Animal market

Kashgar is famous for its Sunday Bazaar and animal market because of its silk road history. Tourists quite literally swarm the town at weekends to go and see them. I had a train to catch at lunchtime so only had time to briefly see one and had been reliably informed that the normal bazaar was just very big and touristy, the animal market on the other hand was an entirely different er... animal!
I knew it would be cool as we approached on the dual carriageway when we hit a traffic jam consisting of donkey carts. Mohammad (he spotted us again outside the hotel) fought his way through in double quick time with excellent (some might say excessive) use of his horn. He was also curios as to how many kebabs i'd eaten last night, he clearly had my best intrests at heart!

Massive bums!

At first glance the place looked a chaotic jumble of animals and men from all over the region buying and selling but on closer inspection it was well organised the first section was cows, apparently you can buy yourself a fully grown one for 5000 yuan (14 to the pound) Then came the sheep, some of these where huge, with even bigger backsides. Next was the really fun part donkeys and horses next to the area where they were all stationed was an expanse of gravelly land on which a lot of test driving was going on. Donkeys and carts hammering it around the track being watched by prospective buyers along with the occasional mongol style horse, seemingly barely broken in, try to throw its rider.

testing out the product

I could have stayed there all morning watching the old gents checking teeth and mussels of horses and folks sheering there sheep with a pair of regular scissors. Sadly though I had to leave to catch the train.
It was a fairly expensive detour to head out to Kashgar but I'm really pleased I made it, the Uighers are some of the most genuine people i've ever met and the town itself though being modernised all the time is still a great place.

Kashi, China