I will start by saying that the landscape is breathtaking, the people here are friendly and so excited to see foreigners. One transportation center had a management person not interested in checking our code when we entered but instead wanted a picture taken with us. We waited while his friend came out to do so…I would have taken a picture with him, but I had to use the bathroom…. The young boys we met after eating lunch wanted to practice their English…. The local people we met on the street were excited to see us and take our picture. They said they had not seen foreigners in years.
The farmland houses we saw along the trip to the airport in Urumqi are among the fields of cotton and corn.
That being said, the checkpoints were grueling with the information being asked and the time required. It made the travel time much longer than necessary. I had expected some of this as I have experienced this almost everywhere in the past, but there was a greater level of not knowing how to handle passport numbers or which name is our surname. They write it differently here in China. Our tour guide had all the information written for them at every checkpoint, but they would not use that.
Hotel staff told us opening times for breakfast that were an hour later than when they actually opened. Whether that was to keep us away from other Chinese or a request of the people who were following us, I don’t know but very odd.
The fact that local police need to review our documents after going through checkpoints, everyone wanted to know when we arrived in China, and so many people have pictures of our passports on what could be their personal phone…. Again some of that I’ve experienced before. They seemed to not know which was our entry stamp to China even though it is in Chinese. The checkpoints in Tibet were difficult but at least it was for everyone there.
But being surveilled is not something I know to have happened. Another person in our group saw people scrambling to get in the car as we approached a checkpoint and made a turn. They followed us until the next rest stop. It now appears we have been followed the whole time and by more than one car.
At the rest stop, this guy in the light blue shirt was first to get out of the car and go to the convenience store while we used the bathroom. We bought two containers of melon. We knew there were three guys in the car.
Their car was the third from the back and parked at a different angle from the rest. The UK ex-military guy and I took the melon to the car and asked them if they wanted any. They said no and the two up front were laughing at the whole thing. We laughed and smiled too and said good day. They know we knew this whole trip as we would often turn around because we noticed.
We were waved aside at the last checkpoint not even 40 minutes from the airport. They took pictures of our passports and wanting to look at entry stamps. We had another COVID test even though we had one 12 hours ago and showed them the results. They detained us for some time even though they knew we needed to be at the airport. The guys in the car did their own nasal test and the officer was the one that did ours. Not the medical worker and add you would guess, they never ran the test.
We hardly look like terrorists. I would recommend people coming to see the scenery but not to go here if you are a foreigner. And all of this extra attention happened the moment we landed and we were pulled off the plane. Yes, I know acknowledging their presence may have provoked the last COVID test, but maybe not. We were definitely given the impression from the authorities that we were not welcome here and that really changed how we viewed some things. The local people though gave a different impression.