Crossing over from Uzbekistan to Tajikistan was relatively simple—It was one of the least busy borders I’ve ever seen. A German guy named Vincent whom I met at my hotel was heading to Dushanbe as well and decided to tag along with me a day earlier than planned. I was happy to have the company and a possible partner to share the car costs along The Pamir Highway. We took a minibus to the border post which. The driver asked for 2,000 each but I emptied my pockets, showed him the 1,400 or so I had left and shrugged my shoulders—I love a country where you can pay what you have in your pockets. It was a quick ride to the border where we were escorted in front of the handful of babushkas waiting. Most guards are so bored that they will do anything just to get a look at your passport. This got us to the front of the line and into an empty border control building. The army guard actually asked me to take a photo of him (I didn’t have my camera out) before a group of 21 Japanese daytrip tourists waltzed into the building and lined up in front of us. The guard wasn’t up for an audience (usually taking photos at borders is a big no-no) and he wasn’t able to get the two of us in front of the Japanese. We loudly complained about tour groups until the last man in line struck up a conversation in perfect English. He entertained us with a bag of magic tricks he brought with him, which was a really great idea for dealing with all the begging children when traveling.

I was nervous about the crossing because Uzbekistan is notorious for searching your bags. If any money above the amount declared on your customs for is found they usually ask for a bribe to let you off. Vincent and I waltzed through as if we had no bags at all and crossed the no man’s land before they could change their minds. The Tajik side of the boarder had no permanent structures at all, only a few shipping containers, one of which was painted in a warped children’s impersonation of camouflage. Guards took our passports inside and we soon had a bright red Tajik entrance stamp in our passports. At the next container a man took our passports and grunted when we admitted to speaking no Russian and no Tajik. He let us go, no questions asked and we piled into a minibus to the closest town, Penjakent.

Our driver had a little TV on the dashboard showing music videos. He told me that he got it in Uzbekistan for $70. I can’t imagine a Tajik minibus driver having $70 to spare. All of a sudden we were negotiating with the driver of a car for the ride to Dushanbe. It was getting late and we wanted to get to Dushanbe before dark if possible but I knew the ride was anywhere between 8 and 12 hours. I stuck with $25 each and the driver came down quickly. The only problem was that the car was full of blankets! They told us there would be four passengers but I didn’t see how we would all fit with a back seat piled to the ceiling with blankets. We pulled away and drove to the driver’s house back in town where he let half of the blankets and we both used his surprisingly clean squat toilet. The driver kissed a baby goodbye (I assume his kid) and we set off with only two passengers. We didn’t stop for about 30 minutes and were almost thinking that we were going to have the car to ourselves. Of course not! We pulled into a tiny village, passing women walking along covered with long white scarves on their heads. The driver must have had these passengers arranged in advance and after the entire family and the neighbors came out to say a prayer at the car we were ready to go.

The ride to Dushanbe was long but incredibly beautiful. We didn’t realize that the mountains would be so high in the West of the country. The other two passengers thought we were a bit silly for taking so many photos but they also seemed a bit proud of their country and pointed out some of the more beautiful views. We had to stop every once in a while, once for a flat tire and then quite a few times to tighten everything up. The little car did remarkably well on the mountain roads but driving that high up was pretty scary at times.

We were dropped off at the edge of town, like usual and were shocked at the asking price of the taxi drivers. We later found out that taxis are expensive in Dushanbe and we got a pretty good deal for $2 to the other side of town. I was pretty grumpy when we arrived at Hotel Dushanbe and were told there were no $10 rooms available. The woman at the desk suggested we try a $50 room, but we stood there long enough in disbelief that she gave in and sent us walking up to the 4th floor with two $10 rooms. Like in Soviet times, a woman sits at the end of each floor and holds all of the keys. When you leave you must leave your key with the floor lady. They are a bit confused by us and said we sleep too much because we weren’t up at 7am like the other guests.

The reality is, there’s not much to do in Dushanbe. I spent my entire first day in the city looking for the Kyrgyz Embassy and then waiting for the consular to come back from lunch and then back from the airport. The Lonely Planet Guidebook’s coverage of Tajikistan is spotty and although the Kyrgyz Embassy moved 5 years ago it is still in the wrong location on the map. I walked around for two hours before finding the Uzbek Embassy who’s guards told me there was no Kyrgyz Embassy. I then went to The US Embassy, which was an empty shell of a building in a residential area. The people in the area confirmed it was The US Embassy even though there was no flag, no sign and no street number. I thought there were pretty paranoid until I realized that it had moved as well. I saw the Swiss flag across the street and ducked in to ask for help. Luckily a man working there knew the Kyrgyz Embassy and drew me a map with a few other people translating into English. While I was there I picked up am amazing map of The Pamirs (the only one apparently) so i killed two birds with one stone.

When I finally arrived at the Kyrgyz Embassy I was told they were at lunch and to come back in two hours. I went to eat and make some photocopies before coming back at 3pm when I was told that the consular was at the airport. I sat outside with two Iranian men who had been rejected 10 days in a row. We talked a bit about Kyrgyzstan until they were finally let in, only to be rejected again. When it was my turn the young doorman asked me why I was alone. I explained that my friends either don’t like to travel or can’t save the money or time. As we walked up the steps into the Embassy he looked over and said “don’t worry, I’m here.” The consular spoke a bit of English and allowed me to fill in the paperwork in his office. I’ve heard it would take two days to get the visa but he looked over at me, sighed and said “express service!” while grabbing his stamps and scribbling out a visa for me on the spot. I think I was asking too many questions and he just wanted to get rid of me.

That same evening I was also able to contact the local man who was arranging my GBAO Permit. Everyone needs a permit to travel in the Easter area of the country and I had applied two weeks prior via email with Stan Tours who had also arranged my Uzbek LOI. With the permit and visa in hand I was as good as ready to go. The only problem was that Vincent thought it might be faster to get the GBAO in Dushanbe and that wasn’t the case. Having a travel partner for The Pamirs is worth the wait though and I told him I’d stick it out until he got his permit and we could travel together. Soon Daniel, an Australian guy on a very similar trip to my own, turned up and we had a group of three.

I spent my time in Dushanbe going to a rather overrated museum (the biggest Buddha in Central Asia isn’t so impressive) and managing to find something somewhat resembling postcards. When I mailed them today I had to argue with the woman for 5 minutes until she accepted them as postcards. They were more like photos printed on cardboard, but it’s the closest thing to postcard available here! Considering it only cost $2 to send 9 cards I figure it’s worth the gamble to see if they show up in a month or two. I also finally met up with a Canadian guy who lives here and has been emailing me advice for the past 6 months. It’s always funny to meet someone you’ve only emailed with, especially when you meet somewhere like Tajikistan. My Pamir partners and I met up with him and his girlfriend at an Ecuadorian place which I think has the best food with the biggest portions in Dushanbe. I ate mostly Mexican and even had an okay piece of chocolate cake.

Vincent’s permit should be arriving any day now and Daniel’s already set off for Khorog, where our trip along the amazingly remote Pamir Highway will begin. I will definitely be out of contact until I pass through The Pamirs, through Kyrgyzstan and back into Kashgar, China so hang tight until early October!

There’s a new Uzbek post up about Nukus and Moynaq backdated here. Where, you ask? I guess you’ll just have to read it to find out. Some little part of me really hopes that someone out there reading this is learning a little about geography.

Did someone say souvenirs? here you go, Korea, Mongolia, China and Kyrgyzstan.

And as if you couldn’t ask for more, the rest of my Uzbek photos are up in the Uzbekistan Gallery.

After a day of driving through the mountains I’ve made it to Dushanbe, the capital of Tajikistan. I haven’t had time to look around yet and today will be spent searching out a Kyrgyz visa (so I can get back to China), possibly registering with my embassy for my mom’s sake and picking up my GBAO permit to travel around the Pamirs. I can’t believe I’m actually in Tajikistan!

Getting to Bukhara was more straight forward than my trip to Khiva. The son of my hotel’s owner drew me a map to the bus station and I walked out of the city walls into the new city. Unfortunately, the bus wasn’t leaving for a few more hours so I decided to spend a few dollars more for a spot in a shared taxi. Walking back toward the taxi stands I ran into a middle-aged French couple looking for a taxi as well. They spoke to one man who agreed to take us, but there was a misunderstanding because he just drive us to a share taxi stand right back at the old city gates. We bargained with a few drivers and the French man, Claude, agreed to a price to Urgench where we could catch a taxi to Bukhara. But from my vantage point I saw that the French man was saying three and the driver was holding up five fingers. Once we were packed in the car I brought out a piece of paper and pen and asked the man to write the price down—he wrote 5000. I spent 800 on the way in with the locals so I knew that wasn’t right. If course the Claude was upset and wasn’t going to have any of it so we got our bags out of the trunk and looked for another taxi.

As soon was we were out of the car Claude stalked over to me, pointing his finger and saying “you made a mistake” in a thick French accent. I was confused and looked around, thinking that I left my bag in the car or dropped some money or something. But he went on to yell at me for asking the price in the car. I tried to explain that the guy never said 3,000 and that I saw that it was going to be a problem but Claude didn’t believe me. I just laughed, knowing I was right and said “whatever dude.” I left him negotiate with the next taxi and hid my grin when he asked to borrow my pen and paper.

In Urgench we were ushered into a minibus by a Japanese girl traveling alone. She said we just needed a few more passengers to leave and the price was great at 7,000 each instead of $15. The girl seemed to know what she was doing so I left the communications up to her but when I overheard them talking I realized that her English wasn’t very easy to understand, just like the French couple. Sometimes when this happens I try to butt in and “translate” because, like it or not, the American accent is one of the most recognized forms of English because of movies and TV. I don’t think that other people realize how hard their English is to understand. Some of you who know me might be laughing because many people in the US can’t understand me because I talk really fast and low. You wouldn’t recognize my travel accent at all because I slow to about 1/4 my normal speed and annunciate really well. Even Claude and his wife commented that I was one of the only Americans they can understand. The way I see it, I’m lucky other people are speaking to me in English since I don’t speak their language and I want to make it as easy as possible for them to communicate with me.

Anyway, the Japanese girl’s comments aside, I realized that we were waiting for more people. After an hour one of the other passengers called her friends to come along and we set off. Halfway through the trip I wished I had paid for a taxi because the bus went slow, had horrible shocks and was stopped by every police checkpoint while the Nexia taxis drove through. My usual bad luck held true when I realized that even at noon the sun was on my side of the van (how could that be?) and I was roasting the entire ride. The tourists all paid 1,000 com to make the bus take us to our hotels instead of the edge of town—a deal worked out by Claude and not a reasonable price at all. My first choice was full so I asked the driver to take me to a new address. He dropped me off on the other side of the tourist area and pointed in a direction. He seemed very confidant and quickly took off with the Japanese girl to her hotel. I soon realized that this was just a random spot he picked because my hotel was nowhere to be found.

Some taxi drivers pointed me in the right direction but I had no idea where I was going so I decided to walk into the main area which seemed to have many hotels. I asked for rooms at three hotels but they were either full or only had a room for one day. Then I decided to try to find a hotel recommended to me and set off down a little dirt street with the right name. No one I came across had heard of the hotel but they pointed me further on when I showed them the address. When it started to get dark and the houses stopped having addresses on the street I headed back toward town. At this point I was covered in sweat and my thighs were aching from walking up and down with 40 pounds on my back. Although the town was full of hotels I resorted to my guidebook to find some down the alleys which might not be full. I passed by Claude and his wife eating dinner and they recommended their hotel they found so I headed down the alley. Their hotel was full as was the next one. The third hotel down the alley had rooms but they were $30 a night. It was 8pm and I hadn’t eaten lunch. I was tired, hungry and fed up so I negotiated $25 with him and threw my bags down in search of food. The hotel room was a splurge but it’s really hard to find anything under $10-15 in Uzbekistan even if it’s not worth it. This room had wood floors, plenty of electric sockets and a shower with sliding doors that I could sleep in. I haven’t felt that much water pressure since I left home—the soap actually washed out of my hair!

I spoke to another B&B the same night who promised me a room the next day, but when I came in the morning they told me no one had checked out and I couldn’t stay. I took that as a sign that I was meant to stay at the nice hotel and settled in. The breakfasts were amazing and I soon realized that I was one of only 3-5 guests staying there while I sat outside in a decorated courtyard eating apple pancakes and drinking coffee (with milk!). The only drawback was that I was right near the entrance and if there were other guests I was woken up in the morning by their conversation. When I locked the heavy tumbler on my door to leave, the staff would be standing behind me with his hand out for the key as I turned around. I felt a certain lack of privacy because of the attentiveness of the staff. The cleaning woman even folded my pajamas and stacked my books on the bedside table for christ’s sake! I usually want my books in a certain place or pajamas not folded. Even if I really didn’t care if they were folded once someone folds them without my permission I definitely don’t want them folded. I had to mess up her attempt to organize my mess whenever I entered the room.

Bukhara’s old town is architecturally preserved like Khiva, but with more life and character to it. Canals run through the city and stone pools are built around town, which used to supply the city with all of it’s water. The main gathering spot is a sunken courtyard with canals on either side and medressas facing each other at the ends. Ancient trees still stand, not surrounded by plastic chairs and eating platforms for the many tour groups that pass through. Following the canal down the street you come to an old stone bazaar building with a domed top, and four huge arches leading out. These bazaars are located at the junctions of roads and you can only imagine how lively the area was before it became one long souvenir stand. At this point I’ve come the realize just how touristy Uzbekistan is. The entire country is filled with tour buses carting around mostly French tourists. I can’t explain why there are so many French tourists here but the locals are learning French to better sell to the tourists and I was taken aback when I was first addressed as “Madame”. Most people still whispered “germania?” when I passed, thinking I’m German, but the French tourists actually addressed me in French, as if it is the universal language English is.

The next morning I decided to change some travelers checks and walked into the new town to find the main bank. The guard at the entrance demanded my passport and after scrutinizing my picture looked up and said “Arnold Schwarzinager!” The woman inside the bank tried to give me dollars but I asked for the local currency. When I asked to change $100 she smiled and said “Fifty, okay?” They probably didn’t have enough com to give me $100 worth.

I wanted to spend some time drawing my first full day in town so I set off to Char Minar, described as “a photogenic little building” and walked around the maze of dirt alleyways until I found it with the help of some locals. It was mostly peaceful, surrounded by houses and a few shops. Every once in a while a tour group would walk up, take some photos and leave. I sat around drawing the Arabic inscriptions before an old man invited me to see his house. His courtyard was covered with grapes and he climbed up a ladder to grab me a bunch. I took my grapes to the front of the building and sat in the shade to draw. The local kids scurried over to ask for pens or “bom boms”, which I think is candy. I laughed each time a kid asked for a pen because they would say “a pehnis?” which sounded like “penis.” Then when they asked for bom boms and it all sounded a little dirty.

One little girl brought me an tiny wooden box to sit on and she sat beside me watching me draw. Eventually I gave her a scrap of paper and a pencil and she began to draw as well. We sat there drawing as tour groups passed and locals walked by curiously. Another girl and her brother also hung around but they mostly seemed interested in “a pehnis” or stealing my chapstick. After my only pencil went missing they lied very well, pretending to look for it and shrugging their shoulders. When the two girls started whispering to each other, even though I don’t speak their language, I knew they were conspiring against me. A pencil isn’t expensive but I was annoyed because I don’t know how to say “pencil” in Russian and there aren’t pencil shops lining the streets of Uzbekistan. Buying a new pencil in a foreign country can be more difficult than you’d imagine.

I spent two more days walking around Bukhara, wandering around the old winding mud brick alleys and staring at the detailed tiles on the front of the countless medressas. The buildings were much more spectacular than Khiva and I was impressed by the system of canals and bazaars. What really impressed me the most was the details on the wooden ceilings often inside the courtyards. Colorful details with flower or geometric motifs alternated between ceiling panels, many with recessed star-shaped insets.

I ran into my Swiss friend again, who I’d met in Bishkek on two occasions and then stayed with in Tashkent. I suspected we’d cross paths again and it was good to have some company. She had found another Swiss traveler in Samarkand and the three of us managed to find a cheap Italian restaurant, which was welcome considering I’d been eating only shashlyk (meat on a skewer), plov (rice with carrots and meat) and lagman (noodle soup with meat) since Tashkent. Central Asian bread is great but the rest of the food is a bit oily, a bit meaty and really lacking seasoning.

I was happy to find the two girls to hang around with for meals because the previous night I had been forced to eat with a very short French man who got creepier as the night wore on. I started out by myself and was looking forward to some time alone to finish my drawings. Some kids came by selling paintings and we looked at each other’s work. during the commotion the aforementioned short French man happened along and asked to sit down, I assumed to look at the kids’ paintings. I shrugged and went on with my conversation. Only, when the kids left the man stayed and before I could ask him to leave he was ordering dinner. I should have gone ahead and worked while he sat there and I tried to hint that I was working but he didn’t budge. His English was mediocre at best and I found it was when he stood up that I realized he was practically a midget. He was walking the same way and stuck up conversation again until I told him I was going to the shop and shook his hang good night. He had given me his hotel phone number earlier and actually said “I’ll be looking forward to your call.” I almost said “gross” out loud when I realized he actually thought I might be interested in a man 15 years older, a foot shorter who doesn’t speak my language. I flat out said that I was busy and wouldn’t be calling him and watched him walk off in another direction.

In the shop I was stalling, waiting to make sure the might-be-midget was gone when the drunk at the counter decided he wanted to buy me a beer. The shopkeeper was on my side and told the guy to calm down when I heard “careful” in a French accent beside me. It was the French man! I looked over thinking “yeah, careful of you, stalker” and turned my back until he couldn’t stall any more and left. The shopkeeper laughed a little, seeing that I was avoiding the guy and I headed back to my hotel in a roundabout way to make sure I wasn’t being followed. Sometimes it’s good to be alone and sometimes it’s good to have someone around just so you aren’t a freak magnet.

I saved The Ark, a fortress for the old ruler until my last day in town and was really disappointed. The price list started at over 4,000 for one person and decreased for bigger groups. I’ve never heard of attractions having bulk price discounts before. Luckily there was three of us (the Swiss girls, not the French freak) so we got in for a little over 3,000—still a high price for one attraction. Inside were displays on the historical significance of The Ark, a few costumes, a few books and a lot of souvenir shops. In Uzbekistan all of the government run monuments ahve souvenir shops inside so while you’re looking around you are constantly approached by woman putting shawls on your head and saying “pashmina, pashmina, only $10… acoodah?” Each town has different souvenirs but Bukhara seemed to have the most of any Uzbek town I visited. Large bedspreads with embroidered flowers called suzannes were common as well as ceramic plates painted with blue and green details. I didn’t buy either so the actual inside of The Ark was pretty boring to see. The majority of it is ruins which you can only see by bribing a guard to let you peer over a wall. I’m not much for bribing guards so I only saw a few exhibits and a lot of suzannes.

Bukhara was interesting to see, but for some reason these more tourist towns don’t feel comfortable and I’m usually happy to leave. Uzbekistan seems to be full of places I’m “checking off” as I make my way toward Samarkand and eventually Tajikistan.

Could it be? There’s new maps up! Okay, the Mongolian flag sucks and there’s no data for NW China or Kyrgyz but it’s something. If it makes you feel any better, I took a ton of souvenir and sketchbook photos for the relevent sections but haven’t gotten around to writing the code and resizing the images yet. It’s coming eventually.

I really have to remember in the future not to tell hotel owners I’m a graphic designer. Sometimes they actually know what it means and then they always ask to make then a logo/brochure/web page. Today when I got back from drawing at the mosque the owner of my hotel asked to see the drawing. She put two and two together and quickly rummaged through her desk to pull out her current marketing materials for me to review. She really wants a new identity system. Don’t we all!

The problem with not saying I’m a graphic designer is that I hate to lie. Partly I hate to lie because I think it’s stupid and people should know the truth. But really I just have a terrible short term memory and forget who I lied to, who I told I was Chinese when they asked me where I was from and how I’m going to keep it up.

Even though I may only stay in a town for a day or two people remember things you say. Every time I walk by the man I bought postcards from in Bukhara he yells out “hey, Chicago!” Peole in Uzbekistan also talk. In Nukus I was “talking” to some women selling dried fish and they seemed nice so when they asked where I was from I was honest. Five minutes later, when I was walking through the covered baazar, a woman comes running by yelling “Americanski, Americanski” at the top of her lungs. I hadn’t talked to this women but word had already trickled down.

I know this is going to shock you all… but there’s new photos up! I finally found a good internet connection in Bukhara and just spent three hours working on the site for you guys instead of siteseeing. I’ve gone on to post about Uzbekistan but am working on some stories about Kyrgyzstan for you as well. Check out the two new galleries (Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan) here.

It’s funny because when I was walking around for more than an hour looking for a hotel last night with 40 pounds on my back I was trying to figure out what was making my bag so heavy. When it comes down to it, my beloved 4lb iBook is the heaviest thing in my bag followed by my camera, my other camera and all of the assorted cords, plugs and adaptors. Every time someone tries to pick up my bag for me I try to warn them but they’re always a little shocked (that it’s so heavy and that I can carry it). In any case, all of those things are what make this site possible. There’s no way I would have time to sit down and write entries or organize images without my computer.

My iBook also helps me to feel a bit more connected to my other life back home. As a designer I actually really enjoy sitting down and drawing the maps for this site in Illustrator as much as sitting outside and drinking a beer or going to a tourist show. On that front I’ve started to feel a strange uneasyness lately and I’ve realized that it’s my body telling me it’s time for the fall TV season to start. I’m already going through withdrawl not knowing what’s going to happen on all of my shows. If course, I went through the same thing during Phase 1 and I’m sure my friends back home can keep me in the loop until I can catch up when I get back home.

Getting to Khiva should have been relatively straight forward—a bus to Urgench and then a 45 minute taxi ride to Khiva. I bought a seat on the local bus to Urgench in Nukus, knowing it might take a little more time than a taxi, but with more space. I was almost an hour early and had to wait with the other passengers inside the bus to reserve my seat. When I asked a man to take a photo of me and the other back seat passengers another man came bounding down the aisle from the front of the bus and literally sat on top of me and the man to my right to make space for himself. As you can see from the photos, I was the only one to be squeezed out because Uzbeks have an amazing ability to take up as much space as possible and not budge. The man grabbed my arm, held it up in the air and then kissed my forearm. I was not too happy with his concept of personal space but he wasn’t moving even though there were other seats toward the front.

Luckily, the bus broke down after only 30 minutes and the man next to me went outside to pretend to help. After sitting for another 30 minutes I saw our driver flag down a car and get a ride back to town so I knew it would be another hour at the very least. Soon an even more dilapidated bus pulled over and I somehow slung my heavy bag over my shoulder and ran to catch it before the other passengers filled it up. Most people decided to stay and wait the first bus out but I decided that saving $1.50 was not worth waiting for hours.This bus had a few bags of produce lined along the sides for seats and a group of brightly costumed women sleeping on the floor at the back. A 19 year-old guy next to me took me under his wing and used his limited English ability to promise we were heading to Khiva.

The second bus only went as far as the next town where we got off and waited by the side of the roundabout for a taxi. Two old gold-toothed ladiesfollowed and soon my 19 year-old guide was carrying their bags as well as mine. Our first taxi was a Daewoo Tico—the smallest car in Uzbekistan. It already had a passenger in the front so we had to fit four people in the back of a car about the size of a mini. Uzbek women are wider than you would think and with all of our hips we couldn’t even squeeze ourselves onto the bench. So, naturally, I spent the ride sitting on the woman in the middle’s lap. Ducking down, my head hit the ceiling and I felt each bump in the road.

The Tico wasn’t heading all the way to Urgench so we got out again, waited ten more minutes beside the road and†found a slightly larger car to squeeze into the back seat. This time the boy sat a bit on my lap, which was slightly more comfortable than being in the middle of an Uzbek–Tico sandwich. We made it into Urgench and started toward the market. Although he wouldn’t let me carry my own bag, the boy gave in and let me carry one strap while he balanced the load with one of the†babushka’s bags in the other hand. We walked through the market and had to ask at a few lots to find the shared taxis to Khiva. The boy was great—when the first bus broke down he told me that he would get† me to Khiva and he did. Even with all of the taxi and bus†changes I still made it to town earlier than I would have had the first bus never broke down, which demonstrates just how damn slow Uzbek buses are.

The taxi ride was uneventful and I got a front seat next to a bag of pig’s hoofs. The glove compartment opened up into my knees ten times before the driver gave up and took the bottle of vodka out so it could close properly. The vodka had been resting right on top of his Muslim skull cap. Despite all of my efforts I was was dropped off at the wrong gate to the old town and wandered around the mud walls until I found a tourist information office to point me toward my hotel. It was 7pm and I hurried to check in and eat before the free fashion show in one of the madressas. The town was just finishing up a two-day festival of free events for tourists which included a fashion show. Unfortunately, despite being billed as traditional costumes, the clothes were only influenced by Uzbek patterns and costumes and included no historic costumes. After the fashion finished we were presented with a brief show of traditional Uzbek singing and dance. One of the men was in his late teens or early 20’s and had an incredible ability to shake his shoulders. That seems to be a large part of the dancing and this man’s shoulders were almost mesmerizing.

I†only planned on staying in Khiva for one full day because I had been told it is quite small and empty. That turned out to be true and I think one day was enough time to see all of the major buildings around town and get a feel for the way the city once operated. Although the old city is now protected it has lost any character it once had as a major slave trading outpost along the silk road. The 18th century city walls reach three to four stories and include four gateways. The interior buildings are made of the same mud brick material as the walls, and the entire place just feels… empty. Empty and khaki. There are some tiles remaining on the outside of the buildings including a heavily tiles turquoise minaret near the main gate and a lot more decoration inside the structures. Even so, the town is so tightly controlled that there are only a few souvenir sellers in the old town and only a handful seem to be allowed to display anything outside of their kiosks. Normally I would applaud this but because the town is protected the only thing allowed in is souvenirs, no old men with white beards selling watermelons or brightly dressed women carrying baskets of bread around. It’s just empty.

My first night in town I had planned a route through town based on the buildings I wanted to see. Starting closest to my hotel I tried to enter a handicrafts center only to be turned away because I didn’t have a ticket. The ticket to visit most of the city had to be bought at the main gate, which was at the end of my planned route. Throwing a tiny tantrum I stomped through town to get my ticket and rearrange my route. The ticket was about $8 and the woman at the gate accepted a ten dollar bill and gave me change in com. Considering it’s technically illegal to pay for goods in dollars in Uzbekistan everyone accepts dollars, including government institutions. Besides a few hotels, a few cafes and a lot of souvenir shops the city was totally empty. Every once in a while I would turn a corner to stumble upon a French tour group, but for the most part I felt totally alone. After French tour groups the next most common groups seemed to be Spanish and I found a few groups with guides to listen in on for free.

After leaving a Spanish group behind I wandered inside the palace to find more courtyards and stumbled upon an Uzbek couple passionately kissing. I went ahead taking pictures around them until they left so I could get a good photo of the elaborately painted ceiling. On the way out I peeked into another room of the main corridor and found them again, this time even more intertwined, and decided to leave before I saw more than I bargained for.

Some of the more important buildings required an additional fee, like the Pahlavon Mohammed Mausoleum with it’s intricately designed tile work and old men praying in front of the money-littered tomb. I think the Juma Mosque was more impressive with it’s 218 carved wooden columns and uncharacteristically-flat roof. I paid a teenage girl 1000 com to be allowed to climb to the top of the tallest minaret in town for a good look over the city. My guidebook said that it afforded views of the surrounding desert but I could†only see the modern city sprawling around the old khaki walls.

After I finished visiting the buildings on my self-imposed “tour” I stopped by the main†entrance to scout out a location for my cartwheel photo. I waited impatiently for tourist to walk by so I could enlist them in my cartwheel picture-taking but no one seemed to be in the area besides a few locals selling fur hats and embroidered suzannes. Ducking inside one of the cafes I found a young woman named Manzura who spoke good English and was more than willing to take my cartwheel photo. After staring at my example photo in disbelief she asked if Icould really do that and exclaimed that I must be very good at sports. The woman here participate in few physical activities so I suppose I seemed like an athlete to her. Afterward I stayed around the cafe and talked to her about our differences and similarities. She explained that most people have gold teeth to cover up crooked smiles and that the gold caps cost much less than white ones.

At twenty one years old she’s under a lot of pressure to get married and her family is worried since she’s already turned down her boyfriend’s first proposal. She explained that he broke up with her recently because of some gossip he had heard about her being “too Western” and she now refused to get back together with him because he believed the town gossip instead of her. To complicate matters her boss is her boyfriend’s father and a close family friend. I think she’s very brave to stand up to the traditional way of life and I hope that even if she does get married she will be able to use her English skills and university degree in tourism to start a rewarding career. While we were talking we were visited by one of her friends who is pregnant and trying to continue her work as a French tour guide. Unfortunately, once a baby is born an Uzbek woman has to look after it even if she is more educated and earns more money than her husband. Of course, once an Uzbek woman is married she’s as good as pregnant. I also think that abuse is common—I saw a man hit a woman in the face during my stay in Khiva and no one looked twice while I stood in amazement debating what to do about it.

Khiva was interesting to see because it is so in tact but it really lacked the character I you would expect in a Central Asian trading post. It was my first taste of the many madressas, mosques, arks and minarets to come in Bukhara and Samarkand.

Karplakastan is a region in Northwest Uzbekistan which has had a really bad century. The entire region’s climate and economy has been greatly affected by The USSR’s draining of the Aral Sea in the 1960’s. What was once the world’s fourth largest lake has been drained to irrigate the cotton fields throughout Central Asia. Moynaq, formerly one of two major fishing ports on the sea, is now a desolate, dusty town 150 km from the sea with little employment and little hope. 

I flew into Nukus, the region’s capital, two days ago to start my travels around Uzbekistan. Because I plan to enter Tajikistan near Samarkand I decided to start from the far end of the country and make my way back East overland. I checked in early and was given a handwritten cardboard boarding pass from a stack a few inches thick. When I requested a window seat the woman shrugged and motioned that she hands them out in the order they are in the stack. One enormous man checked in and I assumed he would be seated next to me, since that seems to be my luck on this trip. While I waited to board I watched passengers carry huge boxes or plastic bags of heavy-looking goods toward the check-in desk. As far as I could tell nothing was being weighed and in addition to the enormous man I figured that we would never make it off the ground. The guard working the x-ray machine made me feel a bit better about the flight when he actually wanted to look in my bag and questioned what some of my hand luggage was. This is the first time anyone has taken a second glance at my bag on this trip, which holds all of my electronics and delicate items during flights. This includes my laptop, iPod, hard drive, SLR, compact camera, extra lens and two disposable cameras. This bag should have been questioned a long time ago, especially in Uzbekistan.

The flight turned out fine once I figured out that there were no assigned seats, contrary to what my boarding pass said, and the stewardess took pity on me and made an Uzbek businessman give me the aisle seat. We were given one roll and packets of jam and cream cheese for our meal and I read the remaining articles in the in-flight magazine I hadn’t read on the way into the country, including one on Uzbekistan’s love for Bollywood films. We departed onto the runway as the sun set and waited for our bags to be loaded onto the only baggage conveyer in the airport. I was once of the first out and quickly found a driver willing to take me to my hotel for 1500 cym. My first choice turned out to be more expensive than I thought and only had a room for two nights. The way I figured, I would go to the museum the next day and take a taxi to Moynq the following day, returning that night before leaving for Khiva. I couldn’t do that if I could only stay for two nights so I jumped back in the taxi and told him to take me to another place down the road. We seemed to be going really far back toward the airport so I made him turn around and head to another big hotel in town. He decided to take me to another hotel I hadn’t heard of but they appeared to be full. Next we went by the largest hotel in town, but the parking lot was crowded with five massive tour buses. It was no surprise that it was full. He suggested a hotel which my guidebook described as “decrepit” and “run down” so I told him to head back to the original hotel— I would just have to change my plans around a bit. 

There were a few issues I had to deal with. Although there is once public bus a day to Moynaq, it leaves at 9am from Nukus and returns from Moynaq at 3pm. That doesn’t give me enough time to take the bus for a day trip but gives me too much time if staying overnight. By all accounts Moynaq was described as “depressing” and “hostile” so I didn’t want to spend too much time there, but I did want to see it. The other option was a taxi, and I hadn’t met any other tourists to share the ride with. Incidentally, although my hotel was going to be full in two days, I was the only guest while I was there so I would have to pay the entire cost myself. I also had to keep the Nukus art museum in mind, which I thought was closed on Sundays. I decided that rushing through a depressing town was better than being stuck and adding even more days to my time in Uzbekistan. Besides the fact that Uzbekistan is much more expensive to travel in that Kyrgyzstan, I have to keep the Pamir weather in mind and need to travel through Tajikistan sooner rather than later.

I found a cafe open past eight for dinner and ordered a cucumber and tomato salad, fried dumplings, Fanta and bread. Apparently that was a lot and the customers in the front of the restaurant were trying to get back to watch me eat but the waitress wouldn’t let them. The bread was actually for desert back at my hotel where I had a jar of chocolate spread and a bottle of yellow mustard I had bought in Bishkek. That night I had my first run in with a tour group, before I realized that Uzbekistan is overflowing with tour groups, mainly French. Although the group wasn’t staying at my hotel they were eating there. I had passed on dinner there (more meat soup, ugh) and when I returned I saw the bus pull up and watched the passengers rush into the courtyard off my room. The last woman actually broke into a jog, which I laughed at until I saw how these groups operate. I walked into the courtyard less than a minute after the group and they were all already eating! I can’t imagine traveling in such a way where I literally get off a bus and step up to a waiting meal. No wonder my hotel’s manager was so stressed out. I took my bread and 1.5 liter bottle of cold Coke (Coke’s almost only sold in 1.5 liter containers in Uzbekistan!) to my room, knowing that the group would finish eating and leave as quickly as they arrived. 

I set off early the next morning to find a taxi at the bazaar. My hotel offered one for $60 but I was able to bargain a nice new Daewoo Martiz for $40 round trip. The ride was pretty boring and I took a nap in the front seat, which reclined. The ride helped out with my new v-neck shaped tan tine. The road approaching Moynaq was elevated and I saw a few dust tornadoes beside the road. The town’s sign has a fish on it, sadly, and driving into town it seemed like everyone was just standing around the main drag staring off into space. The driver stopped the car and said “photo?” He obviously hadn’t driven to Moynaq before and thought I just wanted to come to town to take a photo. I drew a horrible picture of some boats in sand and he drove a little bit more and found a boat statue in the square. I tried to explain that there were many boats outside of town but he spoke no English and wasn’t keen on my pictoral representation of a boat graveyard.

We drove around a bit and he finally gave in and asked some woman for the boats. They seemed as confused as him and explained that the Aral Sea was 150km away. The driver was mad and told me he didn’t want to drive to the Aral Sea. I tried to get him to drive further but he turned back into town and refused to ask anyone under 30 for directions. I saw a school and told him to pull over and wait—there was no way I was paying $40 to drive to a town and not see the rotting boats. The schoolyard erupted into cheers of “hello, hello, hello” when I walked in. I asked for an English teacher and was pointed to another building where older kids hung out. A group of teenage girls talked to me and had basic English skills. Someone in these Central Asian countries taught everyone that the proper response to “thanks” is “not at all.” I think it sounds a bit silly and old-fashioned and I laugh a little every time someone says it to me. 

The bell rang and I was worried that I wasn’t going to find any English speakers until the director came down the hall and introduced himself. He came outside with me and talked to my driver, explaining where I wanted to go. The instructions seemed extremely complicated for no reason and I realized that he was asking about about me and how much I paid. Looking at his watch, the director sighed and said that if he didn’t have a meeting he would take me to the boats and be my guide. Since I am only paying $40 and it’s so cheap he would only charge me maybe $20 for his services. I told him I just needed directions and the man went through another long speech in Russian. One of the problems may have been that the driver was speaking Russian and the locals don’t speak much Russian at all and some don’t even speak Uzbek, they have a local Karaplakastani language.

We found the boats, which were two minutes from the main road at the old port. My driver slept while I walked around taking photos. The early afternoon isn’t the best time for photography but my only choice for nice lighting would have been to stay the night. Some of the lower ground was soft and had a crusty salt coating. I can’t imagine what it was like to have your entire town’s economy dried up in a few years, but it was quite a while ago now and I wonder why people stay. The environmental changes have wrecked havoc on more than the economy, the entire region, including Nukus, has higher rates of cancer not to mention other diseases. 

We headed back to Nukus after an hour or so and I was happy to have a nice car for the ride. Along the way people were standing out in the blazing sun waiting for cars to pass and the driver motioned if it was okay to pick them up. I agreed since I had the front seat and figured that if he makes a little extra cash he won’t even think to complain about the price I was spaying. The people getting on were so happy and thanking the driver and me that I decided it was good we picked them up, there’s not much traffic on that road. They were probably also happy not to be stuffed in the back of a Lada. We parted happily with a handshake back at the bazaar, which doesn’t happen often. I took a stroll through the stalls, buying a comca (samosa) and taking a few photos. In the fish aisle a woman posed with her fish far away, asking for her photo to be taken. This opened up discussion with her and her friends, who asked where I was from and if I was a journalist. A few minutes later in the covered bazaar a woman came running buy yelling “Americanski, Americanski” to which few people even reacted. 

Many people in Uzbekistan carry either bread or empty bottles in old baby carriages, which I find pretty funny. They find it pretty funny when I take photos of them. I am also curious about the drink dispensers they have. All of these countries have stands on the street selling drinks out of a big container. I don’t taste them because they’re mixed with tap water and served in communal glasses. I saw new drink stands in Uzbekistan though, which hold syrup in a glass container that’s mixed with tap water with gas injected form a canister below the stand. Most people who drink bottled water here drink “sparkling” water with gas, which tastes like skunk to me.

The next morning I packed my things and headed for the art museum, which is supposed to have one of the best art collections in the country. The hotel owner told me that I could stay longer because the group had cancelled but I had already changed my plans around. It was a nice hotel, decorated in traditional materials, but not worth the $15 for a room with no bathroom and no opening windows. Even with no opening windows I had to stay up for hours to kill the handful of mosquitoes that got in. 

The museum had a students discount, which is only allowed for students under 25. I said I was 25, since I can probably pass for 20 in Central Asia. The only problem was that I didn’t realize my student ID has my birthday on it so I had to finally give in and pay the extra dollar for admission. Once again, math defeats me! The museum was worth it though, with plenty of jewelry, costumes, embroidery and even headdresses. The upper floors had painting, some of which I liked but most of it wasn’t anything special. Outside the museum was a statue of a man with a furry hat in a park with a ferris wheel and a few kid’s rides. Fall is wedding season and the square was swarming with bridal parties. Cars decorated with streamers and dolls tied to the hoods lined the street and groups walked down the sidewalk to the statue while being filmed by a videographer with a massive camera. So many bridal parties were doing the same thing that there was a line of people waiting to pose in front of the statue and then to ride the ferris wheel. All of the brides wore white dress and the men were in suits. They appeared to have a best man and bridesmaid dressed in their finest but the rest of the family was often in t-shirts and everyday clothes. After fifteen minutes of wedding watching I was satisfied with my brief visit to Karplakastan, flagged down a taxi to the bus station and bought a ticket on the next dilapidated bus South to Khiva.

My route through Kyrgyzstan and into Uzbekistan looked good on paper but in reality it didn’t really work out the way I wanted. My plan was not to backtrack, but without a Kazak visa I could not take the direct bus from Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan to Tahkent, Uzbekistan. I knew this, of course, and somewhere in the back of my mind had decided to fly a long time ago. The distance isn’t that great but the road goes through Kazakstan to avoid a large Mountain range. My other option was to head back South to Osh or Jalal-abad and cross into the Fergana Valley, but that would have taken a few days of driving and passing through Fergana, the most militant Islamic area of Central Asia. Besides, I promised the Uzbek Counselor that I wouldn’t go to “the mountains.” After all, the USA’s criticism of the Uzbek government’s massacre in Andijan a few years ago was what got it’s air force jets and Peace Corps kicked out of the country (and made my visa aspirations more difficult).

With that in mind I copped out as a “hard core traveler” and bought a place ticket to Tashkent. Of course, my plane left Bishkek at 7am so I had to check in around 5am. Luckily, three Japanese travelers at my guesthouse were on the same flight so we shared the early morning ride to the airport. There was a man near the check-in desk who wrapped my backpack in plastic sheeting, sealed it with tape and wrapped it with plastic bands to ensure it made it through the flight intact. With all of the straps on my bag it was 80 com well spent. This was wonderful for the flight but getting the bands off and my straps off was difficult without my knife, which was packed inside the bag.

The flight was full of tour groups and my first impression of this supposedly conservative country was of the flat screen TVs over the Passport Control booths showing a fashion show with barely-dressed models. My taxi driver was a very animated Russian who pointed out all of the buildings in town to me on the way to my hotel. Uzbekistan has a tradition of bed & breakfast hotels which are hard to find for under $10 per night. When I arrived and was shown to my room the man took my passport to register it with the government but when I asked about the price and said that I had been told it was $10, not $15 per room he threw my passport back at me and said no. I was pretty tired and went to sleep, deciding to work it out later. I surprised the man a few hours later when I came back down because he expected me to leave. I usually leave when someone is so rude to me but I was too tired to move all of things across town. He turned out to be very nice most of the time but flew into a rage when you mentioned anything to do with money.

The Uzbek cym (pronounced som, like in Kyrygzstan) only reaches a 1,000 note (less than $1) so I was handed a stack of bills one inch thick after changing $60. I’m a little disappointed that more people aren’t appreciating how wonderfully crisp and new my dollars are after I went to three banks in the US to get the best notes possible for this trip. With local currency I was ready to explore Tashkent and headed for the metro. I love cities but I love metros even more. Tashkent has the only metro system in Central Asia and in true Russian fashion it was built to double as a massive bomb shelter. The stations are nondescript outside, with barely any signs, but once you drop your blue translucent plastic token into the gate and walk downstairs each station opens up with a vaulted ceiling and different decorative theme. Overall, the style is a cross between art deco, early 1900’s Russian design and 70’s kitsch. Every time the train stopped I strained to see what interesting design the doors would reveal.

The only problem with the metro is that it’s swarming with Militsia. I have to keep a watch out for the green uniforms and tried to blend into a crowd of step behind a pillar if they got to close. Usually I don’t try to hide from police but the police here love to check traveler’s passports and papers and then go through all of their bags. Some palm a bit of cash in the process and I really didn’t want to deal with the whole process. Once a man called to me and I just smiled and waved. The local woman in front of me tried to tell me to back but I just gave her a wink and continued on. Most times I passed through without any notice but on my last day an officer motioned me over because I had gotten too close. I started toward him and he motioned for me to come over. Stopping I just shrugged my shoulders, patted my bag and said “niet.” He sighed and let me go. I saw other foreigners in small corridors being searched, usually men, and felt sorry that they had not been so lucky.

Sightseeing in Tashkent seemed overwhelming at first, with lots of parks, monuments, museums and important buildings to see. But it turned out to be very easy because the monuments were easy to get to near the metro and most of the buildings didn’t allow visitors so I just needed a little time to walk around. The two and a half days I spent in the city were enough to get a feel for the city without getting bored. Unlike most travelers and guidebook writers, I love massive Russian-style parade grounds and especially adore the “ugly” concrete 70’s style buildings the Russians left behind. The Palace of the Friendship of Peoples is an elaborate example of the style, which looks like a building out of the original Star Wars movies. After being underwhelmed by the other monuments in town I came back to the palace to do my cartwheel.

Both The Applied Arts Museum and The Fine Arts Museum had wonderful examples of embroidered “Suzanes” which were made for a woman’s dowery. I spent a long time drawing the small birds, peacocks and tulips that adorned the designs. The museum docents tend to assign themselves to you in these museums and stand at the entrance to every gallery, watching silently until you move and they follow with an annoying “click-click” of their high heeled shoes. I become so sick of being watched that I purposefully stood still and tried to see how long the woman would stand behind me until she gave up and moved herself. The modern Uzbek painting I saw was mostly poor mimicry of European works, but I did enjoy many of the brightly colored, almost Fauvist, portraiture from the 1960’s. To round out my cultural experience I went to the opera, something about Alexander the Great and a leopard, which was amateurish but performed with a lot of effort considering it used to be state-sponsored under the Russians. The theater held only as many spectators as performers and it was sad to see the cultural experience go to waste when the expensive seats were only about $1.25.

Luckily, the first day I arrived a Swiss woman I spent time with in Bishkek came up from Fergana (she crossed from Osh) and we shared a room for my short time in town. Not only did I have someone to go for a drink before the opera, but I also had someone to take my carthweel photo and to complain about whatever local custom was bothering me at the moment. I was sick of hearing people ask where I’m from “acoodah?” and she had a run in with her taxi driver on the way into town. Uzbekistan seemed less Russian in many ways, although I still saw many Russians in town and most people seemed to speak Russian still. The people notice you as a foreigner more so than in Kyrgyzstan and make a point of it, shouting out from far away and asking too many personal questions.

On my first night in town I was walking back from dinner in the Chorsu Bazaar only a few blocks from my hotel when a man standing in the middle of the sidewalk shifted to stand in my way. I naturally swerved to avoid him but when he changed directions again I knew he was doing it on purpose. I kept walking forcefully and stepped up onto the slightly raised concrete next to him when he moved more quickly in front of me. I kept walking while he said something to me and when I didn’t answer he grabbed my right arm which I promptly pulled away. Then he grabbed my ear and I slapped his arm away again. My left hand held a full 1.5 liter bottle of water ready to smack him in the face but he was content just following after me yelling and carrying on. I don’t often have these sort of problems and was shocked that it happened along a well lit street in front of a bus stop surrounded by about 50 men and woman sitting around gossiping. It’s nice to know that my intuition and reflexes are still there after successfully avoiding all the drunks in Kyrgyzstan with little effort. After traveling as much as I have I’ve learned not to expect so-called religious people to necessarily be more honest, less violent or more sober just because they wear a special hat and wave their hands over their faces when driving by a cemetery. Of course, with every country the capital holds a certain kind of person and I was anxious to see what more traditional Uzbek life was like on the other side of the country.