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Xinjiang Province; China

Mar
2004-09-14 15:28:14

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China
05/09/2003 the flight from Bishkek (Kyrgyzstan) to Urumqi (China) is amazing. First you cross the Tien Sian mountain range with a hundreds snow peaks of which some reach 7000meters. And just like the mountains have never been there, the Taklamakan desert appears. As dry as a desert should be, sand and dust, blown up in the blue sky above it.

The Chinese pump
One of the challenges we face at the moment is how to leave Urumqi on our bicycles... the thing is we had to deflate our tires before entering the plane, because of the air pressure, to Urumqi and we lost our pump in the bus to Bishkek. Not a problem in China you should think, everybody rides a bicycle here, if it wasn’t the fact that they are using car valves or standard bicycle valves and not the specific French race tire valves!! French valves are long and thin, and come with a lot of European (race- and mountain-) bicycles. Just to be absolutely sure we try the regular pump but it absorbs our valves like baggy pants fit a skateboarding teenager. No way we can get 4 bar in the tires!

An old man running a small bicycle shop smiles when we point at some of the inner tubes he sells and we explain that we have (almost) similar French valves. He walks to the back of his ‘garage’ and returns with a regular pump, showing that he cuts the hose for those inner tubes and puts it over the valve. From his ‘below-knee’ little chair he watches his son inflate all our four tires to 4 bar we need. Of course we by a small (foot) pump at his shop, and we cut the hose.
One-persons sized pots with noodle soup and colourful vegetables are boiling above small fires, shashlik in all sorts, fish of all kind and Chinese fondue: bowls of boiling water built in the table and you choose the ingredients yourself. 10 Leaves of unknown vegetable are pitched on a stick; some go for the fish, tofu, meat and tauge. Simply put the sticks ...