Today was the ideal day to visit Kashgar's famous cattle market, which only convenes on Sunday as well as its bazaar which is open every week of the day but becomes more hectic on sunday because villagers from rural Kashgar bring in their produce to be sold.
The cattle market didn't really get going till around 10 in the morning. It comprises an outside area where fruits and vegetables (fresh figs are in season!) and animal feed are sold, and an inside area where animals are sold. The animals are divided into neat sections, the largest being the cattle and the sheep sections, and then there are smaller sections for horses, donkeys and even camels. The animals are roped to metal fences which are assembled only on sunday (just a matter of hammering metal posts into the soft soil with a hard rock). One of my group had been to Kashgar 10 years ago and said that the market used to be a lot more chaotic.
Generally the bulls and cows looked pretty sad with their wet noses and moist long-lashed eyes. The sheep - well, they aren't as herd-like as one might have thought and many of them seemed to wanted to find the first opportunity to wriggle out of their ropes after which a hilarious scene would ensue where the owner would have to scramble after the escapee and literally hop onto its back to bring it back to the fold. The sheep are also beautified to prepare them for their sale, with little trims of their head to make them look neater. The haircut "du jour" for shorn sheep appears to be to shave their body but keep their bums wooly so it looks like there's a big ball of curly wool attached to a clean shaven torso. (See pics)
The cattle market also offered slaughtering services and snacks for the farmers - including mutton soup (what else but mutton!), breads (the same Chinese "bagel" that I wrote about earlier) and a mutton "calzone" (minced mutton - more fat than meat - and onions, liberally spiced). The mutton calzone cost RMB 2 and was a decent mid-morning snack even for tourists and not just the hardworking farmers.
The afternoon was spent at the Bazaar. A bit of a disappointment really. Nothing like the exotic souks in Morocco or Istanbul with its twisty labyrinth alleys and air of mystery. The influence of the Chinese perhaps. It is a neatly organised vaguely antiseptic market with proper stalls and sometimes even neon lit signs. The only highlight for me was the Chinese medicine section where predictably various dead animals were offered for medicinal value including starfish and hedgehogs (see pics).
The main meals have so far been ho-hum, perhaps because I am now with a group and they are not too adventurous (comparisons to english food come up all the time...). I am looking forward to breaking out on my own for little culinary adventures.
