Public Zone 公開區 > Travelogues 遊記相薄
Silk Road, China 絲綢之路 (18 Apr - 3 May 2003)
chin:
Riding camel the first time, right outside the wester gate of Jia Yu Guang.
chin:
From Jia Yu Guang we took a whole day overland drive to Dun Huang. On the way we had our first taste of the vast desert land of wester China. Along the road we could still see the destruction caused by the sand storm of the previous day.
The next morning, we decided to take a 2-hour camel ride in the desert to the Mogao Grottos.
The desert is not entirely deserted. We saw large patch of burial ground (1st picture) where people draw boundary of the plot for the tombs. Those willing to spend the money or efforts actually built short walls around the plot.
For us city people, camel ride was fun for the first 30-minute. Then it started to get boring....
chin:
One of the most famous grottos in China. No pictures allowed inside.
Unfortunately I had not read enough background information to digest the rich histories and stories.
From what I understand, lots of the mural paintings was commissioned by rich families or regional officials. We spent hours there listening to facinating stories of the grottos.
Lots of the paintings and scrolls were taken away by adventurers in the early 1900s, and I hope they have enough fund to preserve whatever remains there.
chin:
On 23 April, we took an over night train from Dun Huang to Turpan. As our local guide took us to the train station, we can see that he was busy and bit nervous. Instead of settling us down at the VIP waiting room, which we were entitled to since we booked soft-sleeper private rooms, he was running around whispering to people. He never give us our tickets even as we board the train.
Something fishy was going on.
Once we settled on the train - which was practically empty in the soft-sleeper section, we started to theorize what happened. Our conclusion was that the Dun Huang guide knew the train was empty in the soft-sleeper, so he paid the rail company low price hard-seats, then bribe train officers to give us the soft-sleepers that we paid for. That's why we never saw the tickets, couldn't get into the VIP waiting room, and his nervousness at the station.
Once the train set in motion, we visited the regular hard-seat section out of curiosity. It was very crowed, smelly, and kind of having a mini party going on with the staff and passengers. The staff were very laid back and boisterously friendly, almost to the point of clowning around.
When we came back to our "luxurious" section, we got another surprise. As soon as the girl in charge of our section learnt that we came from Hong Kong, she jumped 10 feet away, then maxed out the AC in our section to provide "better" ventilations.
First order of the day was to visit the Jiao He ruins. Jiao He means "meeting of rivers" in Chinese. The name described the tableland between two rivers where the former fortress town was built on.
The first picture of the street of Jiao He, and the second picture shows the river bed where the river is largely gone.
chin:
On the edge of the Jiao He town is the remains of a large Buddhist temple. The temple was destroyed when the area is converted to Muslim. The headless Buddha was the only statue remaining in the temple ground.
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