- 3 days ago
In the first episode of this thrilling series, photographer Nico de Rouge from France, architect Hasnaa Rhazlaoui from Morocco, and historian Neil Schmid from America kick off their expedition to Xinjiang by kicking off their boots and taking to their skis. Then, having enjoyed the thrills and spills of the unique on-piste culture of Altay in northern Xinjiang, they make their way south in more leisurely fashion in the company of migrating herdsmen, taking in a fascinating archaeological site on the way.
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00I don't know where they're taking them.
00:10That's quiet.
00:11And the light of the sun is like so agreeable.
00:15Looks like the best place to take a nap.
00:18I'm going to a particular site nearby called Dundabalaka.
00:30It's a collection of prehistoric rock art.
00:33It is remarkable because it has the earliest depiction of skiing that we have in the world.
00:43I feel like a man.
00:48This is a geography that's more attuned to nomads,
00:53earlier hunter foragers.
00:55It is like a candy store for a historian.
00:58Being here is very different from other travels that I took around China.
01:03I feel like I'm the lead of the herd.
01:06I'm really at the frontier of the frontier.
01:09It could be very inspiring to see what's happening, what's arising,
01:12all the opportunities in the future.
01:15In this project, I'd like to show the diversity of cultures.
01:19How those have shifted over time.
01:22How new cultures have grown up here.
01:24Woo!
01:25I've never seen skiers that close.
01:27Oh my God, I had it on my face.
01:29The frontier of China.
01:31The heart of Eurasia.
01:33I'm in Homu village at the northern tip of Xinjiang, all the way west of China.
01:52Near the border with Kazakhstan, Russia and Mongolia.
01:56My name is Nico de Rouge, I'm French.
01:59I specialize in reportage and documentary photography,
02:03which takes me around the world.
02:05I heard that first skiing is a very old tradition,
02:08and that is how people actually started skiing in the first place.
02:12People from my country almost assumed that it came from us,
02:15that it came from Europe.
02:17I'm looking for Malitin.
02:22He's the man around here.
02:23If I want to know more about the first skis,
02:26where it came from, and if it still exists today.
02:29Oh my God, I've never done this before.
02:35I'm so excited.
02:37I'm Hasna.
02:38I come from Morocco, from Casablanca.
02:40I came here to China to be working in architecture.
02:44I'm in Cucutu High Ski Resort.
02:46It's on the Altai Mountains,
02:48very close to the Mongolia border in the far north of Xinjiang,
02:52known for its high altitude drops in all China.
02:55You have ski grasses in Sweden.
02:58Why you came so far to this place?
03:00I actually live in Shanghai right now.
03:02Okay, right.
03:03So I'm trying to figure out the best place in China.
03:07This is over my expectation.
03:10Hello.
03:11Hello.
03:12I come from Xi'an.
03:13Xi'an.
03:14Do you know the Terracotta Warriors?
03:15Yeah, I do.
03:16Yeah.
03:17It's your first time to go down the slope?
03:18Yeah, yeah.
03:19Yeah, I can watch you.
03:20I'm not skiing, I'm just watching.
03:21Okay.
03:22Bye-bye.
03:23Woo!
03:24She's doing it.
03:27Makes me want to learn skiing.
03:28Why didn't I learn skiing?
03:29What was I thinking of?
03:31Yeah.
03:32Yeah.
03:33Yeah.
03:34My name is Neil Schmidt.
03:35I'm an American and a historian of China.
03:37As a researcher, I work at an archaeological site in Dunhuang.
03:50I'm here, 40 kilometers south of Altai city.
03:53Going to a particular site nearby called Dundabalaka, a collection of prehistoric rock art.
03:59And it has the earliest records of human skiing in the world.
04:02It has the earliest records of human skiing in the world.
04:05It has the earliest records of human skiing in the world.
04:10Today, I'm here to meet Zhang Huixiang, the specialist in rock art, and makes copies of rock art using traditional Chinese methods.
04:17much easier in the world.
04:18You can see the easiest block art using bunny-styleить the topic.
04:24Look.
04:27This is natural like this.
04:28I am used to flee.
04:30Oh, right.
04:31Was it the first time I saw?
04:32Yes.
04:34The next time we saw it.
04:36Where am I on?
04:37There are 4 foot.
04:39Here comes the sidewalk.
04:40senhor mustity them in this direction.
04:41Yes.
04:42super smooth. Even this stick, I don't really know you have to twist your body. It's very
04:48different from the two sticks that I used as a kid when I was skiing, right?
04:55She's like flying. Look at this. Hello. Hello. Hi. Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you.
05:02We learned skiing. I'm here to meet Subinor. She's a young girl being part of the Xinjiang
05:07branch, the National Alpine Ski Team. Subinor. That's a beautiful name. Why does it come from?
05:13It means light? Yeah. It's the same in my language. How many years have you been training?
05:20Can you believe I never skied before? You've got to be patient with me. I don't know how to ski. I've
05:30never done this before. No problem. I can help you. Okay. Okay. Let's go. Oh, my God.
05:38That's exciting.
05:39Hello. Hello. Hello. Should I have one? Yes. If you are here, I can.
05:47You can see the snow will not stay on the ski. You'll go away. These are straight and
06:01these are curvy. What's the difference? I feel like a man. That looks professional.
06:17Oh? Okay, go. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
06:27Okay, we got it.
06:37Don't hold it. Cool.
06:47We got it, we got it, we got it.
06:49We got it, we got it.
06:51Yes.
06:53Where are the trees and other places?
06:57It's not a tree, it's a tree.
06:59What are these trees?
07:01They're from the Chinese era.
07:03Going back a few thousand years, there's not much material record,
07:07so we really don't know the people who created the petroglyphs.
07:11But it's likely that there's a continuity from culture to culture over thousands of years.
07:16Okay, I feel like this is getting a bit better.
07:18On the way up for now?
07:20Seems okay.
07:22The way down is going to be another story.
07:25There are four people in the fourth row.
07:28Two people in the middle are in the middle.
07:32This is a group of rules, including his movement and movement.
07:37And there's a bridge.
07:40How fast?
07:43How fast?
07:44How fast?
07:45You're really good.
07:46Look at that fat dog.
07:47It's a big狂狂.
07:49Hey, hey, do, do, do!
07:51Wow!
07:52Here we are in the mountains.
07:53We don't see anybody on horseback, so skiing would have been the most effective way to hunt.
07:58You can imagine hunter-foragers coming down the slopes on skis, herding these horses and these oxen in a mass hunt.
08:07All the animals are facing to the right, give it a kind of animation.
08:11It's almost like we have an early version of cinema.
08:14The story of early man.
08:23Let's go.
08:24Everything the exact same.
08:25No good.
08:26No good.
08:27No good.
08:28No good.
08:29No good.
08:30Like this.
08:31Can you just stay here like this, please?
08:34Okay.
08:35How do I stop?
08:36Yeah.
08:37Okay.
08:38Triangle.
08:39That's going fast for me, stop it all.
08:55Coo la, koo la, we're skiing.
08:57We're skiing, we're skiing, we're skiing, we're skiing.
08:59Oh my god, stop it all.
09:02Stop it all!
09:03Stop it!
09:05Stop it all!
09:08I made it!
09:10I made it!
09:12I made it!
09:14This is my team.
09:16Hello, hello.
09:18How are you?
09:2014 years old.
09:2212 years old.
09:24That's a beautiful team.
09:30Now that you have confidence in that you are talented,
09:32that you can do very high scopes,
09:34what are your ambitions for the future?
09:36Do you want to play in the Olympics?
09:38I really want to participate in the Olympics.
09:40Yes.
09:42How many years do you think you need to be able to go to the Olympics?
09:46Six years.
09:48Six years?
09:49Yes.
09:50When I'm young, I can participate in the next tournament.
09:54This is my goal.
09:56This is my dream.
09:58Is it you?
10:02Maritin.
10:04It's almost like you.
10:05You're right with me.
10:06Yes.
10:07I'm the first one in the Olympics.
10:09I'm the first one in the Olympics.
10:11You're in the Olympics, right?
10:12Yes.
10:13In Homo, does everyone know how to use these first keys?
10:18We're seeing here in the Olympics.
10:19With this type of wonder,
10:20I don't know how to use it.
10:21This is what you're seeing.
10:22When you're here,
10:23the very old size of goldm地 isn't one-onerated.
10:25There's a lot of goldm地 that's been used by goldm地.
10:29I guess it's bluem地 and goldm地.
10:34Mr. Zhang wasn't able to do printmaking in Dundabalaka, because the types of images are painted and not carved.
10:42So we went to another site called Dulata. You can actually see these images carved into the rock.
10:49This is a year ago. It's about $8,000, $1,000. It's beautiful, but it's too expensive. It's too expensive.
11:02It's not going to change the world. Let's find another place to find out.
11:10When we saw the house, the house got to the house. The house got to the wall.
11:17The house got to the wall. The house got to the wall. And the house got to the wall.
11:23The house had to be a wall. It hadn't seen. It was a wall.
11:28Oh, this is what you found.
11:31The girl.
11:33I've seen you.
11:35I've seen you.
11:37These animals have been extinct in this area for 15,000 years.
11:47They're much, much earlier than anything exists here, also anything that Mr. Jiang had seen.
11:54So your dad taught you everything about skiing.
11:58Now that you are a dad, how do you plan on passing the tradition along to your child?
12:06Our children are 13 years old, and our children are 9 years old.
12:12They also have the old化石.
12:15And the old化石 is also the old化石.
12:20Wow, if it's dried, you can become a real scientist.
12:28This part of Xinjiang hasn't been explored by archaeologists, in part because it's distant,
12:32but in fact, there's incredible material that gives us a window onto lives 10,000 years ago.
12:38We can see this ancient knowledge that's been passed down from the Bronze Age all the way to today still being used in a very, very similar way that it was thousands of years ago.
12:53Just a few days ago, I was in the snow, experiencing fur skis in the Altai region.
13:03Now, I'm in Huocheng, in the Yili-Kazak Autonomous Region.
13:07As you can see, spring is here.
13:17I'm here in the Bordala Valley, in the far northwest of China, heading up to an archaeological site called Adun Chaolu.
13:24This Bronze Age site is unique because it has both tombs and dwellings.
13:30We see the further development of civilization, with pastoral nomads keeping animals, as opposed to the hunter-gatherers of Altai.
13:37I'm here to meet Aira. He's a young Kazakh man, about my age, from a nomad herder's family.
13:50And the time of the transition has come. He's going to help his parents to take the sheep from the winter pasture to the spring pasture.
13:58I'm in Yining, a major city in northern Xinjiang, which has a great and important history.
14:24I'm here to meet Mrs. Kim Esbuli. She's the owner of Tesbula.
14:31It's a quite known company here locally that operates with yorts.
14:35As a family, it's a youthful people. They really like the sheep, the sheep, the sheep, and the sheep.
14:40They make the sheep, the sheep, and the sheep.
14:44They put their sheep on the ground, or put their sheep on the ground, and put their sheep on the ground.
14:49I'm in the best place ever.
14:54I feel like a real Kazakh.
15:00This is the IPA house.
15:04When we were in the investigation, we found a few buildings in this area.
15:08Professor Tsong Dexin has been working here for over ten years.
15:11Since 2011, they've excavated numerous tombs and also a couple dwellings.
15:16So a couple dwellings.
15:18The first view is that it has a difference between the sheep and the sheep.
15:21Especially in the middle of the forest.
15:23At that time, we saw that it was a place in the house.
15:25When we opened the door, we opened the door.
15:27We had a fire and a living area.
15:30It's more confident that it's a living room.
15:33It's a living room.
15:34It's a living room.
15:35It's a living room.
15:36It's a living room.
15:37It's a living room.
15:38It's a living room.
15:39It's a living room.
15:40It's a living room.
15:41It's a living room.
15:42It's a living room.
15:43It's a living room.
15:44We have this new дум around.
15:45It's our dietary room.
15:46It's not just a living room.
15:47It's a living room.
15:50When we arrived, Ahir's mom and dad were there waiting for us.
16:06And seeing them coming out of the house and greeting us almost felt like I was in a movie.
16:16Their winter house was a very small house.
16:19The way they have power is through a solar panel on the roof.
16:22Niko!
16:25Niko, you can see this house from the local farmers in冬天.
16:30We found a interesting phenomenon in the research process.
16:33We can find the same place in the olden times,
16:37there must be a local farmers' house.
16:45Look at this view.
16:47There's Chinese Cowboy over here.
16:50包括他們的選址。
16:52石頭房的住人的周邊是用高大院牆圍圍起的生樹圈。
16:58那麼我們推測,這可能跟現代的這種居住環境。
17:01有某些地方是一致的。
17:03Sut!
17:07I'm almost ready to be a cowboy.
17:10好!
17:11可以教我一些高大院的聲音嗎?
17:16可以,可以,可以。
17:18好,那我試一下。
17:21Shh, shh.
17:23Let's try it.
17:25Shh, shh.
17:27The sheep are following me now.
17:29I feel like I'm the lead of the herd.
17:31Not for long.
17:33I don't know what it was.
17:35Maybe the horse that they gave me was perfect.
17:37But I felt like a real cowboy.
17:42When you see the design of a yort,
17:44you wonder about the hands that made those pieces of art.
17:48Mrs. Kim brought me into the workshop
17:50and allowed me to meet her embroiderers.
17:53I hope I'm not going to ruin it.
17:57Hey!
17:59I have two and three of them.
18:01This is a very few people to travel and travel.
18:06If there are them, I don't want them.
18:10Eventually, we made it to Sairam Lake.
18:12Sairam Lake is nicknamed the last teardrop of the Atlantic Ocean.
18:16The reason behind this is the warm flow of air
18:19from the Atlantic Ocean hitting the Tianshen Mountains
18:22and creating that lake.
18:24This warm flow is also bringing spring with it.
18:27That's why the Yili Valley is the place in Xinjiang
18:30where spring comes first.
18:32The Irish family keeps on herding the traditional way
18:35because it represents the relationship with the people.
18:37The Irish family keeps on herding the traditional way
18:39because it represents the relationship between them and the animals and nature.
18:44The Irish family keeps on herding the traditional way
18:47because it represents the relationship between them and the animals and nature.
19:05The Irish family keeps on herding the right.
19:14The Irish family keeps on herding the right.
19:15We use the right to touch the left and our roads.
19:17The Irish family keeps on herding the right to the right.
19:22The excavation revealed bones that they were able to carbon date, giving us an indication
19:29that these people were here about 3500 years ago.
19:35Although people and old people were not the same,
19:39they were the same.
19:46Thank you, Hayto.
19:48Ira and his dad just had a meal, stopped for a little bit to have a rest.
19:52They're going to keep on the journey.
19:54I'm going to stop here, and I'll meet them tomorrow at their destination.
20:02I felt sad to leave the sheep.
20:04But at the same time, a little bit relieved that I was not going to have to stay on the horse for the whole night.
20:10It was getting very cold in the mountains, and I'm not a real herdsman.
20:16This is the mixture of the modern and the traditional one.
20:21After getting to know Mrs. Kim and her designs better,
20:25she took me to meet her son, Kulan, the software genius of her creations.
20:31That's a metallic structure, not a wooden one.
20:34Because it's really big.
20:35If you use the wooden structure, then you'll have some safety concerns.
20:40But I see a wooden frame in the inside, right?
20:42Yeah.
20:43Well, it was quite impressive that he was taken, again, like his mother, but in his own way.
20:47He was playing with the rules of the Europe, turning it into something more modern.
20:52What made you decide to go back in your hometown while you were studying and graduating in such a big city as Beijing?
20:58You could be successful there, too.
21:00I love this kind of modeling and rendering job.
21:03I'm the big son of my mom.
21:05I have the responsibility to come back.
21:08You're proud of it?
21:09I'm proud of it.
21:10Oh, my God.
21:15I love this light here.
21:17I love this light here.
21:18I was born in my grandmother's house in the house.
21:23I was born in the house in the house.
21:25I was in the house in the house, and I saw the house in the house.
21:27I don't think I'd be better than the good people in the world.
21:33I feel like it's a beautiful thing in my heart.
21:36Everyone is always loving it.
21:37I've done it.
21:38I'm not the best.
21:39I'm the best.
21:40I'm the best.
21:41I'm the best.
21:42They're coming.
21:43Hello, my friends.
21:44Hello, my friends.
21:45Hello.
21:46Hello.
21:47Hello.
21:48Hello.
21:49So how would you say yours in the Basak language?
21:52Kazan?
21:53Yes.
21:54It's a home.
21:55It's a home.
21:56It's a home.
21:57It's a home.
21:58It's a home.
21:59It's a home.
22:00The beginning of the spring is also the time for the Noru's festival.
22:04To celebrate this festival, the family was having a big meal.
22:09They offered some pastries, sour milk, horse meat.
22:14It's good.
22:16It's good.
22:46You don't speak sometimes the same language, but you still connect just with the energy,
22:58with the voice, with the eyes.
22:59So you connect with some stranger and you still feel like you're similar.
23:07I feel like this brought me back to my roots, to simpler things.
23:12We really don't know too much about these ancient people, but clearly there's a continuity
23:22that existed thousands of years ago that's been passed down all the way to today.
23:27All of these provides points for reflection.
23:40When people came to realize and understand the uniqueness of Xinjiang and the range of cultures
23:45that came together, it was a real revelation.
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