ANDREW LIMBONG, HOST:
All Abduweli Ayup wanted to do was start a school. He's a Uyghur linguist who specializes in Turkic languages. After years of studying abroad, he returned to his native China in 2011 and started teaching young Uyghur kids about their language and culture.
ABDUWELI AYUP: I had my kindergarten. At the beginning, it's good. Like, people love it, send their kids. And then I didn't - actually, I didn't expect that, but it became modern language movement. People started to ask the rights, and they wanted to practice their culture. So then it caused big trouble.
LIMBONG: Trouble, meaning he was surveilled by the Chinese government and eventually detained for more than a year, starting in 2013. Ayup's got a new essay in The New York Review of Books about his time in prison, and he says, on the inside, the Uyghur language was forbidden. Also, inmates were subject to demeaning moments. Like one time, he and other prisoners were chained up and transferred to another unit.
AYUP: The chain is really big and when you walk, it will hurt your ankle. And, like, after a few steps, it started to bleeding. But you have to walk quickly because those guys from behind you shout. And if you fall down, it's big trouble because you fall down. The entire line will fall down, and then you will be beaten.
LIMBONG: Ayup eventually got out of prison, fled China, and he currently lives in exile with his family in Norway. But he still thinks about prison because his brother and sister are among the more than 1 million Uyghurs currently incarcerated in China.
AYUP: Like, every time I think about them, I think about my memory. I'm not free at all because I have those memories with me. And then, like, my brother's imprisonment, my sister's imprisonment still kept me in the shackles - not physically. t's mentally. It is really hard because of your two siblings were there and having that life still. It's really hard to forget about it.
LIMBONG: Yeah. I'm sorry about that. In prison, the Uyghur language and culture was forbidden from being expressed. And you write about the ethnic tensions that existed there. You write, quote, "it occurred to me that China's minorities were at the mercy of a totally ignorant majority." Can you tell me a little bit more about what you mean by that?
AYUP: I think it's because of the education. Like, the education in China, they use the ideology that Han Chinese - the majority, 96% of the people - are builder of this country, and they are civilized, and they are supreme, and they are with long history, and they have to help ethnic minority like Uyghurs and civilize them. And that's why in the cell we have that treatment.
Like, for example, when we talk about, yeah, like I - when I was young, I played this game, and something like that, those Chinese persons said, do you have those games? Wait. Do you know how to play those games? Yeah. When I was young, we played that electronic games. We have. But in their expectation, in their mind - that we have never touched TV and we have never touched, like, motorcycle or car or something like that. In their imagination, we are riding horse and riding camels and eating, like, a wild fruit all the time and something like that. So that kind of imagination, in their mind, affected their behavior.
LIMBONG: The Chinese government maintains that the Uyghurs are just being held in reeducation camps, and they deny that, you know, there's any forced labor or torture taking place. How do you respond?
AYUP: Yes. If it's related to education and what is my brother doing - like, he's working there, solar industry, and my sister, she's working for textile industry. What are you doing there, and why can't we go to visit? Like, why U.N. reporters can't visit those places? Why we can't talk to anyone? For example, my family members or my friend Ilham Tohti or other people who are working there - why we can't visit? Education should be like this. Like, we have education five days a week, and in the afternoon they can go home. But people there 24 hours, 360 days, what kind of education is that?
LIMBONG: This goes even so far - like, the Chinese government will try and police the Uyghur diaspora - right? - those who have fled. How so?
AYUP: Let me tell you. Like, in Europe, we have more than 30 Uyghur schools. But now we have only two left. We have only two. In Norway, we don't have Uyghur language school anymore because of people afraid of being surveilled. Because if you send your kids to school, and your family members in China, they will be questioned because of your behavior. How do they learn? Because of the app you installed in your phone. Why do you install that app? Because if you want to contact with your family, with your mother and father. That simple.
LIMBONG: That's the only way. Yeah.
AYUP: Yeah. And then people afraid of coming together. They afraid of participate any cultural activity. There is no Uyghur cultural activity anymore. That's really sad.
LIMBONG: You now live in exile in Norway. Do you think you'll ever go back to China?
AYUP: Yes, I will. I will go back to China and I will see my brother and sister. And I will break those walls, and I will save them then because it will not be the case. Why millions of people are in the camp? Why? That's why I'm fighting for. I will see them. And also, I will see Xi Jinping at the court. I will see those guys who oppressed my people, my sister, my brothers, they are in the justice court one day. And we will see them. I believe that. That's my faith.
LIMBONG: That's writer and linguist Abduweli Ayup. His piece in The New York Review of Books is titled "A Thornbush In The Desert." Abduweli, thank you so much for sharing your story with us.
AYUP: Thank you for having me.
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