Dan Levin, A Desert Blooms Along China’s Silk Road; An ancient route, amid teh dunes of the Taklamakan. New York Times, Oct. 17, 2010.
http://travel.nytimes.com/2010/10/17/travel/17explorer.html?scp=1&sq=xinjiang&st=cse
Note:
(a) The above appears in Travel Section that appears every Sunday.
(b) Taklamakan Desert
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taklamakan_Desert
(塔克拉玛干沙漠; The name is probably an Uyghur borrowing of Arabic tark, "to leave alone/out/behind, relinquish, abandon" + makan, "place".)
(c) Bactrian camel
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bactrian_Camel
(PRESENTLY restricted in the wild to remote regions of the Gobi and Taklimakan Deserts of Mongolia and Xinjiang; probably domesticated 2,500 BCE in central Asia; two humps on its back)
* Bactria
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bactria
(d) Hotan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotan
(和田 in China but 和闐 in Taiwan; also spelled Khotan)
Known from the Han Dynasty until at least the Tang Dynasty as Yutian (Chinese: 於闐), the city was capital, Kingdom of Khotan 於闐國(56–1,006 AD). (For example, 《史記大宛列傳》：「漢使窮河源，河源出於闐，其山多玉石」.)
(e) The noun "race" in "Turkic race":
"1: a breeding stock of animals
2a: a family, tribe, people, or nation belonging to the same stock"
www.m-w.com
(f) Muztagh Ata
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muztagh_Ata
(Turkic 'ice-mountain-father'; 慕士塔格峰; 7,546 meters)
(g) The Jewish surname Levin is Slavic form of Levi. This explains why the author conjured images of bagels and Jerusalem.
(h) Yarkand County 莎车县
(i) chador
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chador
(j) I simply can not find Chinese translation of Altyn Mosque.
(k) Eid al-Adha
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eid_al-Adha
(literally Greater Eid; to commemorate the willingness of Abraham (Ibrahim) to sacrifice his son Ishmael (Ismael) as an act of obedience to God, but instead was able to sacrifice a ram (by God's command); 10 to 13 Dhu al-Hijjah)
* Literally meaning ‘Possesor of the Pilgrimage,’Dhu al-Hijjah is the twelfth and final month in the Islamic Calendar. It is in this month in which the Hajj Pilgrimage to Mecca takes place.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dhu_al-Hijjah
* Eid, an Arabic term meaning "festival."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eid
* Muslim holidays
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muslim_holidays
(There are two main holidays in Islam, Eid Al-Fitr and Eid Al-Adha)