A village outside Turpan, Western China, and a local family.

After our morning seeing the tourist sights of Turpan (see last Blog, if you haven't read it) we had a long drive back to the city. Hunger pangs were beginning, and getting more serious by the moment, so we persuaded our driver to stop at a small village we were approaching.

He wasn't too pleased, and tried to persuade us to wait until we reached Grape Valley where he assured us, food was available.

(When we reached Grape Valley later that day, we were pleased that we'd insisted on the village stop, because Grape Valley was a big disappointment!)

Our lunch, "on the street"...kebabs, noodles, "sausage rolls" and a pot of tea.

The village was very small, but we found a roadside food seller, and sat at the ubiquitous small stools and laminated table, and dined on noodles, and small pastries, which were something like sausage rolls, but lamb was the filling, not beef. And of course, the aromatic tea, drunk from bowls.

Our meat and pastry bites...delicious.

Friendly locals at the next table, waiting for their lunch.

A group of local young men sat at the adjacent table, (well, the only other  table...it was a 2 table eatery!) ate their lunch, and presented us with a pomegranate!  Diagonally opposite us was a tea-house, with older Uighur men sitting on the verandah, drinking tea, smoking, chatting.   A flock of sheep was herded around their corner.

A gift from the men at the next table...a pomegranate.

The sheep being herded to ???? Note... another eatery on verandah behind the sheep.

After lunch, we went for a walk through the village, and came across a group of women, spanning probably 3 generations, sitting outside a building, chatting, and watching another woman wash fish under a tap in the street.
My Chinese-speaking daughter-in-law stopped to speak to them, and the younger ones could speak Mandarin. They'd been taught it at school. The elder women could only speak Tajik.

Smiles all round, as my D.i.L chats to the women.

And here the group of local women are happy to be photographed.

Washing fish at an outdoor tap.

The next meal for the family.

We, via my D.I.L. and her command of Mandarin, had a conversation, and then we  were asked into the house. We were given a seat in their eating area, where we were offered grapes.
They did not have a lot in the way of material goods, but their generosity and friendliness was characteristic of the area, as far as we were concerned.

The young girl in the family, about 8 or 9, showed my 2 granddaughters her swing, and the 3 girls played happily on that.

The swing was simply a rope suspended from the ceiling. This is a large space, like an entrance area. You can see the ladies sitting outside, in the background.

This little girl is firmly strapped in, don't you agree?

Nearby lay the latest addition to their family.....a baby, strapped into its cradle.  I can almost hear you ask..."what about China's 1 child policy?"  The Uighurs, and probably other ethnic minorities, are exempt from that law. Consequently in this far western part of China, families have more than one child.

Three generations, and aren't they beautiful?

And chatting with the father of the two girls, husband of the fish-washing woman.

This was an unexpected part of our day, and was full of memories of happy, generous people.
Such instances made our unforgettable trip to Western China even more memorable.