Note: This post is written about events before our arrival in Shanghai in early November.

Saloman and his lovely young wife in front of their pulled noodles business off a highway in the heavy manufacturing district of Kunshan, Jiangsu, by Andy

On the road from Suzhou to Shanghai, in the prefecture of Kunshan, on one of the four-lane provincial highways on which goods from inland manufacturing bases are sped toward the ocean, sits a row of restaurants catering to truckers and other passers through the dusty industrial zone. Amid shabby storefronts, we found the familiar blue facade of a Lanzhou Pulled Noodles restaurant, here belonging to Ma Jun (马君), where we lunched on the final leg into Shanghai. After ordering a cheap lunch of noodles and stir-fry over rice, we settled into conversation with the proprietor, who instructed us to call him by his Arabic handle, Saloman (think baby-splitting king).

Hailing from a little village outside of Xining in Qinghai province, the 30 year old member of the Hui Muslim ethnic group of China didn’t exactly do any pioneering work in his trade. There are tens of thousands of Lanzhou Pulled Noodles restaurants throughout China, including hundreds if not thousands of shops just in and around Shanghai. Whereas outside of Shanghai the owners of these restaurants could come from any number of locales of high Hui concentration, in and around China’s most populous city, all the Lanzhou Noodleries seem to be run by Qinghai’ers.

Saloman, looking to become financially successful in his own, came to Kunshan four years ago with an infusion of capital from his family back home and experience from working in his uncle’s shop in Guangzhou. After two years on his own, he returned for his annual visit home to pick up the 21 year old bride his family had arranged for him. Luckily for our friend, they did him a good turn — his wife was charming despite her “veiled” manner. Since then it’s been the family of two plus a 14 year old, non-Mandarin-speaking, rosy faced boy, who came recommended from a neighboring family in Xining as an apprentice. The only contact with their own people they have these days, other than each other, is when they travel to Suzhou to visit other owners of similar Lanzhou Pulled Noodles shops.

“Our capital is limited,” Saloman admitted when I asked why he would choose the dingy little spot on the side of a Kunshan highway rather than opting for a place in the middle of urban Shanghai. I then realized it wouldn’t matter much whether they chose to live in Kunshan, Shanghai, or the moon, since they work from early morning to late night seven days a week, scarcely affording any opportunity to leave their starchy confines. Rent on the couple’s one-room restaurant, above which is a small bedroom in which the restaurateurs spend their downtime, is 2,000 yuan (~$293) per month, but would likely be several times higher were Saloman to opt for a more metropolitan setting.

“Business has been good from truck drivers and migrant workers in the factories for the last few years, but this year especially I can feel the money dropping off. Business is getting hard to do around here.” My first thought was that the couple should pack up their bags and move back to their home, which was undoubtedly a much more beautiful place, but Solamon disagreed. “There are no opportunities to make it big back home. We could open a restaurant in Xining if we wanted, but we’d make just enough to stay alive — not to mention we’d have to make some pretty good noodles to please the connoisseurs there. Pulled noodles are a road out for us.”

Pointing at a wall-sized image of a Qinghai valley on which the restaurant’s menu is printed, Solamon recalled what the couple had left behind, “At our home as far as you can see in any direction it’s just huge, blue skies between giant mountains.” By contrast, he said, “There’s nothing beautiful about this place. All the pretty places here have been developed out (被发展掉).” The draining environment, in addition to the monotony of his life on the side of the road, have Saloman starting to consider his options these days. A few months ago he visited his uncle in Guangzhou, where he first learned the noodle trade, on a scouting mission. The small family is contemplating uprooting and relocating to the center of Cantonese culture and starting afresh, if for no other reason than to break the endless routine.

Before we parted from his shop on our way to Shanghai, Saloman wrote down the address of his family back in Xining. “My family will take care of you if you go visit them! Just tell them that I sent you,” he promised, exhorting us to explore his home territory and saying he would send pictures of us to his family so they can recognize us when we arrive. Hopefully on our upswing through Qinghai months down the road we can actually find Saloman’s family and evaluate for ourselves why he’d want to leave the vast expanses of blue skies and the warmth of his circle of family for a little strip mall in Kunshan and the grind of the noodles business.