Great Success!

Contrary to my general opinion on long-distance buses, I enjoyed the ride from Urumqi to Almaty very much.

The best part was that I was leaving China, which I was fed up with, mostly due to unbearable train rides of inconceivable length, the frustrating pursuit of a baffling girl, Kafka-esque visa processes, a long-ignored desire to move westward, and the overwhelming omnipresence of gray sprawls and humanity.

The bus had only two rows of bunks, making each wider and more comfortable than the three-rowed buses I had previously been on in China. The passengers were Kazakh, making them less prone to spitting, screaming on cell phones, and smoking on the bus.

Leaving Urumqi, I felt wonderful, thinking that I had gotten a lot out of the city, and I had nothing to regret about leaving. Reclining on my bed, I watched as a young boy clomped through snow in shoes far too large for him. Two pairs of beautiful Uighur girls approached each other on the street and kissed the others on their cheeks in perfect unison. I said goodbye to Chinese characters, BYDs, and filthy icicles.

I had plenty to read, the 1200 dense pages of Atlas Shrugged, and a headlamp to light up the pages when the sun fell.

Exiting China through their border, I was once again held up, my passport scrutinized, the supervisor called over to clear me. I expected it at this point. Entering Kazakhstan, a guard pulled me aside, filled out my form for me, and had me skip everyone else in line. “Welcome to Kazakhstan!” another said as he waved me through the exit gate.

It seemed like as soon as we got into Kazakhstan, the sky was blue and there were snowy peaks in the distance. We passed untamed open land beyond lines of trucks waiting to clear customs and get into China.

The weather changed from spring warmth, to gusty winds, to rain, and eventually snow.

The people on the bus were nice to me. I stood out, but not as a freak to be gawked at, but as someone to be interested in. People talked to me instead of wordlessly taking my photo, and one guy bought me a meal at a rest stop because I hadn’t changed any money yet.

When we arrived in Almaty, snow had begun falling. I had the phone number of a CouchSurfer, but no address, and no phone on which to call, and no money with which to buy a SIM card. I wandered around in the darkness for a bit before some of the passengers insisted on putting me into a sort of taxi. They threw some luggage into a massive van, and a kid drove me to an ATM, then let me use his phone to call my host, and dropped me off, no charge.

Not a bad welcome into Kazakhstan.