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By Hannu Berghäll
Location: Northern Pakistan and China
Date: August 15, 2000
HI GUYS!
So, I left Peshawar, disappointed by the fact that
the Afghan taliban government refused me a visa. A really long bus
ride (26 hours with one change in Rawalpindi) took me to Gilgit,
and once again I was on my way to cooler climates. Met up with some
fellow travellers I'd met before in Pakistan in various cities,
and sat waiting for a few days for the road to Skardu to open. Landslides
are common in northern Pakistan (as in many mountain areas), and
now Skardu was impossible to reach with a bus. I was staying at
the same guest house as in 1994 when I was in Pakistan for the first
time, contemplating whether I would or wouldn't spend a month of
my visa-extension there in Gilgit, working for the guest house as
they were looking for staff. But in the end I just felt a need to
get going again. The Skardu landslides didn't get cleared in 3 days,
to work in a backpackers hostel for a free bed and food didn't really
sound that interesting, and so I went to higher altitudes and further
north on the Karakorum highway...
I stopped 3 hours from Gilgit by bus, in Karimabad,
the former Hunza emirs capital. The views towards one of the worlds
higher mountains, approx. 7700 meter high Rakaposhi, are stunning,
the surrounding villages with their terraced fields are just beautiful,
people are very friendly and many are English-speaking, the temperature
is perfect. The only thing I can think of to be on the negative
side is the tapwater: it comes down the mountain behind the village,
being mainly melted glacier water, and it is GREY. FULL of silt,
and not really the stuff you'd like to get yourself unthirsty from.
Still, there are other things to drink, as I will soon describe
to you... Karimabad town itself has grown, due to tourism, and the
main street is nowerdays full of tourist shops. Still, it can only
be considered "very touristy" by Pakistani standards - as there
are still not THAT many white faces around in Pakistan, as compared
to many other countries worldwide, Karimabad isn't that bad. I found
a really nice place to stay, Garden lodge, and the greyhaired owner
there was a bit of a character. First evening in the hotel restaurant
where I had my dinner he was forcing some of us guests to try the
"Hunza water" he had in a 1.5 liter bottle. This is what I was coming
to when I wrote there are other stuff to drink in Hunza and Karimabad
then the tapwater: although the people there are Muslims, traditionally
they have always made their own apricot wine and mulberry arrak.
"Hunza water" is the approximately 35% mulberry stuff, coloured
grey as is the tapwater, but definitely with a much sharper taste.
It surely got me going, and also the owner who staggered around
offering everyone glass after glass. He was getting more and more
bluryeyed (correct spelling?), admiringly over and over again touching
my soft blond hair and generally making us guests having arrived
that day feel very welcome. Next morning he apologised for maybe
having been behaving a bit annoyingly, but I assured him he'd been
all right, and the same procedure was repeated that evening as well...
After Hunza and Karimabad and a one night stay at
Ultar meadow by a glacier, I didn't really know what to do or where
to go. I had still not fully overcome the fact that I was refused
an Afghan visa, and my travelplans were in a mess. You do get weary
from travelling for a long time, and now I was a bit derailed and
not sure about what to do. Should I rush straight for China? Should
I stay in northern Pakistan where I truly feel at ease and welcomed
and love the nature, for another 2 months as my visa would last?
I revisited a few more villages in the north, places I had seen
in 1994, went for the same daywalks I'd done then, and pretty soon
I had come to the conclusion I should head for the border. I went
to the border town Sost, made sure I spent exactly the correct amount
on stuff I would use later on (i.e. walkman batteries, snacks for
the busride over the border), and then I was prepared. On the 10th
of August it was bye-bye to Pakistan and I was going to enter communist
China for my third time...
The 2 days one night busride over the 4700 meters
high Khunjerab pass is really spectacular. On the Pakistani side
the mountains are rising up sharply next to the road, and sometimes
the drop at the side of the so called "highway" is equally abrupt
and steep. The road passes through the Khunjerab pass national park,
where I spent my last 216 Pakistani rupees for the entrance fee
to get through (what could they do if one only had travellers cheques
there - In Sost one formally exits Pakistan before entering the
bus, getting ones passport stamped and everything, so would you
really be sent back for the sake of 4$...?). Anyway, I paid. The
bus windles its way on the often broken road (landslides being the
main problem here too), and just at the Khunjerab pass there is
the actual border. The bus stops and lets the tourists take a photo
of themselves standing there with one foot in each country, right
by the bordermarker, and then you are on the wide Khunjerabplateau.
Suddenly you see hairy camels walking around, and the people look
different from Pakistan as well. Tajics, Kyrgiz, Uygur and many
other central Asian Muslims live on both sides of eventual borders.
The only han-chinese you see are the People's Liberation Army's
(PLA's) borderguards. The Chinese authorities probably are afraid
to let the various Chinese minorities get a foot and some insight
into the controlling police and army. In that sense China is still
a communist state...
The bus arrived too late to the Chinese border town
of Tashkurgan, for the customs had closed and the foreigners on
the bus were taken to a preassigned hotel for that night by the
customs official and one had to be contempt with what they offered.
They insisted to give us a 35 Yuan (4$) dormitory, but after some
haggling I managed to get them to admit that there was indeed a
2.5$ dormitory as well. This is often the case in China: they see
you as a foreigner, therefore you must have money, and so what you
are offered is always the more expensive alternative. In this cheaper
dorm though, I was lucky enough to meet a Chinese backpacker (Yes,
they do exist - a new phenomenon in China!). He had left his job
and was now travelling around in China for as long as his money
would last. He told me a lot about the apparently very vibrant Beijing
music scene, and now I am looking forward to go to clubs and pubs
there, exploring Chinese rock and punk bands...
Next morning we westerners went to the customs again,
as soon as they opened, and after some delays we were given our
passports and our luggage was checked and off we went again towards
Kashgar.
Ah, Kashgar! Far away from everything oasis! Much
has changed in the past 6 years: the streets are wider, there are
more cars, and the shops are full of just about anything you can
imagine. In this sense China is NOT communist; the motto seems to
be "the more you shop the happier you get". And they do shop, and
what is on display is nowerdays much more imported goods then before.
Kashgar seems to more and more become the Hong Kong of western China...
I saw the famous Sunday market again, this time in
a more relaxed way because I was not as busy with my camera as last
time here. I just enjoyed the hordes of people coming from all over
central Asia to trade with each other. Too bad they still sell snow
leopard skins and hats though (and that some tourists buy them!!!),
trying to pass them and other fur objects of as lynx, fox or even
dog (!). The cattle market was maybe the best part to see, with
people testriding horses and donkeys. On another part of the market
Uygur men get the latest fashion haircut (which amongst them has
stayed the same shiny bald head for hundreds of years). In yet another
market area a man wanted to try out a new pair of shoes, but had
to put his foot in a plastic bag first, and then stand on one spot
inside the shoebox instead of walking around finding out whether
the shoe was comfortable or not for walking - just able to stamp
on one spot with it. A few restaurants in a row try to draw customers
by showing put-together violent fight scenes from various movies,
and this with the volume turned to maximum. But people seemed to
enjoy watching endless different shootings and kung-fu fights...
Since Sunday I have been busy trying to organise a
lot of things: I have by now overcome my weariness and had made
up planes on how to continue from here: instead of going to Xinjang
states capital Urumqi, and then eastwards to Beijing (I came that
way in 1994), I have decided to try to sneak into Tibet from here.
It's apparently not impossible, and with the help of a Chinese speaking
Austrian guy, some friendly Chinese, a lot of info from other travellers,
and a bit of luck, I hope to get to Lhasa in a month from now. In
two hours from now when I write this I'll set of from Kashgar, sitting
on the back of a lorry. The last officially open (for foreigners)
city will be Yecheng tonight, and from tomorrow it will be 3 to
7 days hiding on the back of yet another lorry before I am far enough
into Tibet to be sent back to Kashgar by the police at the various
checkpoints. It will be COLD and HARD and I'll get mean and lean
before I am there. The road goes over some 5400 meter high passes,
there might even be snow, the road itself is often flooded and one
gets stuck for days or weeks, the nights are freezing and the food
is limited and boring. But: It's adventure. The worst thing that
can happen is that I get jailed and deported, but that is very unlikely:
what is more likely is that I get fined and then can continue...
We will see; you'll hear all about it in a month or two when I see
a computer again... I'm prepared with my fancy Chinese army long-johns
and my German travel companion having a stove and a tent. We've
filled our bags with noodles and dried meat, biscuits and snacks.
I'll get through, I'm sure...
-------------------------------------------
Long mail again, and this time I won't have time to
correct it to see if there are any misspellings or too long or even
non-understandable sentences. Hope you get something out of it though;
I have to rush back to my hotel, get my bag and then rush to the
lorry depot! Wish me luck with the PSB checkpoints (and that is
NOT Pet Shop Boys; but Public Security Bureau).
Hannu
Read more
of Hannu's adventures.
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