Monthly Archives: September 2010

mountain people

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Since we had nothing better to do, Zhu Hui and Lei Sheng took me to the mountains today. It was very nice and relaxing: I fell asleep a bunch of times on the warm and fragrant grass, and the rest of the time we amused ourselves taking pictures: And I felt… …like there wasn’t a […]


quod erat demonstrandum

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Mr. Wang showed up in my room again this morning. I was surprised, because today was a major holiday, and I figured he would have liked to spend the day with his family instead. But he had work to do, so we continued our interview. I was nervous. “When is this going to be over??” […]


worlds away

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What a bad night – hardly any sleep at all. I had done some research about the possible outcome of my situation the evening before, and it looked pretty serious: One foreign dude caught on a stroll with his GPS in Henan 河南 three years ago had apparently been detained for several months before being […]


life is like…

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a box of chocolates – sometimes you just pick an unpalatable one. … The phone woke me up this morning – it was the police. When I opened the door, I was looking at five middle-aged men and a police badge. They were wearing regular clothes and had stern expressions on their faces. I knew […]


police and thieves

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I wasn’t going to walk today. I wanted to take it easy and rest up in my hotel room. But first, I had to take care of my visa extension. So I went outside: “You can apply for a visa extension in every city 市” I had been told in the police office of Ürümqi […]


miniature skyline

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When I woke up I realized that I was alone again – Zhu Hui had taken the last train home to Shihezi the night before, because he had class today. I didn’t envy him for having to do martial arts exercises after yesterday’s rampage. Anyhow, I had a tiny bit of suffering ahead of me […]


godlike rampage

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Who would have thought that this was going to happen during this year’s little summer vacation? (If you have no idea what I am talking about, please refer to the beginner’s guide and the advanced formula.) … Well, today I found out about yet another way to walk 50 kilometers in one day: take a […]


out with Huihui

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Zhu Hui was obviously not going to miss out on another chance to see me suffer a little bit, so in the morning he came to my hotel and we started slowly rolling out of town. Little did he know that he would be sharing my foot pains sooner than expected! … The first bit […]


New Model Terracotta Army

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Yesterday, I had promised Li Na to take a picture of her: Hope I did her some justice: … Zhu Hui took me to an elementary school in the afternoon: We were going to talk to the kids about physical education, but I was invited to watch the girls’ dance practice. I shot video after […]


sexy time immemorial

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My friends Zhu Hui, Master Qi 祁师傅 and Li Na 李娜 got me into a car and drove up to the Tianshan mountains today: It was very beautiful up there… …where the sheep walk in the middle of the road… …and the cows… …and the shepherds… …enjoy the daily luxury of a sight that money […]


how the calabash got on my backpack

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I did an interview with a local newspaper today. Since the reporters were very friendly and seemed interested in finding out about the project as a whole, I just showed them the photo set I had prepared for presentations: See the little dude in the front who is laughing at some stupid episode during the […]


the best dumplings ever

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People were singing in the backyard of my hotel: By loading the video, you agree to YouTube’s privacy policy.Learn more Load video Always unblock YouTube I don’t think they were singing for me though… I celebrated the day with what could have very possibly been the best dumplings I ever had: Their skin was delicate […]


let’s all go to the lobby

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Zhu Hui invited me to his Taekwondo club today: I was going to show some of my pictures to some of his students: I had a great time: And I think they did too.


green dots on photographs, taken from low earth orbit

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Luckily for my feet, I didn’t have much distance left to Shihezi, the next important destination on my long red line. My good friend Zhu Hui (poor dogs and lucky dogs) lives there, so today he rode his bike over here and brought his 12-year old Taekwondo student Zong Zheng 宗正 along: They were going […]


the good lunch

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I got up at six and started walking a half hour later, when our part of the world was still completely covered in darkness: By loading the video, you agree to YouTube’s privacy policy.Learn more Load video Always unblock YouTube People were just getting up and starting their day: And there seemed to be less […]


sleeping with melons

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Bad health or not, it felt good to be out on the road again. The earth was beaming with sunlight: And I had my moon cake: Yummy!! I was about to take a shortcut at some point, but these friendly Uighur folks came running across the street to warn me that I was going in […]


ode to an eggplant

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The medication doesn’t seem to help. Maybe I don’t have a cold at all. Could it be that I am allergic to something out here? To walking…? … Anyway, I ordered some food and decided to get on the road again the next day, no matter what: I forget what this dish was called, but there […]


hats off to all writers of big fat books

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Guess what, I am still in my hotel room: It’s spacious and comfortable, and I got it for pretty cheap, so it’s okay. I am trying to get some words written down while I am here. Walking 1000km is definitely easier than writing 100 pages…


tied down

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Seeing that this was my summer vacation, I wasn’t very happy when I realized that my cold was going to tie me to a boring hotel room for the time being: I decided to take it easy and get some work done. … I treated myself to a massive bowl of Xinjiang Tangfan 新疆汤饭: This […]


achromaticity limpidity beef noodle additive

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I woke up feeling terrible. Maybe the cold had finally caught up with me? So here I am talking about food. There’s a typical dish in the Northwest of China, it’s called Lanzhou Noodles 兰州拉面, or just Beef Noodles 牛肉面: I have mentioned that I really like this dish before, only at that time I didn’t […]