to use it constructively?
There seems to be so much time available when you’re ‘wasting time’ (not that I do any of that here, of course), but time just totally escapes you when you’re actually aiming to study.

My defence is that Wednesdays are the longest days of the week, in terms of my uni timetable. Classes from 8am to 12 noon, and then again from 3:30 to 5:15pm.  That break in between is extremely annoying. Luckily I only live a 20minute walk away from campus. After getting some lunch with friends, I actually did some work in that time today. But once you start doing the work you should have been doing all year, you realise that there really is a lot of it, and it’s never-ending, and that you need to spend every single moment of your time keeping up, and that this hour you just spent working is only scratching the surface. Wait, why am I even describing that? That’s just standard student life. It’s my own fault I avoided it for so long 🙂

On another note, Nafeesah and I have recently been really trying to figure out and determine (by this, I mean with actual calculations) if cooking at home is more cost-effective than eating out. It may sound obvious, but it’s actually a pretty close call. Today we made….well, I guess I’d call it stir-fried cabbage, in various Chinese-y sauces: soy sauce, garlic chilli bean paste, sesame paste. We’re coming to the conclusion that you probably save a few kuai (20 to 30p) overall per meal, financially speaking, but then we should take time into account too, right?
Spending approximately 2 hours preparing, cooking, eating and then washing up and clearing away vs. 40minutes to walk to the local Halaal place, order and wait for your dish, eat it up (nom nom), and walk back home. (or 10minutes to get there, get a take-away, and walk home again!)
On balance, it comes down to this – minimal monetary savings vs. the opportunity cost of time and better tasting food!

I did get somewhere with regards to the list from yesterday though. I bought tickets to Xinjiang, for after my exams are over in June! I’m feeling that was a little impulsive now, in the sense that I have no idea where I’ll be going or what I’ll be doing there, but that’s something I can think more about as the time gets closer, I suppose. Booking the tickets was the more important, initial step, and I just hope that trip proves to be an exciting final adventure in China!

Something I just read online about Kashgar, the city I’ll be landing in:

The city of Kashgar lies in the Taklamakan Desert, and “Taklamakan”  is said to translate as “go in and you won’t come out,” or the “desert of death.”

Uhhh great, that’s reassuring.
They also don’t speak Mandarin there…