It seems just lately that every time I turn on the news there is somewhere else that I have been that is now a no go area. The latest is Kashgar, a town in northern China where I spent a fascinating couple of days visiting the famous local market. I even wrote a poem about it which is reproduced below. The title of the poem was "These Things Define The Day", which was also the title of my original brief blog. You can see from the poem what things defined the day for me but nowadays the days in Kashgar are apparently defined by ethnic violence, fear and tension and what the BBC just called "a hotbed of Islamist extremism".
It seemed safe enough when I was there, though that was before 9-11 changed the face of the world.
When I see these stories about how dangerous places have become, places where I felt safe, I feel a profound despair about the world. How have things become so bad so fast? Kashgar felt fine in 2001 and now, in 2009, it doesn't sound like a place that I'd be able to visit, let alone happy to visit. The Chinese authorities have restricted access to the city in their efforts to close the problem down.
There are other countries and cities where the same thing is true. Islamabad, for example, was in the same broadcast after a major terrorist bomb in the city. And who would even consider a tourist visit to Iran at the moment?
I could theorise but my opinion on the matter is no more valid than anyone else's and certainly no more likely to make a difference. I just feel that if I were just considering now the trips that I made between 1999 and 2001 I probably wouldn't make them. Not only that but things seem to be getting worse not better and the prospect of travelling in the near future in the places I travelled in so easily in the near past seem to be very unlikely. And that is what I feel such despair about.
Anyway, to help cheer myself up, here is the poem that I wrote about Kashgar in happier times.
It seemed safe enough when I was there, though that was before 9-11 changed the face of the world.
When I see these stories about how dangerous places have become, places where I felt safe, I feel a profound despair about the world. How have things become so bad so fast? Kashgar felt fine in 2001 and now, in 2009, it doesn't sound like a place that I'd be able to visit, let alone happy to visit. The Chinese authorities have restricted access to the city in their efforts to close the problem down.
There are other countries and cities where the same thing is true. Islamabad, for example, was in the same broadcast after a major terrorist bomb in the city. And who would even consider a tourist visit to Iran at the moment?
I could theorise but my opinion on the matter is no more valid than anyone else's and certainly no more likely to make a difference. I just feel that if I were just considering now the trips that I made between 1999 and 2001 I probably wouldn't make them. Not only that but things seem to be getting worse not better and the prospect of travelling in the near future in the places I travelled in so easily in the near past seem to be very unlikely. And that is what I feel such despair about.
Anyway, to help cheer myself up, here is the poem that I wrote about Kashgar in happier times.
The air is filled with song and sound
From birds in bamboo cage.
Bent artisans shape wood and leather,
Faces creased with age.
The lizard skins laid out and dried,
With powdered bone on wooden tray,
Strange medicines and ancient cures -
These things define the day.
The strings of horses, sheep in pens
And cows and pigs and goats,
They whinny, bleat and grunt and call
A noise from every throat.
The hill folk dressed in blue and red
The city men in grey
The children, iridescent, bright -
These things define the day.
Cows' severed heads, the charnel stench,
The smoke from burning hides,
Red rivulets that carve the dust
From road to riverside,
The withered old men gathered here,
The children at their play
Among the bloody carcasses
These things define the day.
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