Ape Rifle

Looking out the train window after a rather restless night on my top bunk, I was once again reminded how artificial borders can be (although in China they mean a lot more than in some other places). Sometime in the darkness we had left Xinjiang and crossed over into Gansu, and yet the scenery remained exactly the same: a desolate expanse of rocks and desert.

By the time we were pulling into the train station, I think both Justin and I were reaching the end of our patience with the world of Chinese tourism. It was early July, and I had been away from Hangzhou for nearly a month crossing the country on all manners of trains, planes and buses. The mere idea of braving another mob of taxi touts mentally exhausted me.

Luckily, the arrival in Dunhuang proved to be quite different from our previous experiences. We had reserved two nights in the Dunhuang Silk Road Hotel, a birthday present in absentia from my mother. While she was travelling on the Yangtze she had heard from others that it was the nicest hotel in all of Northwest China and thought we should check it out. Given the fact that it was way out of our price range, a birthday gift was our only ticket to getting in there.

As we exited the station (not actually in Dunhuang, but an hour away), I was amused to see a typical driver-type holding a sign saying “Batrick Bennett”. Figuring the chances of someone on the same train being called Batrick and sharing my last name were slim to none, I went out on a limb and assumed it was supposed to be Patrick. Justin and I soon found ourselves relaxing in a Santana (what else?) and munching on complimentary fruits as the car bumped through the desert towards our destination.

Dunhuang itself was nothing much to see, your rather typical small Chinese city comprised of cookie-cutter white tile designs and countless mobile phone vendors. However, something was missing from the equation: dirt and pollution. Dunhuang was a cheery, sunny town framed by blue sky. Things here just seemed brighter and better kept. Although I’m sure Dunhuang is considered “poor and backward” according to Chinese standards, it is rather amazing how developed a nice environment can make a place feel. The poverty appeared less appalling, as it wasn’t smothered in an industrial haze nor surrounded by fouled waterways. I guess sunlight really does count for something.

As our Santana crossed through the town, we came onto a newly-paved boulevard which led directly into a wall of mountainous sand dunes. The Dunhuang Silk Road Hotel sat towards the end of this road, looking like a desert fortress. It was pretty impressive; things were definitely looking up.

The fortress of solitude

We soon got our reminder that we were dealing with the Chinese tourism industry upon check-in, though. It turns out we had to pay 200RMB for the drive in from the train station, as the driver “didn’t work for the hotel”. There was a bit of confusion on my part as to how, in that case, he managed to get my name considering we never asked for a pickup (nor were we informed it would cost that much). In the end Justin and I paid, frustrated but lacking the will or energy to make a fuss. Never a moment’s respite, I tell you.

But the hotel itself was a great experience. It was built in a traditional Chinese architectural style, its colour scheme and spartan feel blending in perfectly with its remote surroundings. The cavernous halls and numerous courtyards mixed effortlessly with all the modern conveniences of globalized hotel accommodation, including well-designed, comfortable rooms (think rustic Southwest USA with a Chinese twist and a lot of Guangdong satellite channels).

Great design

I found the Dunhuang Silk Road Hotel a good example of how China could successfully fuse its own architectural traditions with its obsession to modernize. This structure was much more impressive and forward-looking than many of the forty-floor monstrosities sprouting up everywhere. Sadly, I think development in China is so mired in corruption, conformity and worship of the fast buck that places like the Silk Road Hotel will remain few and far between. It makes me angry just thinking about how amazing architecture could be in China right now, and how at the moment it is anything but. You really have to wonder what people will think when all the dust settles. China, the world’s biggest suburban office park? Stay tuned.

Anyways, I’m getting a bit off track here (anything involving architecture and urban issues tends to bring out the ranter in me), so back to the town at hand.

Given Dunhuang’s small area and flat surfaces, renting bikes was by far the easiest way to get around. We used them to get to the tourist sights, get to and from the hotel (a few kilometres out of town) and to get hopelessly lost looking for the night market (my fault completely, I’m stubborn when it comes to directions).

Off the main streets, Dunhuang had some wonderful, quiet lanes lined with bright courtyard homes and watched over by a large mosque. The Uygurs were back in Xinjiang, but this was still predominantly Muslim country judging by the number of bearded men in skullcaps. Another fashion note: Dunhuang featured the largest number of old men in Mao suits I had seen in the country. The blue outfits were surprisingly well-pressed and new looking, and the accompanying blue Mao cap was also de rigueur. Wisened old man puffing on a cigarette optional, but preferred.

The calm backroads of Dunhuang

Our first real “destination” in Dunhuang was the desert just down the road from the hotel. No longer the rocky flatness so common in Xinjiang, this area sported massive, rolling sand dunes. And I do mean massive ; I mistook them for mountains at first glance. We reached the entrance gate and dropped a ridiculous 80RMB for admission to, yes, a desert.

Granted, there was some sort of famous crescent moon oasis, but it was a bit ridiculous. There were very easy ways around this steep price (like going a few hundred metres left or right where the fence ends and you can just walk into the desert yourself), but for some reason Justin and I just couldn’t be bothered. Our will to be different, creative or economical was crushed: The Man had won. To wear my shame I purchased a Marlboro cowboy hat, a must-have for any Chinese tour bus jockey. Having just paid 80RMB to avoid walking five minutes out of the way, I was now one of them.

Once “inside”, we started walking towards the sand dunes, opting to skip the little tourist buses that shuttled people a whopping 400m. The sand sledding touts greeted us with the usual round of hellos and incomprehensible shrieks, and after a few minutes we bought a coupon from one of them to the chagrin of his hollering friends.

The ascent up the side of the dune was a bit steeper than I expected.

Notice the guy carrying up the stack of sleds

Thankfully, someone had the great idea of laying down wooden steps. Justin and I made our way to the very top of the dune, past the sand sledding level, and were greeted by a faceful of stunning desert scenery. We just sat up there taking it in, and of course I marvelled at how impossibly photogenic this area was.

The fun, however, was just beginning. With a nice gust, the wind blew off my prized Marlboro cowboy had and sent it tumbling waaaaaay down into the depths between the dune peaks. For some weird reason, I decided that I was not going to give up that hat. It was my prized possession, my link to the Chinese middle-class and its tacky ways, my only way to avoid the desert sun! So off I went, tumbling down in the hot sun to rescue my straw companion.

I reached the bottom, got the hat and promptly realized that what I had just done was pure folly. In the desert, there isn’t much to give one an idea of perspective; the hat didn’t look that far away. But once down between the towering dunes, I turned around to see that Justin was now nothing but a tiny speck back where I had come from. I was going to have to climb back up there…Oops.

Before starting on my way back up, I took a few minutes to enjoy the sheer silence. There were no sounds down there. Nothing. Just sand, brush and blue sky. China, although just over the sand dune, felt a thousand miles away from there. The only signs of civilization were my footprints and the trash that those eco-minded Chinese tourists had obviously tossed off the dunes above.

Pure desert

Climbing up involved a frustrating pattern of one step up/half-a-step sliding down. The sand was up to my knees, and I removed my sand-filled shoes as they became too heavy to bear (I kept my socks on, though, because the sand was scorching hot). In a state of near-heat exhaustion, I made my way back up and found Justin waiting patiently at the top.

On the way down the other side, it was time to try out the sand sledding that we had presumably gone up there to do in the first place. I sat on the wooden sled, trying as best as I could to hold on to my travel bag and camera case. The attendant told me to steer with my hands on the side (I listened to him; we had seen one or two decent wipeouts earlier).

Ready, set…go!!

So down I went. I was treated to a faceful of sand, some speed and then…the bottom. That was it? No rush, no amazing spills? All I had to show for my descent was clothing full of sand. The guy at the bottom asked me if I wanted to go for a second run, but I declined. I guess that, being Canadian, I prefer the snow.

Dunhuang and the desert weren’t quite done with me yet. The next day, Justin and I set out to see the Mogao Grottoes, of Buddhist carvings fame. The man at the bike rental shop told us we could easily do the 20 or so kilometres on two wheels (and I must admit, at the time it didn’t sound too hard).

We set off, and the first 10 kilometres were easy going, a straight ride down a tree-lined road through villages, farmland and gawking teenagers. It was the kind of ride where you could spend more time thinking about the conversation at hand than where you were going. A Sunday stroll.

Of course, that changed abruptly when we hit the turn-off for the grottoes. The trees disappeared and the sun came out of the clouds. There we were, facing a 15km ride through open desert….into the wind. Tour buses blew by us, their occupants visibly surprised to see two foreigners biking this road (or maybe they were just surprised we could actually bike).

I don’t remember much from the ride beyond intense heat, frustration and a lot of swearing. Justin made it pretty far ahead, and I collapsed several times along the way for desperately needed breathers. I had my hat and a huge bottle of water, but little to stop the wind and the blowing sand. I was a wreck but I made it there eventually.

The bike ride from hell

I toured the Mogao Grottoes in a serious state of heat exhaustion delirium, so I couldn’t really tell you how they were. I remember going in and out of countless chambers, and seeing some pretty impressive statues (not to mention a few gigantic ones). I also remember the tour guide (you have to join a tour, they keep the chambers locked) telling some middle-aged men to shut up. People snapped pictures with their phones, while others decided it would be a great opportunity to carry on a lengthy call. The women were dressed like they were expecting to go clubbing, not tour grottoes. It was high school all over again.

If I was feeling better, I’m sure I would have found the grottoes fascinating. But at that point, all I wanted was an ice-cold shower and a bed. And after a surprisingly cheap cab ride back into town, I got just that. The rest of my time in Dunhuang was a heat exhaustion-induced blur.

I have often read on blogs (and other sites) that travelling through China is a great way to meet the common folk and feel the pulse of the nation. Tales of train ride encounters abound; writers tell of interaction and conversation with young students, fascinating old men, kind families and ambitious, forward-looking businessmen.

Every time I got on a train in China, I hoped to meet some of these fascinating people. And yet, my train experiences never lived up to the promise. Instead of meeting some chatty students or a wise old man, I got put with the marathon sleepers (the kind that, in 15 hours, wake up for 10 minutes to noisily slurp down their noodles and then…bang, lights out again). Instead of getting insight into the minds of the modern Chinese middle class, I would get treated to hours of child-like whining from the woman in the bunk below me (her boyfriend doing a valiant job of completely ignoring her).

The train ride from Dunhuang to Lanzhou, my last in China, was no different, and gave me countless hours to enjoy the company of some drunken businessmen. They were crude, noisy and strangely entertaining. One of them used our toilet paper without even a word to us (I guess anything on the table is fair game). They chatted, laughed, slurped noodles and spat constantly.

One particular incident involving one of these men comes to mind. I was waiting dutifully for one of the bathroom stalls to free up at the end of the car. When the first one did I took one glance inside and decided a few more minutes waiting wouldn’t be so bad: the squatter was obviously blocked, filled to the rim with water and god knows what else. Someone had done a serious job on it.

Before I even had a chance to react, though, one of the businessmen scrambled into the stall in front of me and locked the door. After a few minutes, he came back out looking really sheepish, his pants completely soaked with water. He shook his head as if to say: “DON’T go in there”. I didn’t, and tried really, really hard not to burst out laughing.

The next morning, this same businessman set off for the bathrooms and returned to our section a few minutes later once again soaked with water. I guess the first time didn’t teach him.

Our train pulled into Lanzhou to a scramble in the cabin as an attendant came in selling beer. If I was going all the way to Wuhan like a lot of people on the train were, I’d be fighting to buy beer too. Justin and I got off, and the station platform seemed to be strangely perched about ten floors above street level. As we looked for the exit (and went the wrong way), a man made his toddler pee right on the steps of the station convenience store. Charming, welcome to Lanzhou.

We only stayed in Lanzhou for an afternoon and a night, and I don’t remember it having much to distinguish it from countless other cities in the country (apart from the wall of mountains to the north and south). It was a jumble of badly-built highrises, uninspired public places and a KFC or two. We did get a great meal out of it though, western China sure knows how to cook.

Gone were the deserts and blue sky: back was the dirty haze and the offensively-sized billboards and concrete bunker malls. Road traffic was heavy with jostling taxis, Santanas and party official SUVs. There seemed to be a beer garden on every single corner, be it occupied by a store, bank or hospital. Buildings designed by drunk blind men were being erected in a forest of cranes, right beside the abandoned construction projects of the year before. The vacation was over, the exoticism completely gone: I was back in “real” China.

The wonders of modernity

The flight from Lanzhou to Hangzhou was extremely comfortable, with the plane half-full and not a second of turbulence. As we came in for landing, I could see the familiar sprawl of crowded farming villages through the haze. Compared to western China, northern Zhejiang looked like a lush jungle.

The air in Hangzhou was unbelievably humid, a complete system shock. Everything seemed to be dripping, the air thick with moisture as well as chemicals. Our taxi flew onto the freeway towards town, and I took in the scene of density, highway interchanges and swerving Audis. There was not an inch of nature in sight, not a moment’s respite from the row of factories, warehouses and smoke-belching trucks. But I still remembered how excited I felt to be “home”.
A good night out with friends was waiting, and eastern China was jumpin’.

Hello, East Coast!

We arrived in Turpan after an overnight train journey from Kasghar. The trip was rather uneventful and reminiscent of any train ride in Central/Eastern China, differentiated only by the endless hours of rocky nothing passing by (and the occasional industrial complex/labour camp plunked in the middle of nowhere).

Turpan’s train station isn’t actually in the city- in fact, it’s about 50km outside of town. This seemed to be a rather unfortunate trend in that part of the country; trains stations weren’t located anywhere near the urban areas they were supposed to be serving (the experience was similar in Dunhuang).

After arriving in town courtesy of a beaten up old cab, I noticed two things about Turpan immediately: it was HOT and there was absolutely no one on the streets (my amazing intellect later concluded these two were somehow connected). Justin and I dropped off our bags at a hotel and set off in search of food, e-mail and onward train tickets to Gansu.

Turpan was just about the emptiest city I had seen in China. I felt like we had been dropped off in some far-flung outskirts, but our map clearly indicated we were in the centre of town. Given the Chinese propensity to monumental building projects and needlessly wide avenues, the effect was even more pronounced; here we were in a typically over-wide city, only there was no one in the streets. Had the apocalypse hit sometime during the night?

Where is everybody?

Our wandering soon brought us to Turpan’s most attractive draw: a pedestrian street beautifully shaded by overhanging grape trellises. This was lined with small restaurants, street eateries and the ever-present beer gardens. A few people meandered about while a great many more hid in the shade of their shops. I guess we got a little “homesick”, because at this point we decided nothing would be better than a heaping plate of steaming dumplings (sans the spices that had been ravaging my stomach throughout Xinjiang). We settled for a quiet place run by a cheery Han family, and proceeded to order our food and some cold, cold beer. As we sat outside under a parasol, the grandmother fawned over the Little Emperor of the clan, who was well-fed to say the least.

A happy family

It was here that we met two American guys from Colorado (by way of Harbin). They joined us for beers and entertained us thoroughly with tales of life in the Northeast (apparently full of noodle house brawls and sketchy Russians). At some point we were forced inside as a mini-sandstorm swept into town, so we soon relocated to another cafe to make arrangements with a driver for a tour the next day. One of the guys from Colorado (whose name I now forget) made a great show out of the bargaining process to the ire of another patron who jumped in and yelled “You Americans, you think you own the world!!!” Obviously, she was quite unaware of the normal bargaining process in China. Trying not to get ripped off does not equate cultural imperialism in my books.

The next morning I woke up to the realization that I had turned 24 in the searing heat of the Xinjiang desert. My birthday present was day-long tour of the attractions of Turpan in a Nissan Bluebird. But it wasn’t any Bluebird: this well-worn car somehow sported a DVD player, so we got treated to a deluge of Uygur music videos. China never ceases to amaze me.

Our first stop of the day was Ai Ding Hu, a salt lake plunked in the middle of a searing hot moonscape and apparently one of the lowest points on earth. As we drove in over the severely deteriorated access road, we passed the remains of what we were told was a “salt factory”. I read later that this was, in fact, a labour camp at one time, making our jokes about bodies disappearing in the lake a lot less amusing in retrospect. The crumbling buildings were suprisingly still inhabited; a dirty toddler stared silently as our car pulled in, and a shirtless man gave us a friendly wave. Heaps of salty mud dominated the horizon, occasionally topped off by ageing excavation machinery. The whole scene was, needless to say, otherworldly.

With the lake in sight, our driver stopped the car and we continued on foot. We had been told the night before that we could float around in salty delight a la Dead Sea, and so were quite eager to get out to the lake. But a few hundred metres later, our plan was abruptly thwarted.

As we walked across the salt-crusted earth, Justin suddenly sank knee-deep through the surface. One of the guys from Colorado and I were just behind him, and we started laughing as he swore profusely, more perplexed than angry. Of course, seconds later both I and “Colorado 1″ sank knee-deep in too. Colorado 2 somehow remained on the surface and found the whole thing rather hilarious.

What the??

Stuck in a mucky mixture of salt and hot mud, we realized we hadn’t exactly being walking towards the lake- we had been walking on the lake! Apparently the top layer had dried out and crusted to form an amazingly deceptive false surface. Good thing we fell in there and not further out.

Getting our legs out of the muck was somewhat difficult but manageable. However, we must have broken some kind of pressure seal: with almost every footstep back towards shore, my legs went crashing back through the surface. Although we were all laughing hysterically at our unexpected misfortune, the trek back started taking its toll. Each time a leg went through, it got cut and scratched by the sharp crust. Then it got to sit in a nice solution of hot mud and salt. Let’s just say it burned.

About halfway back my sandal got stuck below in the muck, and I had to fish around for it to the great amusement of the others (as a result, I alone also ended up with cuts and scratches on my arms as well). When we arrived back at the car, the driver looked thoroughly unsurprised (as if this happened all the time!). We wiped some of the salty mud off our limbs with tissues, but left the site with salt still drying on our legs. As our wounds burned and the temperature sat in the low 40s (Celcius), I couldn’t help but feel a little hot.

Nissan Bluebird, transportation extraordinaire (post salt lake, hence Justin’s muddy legs)

The driver told us about a mountain stream where we could stop to wash ourselves off. On our way, we stopped to see the Flaming Mountains, which were in fact neither flaming nor mountains. Anyways, we couldn’t see much through the heat haze besides a parched and cracked landscape.

I wonder if it ever rains here

The mountain stream turned out to be not much more than a drainage ditch, complete with floating garbage and people washing their laundry. As I weighed the discomfort of burning salt legs vs. the health hazards of infected wounds, my cell phone rang. It was my parents calling to wish me happy birthday! I told them about the salt lake craziness and chatted away on the phone will washing off my limbs. Oh well, at least the water looked clean. The one bad thing about getting all the mud off was seeing how scratched up my legs really were (I still have a small scar or two).

A pristine mountain stream (or so we were told)

The rest of the day consisted of a lazy 大盘鸡 (Da Pan Ji)lunch at a Uygur restaurant in a tourist trap, a visit to an Afghani-style mosque (very impressive structure surrounded by grapevines and Uygur villages) and an unsuccessful attempt to find the area’s famous underground irrigation system. A fun day, although almost every sight was completely oversold by the tout the previous night;as with anything involving the tourism industry in China, buyer beware.

After washing out my wounds as best as I could in the hotel shower, it was time for the birthday celebration. We returned to the pedestrian street and dug into mounds of 羊肉串, cold beers and good conversation. After a decent amount of drinking, Justin and I set off to find Turpan’s nightlife. A cabbie drove us around asking friends where the hot spots were, trying valiantly to help us out but eventually failing to deliver. After visiting a number of empty bars and staying away from a scary amount of dirty KTV palaces, we ended up in a closed disco drinking with the owner and the band. 4am in Turpan isn’t exactly jumping.

The next day, my mild hangover was greeted by Turpan’s unbelievable heat. This wasn’t just any heat: it was like nothing I had ever experienced before. It felt like we were been cooked in an oven (the debate is on about whether this was preferable to Hangzhou’s disgusting humidity). The air was just HOT, around 45C or so. We did nothing but sit around and sweat, and any trip to the washroom caused heat exhaustion (note: it is not a good idea to build windowless bathrooms out of concrete in this kind of climate). We hid out in an internet bar with A/C for the afternoon, took a donkey cart ride back to our hotel and continued on to the train station by cab for our journey into Gansu.

Turpan as a city was pretty featureless; although it is technically in Xinjiang, after Hotan and Kashgar it felt like we were back in the familiar world of the Han Chinese. Apparently the population is half Uygur, but in appearance, layout and lifestyle the city is an overwhelmingly Han experience.

Despite the intense heat, it was good place to relax, catch a breath and look up at the deep blue sky. It had a quiet spaciousness to it that I really enjoyed. Turpan was another reminder of the sharp contrast between the human crush of Eastern China and the desolate expanse of the country’s vast Western regions.

Afghani-style mosque

And, obviously, the salt lake incident will always be a good story to tell.

Well, it would seem that life has quickly outpaced my ability to write about it (go figure). Here we are in early September, and yet my blog seems stuck somewhere back in the wilds of Northwestern China circa early July. I’m leaving for London in a week and I still haven’t managed to finish my travel journals. Oops.

I guess it is because I’ve been having so much fun playing tourist in my own neck of the woods. I’ve been approaching once familiar and mundane scenes with a completely new and rather sinocized perspective, aka “the sky is so blue!” syndrome. From exploring Old Montreal to canoeing on an isolated lake in pristine Quebec wilderness, I’ve been having a grand old time.

Today I just got back from a weeklong trip that took me through two of my favourite places on earth: New England and New York City. They have both had a significant effect on my life; the former because I spent a month there every summer for sixteen years, the latter because I was so frikkin’ obsessed with it when I was a kid. I hadn’t been down to the States since 1999, so it was great to visit the southern neighbour that is so familiar, yet still so very different. In Canada, a “small” beverage is not larger than a bucket. : )

For those very few dedicated readers wondering where China fits into all this, fear not: I still have travel journals from Turpan and Dunhuang to post here, and they definitely feature some of the more amusing experiences from the whole trip. But as Ape Rifle changes continents once again and moves further away from life in China, I’m not sure which direction this blog will take. I will still follow everything of interest in China-related news, but sadly there will be no more first-hand tales of life in the Middle Kingdom. Perhaps we will have to settle for accounts of mangled Mandarin in the Chinese eateries of London.

So to reflect the gradual move away from China that this blog must make, I’ll take the lazy way out and post some pictures of the places I’ve explored this summer in North America.
Montreal, Ottawa, Rhode Island and New York will all, in good time,get the dedicated posts they deserve. For starters, though, I offer some simple eye candy.

Hotel-de-Ville
Montreal, Quebec

Boulevard Rene-Levesque
Montreal, Quebec

St-Lawrence River
Montreal, Quebec

Parliament Hill
Ottawa, Ontario

Chateau Laurier
Ottawa, Ontario

“Trout Lake”
North of Shawinigan, Quebec

Newport, Rhode Island, USA

7th Avenue
New York, NY

Downtown Canyons
New York, NY

Before I start rambling on about my adventures on this continent, however, I will give my China experience the proper closure it deserves. So, next up and last stops: Turpan, Xinjiang and Dunhuang, Gansu.