China Guide
The Northwest
Kashgar
A large part of the excitement of KASHGAR lies in the experience of reaching it. Set on the western edge of the Chinese empire astride overland routes to Pakistan and Kyrgyzstan, Kashgar is fantastically remote from eastern China: as the crow flies, it's more than 4000km from Beijing, of which the thousand-plus kilometres from Ürümqi are for the most part sheer desert. An oasis 1200m above sea level, Kashgar is a remarkably prosperous and pleasant place, despite being, in part, an essentially medieval city.
Kashgar remains a visible bastion of old Chinese Turkestan, though gradually the more "authentic" parts of the town are being cleaned up as tourist attractions, and its residents moved to modern high-rises on the city limits. Nonetheless, despite Han migration into the city, its population is still overwhelmingly Muslim, a fact you can hardly fail to notice with the great Id Kah Mosque dominating the central square, the Uyghur bazaars and teashops, the smell of grilled lamb and, above all, the faces of the Turkic people around you. If you can choose a time to be here, catch the Uyghur Corban festival at the end of the Muslim month of Ramadan, and again, exactly two months later, which involves activities such as dancing and goat-tussling. And don't miss Kashgar's Sunday market, for which half of Central Asia seems to converge on the city and which is as enchanting to the average Han Chinese as to the foreign tourist.
Kashgar's Sunday market
Address: East of the Tuman River (bus #16 from Renmin Square, or 40min walk from Id Kah mosque)
Known in Chinese as the Zhongxiya Shichang (Western-Central Asia Market), or in Uyghur as the Yekshenba Bazaar (Sunday Bazaar), what was once the mother of all markets attracts up to one hundred thousand villagers and nomads, all riding their donkey carts from the surrounding area and gathering in two sites to the east and the southeast of town. For the sheer scale of the occasion, it's the number one sight in Kashgar, if not all Xinjiang. Considering the large numbers of minority peoples who come to trade here, all sporting their own particular headwear, it is also an anthropologist's delight. Knives, hats, pots, carpets, and pans, fresh fruit and vegetables, clothes and boots and every kind of domestic and agricultural appliance – often handmade in wood and tin – are all on sale, and some produce, such as Iranian saffron, has come a very long way to be sold here. The market goes on all day and into the early evening, and food and drink are widely available on and around the site.
Due to the traffic chaos thousands of animals used to bring to the city centre every Sunday, the livestock market has been moved to an area a few kilometres south of town to Ulagh Bazaar, or Yuanfang Shichang in Chinese. Here you'll find traders haggling over everything from camels to cattle, while sheep turn a blind eye to the food stalls on the periphery.
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