One month on the road!

To celebrate our first month of travel together, we all decided to have some stomach problems. Mike joined in a bit early, but obviously didn't feel like being a part of the team on this one, because he quit quick. Ubul's mom made some special corn gruel to help us at the family restaurant down the street. After, we spent some time outside of town by a large river. I wasn't feeling well, so I sat on one side and sketched. The rest of the guys and our taxi driver jumped in for a swim. There were all kinds of kids and adults (all male) swimming in the river. As I sketched a lane off to one side, a crowd of 15 kids crowded around to watch. When they left 15 more came by. It was pretty funny hearing their voices and picking out a few words here and there. I showed them the sketch from time to time as I worked on it. It was funny, but cool to share with the kids. After I finished, I passed it around to the kids that were around me and one gave me a "Yakshi" and a thumbs up :). We spent some more time at various spots around the river before rushing back to get our things and jump on the bus to Kashghar. Mike parted ways for a bit to do his own thing, and we'll meet up with him again in a few days. It was a pretty sad goodbye to Ubul and his family. Even with language barriers etc, we really felt close by the time we left. Particularly Ubul, who made time for us and was just so much fun to be around. He is one of the warmest, kindest and funniest people we have met on our trip, and being here with him and his amazing family has been one of the best times in the whole trip.