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Every Sunday is a big day in Kashgar – the population swells by 50,000 as buyers, sellers and onlookers stream in from near and far to attend one of the biggest bazaars in Asia. We were up bright and early and went first to the livestock market on the edge of town to see thousands of sheep, goats, cattle, horses and donkeys bustle into the arena. Each type of animal had its own allocated area, and it was fascinating to watch the Uighur and Tajik farmers and butchers locked in earnest negotiations, going through a buying and selling ritual we didn’t fully understand. Out the back, prospective purchasers took horses for a test-drive, riding them expertly around a large gravelly yard.
The animals and people across the whole market were in close contact and I reckoned that there must sometimes be broken bones for both man and beast. We strolled around for about an hour watching all the fascinating, swirling sights and soaking up the intoxicating smells and sounds. Then we saw a large bull not far from us break free from its handler and charge in our direction. We leapt to the side to get out of his path but he continued to charge, so we began to run. Luckily for us, the call of nature intervened to save us. The bull must have streaked past a cow on heat – this stopped him absolutely dead in his tracks and he proceeded to mount an exhibition of an altogether different kind, prompting an immediate whipping from his owner (or more likely the owner of the cow). We didn't hang around to see the climax of this particular piece of saleyard theatre, instead taking the opportunity while the bull was otherwise indisposed to flee to the relative sanctuary of the goat and sheep arena where we made another inspection of the fluffy little animals all tethered by the neck in their cute straight rows. Then we sat down with some Uighur farmers to enjoy a bowl of freshly-made goat and vegetable noodles.
We'd had enough excitement for one morning, so we fought our way through the throng to get to the market exit where we hailed a taxi to take us to the Kashgar Bazaar. This occupies several blocks of the city, and pretty well everything imaginable is for sale. The myriad of silk and chilli pepper stalls throughout the bazaar add a lot of colour to the proceedings.
After we'd had our fill of the sights, sounds and smells of this fascinating market, we hailed another taxi to take us to the bus station where we intended to buy a ticket to Tashkurgan near the border with Pakistan and Afghanistan. But language difficulties intervened and we ended up not at the city centre bus station but on the city outskirts at the Tomb of Abakh Hoja, an Uighur ruler of long ago. Fortunately another taxi soon arrived and we caught this one back to the city. This Uighur driver spoke not only some mandarin but also quite a bit of English too, and he introduced himself to us. We took an immediate liking to Mohammad - he seemed to be the sort of guy who could move a mountain if necessary - and by the time we arrived at the bus station we had closed a deal with him to take us in his taxi on a two-day jaunt to Tashkurgan, leaving tomorrow morning.
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