Not Vacationing in a City Under Siege

27 July 2009

Not Vacationing in a City Under Siege

Until three weeks ago we were scheduled to be in China this month. Just before we'd have left, we canceled based on China's H1N1 flu quarantine policy. If we'd gone - and not been quarantined - how would things be going?

First we were due atop Emei Shan, a mountain south of Chengdu, to view the longest total solar eclipse of the century. Alas, that was not to be. Emei Shan, and much of the entire Chinese industrial heartland where the eclipse would have been visible, was all socked in with rain and clouds.

Tough as that was, at least that was only one of our three weeks. But wait. Whoops - our next stop was deadly-race-riot-plagued Urumqi. Then Kashgar. Here's pictures of Urumqi today (thanks to Fallows). and the FT reported in its Saturday weekend edition, "Security gets stricter west and south of Urumqi, with Kucha and Kashgar virtually under siege. Hundreds of police with machine guns recently guarded the main square in front of the Id Kah mosque in Kashgar."

It just might be that a photo journey through far western China, poking my camera lens at anything that moves, the way I do, might not have been the best idea just now.

(Photo from Alastair Thornton in The Interpreter blog.)

(See more photography from China at EarthPhotos.com.)