Riding the Iron Rooster

I stayed in Xining longer than I had planned because I liked its stuffed pancakes and snowy skies, its red-cheeked Hans and the ragged Tibetans in their greasy cloaks, who went smiling down the street. I climbed all the nearby hills—to the Tao Monastery, with its cave-dwelling monks and its temples balanced on cliffs (the whole thing looks like a wooden fire escape)—and from the tops of these hills I could see that Xining was larger than I had imagined. But the rest of the town was merely brown shoe-box-shaped buildings that had no visible function. After the snow melted, the harsh wind from the mountains whirled dust into the air. It was a terrible-looking place, but it was friendly; and I liked being the only barbarous foreign devil (yang guedze) in town.

22: The Train to Tibet

In the more remote regions of China, where people are not trusted to be orderly, the authorities devise specific drills for boarding the trains. Xining had one of the cruelest I had seen. The Hard Class passengers were lined up in front of the station—perhaps a thousand cold, impatient people in a long, shuffling line. But it was a directionless line. It led nowhere. It was formed in the windy plaza in front of the station, behind an ugly statue depicting a dozen contending minorities. That was appropriate, because the line for the train was composed of the same minorities, contending for seats.

Ten minutes before the train left, a railway guard blew a whistle, and these people snatched up their bales and bundles, and ran. They went flapping two hundred yards across the plaza, panted another hundred around the station, and wheezed down the platform to where the train sat steaming. That race sorted them out, and so there was a gasping free-for-all for the seats, women and children last.

It was a horrible train. But that was not a bad thing. It is almost axiomatic that the worst trains take you through magical places. I had a strong feeling—and I was proved right—that I would be traveling through one of the most beautiful landscapes in China. This train was dirty, scruffy and extremely crowded. Before it set off there was a fight among the passengers, as five heavily laden Tibetans tried to get into the wrong coach. No punches were thrown. It was all push and pull, and some snarling. The Tibetans smilingly resisted. The most explicit sign that it was a bad train was that it ran out of water an hour after it started. No water—for tea more than for washing—is a catastrophe rather than a simple hardship in China. But no one got angry. No one even complained. They inquired in froggy voices, and then took it without further muttering. I was impressed but annoyed. Without hot water this long trip—thirty hours or so—would be unbearable. We were headed for Golmud, in the Qinghai desert, and there the train stopped. I planned to make my own way to Lhasa, with Mr. Fu.

There was no food either. I made noodles in a cup with the last few inches of hot water. People congregated in the dining car, but nothing was served. There was a certain amount of shouting and lots of abuse, but these sounds were drowned by the rattling and clanking steam engine. There were no lights on the train either. I was exasperated, then uncomfortable, and finally bored stiff. I couldn't eat, I couldn't read. I hated the friendly honks of passengers, the yells, the squawking kids. I dug out some of my food and ate it, and wished I had more. The floor was covered with spat-out sunflower seeds.

I was in a compartment with a young man and an old man. The young one smoked, the old one spat. But they were otherwise very courteous. They were also going to Golmud. As we went along in the trembling train it struck me that we were a great distance from what most people would regard as fruitful and bounteous China. We were over the edge, way past the old Chinese frontier, four days at least from civilization and its vast, stinking cities.

The scenery was lovely. The train had risen and snaked through the mountain passes west of Xining and then had traveled down to the cold valleys. The frozen river was a startling chalky white, and it showed up clearly even in twilight, like a road covered with snow, winding through the brown valleys.

"Going to Xizang?" the old man asked, meaning Tibet.

He assumed that no one would go to Golmud to stay, and of course he was right. That was why this was the train to Tibet.