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Standing at the top of a dirt and gravel hill, past the sand-filled barriers that enclose a small base of Kurdish forces, a soldier looks through binoculars. One bridge and a body of water separate them from the so-called Islamic State or ISIS.

"Just across the river, under the bridge there is the checkpoint of ISIS," the soldier says.

We're at a checkpoint called Maktab Khaled about 12 miles south of Kirkuk, the disputed and oil-rich city in northern Iraq.

“ It's like two countries. I cry every time I cross. Iraq is broken.

- Hasna Hussein, an Iraqi whose village lies on the ISIS side of the Maktab Khaled checkpoint

Sandbags, concertina wire and armed Kurdish forces man a series of checkpoints at a crossroads between them and ISIS less than a mile away. It's the same country but feels like an international border crossing — a border that divides families, lives and livelihoods.

It used to be an Iraqi army checkpoint before the Iraqi forces fled this summer in the face of ISIS advances. Then the Kurds swooped in to the disputed territory.

Relics of the Iraqi army are still here. There are four Humvees and several armored vehicles. One is spray-painted with the words "Loyalty to Iraq" — ironic given extremists from ISIS have wrested control of about one-third of the now-fractured country.

This contested military zone is one of the last where civilians flee to try to get to the relative safety of the Kurdish north, or to return back to their families in ISIS-controlled territory.

Vendors sell cooking gas to people passing in and out of the checkpoint. Leila Fadel/NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Leila Fadel/NPR

Families carry babies and bags to walk through the dusty terrain from one world to the other.

Those bags are searched multiple times before the travelers board buses or walk from one end to the other. On the Kurdish-controlled side, the buses are driven by Kurds; on the other, Arabs.

Civilians, mostly Arab, stream through searching for safety, education or cheaper goods.

On the Kurdish side of the checkpoint, in the ethnically mixed city of Kirkuk, women don't cover their faces. But they carry the black shroud, or have it swept up on their heads, ready to wear as soon as they reach ISIS territory. There they must comply with the stringent laws of the extremists who are in control.

About 5,000 people cross this artificial border every day, a testament to the civilians caught in the middle of this fight and just trying to survive. Some are escaping airstrikes or the brutality of the ISIS gunmen.

Vendors are capitalizing on the misery. Taxis wait, calling out destinations for recent arrivals. A cigarette stand is set up to serve those who have just arrived on the Kurdish side, coming from Islamic State territory. Under ISIS, smoking is forbidden.

Men sell cooking gas cylinders for about $8. They are triple the price in ISIS-controlled areas.

Hasna Hussein carries her 2-year-old, two bags and herds her four other children on foot through the checkpoint. She is trying to get to her village, which lies on the ISIS side.

"It's like two countries," she says. "I cry every time I cross. Iraq is broken."

“ We are the living dead in Mosul. No electricity, no water, no jobs, no education and death in the streets.

- An Iraqi man who declined to give his name, on life in ISIS-controlled Mosul

She comes to Kirkuk for paperwork in the province nearly every day. But the journey is long. She's forced to walk nearly an hour, carrying children and her belongings. On the Kurdish side, they regard her with suspicion and search her bags. On the ISIS side, she cowers in her house, away from the gunmen in the streets.

"We want a solution," she says.

This place is a window into life under ISIS and how people are shouldering the burden of this new reality.

On this day, college students are streaming through.

Uday Abdullah carries pillows in a plastic bag. He used the pillows to hide his books and his ID. It's where he stuffed them when he snuck out of the ISIS-controlled city of Mosul at 4 a.m. to get to his exams in Kirkuk. He hid his books because the head of the Islamic State, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, decreed it illegal to attend state universities.

The disputed area around Maktab Khaled is one of the last passageways where civilians can travel between the relative safety of the Kurdish north and the one-third of Iraq that ISIS controls. Leila Fadel/NPR hide caption

itoggle caption Leila Fadel/NPR

"They won't allow us to continue our studies," Abdullah says.

His friend, too afraid to give his name, chimes in.

"We are the living dead in Mosul," he says. "No electricity, no water, no jobs, no education and death in the streets."

Nearby, a man and his two sisters and their children wait for their bags to be searched. He's here to say goodbye to them.

The family is divided. Ahmed Mohamed's two sisters live in Mosul and he lives in Kirkuk.

After their bags are searched, they walk to the buses just beyond the sand-filled barriers at the checkpoint.

They kiss each other goodbye and ask God for mercy. The two sisters and the children board the bus, just beyond a stretch of asphalt is no man's land. There the family will walk into ISIS territory and continue their journey.

But unlike these two sisters, going back to ISIS-controlled areas isn't a choice for everyone. Some of those seeking refuge in the Kurdish north or the disputed territories have run out of money and have to go back. They don't know what awaits them on the other side.

Islamic State

Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant

Islamic State of Iraq and Syria

Iraq

Hong Kong's leader is blaming "external forces" for helping stoke student-led pro-democracy protests that have brought parts of the Chinese territory to a halt in recent weeks.

Leung Chun-ying's statement in a televised interview on Sunday marked the first time he blamed foreign involvement for the unrest, something that Beijing has said repeatedly during the three weeks of demonstrations, according to The Associated Press.

The AP writes: "When asked on the Newsline program about a Chinese official's comments on outside involvement, Leung said, 'There is obviously participation by people, organizations from outside of Hong Kong.' Leung added that the foreign actors came from 'different countries in different parts of the world,' but didn't specify which countries."

NPR's Frank Langfitt, reporting from Hong Kong, says that many Hong Kongers view Leung, who was not democratically elected, as a puppet of Beijing. His echoing of China's line on the demonstrations is likely to reinforce that image.

Frank says after nights marked by violence and injury, the streets of Hong Kong have been peaceful, even as the protesters still control parts of three business districts. One of them, Mong Kok, has been the site of clashes between protesters and police.

The South China Morning Post says Hong Kong's High Court has ordered the demonstrators to leave Mong Kok in two cases brought against them by taxi drivers and a bus service that have suffered economic hardship as a result of the protest camps blocking main thoroughfares in the congested district.

The U.S. consulate in the city has rejected the claim of foreign intervention, with spokesman Scott Robinson telling the SCMP that Hong Kongers' desire for universal suffrage was driving the demonstrations. He said any suggestion otherwise was designed to distract people from the real issue.

Hong Kong protests

State Department

China

Across the country, cattle prices continue to climb. That means profits for some ranchers — and huge potential payoffs for cattle thieves.

Drought in states like Texas and Oklahoma caused the cost of feed to rise, forcing ranchers to sell off their cattle stock. Now that feed prices are back down this fall, ranchers are looking to replenish their dwindling herds — and since cattle supply is low, that demand is driving the cost way up.

In Oklahoma, Tulsa stockyards reported selling 4,500 head of cattle at record prices in a single day's sale this month.

With those record prices, ranchers have to be extra vigilant over their herds.

In The Dead of Night

Leon Langford runs a cattle ranch an hour south of Tulsa, Okla., where stockyards reported

"Our family's been in this business for 75 years," he says. "Taking care of cattle, all day every day."

The Langfords have a thousand head of cattle on their ranch. Recently, 19 registered purebred Herefords, worth $100,000 dollars, went missing.

That is, they were stolen.

Like something out of a Western movie, cattle rustlers trespass onto pastures and steal the animals in the dead of night.

"You know, you're sick to your stomach because you lost them," Langford says. "But when you know they're stolen, it's even a little worse. Somebody takes things that don't belong to them, it's a sickening feeling."

Since the cows were branded, law enforcement was able to identify some of the cattle.

"Nobody else in Texas, New Mexico or Oklahoma's got that same brand. And we know when we see that brand, it's our cattle," he says.

The woman selling them at an auction in Southern Oklahoma has since been sentenced to two years in jail.

"We're happy to get some of them back and we got a little over half of them back," Langford says. "I mean, all of the cattle were real valuable."

Call In The Special Rangers

When cattle go missing, the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association is on the case.

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Special Ranger Wayne Goodman with the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association, keeps an eye out at the Dublin, Texas Livestock Auction. Ron Jenkins/Getty Images hide caption

itoggle caption Ron Jenkins/Getty Images

Special Ranger Wayne Goodman with the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association, keeps an eye out at the Dublin, Texas Livestock Auction.

Ron Jenkins/Getty Images

You can find Special Ranger Wayne Goodman keeping an eye on local sale barns in Texas. With his badge, a cowboy hat and a pistol in his holster, he's the lawman there.

Goodman's job is to track down rustlers, and his work keeps him busy.

"I've got one I started yesterday where 50 calves were taken," he says. "[They] come in at night, they will honk the horn, call the cows up. They'll pull in there with a trailer, load them up and they're gone."

For some ranchers, it could be days before they realize the herd has shrunk.

That gives rustlers plenty of time to transport cattle out of state, never to be seen again. They usually take them to an auction, Goodman says, where the profit can be huge.

"If I break into your house and steal a TV set or your stereo, I can take it to a pawn shop and I get 10 cents on the dollar, maybe, if I'm lucky," he says. "I can take your cows to an auction barn, and I get dollar-for-dollar."

It's a lucrative enterprise for the cattle rustler. For the rancher, it's devastating.

"These ranchers have a lot of money and a lot of time in these animals. Some guys could lose two or three and it would hurt them real bad because a lot of these cattle are mortgaged through banks," he says. "I worked a case out in East Texas when I was stationed out there, where I've got two families who had to sell their homes because of loss of cattle."

Protecting The Herd

It seems like it'd be impossible to track down stolen animals. But Goodman says it comes down to a tried and true method of identification.

"Branding is the oldest form of identifying cattle, but it's still the most effective," he says.

In Texas, ranchers actually register their unique brand symbols.

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The surest way to show proof of ownership is with a brand. Dairy owner Pete Wiersma, shown in Idaho in 2008, displays a small branding iron intended for newborn calves. Elaine Thompson/AP hide caption

itoggle caption Elaine Thompson/AP

The surest way to show proof of ownership is with a brand. Dairy owner Pete Wiersma, shown in Idaho in 2008, displays a small branding iron intended for newborn calves.

Elaine Thompson/AP

"You have to put down what your brand is, draw a picture of it, and where are you going to put it on the animal," Goodman says. "Left hip, right hip, right shoulder, left shoulder — all of that is part of your brand registration."

They also keep track of ear tags and small tattoos inside the animals' ears. All those details go into the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Association database.

When an animal goes missing, special rangers know exactly what markings to look for at the local auction.

"We've had cases where we knew the cattle were stolen before the owner did," Goodman says.

Still, the risk of getting caught won't stop the thieves.

"There's all kinds of reasons for it. I mean, there have been instances where one young man was doing it to pay his girlfriend's rent," Goodman says. It's all about the money."

In this bull market for cattle, there's a lot of money to go around. Special Ranger Wayne Goodman just hopes the money ends up in the right hands.

On conditions on the train

It depended. We went a lot in third class because I really just wanted to sort of feel what it was like to ride the rails. And a lot of Russians who are going to see family or traveling from one place to another, they go in third class. And I would describe it, sort of, as a college dormitory. Actually, I think back, even more primitive than my college dormitory. Each little area of an open train car would have six bunks, so you'd be kind of right up against the window. And there were four bunks, two and two, and the bunks were on top of each other. Then there was this aisle where people would constantly walk back and forth and not care if they ran into your bed or anything ... And navigating these bunks was horrifying. I mean, you had to really be a gymnast — which I am not — to kind of climb up and get up onto the bunk. And it's really humiliating because everyone's watching and it's embarrassing.

Ask Me Another

David Greene: From Russia To NPR With Love

On the contrast between the open, empty countryside and the enforced intimacy on the train

Totally intimate, and it's an intimacy that I felt like I never want to suggest that I was truly getting a sense for how people live. But — you know, you go back to Soviet times- and, in communal apartments, people in Russia, they learned to live on top of each other. It was both great because families got to know each other and it was awful because there were times when families would basically spy on each other for the government. So it was both extremes. But they learned to be on top of each other, to share space. And you would sort of have to, as an outsider, have to get used to that. I mean, there were these customs. You know, if you had a lower bunk bed, if someone wanted to come in and get up to his or her upper bunk, the assumption was, you shouldn't care if I need to basically step on your face while you're sleeping to get up. That's the way this is! We're sharing this space! So you have to get used to that rhythm of life.

On the train food

There's a dining car, which makes you think that that could have some good food options. And you go there and you can sit there. Basically, vodka is the best thing to do in the dining car because that you know they will always have. They have this giant menu with all these delicious choices and usually none of them are actually available. So you sit there asking, "Oh, can I have the chicken julienne or the mushroom julienne?" "Nyet, nyet, nyet, nyet." "So what do you have?" "Borscht." "Ok, let me have some borscht." Which was fine, but — people would bring their own food on the train and share it. The first time I was on the Trans-Siberian, I was humiliated because I didn't realize that was such an important tradition. And I walked into a neighbor's train car and she waved me in and had a piece of Belarusian sausage from her family and this delicious horseradish concoction. She's offering all of this to me and all I had was a Luna bar that I brought from home.

On the Trans-Siberian versus Amtrak

Amtrak is boring now. There's really never a dull moment. There might be a Russian guy who has gotten way too hot in his compartment and has come out into the aisle. And he's in, essentially, his underwear — you know, box shorts and a tank top. And hiding a cigarette that he's sort of taking puffs of when no one's looking — because you're not supposed to smoke on the train — and gazing out into this empty landscape. But I don't get that on Amtrak. It's just these moments, and the food sharing and the conversation. There's just so much life.