Area where we hitchhiked from

Galen had been sick, so we wanted to leave our campsite at Bezeklik as early as we could. We came out of the canyon and found shade in a cellphone tower. Galen balled himself up, trying to keep his insides inside of him.

We had hitchhiked to the site, so we would have to find a ride back. If we hiked the few miles into the village, I knew we could find someone who could, with a phone call, get us a ride on the local vans that plied the area around Shengjin, transporting folks back to Turpan.

But Galen could not make the hike back to the village in his condition.

I decided that, unless it proved impossible, we should just try to pick up a ride from this road. We had already seen two vehicles, but I had not been able to get to the road in time to flag them down.

After waiting ten minutes, I stood up at the sound of a motor echoing off the red mountain walls. I ran out of the shade of the cell tower and towards the road, but I soon realized it was a false alarm. Weaving into and out of view was a one hundred twenty-five cc motorbike with two people on it.

A few minutes later, though, a van appeared on that same road. Again, I ran out. When I flagged them down, they stopped. It was an old, rough-looking minivan driven by two Uighurs, with basic auto repair tools strewn across the back.

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“Turpan,” answered the driver.

“Can we get a ride there?”

He nodded. We did not even need to discuss the price. He knew it. I knew it.

Galen and I piled into the van’s middle seat, and they rumbled on, blasting Uighur music from their overworked speakers. Along the way, we pulled into a desert truckstop beside a busted van with its hood up. After a few minutes discussion, we were towing the second van into town.

I realized the guys had been going to give their friends a tow, and, picking us up, they had made an extra five bucks. In China, this is the nature of hitchhiking.