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Life of 'Urumqi Jones' steadfast work, not adventure

By Lin Yong (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-05-18 10:20

URUMQI: For Yidilisi Abuduresule, the life of an archaeologist is not much like that featured in Indiana Jones movies.

"Behind the stereotype of fantasies, adventure and thrilling finds are years of strenuous research, time-consuming and even boring field work for a real-life archaeologist," he said.

A senior Uygur archaeologist and former head of the Xinjiang Archaeological Research Institute, Abuduresule is better known as "the desert fox" among locals, colleagues and foreign collaborators.

Abuduresule has paid the most visits to the Lop Nur area - China's "Bermuda Triangle" comprised of the great and mysterious Taklimakan Desert, the second largest shifting desert in the world.

And he has acted as a key member in almost all major archaeological findings in Xinjiang over the past three decades, including the ruins in Niya, the tombs in Loulan and the Keriya River Valley.

After graduating in 1977 from Northwest University of China, Abuduresule decided to spend his life as an archaeologist.

"I was always interested in the unknown chapters of human history," he said.

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The interest eventually developed into a passion for discovering the past glories of the Northwest.

"Xinjiang was a vital part of the ancient Silk Road. It has a rich legacy from the active East-West interchange in ancient times. Xinjiang is a place of great archaeological finds," said the experienced archaeologist who has had quite a few narrow escapes from death during his decades-long career in the deserts.

Any mistake in preparation or direction in the sands can lead to disaster, he noted.

When they ran out of food, Abuduresule and his colleagues have eaten toothpaste. When clean drinking water was gone, they made do with water contaminated by rust.

"The toothpaste tasted fresh and cool which is good for keeping us wide awake at critical moments," he joked, admitting that his tolerance of hard conditions enabled him to stay in the desert as long as six months.

The gray-haired archaeologist looks hale and hearty, although he suffers from chronic ailments such as gastric disease and has collapsed twice at excavation sites. But "I am not worried too much about my health - I know how far I can go after all these years of outdoor life", he said.

"What I care about most is whether we can spot more ancient ruins. And I forget my physical suffering when hitting upon exciting archaeological finds."

What gives Abuduresule most pride is the 2000 discovery and research into the Xiaohe Tombs.

The Xiaohe complex in the Lop Nur Desert sprawls over a 2,500-sq-m oval-shaped dune, 174 km from the ruins of the Loulan Kingdom, an ancient civilization believed to have vanished some 3,800 years ago.

To his delight, since 2003 his institute has received 420 million yuan in financial support from the government for upgrading equipment to better protect the ancient sites in the deserts of Xinjiang.