Kashgar

Kashgar just likes another Islam countries rather than a china city, with a total different culture. I’d really enjoy my time in there.

I was in Kashgar three times (almost four but in 1999 the weather prevented us from reaching it), from 2001 – 2004. I’ve seen with my own eyes how Kashgar is changing. Even at the beginning of the 20th century Kashgar consisted of an Uyghur town right next to the Han Chinese town, with the two groups hardly mixing and carrying on their own lives. It’s still like that but the Chinese are trying hard to become the majority by “exporting” people to the Chinese far west.

By 2002 there were rumors the Chinese wanted to raze down the old Uyghur area of the city and modernize everything – I went round and photographed as much as I could of what it was like, and of the unique Uyghur architecture still left.

And then in 2004:
China is busy renovating all of its cities in preparation for the 2008 Olympics but here in Kashgar there’s an cynical twist to it: the process of renovation (or ‘renovation’) has been going on for years already, driving the Uyghurs out of the city center to new flats at the outskirts of the city, and letting Han Chinese into the city (though their apartments aren’t all that much better). On the one hand, living conditions for the Uyghurs should be better in a practical sense, providing them with water and (better) sewer systems; on the other, culturally they are much worse off: they no longer have their old neighborhood mosques nearby, let alone the Id Kah (a Friday mosque); and if they’re not living on the top floor of the high-rise apartments, they have other people walking above them — something quite disconcerting for people who normally live in family dwellings around a courtyard. I feel that in a sense, it’s taking the heart out of their culture. This may not even be intentional: the supremely pragmatic Han seem to have no sense of the value of a cultural heritage.

Seeing more recent photographs here makes me sad – Kashgar is still changing, and not for the best. But the hospitable Uyghurs are a strong people: I am certain Kashgar will remain a fascinating place where cultures clash but none ever wins.

I want to go back!