Beneath Watchful Eyes

Today, I defied the advice of many concerned friends and went to a Uygur neighborhood in Urumqi on the anniversary of last year’s ethnic riots; but I must admit, after learning more about the racial tension in Xinjiang, I walked around with some apprehension.

I exhibited my tourist identity – a camera hanging down my neck, spotting a colorful tubular buff as headwear, and speaking in limited Uygur language that I picked up in the past week. But what difference would that make? In the eyes of the locals, I would be a Han Chinese tourist from another province.

Oddly enough, when I walked down a lane with many roadside stalls and stopped to buy some cookies from a Uygur vendor, the middle-aged woman asked if I was a journalist. Perhaps, no Han would have any business to stroll down a street full of Uygur, and with security forces in every corner.

Apparently, quite some tourists who owned a SLR camera have been mistaken as a “professional” and asked the same question. A few days ago, I met a tourist from Thailand, who claimed to have been detained by the police for some two hours, as he was being suspected a journalist.

“The officers were polite but questioned me over and over again, hoping I would ‘confess’ I’m a journalist. I have no idea why they targeted me, may be I had remained at one spot far too long while trying to capture a good shot,” he told me when we bumped into each other at a restaurant.

The funny thing was, after we had finished our meal, the restaurant owner asked the same question again: “are you two journalists?” Perhaps, the question came about because both of us had been snapping pictures a little too eagerly during our meal?

I recalled some days ago at the guesthouse where I put up, I overheard the manager informing the staff that if any foreigners with “journalist visa” checked-in, they should alert the police immediately. I wonder if the same instruction had been delivered to all the shopkeepers and street vendors as well, why were they so keen on looking out for journalist?  

Today, as I walked around the part of town under tight surveillance, I was extra careful not to point my camera at any of the security personnel at work, I didn’t want to risk a detention or have my camera confiscated.

The security personnel – they belonged to various units judging from the uniform they wore, some were policemen, some army, some special forces – must have been given very specific instruction on what to look out for on the anniversary day, as I noticed in one area, just under the nose of the police, illegal money changers were going about their business without any interference, these black market activities were obviously not on the list of enforcement this time around.

July 5, 2010