The Chinese Tien Shan

The Tien Shan places a giant wall across Central Asia. The Dzungarian Gates, some 100 km from this location, remained open for Ghengiz Khan and his Golden Hord, but have been closed for most of the intervening centuries. The spectacular pass, shown here, with meadows gleaned from the subalpine forests by Uighur and Kazak nomads, lies only a few kilometres from what in 1981 was regarded as the most heavily guarded frontier on earth (between P.R. China and the former USSR). Travelling for more than a hundred kilometres close to this frontier, we saw little more than yurts, yak, and nomadic people.   These children on the same pass as shown in No. 38 were as shy as deer. After a great deal of coaxing they relaxed, but when I moved too suddenly they sprang up and fled, leaving the baby boy on the grass. On a later encounter, I realized that the girl on the far right had blue eyes; "but", said my host, "Ghengiz Khan did reach the gates of Vienna"!

38  The Mountains of Heaven (Tien Shan) (June, 1981)

   39  Uighur children high in the Tien Shan (June, 1981)
     

 

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