When I first moved to Xinjiang in 2014, I was surprised by how little Chinese people spoke. I thought that Chinese would be more common and widespread, but many people didn’t speak Chinese and people who were able to speak Chinese were very reluctant to do so. It took about 3 months before I could start having conversations in Uyghur, and after that it was much easier to make Uyghur friends, ride in taxis, and buy fruit and vegetables.
When I first arrived, it felt in a visceral way that I had moved to another country (which is precisely what makes Xinjiang so interesting: it is a hybrid of two nations at the same time, akin to a colony). Looking back on it, I only now realize how naïve I was to think that just because I had lived in China for 2.5 years at that point, I was even somewhat prepared for life in Urumqi. I was not. It was a completely different world from that I’d experienced in Nanjing, from the language, to the customs, to the lifestyle. I was often shamed by my Uyghur roommate for acting Han, and she once admonished me, “If you’re going to learn our language, you’ve got to learn our customs. We are not Han and the sooner you learn that, the better.” My first four months in Urumqi were especially emotionally and mentally challenging in ways that I had not expected.
I still get flashbacks to those first four months in 2014. When I think about the times I brought non-halal food into the house, or blew my nose at breakfast, or walked around with a skirt and my legs uncovered on the first day of Ramadan, my face burns red with shame and I cringe as though someone just kicked me in the stomach. It didn’t matter that I was a foreigner. Uyghurs were horrified when I did something that a Han would do, like blow my nose, shake my hands after washing them, or eat non-Halal Chinese food.
Many Uyghurs often describe to me their experiences living in Urumqi as though they are living in two different worlds in the same city: A Chinese world, for them usually associated with work or school, and a Uyghur world, usually associated with family and friends. I too have experienced these two different worlds between my Han and Uyghur friends, one that is clearly and obviously marked through the use of two different time zones: Hans use Beijing time and Uyghurs use Urumqi time. I dress differently, talk about different topics, and eat different food depending on the crowd—Han or Uyghur—I am hanging out with. And without a doubt, the crowds never mix, mostly because the Uyghurs eat strictly Halal and sometimes will even stop eating if a Han enters the room. For Uyghurs, the mere mention of the word “pork” (choshqa goshi) is strictly avoided.
Getting in a taxi is always a reminder of these strict divisions: First, one has to take a look at the face, clothes, and radio station before assessing the driver’s ethnicity and engaging in a “你好!” (nihao) or an “essalammu eleykum!” I’ve gotten it wrong more than once, only to be greeted with blank stares (while Uyghurs and Han are obviously two very different ethnicities, biologically they are not easy to tell apart from just a glance at the face). Han drivers never know where I live and without fail get lost in the winding alleys and one-way streets in my Uyghur neighborhood.
What did you like most about Xinjiang?
Despite the oppression there is so much life, so much culture, and so much love, caring and hospitality. There is a lot of curiosity in foreign culture, interest in others’ lives, and caring for one another. I had a lot of really lovely human exchanges of empathy, laughter, tears, struggle and triumphs. I shared in a lot of joy and a lot of sorrow. That is what I like the most—those kinds of personal exchanges of mutual support and empathy with people. Uyghur culture can be closed in a lot of ways (unaccepting of non-Muslim ideas and people, for one), but it is also incredibly loving and accepting to people, especially guests (and, as I discovered, Christians). I also like the way there is such diversity of cultural expression from the music, to the food, to the movies, to the dress: Turkish, Central Asian, Arabic, Persian, Indian, Russian, and Chinese people, languages, food, and cultures were a common sight. Xinjiang is, after all, on the Silk Road and at the nexus and crossroads of a great variety of peoples, languages, religions, histories, and customs.
What was one of the most difficult experiences of culture shock you had?
Everyone was constantly commenting on your appearance as if they had the authority to police your own body for you: “You have a pimple on your face, you’ve lost weight, you’ve gained weight, you look like a boy, you look cold, you didn’t eat enough.” The commentary never did cease. People were constantly asking if you were too hot or too cold, if you were full or hungry. It was just small talk, a way of greeting, and a way of showing that they cared. But it was jarring at first. I did, however, eventually get used to it.
I didn’t even look that much like a boy all the time (sometimes I did intentionally gender bend and I usually didn’t wear makeup or other characteristically girly things), but even if I was wearing earrings or a scarf people often mistook me for a boy or would comment about how much I looked like a boy. If my friends posted pictures with me on social media, people would immediately and inevitably comment, “Who is that boy you are with?” and my friends would collapse into hysterical giggles. I didn’t mind because I did look somewhat like a boy and so it wasn’t like people were telling me something I didn’t already know. But it took me a while to get used to that.
Then I got used to it and now I sometimes make comments that make people laugh or uncomfortable. The other day I was in a Lyft Line with another girl and I saw someone riding their bike without gloves. “Look at that young man riding his bike without gloves! He must be so cold!” Everyone burst out laughing at this ridiculous comment. There was a girl at the gym who had lost a little bit of weight, and her face was thinner and her chin pointy. She actually looked really different. I pointed it out to her immediately, before I realized that this was an inappropriate comment to make about another woman’s body.
No comments:
Post a Comment