Northern Xinjiang slide show

Northern Xinjiang Slideshow: Shirley’s trip from Singapore to Urumqi, China was created by TripAdvisor. See another Urumqi slideshow. Take your travel photos and make a slideshow for free.

Landscape photography workshop that wasn't

The main reason for the 9-day trip was to pick-up tips and develop my eye for landscape photography. 

However, the workshop wasn't too hot and things went south for me very quickly. My biggest issue was the lack of guidance and the lack of translation. We were all just turned lose when we got to each location. I know how to handle a camera but I paid to attend a workshop to learn, and I expect proper guidance from the workshop leader. Instead, instructions were passed around participants willy-nilly. At one location, I scratched my head when another participant told me that the workshop leader had said to line up the wind turbines in the background along with lighthouse. Huh? They were all too far apart to get onto a frame. 

I had to climb up a flight of stairs to look for the person to clarify. Only to get a different set of information while the person was busy taking photos.
At another location, I decided to test the person by asking for help, all I got was a silly response. It wasn't the kind of response I expected of an instructor.

The final straw that broke the camel's back - was being told to get out of the way as I was in the photo.

Meat so fresh it is still warm

We were taking a walk one evening in Hemu and we came upon a butcher who had just slaughter a Fat-tailed sheep at a mutton soup stall. We decided to hang around to watch him process the carcass.

This place is quite popular with Chinese tourists during the golden week. We passed it the next morning, and another sheep had been slaughtered.

Lost

As you can tell I am having major problems putting words to my just concluded trip to Northern Xinjiang. My bad, atrocious Chinese meant that I couldn't completely comprehend the local guides. It didn't help that the Singaporean lead never provided location information. I am still trying to decipher the mambo jumbo trip itinerary that was given to us.

Therefore, I'll just concentrate on the key areas that are known to me. First stop, after the whistle stop at Burqin was Hemu, a village that is one of the three residences of the Tuva Mongol people in China. The Tuva Mongol is believed to be the offspring of the troops of Genghis Khan. The Tuva Mongol of Hemu Village live in wooden framed houses half-buried in the ground to keep warm during the winter.

What I like about this village once one gets past the real basic facilities and the bare minimum lodging, was the rustic life.  Oh yes, forget about trying to avoid dung as it is everywhere. It is in one of the scenic areas and I came away with lots of photos.

Urumqi International Bazaar

The Urumqi International Bazaar or Erdaoqiao Bazaar is one of the largest bazaars in the world. We went into the bazaar for an hour and had fun taking in the sights, people and munching on fruits.

Did you know that Xinjiang is a grape growing region? I didn't till I got there and they had mind boggling array of different grades of raisins that were really tasty. The fresh grapes were just as good.

They also sold sun dried cherry tomatoes, which were so sweet. I wished I could have brought back some. We then bought some figs from a street vendor to try.

Melons were in season and the hamigua were just delicious. We all stopped to photograph this fruit seller who was very good with his knife skills, and then rewarded him by each buying a piece of hamigua to eat.

What was of most interest to me were the people, they were all so photogenic.

Day 1 - Urumqi

We got on an Air China flight to Chendu at 2 am on 20 Sept. from there we caught our connection to Urumuqi. Being only my second trip to China, everything was new to me. Our group were met by the local guides and driven to our first lunch in Xinjiang.

Imagine our surprise when dish after dish kept coming out. We had a unique papaya, mayo and orange concentrate cold dish, followed by a plate of assorted meats to vegetarian dishes as among the group was one vegetarian. The dishes were all tasty, may be it was because we were all hungry we managed to finish much of the eleven course mean. We also found out that fruits in Xinjiang had higher sugar content and tend to be sweeter.

Back from Xinjiang, China

Haven't fallen off the face of the earth but rather at the farthest western-end of China in Xinjiang. The trip was an eye opener in many ways. Yes, I am shifting through tons of photos. In addition, to fighting a bug I picked up along the way.