A trip to Xinjiang under the shadow of epidemic situation

The eight-day trip to Xinjiang finally came to an end. It should be said that this is an unsatisfactory journey.

Before we set out, we repeatedly confirmed that the land in Xinjiang was still safe. However, the epidemic is like the mutation of COVID-19 strain, and the speed is hard to prevent. After our flight landed at Diwobao International Airport in Urumqi, we heard that a person who entered Xinjiang the night before tested positive for nucleic acid and was sent to the designated isolation point for closed-loop management.

During the period of digital epidemic control, Xinjiang's epidemic prevention and control response is no different from that of the mainland. Since our flight entered Xinjiang, the Urumqi Epidemic Prevention Army has been deployed at the entrance of the airport, checking passengers' travel codes and health codes one by one, and doing nucleic acids on the spot before releasing them.

Before I set out from Wuhan, I only knew that Jilin and Shanghai were suffering from severe epidemics. I never thought that the remote and sparsely populated northwest border was also shrouded in the haze of the epidemic.

Guided by the local tour guide, our group bypassed Urumqi on the first day of entering Xinjiang and stayed in a hotel in Changji Hui Autonomous Prefecture, which is half an hour's drive from Urumqi.

In the next few days, the trip has started the "crossing mode"-according to the previously arranged tourist route, each scenic spot is uncertain whether it can be reached smoothly. Every time they pass a checkpoint, the public security personnel get on the bus and check the boarding code, health code and ID card one by one. Every time you enter an administrative district (city, county), you have to do nucleic acid testing no matter how you go back and forth, and you can only enter if you get permission.

In the Sailimu Lake Scenic Area, which must pass from Changji to Yining (the seat of the state capital of Yili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture), the lake is still covered with snow and ice. Due to the epidemic control, we are not allowed to enter the scenic area, so the tourist bus has to temporarily stop on the road around the lake, so that our party can take photos and punch in from a distance through the guardrail of the scenic area to show "this trip is a tour".

Although Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture has succeeded in "breaking through the customs", a large area of wild apricot trees in Xinghuagou, Turgen has not yet blossomed, the Ranati grassland is still snowy, there is no green grass and safflower, and naturally there are no shepherds and beekeepers.

Wherever I went, the trees didn't sprout, the lawn didn't turn green, and when I looked around, it was bleak and desolate.

Nearly 700 kilometers from Changji to Yili, almost all of them were spent on tourist buses. This is nothing, at least it has reached its destination.

The most cheating must go to Turpan first. We bumped on the bus for several hours and finally reached the border of Turpan, but we were told at the entrance that Turpan did not accept foreign tourists because of the epidemic control. Most people in the car have been tossed out of temper, and several "less than a week" people got off the bus to negotiate and provided the nucleic acid test results once a day before, but they still didn't release them. The tourist bus had to turn around and return to Changji.

Most of the scenic spots that should be visited in Xinjiang failed to arrive as planned, and the scenery that I wanted to see was not seen. In the words of the tour guide in Xinjiang, "it's a little early."

However, this trip to Xinjiang is not without gains.

Every step of life is not in vain, and every step is valuable. Either a lesson or a feeling.

We bumped along Tianshan Mountain for 700 kilometers on Lianhuo Expressway, the main road of the Belt and Road, and finally only saw wild apricot trees that had not yet blossomed in the mountains. Although there are regrets, at least I witnessed the vastness of Xinjiang.

Although Beijing time is unified in this land of Xinjiang, there is actually a two-hour time difference with the mainland. This season, it gets dark at eight o'clock in the morning and eight o'clock in the evening. Children go to school and leave school two hours later than mainland schools.

Unexpectedly, I have to adapt to the time difference before going abroad.

At the same time, I also felt the economic depression in this land. In the urban area, there are many closed commercial pavements with notices of sublease and transfer. Among the several scenic spots that can be accessed, there are no other tourists except a group of tourists from Wuhan. Commercial booths in tourist attractions are idle, and a large number of parking lots in scenic spots are closed in car ferry.

The only thing that makes us happy is that the little brother of the Xinjiang ground tour guide arranged this time is not bad. The descendant of Xinjiang Construction Corps, a young man born after 1985, is meticulous in his work and sincere in his attitude. Obviously, he has done enough homework to lead the team. On the tour bus, he introduced in detail the tourist destination that we couldn't reach this time without losing humor, and by the way, he introduced how these three generations, from his grandfather, his father to himself, blossomed in Xinjiang. In fact, The Past Life of Xinjiang Construction Corps is introduced in detail from the side.

In fact, after the founding of the People's Republic of China, he followed the Xinjiang Construction Corps to take root in this barren land in the northwest border, to his father (the second generation of agricultural reclamation) 60 years later, and then to himself. He went to the mainland to study at the beginning of 2 1 century, and then he struggled in many parts of the mainland by himself. After years of wandering, he returned to Xinjiang to develop. The ups and downs of this family's fate in the background of the great era is itself a book with complete plot, depth and worth reading.

This is also the most affectionate place for me to wait for a group of mainland tourists from afar.

Perhaps this is the biggest gain of my trip to Xinjiang!

Before I left Xinjiang, I still felt that this trip through Qian Shan was very frustrating and disappointing. After boarding the plane home, I gradually felt relieved. After all, affected by the epidemic in recent years, it is not easy to travel all over the country. According to the tour guide, he lost his job after the COVID-19 outbreak in 2020. Forced by his livelihood, he had to do short-term jobs everywhere to earn living expenses. Tourism in Xinjiang improved slightly last year. However, from last year 1 1 month to the end of March this year, no group traveled to Xinjiang. We are the first group to travel to Xinjiang this year.

I can see that his efforts deserve his luck. Although I was wronged at home for five months, I came out to work again. I can understand that as a man who is the pillar of a family, there are old people and young people in the world. If he is unemployed for a period of time and has no income, how much psychological pressure is there.

The tour guide not only has good professional quality, but also speaks and does things carelessly. Knowing that everyone is euphemistically covering up their disappointment in this trip to Xinjiang, he said shrewdly, "I will try my best to help you find food and make up for the beautiful scenery you didn't see this time. Consider it a trip to Xinjiang!" Welcome everyone to come to Xinjiang to see the beautiful scenery and enjoy the food at a suitable time in the future! "

What are we talking about? Although we can't always blame the epidemic for our lack of hard work and unsatisfactory work, the epidemic has really hit many industries and many enterprises are on the run.

Pray for an early and comprehensive victory in the fight against the COVID-19 epidemic for the third year; It is hoped that the epidemic prevention and control supported by big data will be more accurate and effective, and the impact on social economy and people's lives will be minimized; We are expected to get out of the epidemic haze as soon as possible and embrace the flowers in spring.