Xinjiang on a Regular Day

This is a visual diary of my trip to Xinjiang.

I saw some local folks making lamb dumplings in the market one day. It was an interesting process indeed. Right at that moment, the man handling the dumplings dropped a few pieces onto the ground. Lucky for him, a comrade who was chopping up firewood on the ground instantly picked them up, gave them a good cleaning by spitting on them, and then handed them back to the dumpling seller. Thanks, comrade! You just saved that guy the trouble of cleaning the dumplings.

Old City of Kashgar

Kashgar 2, originally uploaded by sookiyaki.

The old city of Kashgar looks like a set out of Alibaba and the 40 thieves. Old living quarters on mud terraces create a labyrinth within this old part of the city. High Terrace Folk Houses are a unique part of Uyghur ethnic history.

A View from Above

Adili and his students practice on a wire 25m above the ground inside this auditorium. It would require a certain level of fitness, not to mention small body size, to climb this ladder to the top of the wall. I managed to climb up with my backpack on, getting stuck a few times as the bag got caught on the sides. Camera equipment and tripod had to be hauled up with a pulley. Praying hard nothing drops on the way up.

Once on the top, Adili was full of ideas as to how we should film him. Already a media savvy celebrity, he suggested tying the DV camera to one end of his balancing pole for a side shot. Great suggestion. I crossed my fingers again and handed the DV cam over.

We had to make our poor guest perform a few times with the DV on one side of his pole because we realized after the first round, that the DV cam wasn't properly focused. Yea, its almost like capturing a great kodak moment and then realizing later that the camera wasn't even turned on. But in this case, it was ok because this veteran tightrope walker could do a few more flips on the high wire, no sweat.

But for me, the climb up and down the neverending ladder was enough to keep me off the stairmaster for a while.

You can watch the feature on Adili Wuxor on the Artsworld program here.

Meeting Man on the Wire

I was in Xinjiang for a week a few months back. So far, the only warning that I got from friends who knew I was there was - be careful of terrorist attacks. And that was just because of a few isolated cases of bombings that happened last year.

I was there to interview Adili Wuxor, celebrity tightrope walker and Guiness World Record Holder. He now has 5 world records under his belt, including walking on the highest altitude, longest distance, and longest amount of time on the tightrope. He has even survived 25 days on the tightrope, only eating and sleeping in a makeshift hut on one end of the rope and performing on the rope during the day.

We spent 3 days in the capital of Urumqi and another 2 days in the old city of Kashgar, following the life of Uyghur acrobat, Adili Wuxor.











This is a picture with Adili among the apricot blossoms in his hometown. Covered in yellow dirt from head to toe, we had a piece of Kashgar to take home with us in the form of sand.

I will blog about Xinjiang now

Right after the riots in Xinjiang this July, life got tougher for those of us who live and breathe in cyberspace. Facebook was blocked. Twitter too. And Blogspot.

Since the banning of Youtube, I've had to find a new way to upload my videos. My website still runs but half my content are redirected to Youtube and Blogspot and Flickr. So, with the current situation, most of my stuff are inaccessible inside China.

Since everything is now blocked from within China, I can just blog about anything at all. No need to worry about getting blocked, coz this can't be viewed in China.

So next post, I will be talking about Xinjiang. Yes, Xinjiang, the topic that they so very much want to avoid.