Vignettes of the World
Khiva was clean, neat and windswept. We went right by the Kalta Minor to find the Orient Star Khiva Hotel, which took over the original site of the Madrassa Muhammad Aminkhan as its place of business. The construction for the Kalta Minor was never finished …
I’d be willing to offer a bag of gold in exchange for just one look at the ancient city of Khiva. This Central Asian saying speaks amply to Khiva’s historic status as one of the most beautiful and storied cities along the ancient silk road …
At the roadside restaurant, where most tourists stopped for their meals in a vast stretch of no man’s land, we had a much-needed Lachman in hot soup. I also had the opportunity to put on whatever pieces of clothing that I had with me to keep warm. Our next stop was the Muynak Ship Cemetery.
It was extremely windy at Muynak. We warmed up again inside the Muynak Museum. Despite its small and humble collection of exhibits, I thought it well served the purpose of introducing the story of the Aral Sea.
Before the 1960s, the Aral sea was thriving with life. It was the fourth largest body of salt water situated inlands. The main products of the Aral Sea were fish and fur. There was video footage at the museum showing the fish canning industry, with images of the abundance that once blessed this now-deserted community. The fish canning factory must have employed thousands of people. The footages conveyed a sense of upbeat optimism—there was food and there was work.
Besides the fishes, the wildlife that once roamed the nature here included wild ducks, herons, swans, geese, pheasants, flamingoes, pelicans, swamp lynxes, eagles, sparrow hawks, wildcats etc.
But in the early 1950s, the Soviet Union embarked on a program to increase river diversions to expand irrigated cotton production in this region, including parts of Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. Starting in 1954 with the construction of the Karakum Canal in Turkmenistan, large amounts of water were diverted from the former fresh water sources of the Aral Sea to irrigate fields. Gradually, the origin of the water for the Aral Sea, the rivers of Amu Darya (also known by the older name of the Oxus) and Syr Darya, were cut off. Half of the flows of these two rivers used to replenish the water at the Aral Sea.
This decision of the Soviet Union had the immediate result of the sea level declining by 15 meters or so, and the surface area reduced by half. In the late 1970s, no water from the Syr Darya reached the Aral Sea, and the Amu Darya supplied only a minimal and dwindling volume.
Until the early 1990s, fish had been shipped in from distant locations (the Arctic, the Baltic and the Pacific) for processing. The loss of fish productivity sparked a collapse of the industry and employment. In the 1960s, 43,430 metric tons of fish were caught in the Sea, dropping to 17,400 tons in 1970, to zero tons in 1980, and still now. This was devastating to the Karakalpakstan people, not least the fact that the environmental damage has caused an enormity on their health.
Uzbekistan is still the largest exporter of cotton today.
There was phenomenal decline in the water level and surface area at the Aral Sea, so much that the shrinkage was observable in space. Even in the 1950s and 1960s, there was widespread awareness of the potential degradation surrounding the Aral Sea draw-down. Eventually, the water surface area shrunk to 1/10 of its original size. The Aral basin was singled out by the International Geographical Union (IGU) in the early 1990s as one of the Earth’s critical zones. Fishing stopped altogether in the 1970s to 1980s. Then the following decades came with significant desertification.
Perhaps it takes a brief explanation for how the dry-up of the Aral Sea has caused far-reaching damage to the whole habitat and the ecosystem. First of all, monocropping of any plant erodes soil, and cotton farming itself requires a significant amount of water. This resulted in the complete diversion of the two main rivers. As fields were continually irrigated on a large scale, soil fertility rapidly declined, and this prompted attempts to use increasing amounts of fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides to maintain, if not expand, cotton productivity. Many of these chemicals found their way through the return flow to the rivers, as well as to the ground water.
The cut-off of fresh water flows into the Aral Sea led to increasing salinization of both the water and the soil. To address the increasing salinization of soils, more water had to be used to flush the land of salts and other compounds. Much of this drainage water was returned to the rivers and eventually to the Aral Sea. Drainage canals were eventually constructed to divert some of the contaminated water away from the Sea into Lake Sarakamysh, a regional desert depression.
The salinity of the Aral Sea water increased to such an extent that several areas had the same salinity as an open ocean. The decreased sea levels resulted in dust storms that had both environmental and health consequences.
The sorrowful sights at the ship cemetery confirmed this process. Some ships had their steel cast bodies stripped and left with just the rusty skeletons. The gloomy day seemed to match this despondence. The abandoned fishing boats lying on a vast swathe of desert stand as the woeful testament to a once-thriving fishing industry that supported the people that took this area as their native land.
The people of Karakalpakstan suffered from severe health consequences of the Aral Sea depletion. High infant mortality rate, birth defects, widespread kidney stone issues, and throat cancer began to appear after the Aral Sea depletion. There were efforts to advocate for the Karakalpakstan people to move elsewhere en masse, but many have refused to leave their native land, despite the wholesale destruction of both their natural habitat and their means of livelihood. Of course, some have also left, and they ended up taking low-paying jobs at the bottom rungs of the economic ladder. This environmental disaster has destroyed both the habitat and threatened the survival of a whole people.
There is current effort to recreate the Aral Sea, and the water surface has indeed increased. Some wild life has also returned. While these efforts to restore the Aral Sea were met with moderate success and it takes a very long time to show results, hope goes a long way.
Descriptions on site at the Muynak Ship Cemetery
Iwao Kobori and Michael H. Glantz, Eds., Central Eurasian Water Crisis: Caspian, Aral and Dead Seas (1998).
Jacob Dreyer, A Giant Inland Sea Is Now a Desert, and a Warning for Humanity, New York Times, November 28, 2023, Guest Essay.
The Karakalpakstan State Museum of the Arts was named after Savitsky as the Savitsky Art Museum. Located in Nukus, which is the capital for the semiautonomous region of the Republic of Karakalpakstan, the Savitsky Art Museum is simply known as the Nukus Museum of Art. …
The train headed west toward Khiva. As it turned out, the desert climate of Bukhara would pale in comparison to that of Khiva. When we left the train station, we were greeted with a frigidity for which I was completely unprepared. We went from 38 …
I stumbled upon Oi! one day when I was heading over on foot to Tin Hau from North Point. I was first drawn to the beautiful red brick structure and stopped in for a look. There was staff at the help desk there and I learned something about this heritage site.
Oi! is an art space meant for community involvement, especially in being interactive. Standing on Oil Street in Fortress Hill, the building celebrates art, creativity and ideas of sustainable living by offering the space for dialogue, exhibition and respite.
At its inception in 1908, the former site of Oi! was the Royal Yacht Club Clubhouse. As such, the building’s location on Oil Street was formerly a waterfront area in North Point. In those times, the venue opened its doors only to the Europeans or otherwise very prominent persons.
Photo: These five trees at Oi! indicate the former coastline in this part of Hong Kong. After the North Point reclamation, the Royal Yacht Club had to move its venue to the Causeway Bay Shelter because the former Yacht Club was no longer at the waterfront.
The exhibition halls of today were where the yachts were repaired at the Royal Yacht Club Clubhouse.
Throughout its century-long history, Oi! has served as government staff quarters and offices. Eventually, the venue was handed over to the Art Promotion Office for restoration and re-positioning into the current space for arts and community. It being a government-led initiative for restoration, Oi! is quite different from other heritage sites in Hong Kong. In partnership projects, the Hong Kong Government would approve funding for successful applicants (usually NGOs) to conduct the restoration work, after which the NGO would take over the operation and maintenance of the venue for its own use.
The Oi! has been given the status of a Grade 2 Historic Building.
The former Royal Yacht Club Clubhouse was built in the style of Arts and Crafts architecture. First features to note are the fusion of Chinese and western style architecture. The tiled roof and the red bricks are more representative of the Chinese style, but the arched windows, white paint and doorways are western.
The building has a few sections but overall it is built in a minimalist style. This feature is shown in the fact that the water pipes of the building are exposed. There is also no adornment on the bricks.
Photo: Inside the Kitchen, people can sit freely with their own food if there is no cooking class.
In the restoration effort, the building was repositioned to imitate the idea of a home. Therefore all the different buildings were renamed in home rooms, such as the kitchen, living room, study, balcony and garden etc.
Finally, the different sections of the building shows different heights in its rooftops. One section has a double tiled rooftop as well. This aspect of the architecture provided a textured aesthetics against what used to be hills at the back of the Royal Yacht Club Clubhouse.
The Lawn at Oi! features a green urban space. On the day of the public tour, an installation by a London artist was featured in the lawn. The theme of this series of installations is People Mountain People Sea, in Chinese it is an idiom referring to the exceedingly crowdedness of a given space.
The public area features many old banyan trees and it was generously shaded. The artsy sitting area comes with distinct seating with a tray for placing food and drinks. There are two such seating areas and they are themselves artwork installations, entitled Branching Benches.
Photo: The Branching Benches is itself an art installation that has a very practical purpose.
I inquired at the small outhouse, as its appearance seems to suggest that food is sold there. However, Oi! Kitchen does not actually offer food for sale. It is the venue for community cooking classes. On days where classes are not held, anyone is free to bring a takeout lunch to sit in the comfort of a hip kitchen space and eat.
Photo: The Kitchen of Oi!
According to the introduction of Oi! on the Art Promotion Office (APO), as a venue of art Oi! maintains a vision with four substantive approaches,
Oi! Spotlight invites both local and overseas artists to showcase their work in response to innovative ideas, boosting cultural exchanges between regions at the same time; Oi! Daily hosts events and invites the public to take part in a dialogue where art becomes a part of our daily life; Oi! OnSite invites talented creators to participate in artist-in-residence programmes with the aim of reconfiguring our impressions of and feelings about our surroundings; and Oi! SoGreen sets out to inspire the public with the plants at Oi! and art programmes that help reconnect them with the natural environment by providing a taste of green living with hints of flowers and fruits.
Photo: The Glass House is a modern addition to the heritage site.
The address of Oi! is 12 Oil Street, North Point. The MTR station at which to get off is the Fortress Hill Station.
Free public tours conducted in Cantonese are available every Saturday and Sunday at 3pm. No pre booking is required, but arrive 5 minutes before 3pm at the reception area. The tour takes about 15 minutes.
Be mindful of the opening hours of Oi! The venue is open Mondays 2pm-8pm (except public holidays, when it is open on normal hours), and Tuesdays to Sundays 10am-8pm. On Christmas Eve and Chinese New Year Eve, it is open 10am-5pm. It is closed on the first two days of the Chinese New Year.
Descriptions on site at Oi!
The Public Tour of Oi!
After the Gankeng Ancient Hakka Townlet and the Dapeng Fortress, the only ancient city left to visit in Shenzhen is the Nantou Ancient City. The History of Nantou Ancient City The artefacts excavated in Nantou suggests the existence of settlement as far back as the …
Tin Hau is a haven of good food in Hong Kong. Restaurants serving Hong Kong’s favorite beef brisket noodles once sprawled in this area. The well-known one was Tai Lee. Now there are just about a couple of good ones, namely Sister Wah and Eight …
There was no need to get breakfast as eating breakfast is not my habit, but I was craving for one last good experience in Xingping. I would be leaving a little after lunch that day. At that hour of the morning after I returned from sunrise viewing, the only place that was open was the Shanzhong Suiyue Bakery (its name means “Times in the Mountain.”)
In this early morning the cafe was just getting ready for the day and the aroma there was overwhelming and mouthwatering. I ordered first a bagel in black sesame and paired it with a osmanthus flower coffee. Soon, the staff brought out another tray of pastries, fresh from the oven. I couldn’t resist so I ordered another hot monsieur. The ambience was peaceful and chic, totally the thing to do in an old, revitalized city.
The osmanthus flower coffee left me with a sweet taste of Xingping. Its fragrance gave me peace and comfort, a kind of zen that transcended the hectic schedule of this trip. I must say that the coffee experience in Guilin was fantastic. There are all kinds of creative interpretation of coffee in Guilin (including litsea in Yangshuo and the rice milk and osmanthus flower here), and that certainly is a memorable experience for a coffee lover.
Before heading out on the bus to the Yangshuo Station, I stopped by a restaurant to get a quick bite. I ordered a bamboo rice.
I liked the bamboo rice of Yangshuo much more than this one. The sticky rice in bamboo was not really my thing.
I was leaving for Hong Kong from the Yangshuo High Speed Rail Station. One critical reminder for trip planners is that the Yangshuo Station is not close to Yangshuo, but in Xingping instead. From the Xingping bus stop (right by the ancient town area), the bus runs twice in a given hour, and arrives in the Yangshuo HSR Station in less than 20 minutes.
When I arrived in Guilin, I caught the headwind of a cold front there. It was significantly colder than when three days earlier, and the weather turned fierce with rain, wind and frigidity at the same time. As it turned out, a terrible cold current causing heavy snowstorms in other parts of China was about to arrive on the day that I left Guilin.
I was simply fortunate that the day to see the best of Guilin in Yangshuo was very sunny at the Li River.
Finally, I would like to share some of my insights about this travel experience in Guilin. This would be the first trip outside of the Greater Bay Area for me in years. I can’t even remember the last time I traveled to China beyond Guangdong Province. Needless to say, there has been a pandemic and it does change things.
The feeling that I got when I interacted with the Chinese was that China certainly has changed significantly, be it a consequence of the COVID pandemic or not.
First of all, as much as all of the places that I visited were tourist areas, there was a significant lifting of hygiene standards. All of the towns were well-kept. The public bathroom in Huangyao was speckless, so clean that it felt like home.
Secondly, in all of the places that I visited, I felt no pressure, none at all, to buy or to haggle over anything. Souvenirs, snacks, clothes, in any kind of store – nobody cared to engage in the back-and-forth just so that the tourist buys a little something. Where I had some questions, I sensed that the shopkeeper had all the patience of the world to explain things to me. The interactions were very pleasant throughout. This seems to arise from the fact that China’s economic conditions have improved, propelled, to a point of changing the mindset of the people, especially those that run businesses.
There is also generally a very good observance of no-smoking policies. People do not really bend the rules now on smoking. Smoking is banned on all trains, and many standard hotel rooms do not allow smoking inside either. There is also (generally) no smoking in the restaurants as well, and overall the environments in all of the ancient towns were very pleasant.
Finally, people do not overcrowd the waiting areas too much. Queues are naturally formed at all check-in points, and there is a palpable sense of civility, well, generally speaking. I say this because I had lived in Beijing two decades ago, when things were, to say the least, “a little wild.”
It was not so much that people were uncivilized then, but more so that the public facilities now are much more “people-focused.” Large, clean, open waiting areas with plenty of chairs to sit in—as a result, people probably do not feel the need to “fight” for things, such as personal space or a spot on the train, so to speak. In most of the public venues the structures are built with the vision that enough provision was made to accommodate the sheer size of domestic demand, and then some for the tourists. Of course, these could all still be flooded with crowds during China’s busiest holiday seasons of the year.
In this environment, the element of “adventure” is somewhat tamed, along with some of the old, typical annoyances of a populous developing nation. I embrace progress with just a little nostalgia here, but surely that I will travel to China regularly from now on.
At the hotel I inquired about a private car ride to take me to Xianggong Shan for sunrise viewing. After a day, I was told that there would be no one else to join me on this ride, and therefore I would be fully responsible …