A not so perfect, but practically so Day.

Today is a beautiful day in Kashgar, 29* and sunny. A day to rivial a Seattle summer day. I think it has had me in a great mood today. Even though it has been overcoming one obstacle after another.

This morning I emailed elong.com who I booked my airline ticket to Chengdu with, because i needed to cahnge the date of travel if I am going to go see the eclipse. The number I was given by elong was not the actual number and they gave me a new number. I called the new number only to have written it down wrong, so I had to call back the first number... well you get the picture. We worked out the details and the customer service representative told me I had to go out to the Airport.

So I asked the Fuyuan at the internet bar how to get to the airport. I took off on the walk to the bus only to realize that I had left my travel guide with all my flight notations at the internet bar, so needless to say I had to return. I got to the bus stop only to never find bus 29 to the airport (turns out bus 2 goes there). So I flagged a taxi and it cost 15 yuan. I didn't have him wait 'cause who knows how long it would take.

There are only a couple flights a day so the airport was dead and they had to go find someone to operate the x-ray machine before they would let me enter the building. It took a good 20 minutes for them to find my e-ticket in the computer, after calling the central office in Beijing. Finally after close to 45 minutes I had a new e-ticket number. But by then the line of taxis out front was gone. I asked how to get back to the city and they informed me of the bus. But when I got there the attendent was busy cleaning and wiping down the bus. I am pretty sure she didn't speak Mandarin, because I couldn't get her to tell me what time the bus was planning on leaving.
The driver was fast asleep under a nearby tree.

Thankfully a taxi finally showed up and I rode it back towards the city for 11 yuan. I wanted to stop at the international bus station to buy a ticket out to Kabakul lake. Which is on the highway to Pakistan so I went to the international bus station. They sent me to the long distance bus station across town but since I am a foreigner they will not sell me a ticket. In the beginning they said there was no bus, but when I pressed them they said there was a bus but they wouldn't sell me a ticket. This is because it is a second-grade pass which in Chinese speak means for locals only. I have talked to two travelcompanies and one has an overnight trip for 640 yuan, and the other has a one day car rental with driver for 880 yuan. I am going to look around town somemore so we will see.

I am hoping I can hop a ride in a mini-bus. I would love to make it all the way up the pass, but it doesn't sound like it is going to happen. I might we able to get to the lake, where I want to spend two nights. We will see.

I feel like I have faced as much adversity as I did yesterday and yet I have a completely different attitude. Maybe it is the perfect summer day or maybe it is the fact that I am now official 22. Who knows but I am in no rush today and so I have taken everything in stride, which I am very proud of. Somewhere between Hong Kong and here I have lost the crazy pace with which I do things in DC. I have become a lot more relaxed and I am surprisingly enjoying it. For the most part I don't know what the date is (only when I have already bought tickets somewhere or it is my birthday) and I have absolutely no hope in telling you what day of the week it is.

I first noticed the change in Dunhuang when my travel companion was go go go and I just wanted to take the leisure scenic route. Maybe it is because I only have a vague plan that I have relaxed a little. Well see if I can keep up this new pace upon returning home.

Oh yeah, I wanted to share another story from my birthday yesterday. When I was walking from the bus station to the hotel, I heard the faint refrains of song growing closer and closer. It was a familiar song and then I knew what it was.... the song was "Happy Birthday!" It was coming from teh water truck that sprays down the dust on the roads. It could have been a complete coincidence that the truck played Happy Birthday, but I heard another truck today and it was playing a different song. I think maybe God knew what I needed, knew that yesterday I was feeling a bit lonely and missing my family. He's amazing isn't he?

In fact I have been thinking about God a lot on this trip. Him and I are in the middle of a fight as I don't particularly agree on some of what the bible teaches if taken literally. So we aren't really speaking at the moment. But I will be walking through sand dunes or past tiny villages, and wonder if the places Jesus travelled through were similar. I spent 4 hours in the desert He spent 40 days, I can't imagine. When I take off my sandles at night, I am reminded of the story of the washing of feet and I comprehend it on a different level. I never thought that in a place where God is so absent, I would find myself being pulled toward Him.

Don't know what I am going to do this evening, maybe look at this problem of reaching the lake a little more and enjoy a nice cold beer on a perfect summer night.