It’s six o’clock in the morning, that is to say very early for I fell asleep around 4 am. Either I go on confusing myself with the scent of badly washed yak or I go back to sleep. Pumping up some more energy or stinking up the barn, a Cornelian choice, I opt for sleep.
Around seven o’clock, I am surrounded by a general uproar. The blankets are shaken, puffy faces appear. Everyone huddles around the stove on mini stools for breakfast. A man and a young woman pick out tiny fillets of sardines from a can and spread them on bread. Our hostess has lit the fire again and is preparing food: big, soft pasta and rubbery mutton, which are still a bit disgusting this morning. Out of politeness, I pick few pieces into the bowl, swallow the salty tea and go outside to take a deep breath of fresh air.
The minibus that brought me here drops me off an hour later at the border post, which is still closed at this hour. Already, people are waiting in line in front of the iron gate. Men and women in uniform keep us in single file like cows entering the stable. They let small groups of six or seven people enter.
First check at the counter after ten minutes of waiting, the officer shuffles my passport and sends me back to fill in my exit card. I leave the queue, fill in my form and come back. My turn comes, the same officer informs me that I have to go to another office to get this damn piece of paper stamped.
I leave the queue again, enquire about the office, see an officer who doesn’t seem to know how to read, but who, under the impression that he’s working on my passport like an arithmetic problem, ends up stamping it to save the day.
I take my place in the file and finally pass through the first gate. Now I have to get into the second queue to present my beloved passport to a surly lady with a wax face, trapped in a glass window.
I am almost there when I remember that I have to change my tugriks before leaving the country. Nobody outside Mongolia, no bank, exchanges this currency. I will have to leave the queue once again because, yes, there is a exchange office. Alas, three times alas, if the exchange office exists, it has no money! What is the purpose of this bureau de change? It’s normal, this is Mongolia.
I go through the gate and take my place once again: when the exit stamp is finally printed on the paper, my passport shivers with pleasure.
First check.
The room is rather informal. I have to go through a gate that detects machetes and nail clippers, a X-rays baggage scanner for homemade bombs and Kalashnikovs, a full body and bag search, the usual.
An officer scans a mobile phone. There is also a detector of dangerous photos for the security of the territory. Everything is studied in manual: expert index finger, eagle eye, wrinkled forehead, concentrated look.
I’ve already deleted all the photos from the smartphone to save time, but I can’t prevent them from snooping on the computer where at least 200,000 photos are stored. The customs officer gives me the phone back without even giving me a glance. I quickly pack up my belongings hoping to escape the opening of the computer.
But this is without the legendary zeal of the Chinese when it comes to national security. He discovers that I am carrying a laptop and a camera.
This control is really stupid but the world is imperfect. Now it’s just a matter of keeping a smile on your face, staying relaxed and hoping for the best.
The customs officer opens a dozen files whose names she probably can’t read, which in turn open equally mysterious files and sub-files. Fortunately, after ten minutes, she gives up and I continue my progress towards the exit. In this bureaucratic obstacle course, I am now standing in front of the counter where my nice passport is about to receive communion: the stamp for entering China, right next to the visa issued in Hong Kong, entry number two.
Transit through this border is rarely used by travellers. These border guard are not used to
Deuter backpacks and Decathlon parka, so what can you say when it’s a French woman of almost fifty? They are curious and very cordial towards me.
It’s not the first time I visit the Republic of China. But, I don’t know why, there’s always a problem with my passport. Ijust have to be patient and everything is eventually sorted out, it’s just a matter of time. Fortunately, I have time.
Poof, stamp, it’s on, baby. Fēicháng gǎnxiè!
Everything is going incredibly well, I can’t believe it. I feel light as a feather and my soul is victorious
Around me now, it’s a strange no-mans-land. Shacks, low buildings, supermarkets, transit centres for trucks. I look for a car or a bus that will take me to the Kazakh border. I have to go through Urumqi, a twenty hour bus will take me there. Normaly. But this morning, no bus. There are only taxis to share, waiting to fill up with passengers before leaving.
I announce to the crowd : Ouroumtchi ? Kazakhstan ?
Immediately the answers come in: yes yes, two-fifty! Understand: two hundred and fifty yuans, about thirty-five euros.
Surrounded by a small group of curious people, I load my bag in the trunk, light my last cigarette and start waiting. I am warned, the car will only leave when it is full, four or five hours of waiting will be enough.
Then a well-dressed man arrives, with a confident step and an open face. He goes directly towards me, Kazakhstan? No Urumqi! Not good ! Too long! Jemenai Ok!
He has a laugh-out-loud accent, punctuating the end of his sentences with a hi? Really comical.
It’s ten o’clock in the morning, the sun is already burning my scalp
I ask around to the customs officers hiding in the hut, playing with their mobile phones. It turns out that Jemenai is better than Urumqi.
I won’t know why until much later: the Urumqi border closes sporadically. It’s off to Jemenai, and what’s more, my driver named Khale (Raleeeee) leaves right away, go go go, no waiting and the icing on the cake, his car is as comfortable as a limousine and I’m all alone inside! A dream come true.
After having swallowed thousands of kilometres of dust piled up in overloaded buses and taxis without air-conditioning, what happiness!
Khale speaks three words of English and I don’t care, once I’m settled in the leather seat, I start to melt with fatigue, I don’t have the strength to start a conversation that will require more concentration than saliva. Khale is Kazakh but born in China. He explains a lot of things I don’t understand. He then switches to three dimensions with a lot of gestures and mimics, I finally understand:
Woman (thumb and index finger going down from cheekbones to chin, scarf),
Child (hand, palm open towards the ground in a descending gesture),
Passaporteeeee (passport then),
Go to (gesture of the ball being thrown into the basketball hoop),
KAZAKHSTHAN! (no translation).
And he’s going to tell me that at least ten times, foreigners are a bit stupid.
My scenario is that we go to Kazakhstan to get his wife and child.
But here we are, we don’t set off on the road towards the Kazakh border lulled by the sweet song of the engine and cooled by an air-conditioning set to the nearest degree. No, we turn left and there begins another journey that will last until 2.30 am.
First stops, he collects the passports of his little family
Several people get in and out of the car, we walk from residential areas to official buildings, plus a break for lunch.
Then we take the road towards an unknown city, the GPS doesn’t answer anymore since we crossed the border.
We go to the home of some lovely families in small buildings where tea, camel cheese, bread and nuts await us. He picks up his wife and son, chats endlessly, I smile and keep quiet.
Then it’s time to say goodbye to friends. I say hello and goodbye, I play wallpaper. but it doesn’t matter, these people are really nice. Finally we go to his flat where they pack up, we take another person who, like me, hires a driver.
Let’s go, this time, it’s the good one!
Well, it’s not.
We stop everywhere for what seems to be administrative formalities, given the flags that adorn the facades.
We really set off on the beautiful tarmac road that crosses this piece of desert China for five hundred kilometres at around six o’clock in the evening.
Is it worth mentioning that I am not alone in the car anymore?
Desert, herds of camels and the setting sun pass by the window. I realise that I haven’t even once thought of complaining about the service, the delay or being treated like a packet. I have no idea what will happen later or when we will arrive, or where, actually.
Around two in the morning the car stops in an unknown town
Khale gets out and explains that tomorrow morning at 7.30 I have to be there (he points to a huge building with closed gates) to take a bus across the Chinese and Kazakh borders.
Okay, I say, now what? Where do I sleep?
There are moments like this in life when it’s not even worth getting angry. Because if we had left at the promised time, I would have had a thousand times more time to find a place to stay for the night. There’s no way Khale’s going to dump me here, like a common package, without any help.
Hotel?
Yes, please!
Khalee drops me off in front of a three-star hotel. Nothing else seems to be available around here. I pay Khalee who disappears immediately, without any further bye-bye.
I firmly negotiate the price with the night watchman who doesn’t speak English at all and who is not at all willing to lower his price. The situation seems hopeless until a young Chinese man calls out to me in almost perfect English and helps me to reach an agreement with the stubborn receptionist. The price is set at one hundred and thirty yuan instead of three hundred. I take advantage of my saviour’s perfect English to get information about tomorrow’s bus.
O miracle, he too is going to Kazakhstan tomorrow, to Almaty like me!
He adds that if I need help tomorrow, he will be at the bus station from eight o’clock. There is a God for traveller.
However, tomorrow will be a hard day, the buses will be full because the day after tomorrow, ha ha, the border will close for seven days. Registered.
I go up to my room on the third floor, in the corridor my shoes sink into the thick carpet. Wow.
I open the door with the help of the electronic card… The room is as large as a dining room, two large white beds with thick duvets and pillows are inviting me. The bathroom, with its gleaming ceramic toilet, sparkling walk-in shower and immaculate, fluffy terry towels, is depressing me: I’m only going to spend four hours in this room! Big sigh.
But life is full of surprises. The bedroom phone rings. It’s definitely not a wrong number and I don’t know anyone here, so good or bad news?
It’s the English-speaking Chinese guy who reminds me that we are on Chinese time here, so two hours earlier than in Mongolia. I have two hours more!
Showered and shampooed, I sink into the diabolical mattress like a quicksand, and feel like an anvil falling to the bottom of the Tartar Desert.
Tomorrow is another day!
