Criminalisky

Mtskheta and Jvari, Georgia, August 11, 2009

It started innocently enough. I was in a little village with a nunnery, a couple of seminaries, lots of little churches, and a couple of rivers. Across the river and way up on the top of a hill on the other side of the valley was the "spiritual center" for all Georgian Orthodox believers, in the form of a cathedral that had been built and rebuilt on the site of a church built in the sixth century where St Nino... etc.etc.etc.

To get to this church, I decided to forego the 18 kilometer taxi drive around some twisty mountain roads, and walk the three kilometers (with 300 meter(?) elevation gain). THere were no roads or path, but a group of boys in the town told me I could just scramble up through the thickets that grew on the hill. So I did, in a bit more than an hour. And visited the church. And started back down.

Two minutes down the remote country road (with cows and stuff), a gray Hundai or something pulls up behind me with two real big guys in it. One gets out, smiles, and says something....I said hello, and he said something about he was not a taxi, and flashed me a card and said Police, or something. Now, you should know that one of the scams is that people identify themselves as police and do "money inspections" or other weird things that tourists end up losing. And here I was three hundred meters from the church, and an hour walk away through a bunch of brambles and weeds to the town.

The guy went on for a minute or two about something, trying to decide what language we would speak.....and we had none in common.....and then started asking me for identification. I showed him a luggage tag on my backpack. And he asked where that was, and I drew a map with my finger on the hood of his car of Moreno Valley compared to Los Angeles and the Pacific Ocean. Meanwhile his buddy gets on a cell phone and is talking to somebody in charge, I suspect. They ask me (I think) where I have been and I take out my map of the little town, and write the times I was at various places. They are talking about something about crimes, and at one point the guy points his finger like a little gun at his head and pulls his pretend trigger, and says criminalsky or a word to that effect. I knew I was not pulling out my passport and money out on this country road. So I was about ready to head back to the cathedral with the other tourists. But (after about ten minutes now) they lost interest and let me head on down the road.

I went around a curve in the road, and hid behind a bush for five minutes just to make sure they were not following me until I was really far from the church and could not be seen by the other tourists. And then I headed uneventfully back to the village.

I suspect, since I am still alive and unrobbed, that these guys really were cops. Either they wanted to warn me to get a taxi, and not walk around these hills by myself because there were criminals around, or they wanted to find out if I was one of the criminals. I will never know.

Quiet Day in Tbilisi August 10, 2009

Having abandoned my plan to get to Istanbul, I could enjoy a visit to the countryside in Georgia. This entailed some old churches, a long hike, and a little adventure that I will save for later (with the Department of Internal Affairs--the only word I knew for sure was "criminalsky," but they did let me go on the rest of my hike after ten minutes of trying to ask questions in Georgian or something).

The flower seller above was not a happy lady, it seems, but her flowers were pretty.

Caucasus

Tbilisi--Georgia, August 9,2009

I had the most wonderful ride today.

It started a little strange, when I had gotten into a minibus/taxi for the ride from Yerevan, Armenia, to Tbilisi. I had my bags on board the rickety, smelly old bus and was about to board when four guys from Ghana showed up. There was not room enough for me and them, and so they kicked me off. That means I had to wait for the next bus, which would happen when another fifteen or so people showed up. That took about an hour, but it was not so bad because it meant I got front seat. And it turned out to be a beautiful relativey new Ford van (whose speedometer read in miles,not Kilometers).

But the best pat of the surprise was that about three and a half hours later, we caught up to the other van (which had left an hour before) when they got to the border. And, to make matters worse, the Ghana guys needed real visas (not like the stamps I needed, and the nothing needed by the other occumpants of our van). So, they would have an hour delay while we skated on past. We got to Tbilisi about an hour before the van which I had been kicked off of!!! Hooray for me.

The trip itself was pretty nice. The roads were paved. Maybe not completely smoothly paved--but paved. The countryside was green and peaceful. THe driver did not play the music so loud that you needed earplugs. It was nice.

The picture today is the sun setting on a cathedral in Tbilisi.

Locked Up Abroad

August 4, 2009, Bokhara (but not posted until out of Uzbekistan)

 

You all told me it would happen. See the picture. (It is not me--just some other poor dummy locked up in a dungeon by the Emir years ago.) Judy says that a few American tourists got locked up in Iran recently. Since I had been in the mountains, I had not posted for a while. Judy does not know my exact itinerary (I don't either), and she wondered whether I might have been locked up abroad. So far, despite the above pictorial evidence, I have not. And I do not intend to be. But I have to constantly have to think about it.

 

....Every time we go across a police checkpoint (there were maybe half a dozen checkpoints in the five hour bus ride yesterday, for instance), the driver gets out, and talks to the police while we sit in the bus or taxi. Then the driver jumps back in and off we go. Took me a few days to realize that every time before the driver gets out, he puts three or four bills in his wallet/papers. I doubt they are there when he gets back and drives off.

 

....I was warned by somebody familiar with Uzbekistan that the police often pull yopu off into a side room to do a search for drugs, bombs, and such. They make you put all your stuff on the table, and you leave the room. When you come back, yhou are cleared to go. However, you do not have as much money in the wallet as you used to have. They do not take it all, just a few bills of your foreign currency.

 

....I needed to change money today. I went to the official exchange window--The rate was 1500 to the dollar. I said no thanks, and walked away. As I walked away, a rich woman caught up to me. (I knew she was rich because she had all her teeth, and they were all gold!)  She offered to change money at 1550. I said no, and we started to negotiate. We wound up at 1790. I changed $100. (A side note--the largest bill here is 1000--about 55 cents. And she only had so many of those, so she gave me a bunch of 500's--altogether some two or three inches thick of paper!!!). Three minutes later, in a rather remote part of the "Ark" (fort) where I was all alone, I saw a policeman approaching and saying he wanted to talk to me. (I'm assuming that is what he was saying.) "Oh darn," I thought, or words to that effect, "maybe I should have gone with the official rate of exchange at the government window." Turns out, he just wanted to escort me to a really remote, undeveloped part of the fort where I could get a good picture of the old city. "Panoramski!" And I said "Skolka?" and he said "Nie." And I said "No money?" He said "No Money." He unlocked the gate that led to the remote area, where he and I would be alone just after I changed $100 into local currency. I turned away and walked back to where I could find some other western tourists to hang around.

 

.....A lady at breakfast this morning said if I had an Armenian Visa in my passport, I would be denied entry into Azerbaijan.

 

.....Another person warned me to be sure to keep the entry stamps and paperwork. Not having them could be considered something illegal, and I could be fined $1000 for visa irregularities.

 

What more is there to worry about? Am I doing this right? Is this a forbidden area? What is that group of young boys doing just beyond the wall in the dark? There's always something to think about. As a Swiss lady said this morning--"You just cannot turn off your brain."

 

(PS....when I paid to visit the Zinda (dungeon and torture chamber) today, I did not pay the extra 1500 for the permit to take pictures......but I snuck this shot anyway cause this guy looked so forlorn sitting there in the dirt.I did not get caught. At least they have not come for me yet.)

 

NOTE ON POSTING--I am posting from Moscow after leaving Uzbekistan at 4:50 this morning (August 8). True to form, I was searched (actually frisked) twice, went through two metal detectors/luggage x-ray machines, had ten minutes of hassle because I could not produce the registration paperwork from two days of a hotel stop in Bokharra (He finally gave up and let me go, but looked ominous.), and had to empty my backpack in a separate room with one policeman/guard in attendance. I was not, however, asked to leave the room, and I was missing no money.

Tashkent, Uzbekistan

August 7, 2009 Tashkent

I'm tired from having to get up early to catch a flight from Khiva to Tashkent today. Then I walked around Tashkent and found out about the glories of Amir Timur (Tamarlane). And now I have to pull an all-nighter waiting for a 4:50 am flight to Moscow/Yerevan.

One of our RAS buddies has warned me not to take an Airbus, but stick to Boeing planes because they have a better safety record. Well, I have thought about it, but realize that I don't really have all that much of a say in what kind of equipment the airline is flyimg. At any rate, what would he say about the Ilyushin IL14 prop jet I took today on Uzbekistan Airlines? Fact is, the whole thing went rather professionally, and I did not feel unsafe. There was a crying baby next to me, and at the end of the flight people did not cheer and applaud (as I have usually heard when flyhing Russian airplanes). So, things were very much like flying anywhere else. And much safer than any road I have been on in the past three weeks.

Anyway--not much to report here. Another touristy day. Here is a bird I found at a mosque. This is the head mosque for most of central Asia. The head Imam here is like an Archbishop of the region. It was a very nice place.Clean, neat, fresh, and all that. Tomorrow I will be in a mostly Christian land, and in a way, with some few exceptions, the travel emphasis will shift away from desert Silk Road to Christian (Orthodox) monasteries......I am due for a change. I am so tired of brown and majollica.

Khiva and a Hearty Breakfast

August 6, 2009, Khiva, Uzbekistan

After a few doses of intestinal medicine, and a nights sleep, my insides felt so good this morning, I went down to the fish market for a hefty breakfast. (See the picture.)

After the general decay of the various places I have visited in the former Soviet Union over the past couple of weeks, and the bustle of Samarkand, and Bokhara's little corners and crannies, Khiva is a real change. It is like so many of the Unesco World Heritage Sites--clean and pure, and full of souvenier stands and restaurants. So, I don't have much to report but touristy things.

Khiva on an upset Tummy

August 5, 2009, Khiva, Uzbekistan

Today was not a fun day. As usual when I travel like this, I'm a little sick to my tummy--well, below my tummy. But every once in a while, it gets worse. Overactive intestines are a problem anytime---but they can be really annoying when you have to take a long taxi or bus ride, and they are even worse when they are accompanied by a slight fever, and that achy feeling. It would have been a good time to stay in bed. But I had to move on.

I was very fortunate to get right to the Bazaar this morning in time to catch the last taxi coming out of Bokhara heading to Khiva--or maybe not so lucky. A couple of French people had just rented the previous taxi for, I was told, $70 each. And a whole taxi for four should have been only $80--so our bargaining atmosphere was difficult to say the least. But there was already a Dane who spoke some Russsian and a couple of Japanese kids joined us soon,and we managed to arrange an $80 taxi all the way to Khiva. But, since I was poopy (exactly the appropriate word), it was risky.

One of the nasty parts of travelling here is that the roads are horrible. Even the paved roads are full of holes. This was a five and a half hour trip across potholes, and I was mildly sick. The problem with bad roads is that you cannot relax, you are constantly straining your muscles and bouncing back and forth in the car, and the people in the car are bumping into you. How many of us ever go four wheeling for more than a few hours at a time? Oh, and it is more than 100 degrees out there. (And no, the cars are not air conditioned.) God, it was miserable. We did have to stop at one point, and I took advantage of the squat facility. But I survived. (Were you hoping for some disaster to make the semi-scatological buildup worthwhile?)

We are in Khiva. It is a jewel of an outdoor museum. Brown mud bricks, blue tile, and just clean as could be. I was amazed at how well preserved it all was until Martin, the Dane, informed that much of it is a Soviet reconstruction--there are a lot of bricks covering steel reinforced concrete. As always, I am going to include a picture showing what my day was like. I have opted to show you Khiva, and not the rest of the day and its poopiness.

People Taking Care of Me

August 3, 2009, Bukhara

This picture is an example of what I was talking about in the blog about people mugging for shots. This guy (in Osh, Kyrgyrstan) saw me with a camera, picked up a bunch of grapes and put on a show. He went to several different booths in the bazaar doing the same for me.

But I wanted to talk about something else I have noticed. These people really want to take care of me. In Urumchi, for some reason my backpack had opened up--somebody could have reached inside and grabbed something. A lady called my attention to it before I could lose anything. I told you already the story about leaving my camera bag/backpack behind, and having one of the taxi drivers chase after me with it. The hotel people take particular care to know where I am going, to write out (in the local language) what I need to do so I only need to point it out to a taxi driver or somebody. But the transportation people are amazing. They want me to get where I am going safely, and take a personal interest in my successful arrival. I told you about the the Tajik lady on the Mashrutnoe who pointed out where my stop was when I first got to Khojand. She was only one of many. After that horrible traffic delay on the way to Ayni, the taxi driver knew that I was being left in a dirt poor town, with no hotels, long after dark. He stopped at a little store, and got some advice, then had to drive back, and go find a guesthouse for me, check it out, and then come out to get me, carried my bag in, and all that---instead of just dropping me at the taxi stand. The bus driver today made sure I got on the right marshrutnoe when he left me, and that he talked to the driver to tell him where I needed to go, explained to me that he had already paid for it (well, he should have paid for it, he was dropping me off 46 kilometers before we had actually gotten to Bukhara, which is where the bus was supposed to go). What's funny about it is that we have these weird negotiating sessions for the taxis, and they sometimes are not really all that friendly. But, once I get into his cab, that guy wants everything to go right for me, and makes sure I know what I am doing, and that I am safely where I am supposed to be. (Well, except for that one Russian driver who fought in Afghanistan and snuck me across the borders around the Uzbek pockets in Tajikistan. He was not a nice guy.)

People Pictures

August 3, 2009, Bokhara

When I'm travelling around, I like to take pictures. I almost always go for monument and landscape shots, but I have to remind myself to go for people. I feel funny taking people pictures. Usually the kids don't mind at all. As a matter of fact, they will often mug for the camera, and beg you to take thier pictures.This is an example of a girl and a couple of boys doing just that yesterday in Samarkand. It was actually hard to get the shot. They kept jumping around, putting devils horns on each other, pushing one out of the way as they moved to the front, and all that. I could not get them to pose with the bike. And then, after you take their picture, you show them what you got on the monitor. (How did we do things before digital cameras?)

I always feel awkward taking adult pictures. After all, I don't like it when people take my picture when I am just out in public. (Or, come to think of it, at virtually any time.) And my experience is that people in general share that feeling.

Now, I am talking about more than the nice peacekeepers the Chinese had provided on every streetcorner in Urumchi----who asked several times that I not take any pictures--sometimes while displaying firearms. (And that is too bad, because once, about two minutes after I got told not to take pictures, there came rolling down the street real slowly a convoy of six trucks stuffed with boys in uniform, riot gear hanging in the truck, the lead truck with a big sound system saying something like "Have a nice Day." or something!--Would have been a cool movie to show you all).

The first butcher I tried to capture (chopping on a legbone with a really big axe!!!) in Xian made it perfectly clear with waving hands (not the axe!) and such that he did not want his picture taken. However, since then, I have had several people, adults as well as children, mug especially for the camera. This kinda defeated the purpose of getting a candid, but it was interesting. Just walking around the market I have had people do special things when they saw I had a camera, and wave and smile, and indicate that they wanted to see monitor review of the pic. Even old women, and men dressed up in local garb, and all that. And I have tried to grab a lot of pictures with a longish zoom. But, while the scene might have been interesting in person, I could not successfully capture it, since I refused to stick that big old camera up to my face and concentrate on taking the picture. I have tried to rush the shots, before the people told me to get lost, and I have not gotten anything good. As a matter of fact, I would guess that what is keeping me from taking better people candids is my own feeling about the issue--not the people's.

Samarkand Tourist

August 2, 2009, Samarkand

 

Not much to report today. I just did touristy tings. Spent something like twenty dollars in admission fees to various museums, tombs, and other monuments, and walked all over town. I managed to visit the remains of an observatory built just before the introduction of the telescope. Not much to see there except the remains of the long quadrant--about thirty meters. Unfortunately the gnomon is no longer there, and the whole thing is covered and cave-like. So there is not much to report astronomically. It did rain a bit on me. Could you imagine coming to Samarkand--a quintessentially desert oaisis--and getting rain.

Wally World

August 1, 2009, Samarkand

 

When I first started thnking about my Silk Road trip three years ago, the Wally World for the trip was Samarkand. (Of course since then, visiting Steve, Eva, and Mia, and of course the eclipse also became Wally Worlds for this particular trip.)

 

Well, I'm here. And unlike the Griswold's experience, my Wally World was open. I walked around the Registan this afternoon, and it is spectacular. I don't often say that about much.....but this place is really impressive.

 

I remember in Herat, Afghanistan, some thirty five years ago, thinking that there were only four colors in the whole country--the deep blue of the night sky, the cold bright blue of the daytime sky, the deepest of greens of the gardens of Herat, and, of course--the tan/brown of the ubiquitous dirt of the desert. These colors were reflected in the mosques, tombs, and fortresses that dotted the country. In Samarkand, one sees this happening again in the tiles and brickwork. In Afghanistan nearly everything was in ruins, though. Here the monuments are in great repair. As a matter of fact, parts of them are so spiffy it is hard to believe they are 600 years old!

 

I'm staying in a hotel that reminds me of my first trip across Asia. For the first time, I have fellow travellers. I have been able to swap ideas and such. (Two guys are cycling from Korea to Portugal!)

 

I am pretty healthy, and feel perfectly safe (although I have to be a better bargainer here than in Tajikistan!). I was the last one through the border this afternoon before it closed for the day--which means I would have lost another day!!!!

 

At any rate, I figure by now the only people reading this blog is probably Judy, and maybe Gramma Sue! Just remember that these things are typed up as I get time on the little portable, but they cannot be uploaded except now and then when I find an internet cafe. (Since my last two hotels did not have water, you could not expect them to have wireless......). At any rate, they may not upload in the expected order--so be prepared to rearrange them in your brain.

Peaceful Lake

July 31, 2009 Iskander Kol, Tajikistan

I survived the night after yesterday's mess. Although I had a massive headache from the hours of four wheel driving, the diesel fumes, dust, and such, I took two Alleve, and slept right through the night. I skipped my shower since there was no shower in my room, or in the hall, or in the mud-brick building in back that housed the toilet. Come to think of it, there was no water in the hotel, anyway---so it did not matter that they did not have showers.

 

Then I started walking across the town looking for transportation to the lake. I got to what looked like the end of the town (Ayni, Tajikistan), and had not found the bus stand/taxi stand/mashrutnoe, etc. But there was a guy there (who spokle no English), and I asked him if there were more Ahni ahead. He said there was, and asked me where I was going. I told him Iskander Kol, and he flagged down a car and said something to the driver, who drove me a half a kilometer to a place with a few taxis. After ten minutes of negotiation, I started walking away (a second time----part of negotiation). Actually, I was going off to find a money changer since I figured I would need it. The guy who I had run into (my guardian angel) pulled up behind me, and said I was going the wrong way.....I told him I had been there to the taxi stand, but they were asking 150, and my guardian angel agreed it was too much. (I had already gotten one down to 100, but I still figured that was too much.) So, this guy left his car parked in the road as we walked back together to the drivers, and they had a big argument. Then another guy, who spoke English (real English--I didn't know how to talk to him!)comes in to find out the problem. I tell him they are asking too much, and he started to explain why nobody would go to Iskander Kol for 100. Well, I said, "that guy said he would."....and, after a bit more negotiation to get him to take a US $20 and a Tajik 10, we piled into the car.

 

Two hours or so of mostly off roading up a mountain, we were at a beautiful lake. I spent the day walking around. It was nice and peaceful. I am sitting in a grove of trees, with mosquitoes buzzing around, and occasionally biting me, typing on my little computer and listening to Jimmy Buffett. Extreme Tourism.

Bargaining without Knowledge

July 29, Khojand, Tajikistan

 

While standing on the sidewalk late this afternoon, looking at the Lonely Planet Guidebook, a couple of nice young men asked me if they could help me find my way. I told them I was looking for the internet café on the map, and they said it was just a half block up, and that one of them was going that way, and he would walk me there. This immediately pricked up the defenses. One common scam is to have somebody bump into you, and want to practice their English. The next thing you know, you are at a coffee shop and the bill comes to $20, or something ridiculous. But it turns out these two guys were just heading up to the internet café. So, here I was accusing them in my brain of scamming, when they were just being helpful.

 

Compare that to the beginning of my day. Yesterday, I had gone to two travel agents and checked out with the Polish guys, and one other set of travelers about how to get to Tajikistan from Osh. Nobody knew how to do it except the guy from "Community Based Travel," the agent recommended in Lonely Planet. And he said (I'm sure he said, but he claims he did not) it would be $90 for the taxi of 4 people. This was less than the $100 I had heard other people paying per person for some transportation into Tajikistan on other routes. It was also in line with my guidebook. But it seemed way too high for what I had been paying. (The 450 kilometer trip from Bishkek cost 700 soms, and this was to cost 4000????).  At any rate, when I got to the cab this morning, it turns out MY SHARE of the cab was to be the $90…..

 

What to do? Was I being scammed? How to know? Problem is that unless you have time to really check things out, hang around with the locals, see the actual route, and a whole lot of other things, you never will really know. That is the trouble with bargaining. It takes experience and knowledge. And unless you are going to invest some time, you cannot gain that experience and knowledge. Having to get all the way across Asia in three weeks leaves one little time for learning local customs and costs.

 

Well, the agent told me, the road is very treacherous, since they have to go around the Uzbek enclaves, (Parts of Uzbekistan are inside the territory of Kyrgyzstan), the road is very rough (it was an eight hour drive, three hours of which  were over washboard—Think GMARS Gibraltar Road and worse for three hours), we had to pass numerous military checkpoints (Tajikistan is one of the greatest exporters of heroin--and the more checkpoints you have, apparently, the more expensive to bribe the additional soldiers to look the other way), and a border…….and so forth. What the agent did not say—is that I would lose a day if I did not get in the taxi right then.  And for all I know, he was right. He was highly recommended in Lonely Planet and by the several other travelers I had talked to, and it was in line with other rates into Tajikistan. It just seemed three to four times too much.

 

Now, money is not the issue here. I know I like to save a buck ("get value" for my expenditures, I call it. Other people call it being cheap). But when you are travelling you have to uphold some integrity. If everybody is haggling, you have to haggle. When the trinket seller manages to get one lazy person to say yes to a $100 doodad, that is what other tourists are going to have to listen to. It's not right. You should not overpay. Besides you will be laughed at for being an incompetent haggler. On the other hand, who cares whether this loaf of bread should cost 8 cents or 12 cents. And when your choice is losing a day, or just grinning and getting in the taxi—what is another $20, or $30? I mean, I did not come to Asia to build up my bank account.

 

At any rate, the driver dropped me off at the bus station south of town—not at the hotel I found in the guidebook. I asked him where we were and how to get to the Leninabad Hotel. (He did not speak English—but was a soldier in Afghanistan during the Soviet occupation.) A marshrutnoe was passing by, and he flagged it down, and generally shoved me on it. But I had no Tajik money, and no idea where I was. Luckily, the toothless guy in front of me reached over and paid for me. The big lady behind me kept bugging me about something and then finally said something to the effect of get out, and pointed to the west. I got out, and lo and behold, just a block to the west was the Leninabad Hotel. They took good care of me on that little bus.

Sucky Day

7/30/09  God Knows Where, Tajikistan

 

Today kinda sucked.

 

Not all day—just nearly all of it. It started great. I got up early, and had all the directions I thought I needed for the next leg of my journey—a trip through the last corner of the "Roof of the World," through 15-20,000 foot mountains to a lake, where I would spend a day or two hiking. I got a liter of Coke and a couple of rolls for breakfast, and found the right Marshrutnoe for the next part of my journey.  When the driver finally understood where I wanted to go, we were already past my stop!!!! So,  he flagged down a Mashrutnoe going the other way, and gave him specific directions on where to drop me. Then I got a taxi to get me to the next town 100 kilometers away, and after that I quickly picked up a ride to the next destination, some 200 Kilometers down the road. Then it went real bad……

 

It seems that the Chinese construction crew has maximized their efficiency in rebuilding the road by simply closing the existing road for twelve hours a day. This is the main highway down from Tashkent to Dushanbe, the capitals of the two countries. As a matter of fact, it is the ONLY road between the provincial capital of Khojand and the national capital of Dushanbe. ---So, for the past nine hours I (along with what is now more than a hundred other cars and smelly trucks) have been waiting  on the side of the road, far from my mountain lake.

 

And the worst of it has not even happened!  Instead of driving through the beautiful mountains in mid-day, it will be dark. Instead of getting to the lake in the middle of the afternoon, I will be arriving in a little town with limited tourist capacity (not much of a hotel, I am told) at about 11:00 at night. This really sucks. And it is starting to rain. And I broke my glasses about an hour ago—so they have to balance on the tip of my nose.  (Added later-----you want it to be suckier—Right as it was approaching 19:00, the time to re-open the road, I find out that my watch is wrong—I was still on Kyrgi time. Here in Tajiki, it was only 18:00!!!--Another hour to wait!)

 

I did meet some really nice people, including one student of Tourism, who told me a lot about his country. He spoke pretty good English, and was happy to practice with me. He also told me that I had overpaid for my taxi (Duh, what else is new?, But that it was not by too much. The locals are paying 50, and I am paying 65. (about three dollars too much!) And it could have been a whole lot more suckier except for the nicest thing that happened all day. In Khojand, I got involved with taxi dealings, and when I finally picked the winner, I walked off with my backpack about 50 meters to his taxi. What I did not realize until I saw somebody running up to us was that I had left my camera bag (and money, credit cards, etc...) back at the taxi stand.....They had found it and ran after me before I could leave. I was so lucky.

Almati Overnight

July 27, Almaty

I have been quite busy since I last posted.  I arrived in Almaty late in the afternoon after a five hour ride in from the Chinese border in a shared taxi. They dropped me off at a hotel where the guidebook said I would find a $10 to $30 room depending on whether it had a bath or whatever. I took a look, but went in anyway. The nice young ladies, both of whom spoke English (which was a sure confirmation that there were no $10 to $30 rooms there) said hello and then "The information in the guidebook is old. The minimum room is $100." And that was true for the other three hotels I checked, too. This is due to a combination of some serious inflation over the past few years (and of course, some dollar problems) and my use of a four year old guidebook. At any rate, Almaty was a very quiet town, so I woke up the next morning and found a mini-bus for Bishkek, Kyrgyrstan. But, ahhhh—got some laundry done.

Top of the World

July 28, Osh, Kyrgyrstan

In the year 2000, Osh, Kyrgyrstan celebrated its 3000^th anniversary. Not that they updated the paving or sewer system or anything since founding, but they had a celebration of some sort, I heard. This was one of the big stops on the Silk Road. To get here, I had to take a taxi over the top of the world. The taxi was not really a taxi. It was a guy and his brother driving their own car from Bishkek who wanted somebody else to pay for the gas. So, when I showed up at the taxi/minibus station, a guy grabbed me and started negotiating on a ride. He walked me around for more than 200 meters before we settled on the price for the ride, and I walked in and got in the car.

The ride was quite impressive, over three passes 11,000 feet or higher (with horses, yurts, and all the stuff you see in the pictures of Central Asia) before settling into a long, hot dry canyon area (five Soviet dams collecting miles and miles of hydroelectric capacity), followed by five hours through an agricultural flatlands (where corn and all tons of melons were in evidence). Think of going over the Tioga pass a few times, dropping into a road along Lake Mead and the Nevada desert, followed by a few hours through California's Central Valley (although a little messier than the Central Valley). Except for the mountains, it was hot and dry.

The brothers decided not to go all the way to Osh. They had stopped at their own home about an hour east of Osh, where we unloaded the car and visited with mom (who shared bread and a gooey butter, and we would have had tea, but wanted to press on) and some cousins and such. So, since we had made the deal to get to Osh, one of the brothers and dad (Abdul Ahmillah, he introduced himself) drove us back to the main road, hailed another taxi (which was not really a taxi, either), slipped the driver some money, and sent me and the mother/daughter who was sharing my ride the rest of the way. I found a room real quick, and had a great evening drinking a beer with a couple of Polish guys who were going trekking in the Pamir Valley.

Royal Treatment in Bishkek

July 27, Bishkek

 

One thing that is critical when travelling alone, without a guide, and not knowing the language, is to seek out others who are travelling the same route.  It helps if one knows a good place to stay, tricks about crossing the border, changing money, and such. It is particularly nice if you can swap information about reasonable places to stay. Finding a place to sleep is always a difficult proposition coming into a new town. While waiting in Almaty for the mini-bus to find its required fifteen passengers so we could depart, I saw a young man talking to another person in English, and took the opportunity to ask him what he knew about Bishkek, our destination.

 

Turns out that he was a German doctoral candidate, doing research on his thesis. He had been documenting how the newly established post-soviet Central Asian states used propaganda and publicity to establish themselves and their countries, particularly among their own people. Obviously a smart fellow, it turns out he was quite sociable and proud to call Bishkek, where he had based himself, his new "home." The ride was made interesting by the mini-bus breaking down, leaving us all stranded along the highway. Gradually cars stopped by and picked up a few of us, and then a relatively empty minibus saw us and got us all as far as the border, where we could easily pick up a marshrutnoe (shared taxi-bus) to the city. When we arrived, Sandro walked me around, explaining changing money, looking for hotels (we could not find any good cheap ones) and explaining the history of the place. Finally giving up on the hotel in the center of town, we went to his apartment way down south, where his roommate had cooked up a big plate of potatoes, vegetables, and spice. After dinner, he walked me to a nearby hotel. The place was clean and the price was right.

 

An hour later he came back, and we walked from one end of main street to the other as he explained the transition from Sovietization to independence/capitalism/democratization(?)/and the future of these new countries. Each of them have a different personality, resources, and geographical conditions, and they are each developing differently.

 

We had a second dinner at a Turkish restaurant, and Annika, his roommate, joined us. The conversation went on as we walked back through the big central square (it used to be Lenin Square, but the big statue has been moved to behind the building). It was a great day, and Sandro and Annika made sure I was taken care of.

If It's Tuesday, It Must Be Hong Kong

The trip is over and it is time to go home. After briefly exploring the shopping malls attached to our hotel, we caught the high speed train back to Hong International Airport.

While on the high speed train, I lost track of what luggage bin I had placed my bag into. The porter was so upset that he nearly cried. He finally located my bag and delivered it to me, hugged me and brought me a drink. Everybody laughed.*

Within minutes, our smoothly gliding train arrived at the airport. Nobody had a chance to sleep. Going through Customs, the officer commented on what a nice camera I had. He even offered to help process images.

Ralph is on a later flight. Alson and I are off and will arrive home soon.



*Ok, none of this really happened – I just couldn't resist after having read Alex’s blog…

Finally, a Review

Although there are ways to overcome Chinese censorship, tonight is the first time I have had a chance to review the blog(quickly--I really could not read them all). (And the movies won't load. Just as well, I don't relly like "It's a Small World." --itjust is the thought one has when one bumps into somebody 8000 miles away)

 

Wow--this is really cool. I'm in a bar that has wi-fi. We've come a long way since poste-restante at the American Express the first time I picked up a backpack. The girl about five feet away at the bar is smoking a really stinky cigar. (Richard Garcia would be at home. With the cigar, I mean.) Everybody speaks Russian. And everytime they say "Alex your order is ready." I think I ordered something else. But,no, I have been nursing this one beer for nearly an hour or so.  

 

I noticed my last two entries did not load in the right order--that's okay. But if there is anybody following-----they are out of order, so fix them in your brain.)

 

It looks like the Shanghai crew, by moving cross ways got to see something. That's good.

 

I just washed my clothes. They were really tired of me. God, I hope they dry by the time I have to check out of that pit.

 

Urumqi

I was in Western China to see the eclipse yesterday. Today, I took a three hour plane ride further west to Urumqi. China is bigger than I thought it was going to be. 

 

So far, I have visited three Chinas. Beijing is big and modern, with lots of skyscrapers, and a subway, and all that. It is also where I saw some of the great big monuments, like the Forbidden City, Temple of Heaven, and (just outside of town) the Great Wall. Xian contnued a little of that...although it was not nearly as new and modern. The second China was the days I spent at Emei Shan and around there. On the way there, I passed a lovely night on a sleeper train with a young couple, a mother, and her about nine year old daughter. The little girl wanted to look at all the pictures I had on my computer (my astrophotos). The Tingling Mountains, which were more tunnel than vista on the train, were in some ways, the "typical" China one thinks of in postcards and things. They featured craggy peaks, a river flowing by temples, farms, and such.  All very green. Emei Shan, with its temples, and shrines continued that feeling.Finally today, I am in a third China. Urumchi is a town out in a much drier climate. (It was not raining, and I actually went for a walk with the sun!!!--I have seen the sun clearly maybe five or six hours the whole trip so far.) And the people are different. There are more Uighurs, an Indo-European looking clan, more akin to the Turks than Chinese.

 

Urumchi was also the first place I saw troops out on the street. There had  been some horrible riots here last month, and, believe me, there will  be none this week. I even got caught taking a picture, and a nice young man with a machine gun, and two of his well uniformed friends kindly asked me to delete it from my memory card. I complied and deleted the one he knew about. You know, even though he did not speak English, and I did not speak Chinese, he managed to get his poipnt across clearly.

 

By the way--I am as far from the ocean today as somebody can be while on the earth!

 

Tomorrow the silk road museum.....And perhaps off to Kazakhstan.

 

The picture I sent today was of totality in the fog. Isn't it moody.

 

PS....I have not had internet connectivity all day, so have not been able to send this and other messages. It is possible when I do get connected again, we will have several days of blogs uploaded at the same time.