October 14-15, 2024
12.53 miles
In two days, I've succeeded in transferring from a hotel in the north of the city to a hotel in the south of the city. I'm pretty proud of this achievement, given The Obstacles.
The first obstacle is a tummy bug. I think the culprit was some cheese I ate in Istanbul. It tasted a bit off, but I went ahead and ate it, because I've eaten a lot of off-tasting cheese lately. But apparently this was the gnaw that broke the camel's stomach, so to speak, and I've been spending a lot of time with the porcelain fixtures.
The second obstacle is my cell phone, on which I rely for translation, navigation, information, and compensation. Without it, I am mute, lost, ignorant, and penniless. My T-Mobile international plan was supposed to work here. But it doesn't.
Luckily, our hero concierge Toby (one of only two people I've met here who speaks English) came to my rescue, and sent me to a China Mobile store to get a local SIM card. The local SIM works better than the T-Mobile card, but is only about 80% reliable.
Even when I can connect to a network, using a whole new set of apps is not trivial. For example, in China, cash is a thing of the past. Instead, folks use WeChat or AliPay to pay for stuff. But when I tried to pay for a new helmet (my old one didn't make it here), AliPay failed, saying I was in an "insecure paying environment."
"You don't know the half of it," I thought. But the kind vendor pulled up a chair, poured me a cup of hot water, and told me to stay calm and take my time. Ultimately, he had to fish his point-of-service credit card machine out of deep storage. He warned me, though, to be careful with such devices, as vendors can very easily overcharge by entering the wrong amount.
(Update: I later learned that merchants must opt into accepting AliPay payments that are backed by an international credit card, and many merchants don't know this and have not opted in.)
The next day, armed with a helmet, a local SIM, and a completely empty stomach, I rode 12 miles to a new hotel on the south side of the city. My first hotel, the Sheraton, was one of the nicest I've ever stayed in, as the American dollar goes a long way in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. But getting through the city takes a while, and I wanted to get closer to the town I was aiming to reach tomorrow.
By Chinese standards, Ürümqi is a small city, with only 4 million people. To accommodate all these people, rows of high-rise apartments line up like dominos, arenas and civic centers bloat and soar over multiple city blocks, and city streets stretch six to eight lanes across. To discourage any more Uyghur uprisings, the police presence is overwhelming, with cameras at every intersection, a police station every two blocks, and riot gear at the ready in restaurants and shops.
Despite its size and police presence, Ürümqi often manages to be charming. Quaint markets line leafy boulevards. Round-shouldered mountains peek through the smog. The few English translations are sweet and welcoming. People smile back when I smile at them.
When I arrive at my new hotel, I learn that no one on staff speaks English. They fumble with registering me with the police (Chinese hotels are required to register foreigners.) Worried that the registration hiccups are upsetting me, a twentysomething desk clerk offers reassurances using a term of endearment that my app translates as "Beauty." The staff admit that I am the first American to stay in this hotel, and they seem tickled.
I then notice that, on a shelf in the lobby, one of the knicknacks is a stack of luggage labeled "U.S. Route 66." I smile to myself at how both huge and tiny the world is, with ribbons of highway tying it all together.
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