Maps And Figures

It probably won't come as a surprise to people that I love maps. From an early age I pored over them, and on our biannual family drives from Scotland to Czechoslovakia I would study our route and navigate for my dad. As I grew older I understood how maps could display so much more information than simple topography and place names: climate, industry, agriculture, ethnography, linguistics, politics - all are made clearer and more immediate with the help of a good map. I'm particularly fascinated by historical maps, with their imprecise coastlines, challenging handwriting, and flights of fancy (here be dragons). But especially because they show a reality that once existed and which isn't necessarily acknowledged today. Sure, London and Paris have been around for over 1000 years, but if you go back 2000 years then they disappear, only to be replaced by Londinium and Lutetia. Borders, which, today, feel immutable and permanent, ebb and flow, disappearing and reappearing with metronomic regularity. Names and national identities, for which people go to war and innocents die, are in fact ephemeral and subjective. Belarus epitomises this (un)reality perfectly. Attempts to find (the name) Belarus in old maps will more than likely come up blank; and if you do find it, it won't be where it is today.

Maps have a strange power. This map of China, from 1735, was recently given as a present from German chancellor Angela Merkel to China's president Xi Jinping on a state visit. A nice present you would think. However it caused huge waves on the Chinese blogosphere because it doesn't show Tibet, Xinjiang, Taiwan or Inner Mongolia as being Chinese, despite the Chinese official narrative of these being immutable parts of China since "ancient times". [For a more detailed analysis see this article.]

A Desperate Despot?

For the "last dictatorship in Europe" I was surprised that I could arrive in the heart of the country without having my passport checked. It's funny how that sobriquet, bequeathed during George W. Bush's presidency, has come to stick to any and every mention of Belarus and its leader Alexander Lukashenko (not that they get many mentions in the world's media). After spending just a few days in Minsk talking politics with almost everyone I met (locals are far more world-savvy and open with their views than one would imagine), I realised that it's an over-simplification that obscures looking at the country realistically (for an idea of the sort of journalistic hatchet-jobs out there you can read this recent article in GQ). Sure, there's no denying Lukashenko has a tight grip on power, political dissent is only permitted within narrow limits (as attested to by the number of people behind bars for their contrary political views), and there is more than a little corruption to be found; nevertheless these truths need to be tempered with others that don't sell as many newspapers.

"Just wait a sec, I haven't told you the punchline yet." Belarus's notorious president Lukashenko sporting his trademark moustache. [Source: Guardian.co.uk]

It's Work Jim, But Not As We Know It

Hello dear reader(s)! You may have surmised from my writing hiatus that my travels are over and that I have returned to the world of the working. And you would be right ... to a degree. It is true that I now have a job, with a pay-cheque and everything, however the travelling has not abated as much as I had envisaged upon my return to the UK.

Upon my return to the UK I decided to do a little tourism somewhat closer to home. Despite having worked a mere 15mins walk from the Tower of London for over 1.5 years I had never actually visited the iconic monument - a lacuna I quickly set to rights.

Sorry For The Inconvenience But Our Country Is Closed. Please Try Again Later.

Travelling through Russia was certainly far easier than I had imagined. People were generally polite and helpful, the roads were of good quality all the way to the border, I had no trouble with the police (one did stop by me whilst I was hitching, but more out of curiosity and to have a chat than to try and extort money), and hitching was a breeze.

The gorgeous Altai landscape (even the people and the outdoor toilet can't detract from the beauty).

Saying Goodbye To Stan

My last stop in Kazakhstan and Central Asia was Semey, also known by its original, Russian name of Semipalatinsk. The town is one of the oldest in the north of the country and the centre is dotted with Tsarist-era log cabins, with their reassuringly organic lines, still clinging on to existence amongst the concrete apartment block. Semey is (in)famous throughout the world for its Soviet past where it, or at least a nearby patch of "uninhabited" steppe was home to the Semipalatinsk Polygon where the Soviet Union tested its atomic bombs. In all there were over 100 above ground nuclear explosions. Although the Soviet authorities were not so stupid as to kill their own citizens in the explosions, they kept quiet about the effects of nuclear radiation and fallout so the area is still haunted by abnormally high levels of birth defects and cancers.

The memorial to the victims of the Semipalatinsk memorial. Very moving, but strangely located in a patch of foresty wasteland on the other side of the river from the town.

Steppe Outside

The Soviet Union was the largest country in the world by area by a considerable margin (more than twice the size of Canada at number 2). When it split into its 15 constituent republics the lion's share of that went to Russia, but Kazakhstan still managed to become the 9th largest country in the world (just a Croatia shy of Argentina at number 8). Kazakhstan is a big country. And with most of the 16 million population concentrated around the edges a lot of it is taken up by the wide, flat steppe. In the dryer, hotter south the predominant colours are already yellow and brown, with a little pale green mixed in, as the summer has already set in for a while, but as you head further northwards the deep green of growing grass takes over. The landscape is easy on the traveller, affording you long moments without changing much, allowing for plenty of time for reading and sleeping.

In the middle of this green monotony, springing out of nowhere (relatively speaking, because you can already see it from over 30km away) is Kazakhstan's new capital Astana. Previously the capital had been Almaty, but 14 years ago that title was transferred to Astana (called Akmola at the time, but since the name means White Tomb - not a particularly auspicious designation for a capital - it was renamed, using a great deal of imagination, to Astana, which means Capital), ostensibly to have a more central capital with closer links to Russia, which is still the most important trading partner, although more cynical people claim the real reason to be Nazarbayev's desire to consolidate his grip on power as Almaty was too large and independent to bow to his whims. There were drawbacks to this move though, the mains ones being the vicious winters of the area (temperatures in January often fall to -40 degrees, not counting windchill, as devastating winds come sweeping in from Siberia, making it the second-coldest capital in the world), and perhaps more importantly, that it was a small, provincial town. Since then there has been a frenzied level of construction to create a showcase capital causing the population to triple in 10 years. The skyline has been transformed with new, fanciful towers springing up every year often designed by the who's who of contemporary world architecture, the only constant being the forest of cranes that whir and hum at break-neck speed. All this has come at a price, estimated to be around 10% of the national budget every year. Some of the buildings are indeed beautiful, but there is no over-arching harmony so instead the place feels rather soulless. Some of the more interesting creations include: a giant, indoor aquarium/sea-life centre which includes a 70m long underwater walkway where you can get up close and personal with sharks and other creatures of the deep (must have cost a ridiculous amount as the sea water had to be shipped in especially, and Astana is thousands of kilometres from the nearest sea); a giant 150m high tent with a transparent roof that is home to a shopping and entertainment centre; as well as an entirely new governmental complex with grandiose ministry buildings (although, as opposed to Ashgabat, it does look like these are getting some use).

Shiny new skyscrapers in the new administrative centre of Astana may look pretty...

Historical Turning Points, And Crayfish

The road from Almaty was initially a railway. The town of Kopa is a forgotten stop on the edge of the steppe on the line heading west out of Almaty. Only one train a day stops there and on that particular day I was the only person to get off. It is, however, the nearest town with any sort of public transport to Tambaly, where there are the greatest collection of petroglyphs in Central Asia. OK, perhaps not one to get the hearts racing, but interesting nevertheless. I sat myself down on the road out of town hoping to get a ride the 30km out to the site. At least the tumbleweeds kept me company. My wait wasn't as long as expected and the very first car that passed took me all the way there (hitching is not only reasonably common in Kazakhstan, but I also don't feel uncomfortable asking for a free ride here where the standard of living is significantly higher than the rest of Central Asia). And in a textbook example of things generally working out in the end, as I was wrapping up my visit of the site, and beginning to wonder how the hell I would get out of there, I spied a group of visitors (the only ones to visit that day apart from me) who had obviously come by car. So I went over to see if I could bum a lift, at least to the main highway. They turned out to be a group of 3 Mexicans living in China, a Kazakh girl (girlfriend of one of the Mexicans) and her father. Certainly not people you would expect to meet in the middle of Kazakhstan. Nevertheless they said, sure, they could take me to the highway as they were going back to Almaty that evening anyway. And so once they had finished visiting the site themselves we set off. I was happy as I got to practice my Spanish which was encased in a sizeable coating of rust, but at least I was still able to conjugate the verb chingar in several different levels of impoliteness, which impressed the Mexicans considerably. As we approached the highway Aina (the girl) suggested I come crayfishing with them. It was getting late, it was in my general direction and I had never been crayfishing before (hell, I hadn't even ever seen a live crayfish before) so I heartily agreed.

Monster from the deep comes face to face with a crayfish.

The Big Apple

Apart from the general sightseeing I did have an important task to do in Almaty: get my Mongolian visa. (I know what you're thinking, "oh no, not another visa anecdote"; and I'm sorry to bring it up - although I will be brief. But visa acquisition forms a large part of a traveller's daily preoccupation - where do I get it? what documents do I need? how long does it take? do I need to do it via an agency? etc, etc - because, very simply, without overcoming these hurdles you can't do any travelling. And the whole visa system in this part of the world in particular is so arbitrary and capricious. It's a universal rule that if you get two travellers sitting down and talking together, within an hour they will be swapping visa stories. Nevertheless I shouldn't complain, as getting into the EU or United States with a passport from Central Asia for simple tourism purposes is nigh on impossible. But back to the story...) So I made my way to the embassy, which is very inconveniently located in the southwest corner of town in a random residential area down a very nondescript little alley, on Monday morning, only to find a little, handwritten sign tacked to the gate saying that the embassy would be closed until Thursday. I was not impressed.

My view of Almaty, with the ever-present Tian Shan mountains behind decked in an approaching thunderstorm. One of my first pics with my new camera - obviously I need to learn how to use it properly.

Apple Strudel

There are some things that we consider to be so quintessentially of a certain place or culture that it comes as a shock to learn that its origins are often very different. There are many examples: who can imagine England without tea, Italy without football, Wall Street without (neck)ties, or even Ireland without potatoes. Yet these come from China, England, Croatia and Peru respectively. And why am I thinking about the origins of things? Well, I am now in Almaty (formerly Alma Ata), Kazakhstan's biggest city and former capital. The name means "Father of Apples" because, believe it or not, the common apple, that is so much a part of the European landscape and even culture, has its origins in the foothills of the Tian Shan. Similarly the walnut, another European mainstay,  is also from the region, with the region of Arslanbob at the eastern fringes of the Fergana Valley being home to the largest walnut forest in the world.

And although Almaty can only count on apples for making it unique in the world, it is certainly unique in Central Asia. Arriving from Bishkek I was greeted by the standard wide, tree-lined grid of streets of Russian imperialism. But there were obvious differences to other towns in the region: rubbish bins conveniently placed all over town, a cycle lane (though to be honest, that was a little deceiving as I was to later find out, as I was let off the bus on the only street in town that actually has a cycle lane) and even drivers who stop at zebra crossings to let you cross - something I haven't experienced since perhaps Poland. Indeed, Almaty is an island of Western order in the sea of Asian bedlam (not that I dislike Asia's organic chaos, which is very stimulating and exciting). Upmarket boutiques, swanky bars and restaurants, flash cars and designer clothes are all commonplace and your average Almatian is as refined and educated as their counterparts in Amsterdam or Andalucia. Although Almaty is no longer the political capital of the country (that title, as of 1997, belongs to Astana) it is still very much the commercial and cultural capital. Certainly a far cry from the image we might have in the West where, for the majority, the only Kazakh personality that is known is Borat, Sacha Baron-Cohen's fictional racist, homophobe, anti-Semite, chauvinist. Interestingly, when talking to Kazakhs about him they are quite savvy and realise that it was actually Americans who were being ridiculed in the film, and are glad that their country got some publicity (the president, on the other hand, didn't get the joke and the film was banned in the country).

Kul

Kyrgyzstan is a land of mountains, but also of lakes (and also of horses, but I'll touch on that later). To get a true taste of the country, both metaphorically and literally, you need to leave the towns and cities - Bishkek feels like a relaxed, provincial eastern European town - and head for the hills, where the nomadic Kyrgyz soul resides. The first place I made for was Issyk Kul lake (a bit of a tautology as kul means lake in Kyrgyz). Talk to any Kyrgyz person and they will tell you that you haven't seen Kyrgyzstan until you've seen Issyk Kul, which is seen as the jewel in the country's crown. It is indeed a special lake. Although Kyrgyzstan is a small country, smaller even than Britain, the lake is one of the biggest in the world (10th by volume, and 7th deepest). For the landlocked Kyrgyz it is their beach destination and is suitably equipped with hotels, deckchairs, parasols and all other beachy paraphernalia. Even the water is salty. However, due to it's high altitude - 1600m - it's not particularly warm despite its name (which translates as "Hot Lake"), as a brief dip unequivocally demonstrated. (The name refers to the fact that, because of its depth and high salinity, the lake never freezes, even in the depths of winter.) This means that the "beach" season is very short, outside of which there's barely a soul to be seen. Not that I was particularly interested in taking a dip, the surrounding landscape is far more interesting to me. The lake is surrounded on all sides by tall mountains and in the east, on a clear day you can spot the challenging 7000m peak of Khan Tengri on the tri-border with China and Kazakhstan, lording it over the other lesser mountains of the surrounding Tian Shan range - not that I ever saw it as at this time of the year the mountains are almost constantly shrouded in a blanket of cloud, at least at the higher elevations.

A "popular" beach on Issyk Kul, framed by a spur of the Tian Shan mountains.

Close Encounters Of The Foreign Kind

I never knew my paternal grandfather who died of cancer a couple of years before I was born. All I know of him is through faded photographs and my father's reminiscences. One anecdote has particularly stayed with me. When my grandfather visited London from Czechoslovakia in the 70's he would wander around the local neighbourhood, but he would leave his watch at home on purpose. This gave him an excuse to go up to people to ask them the time and so strike up a conversation and use his limited English. I do something similar. I like asking people for directions. Often it is necessary as maps and signs are often inadequate, but usually I will ask more often than is really required so that I can practice my limited local language skills and create a human contact. Rarely does anything bigger come of it, but a transient conversation and a smile are the ephemera that make travelling special. I think my grandfather and I would have got along well.

These contacts are the palette that colour my days: even the dullest places can become exciting and the most cosmopolitan metropolis a morgue depending on who you meet. Tashkent is supposed to be Central Asia's cultural capital whilst Bishkek is but a backwater with, quite frankly, nothing going on. Yet for me the roles were reversed thanks to the people I met. Tashkent was OK, but Bishkek has been a revelation. I've met some fantastic people who have led me down the rabbit-hole of unexpected activities such as playing ping-pong in the central, Panfilov park on a Thursday afternoon and going to a private, Soviet-era banya in the bowels of a swimming pool complex. The most unexpected though was through my couchsurfing contact here, a girl named Selbi. A very forceful and energetic individual who is an activist for LGBT rights in Kyrgyzstan. That in itself is extraordinary as in the region homosexuality and even sexuality issues in general are ignored, swept under the carpet and plain denied. Although homosexuality has been legalised in Kyrgyzstan (as opposed to all the other Central Asian republics where it is still illegal) it isn't recognised and there is still much discrimination and certainly little understanding. So when she invited me to come along to a gay club in Bishkek I was very eager to see what it would be like. I was surprised to find that it was in a very central location and not hidden (although it wasn't advertised as a gay club), though the bouncers at the door made sure that only known clientele and foreigners got in (foreigners aren't seen as being homophobic and so are accepted as LGBT supporters). The club itself was pretty ordinary and could have been anywhere. There wasn't even that much overtly homosexual action, but instead it was a place where the LGBT community could let their hair down and relax and have a party without fear of interference. It was nice for me too as I put on my best T-shirt and dusted off my dancing shoes (well, sandals) and bust some uncoordinated moves on the floor. It seems to be a universal law that gay people are not just better dressers, but also better dancers. It was funny to see that there were two groups at the club that night. There's the hard dance fans with their pumping beats, but as soon as I Will Survive hit the amps they fled the dancefloor to be replaced by the camp, cheese crowd (to which, I must admit, I belong). Seeing that there is a gay scene in this, in certain respects, conservative part of the world and that the LGBT community is working to make its voice heard and get its rights.

Vortex Of Unrest

I've wanted to visit Central Asia for a long time now. It's a region that falls well underneath the radar of most peoples' consciousness and yet has a rich history and varied ethnic and cultural patchwork. In fact it is the cline at which the Indo-European and Oriental peoples meet, producing physiognomies from classic European to Han Chinese with everything in between, especially in Uzbekistan and Afghanistan. The town of Osh where I am now epitomises both the best and worst aspects of this fact.



The main entrance to the Osh bazaar says "World Peace" along with a monument with three doves, whilst behind lie burnt out stalls from last year's clashes.

Pamir Travel Travails

From Langar the road follows the Pamir river slowly upwards. The mountains recede to the distance, hanbitations disappear as do the trees and the fields as you leave the valleys of Badakhshan behind and enter the high, desolate, windswept Pamir plateau. The land is parched and the driving wind coats everything in a fine layer of dust in an instant, seemingly forcing it into your very pores. There are few inhabitants except for Kyrgyz herders driving their flocks of sheep and goats from one sparse pasture to another, and a handful of settlements servicing them and the Chinese truckers importing cheap, shoddy goods (it's not just Westerners who complain about the quality of Chinese manufacturing, or lack thereof). But for the most part the plateau is an intensely inhospitable place, a fact noted by Marco Polo over seven centuries ago. The floor of the plateau rarely descends below 3500m and I could feel the effects of the altitude on my first day whilst crossing the pass from the Wakhan at 4300m - a shortness of breath and slight pounding of blood in my head.



The Pamir plateau is beautiful yet barren. Very little can grow at such high altitudes and with such little water and the winters are bitterly cold.



Wakhan Do It

Tajikistan is a poor country. It has the 7th lowest GDP of any non-African country, has no industry to speak of (one large aluminium smelting plant, though the ore has to be imported from abroad), few mineral resources worth mentioning (a handful of gold and silver mines) and only 7% of the country is arable land (whereas 50% is comprised of mountains). Its long and porous border with Afghanistan that the government cannot possibly effectively control makes it an important conduit for drugs. The evidence of the drugs trade can easily be seen if you take a ride north from Dushanbe along the Varzob valley where tasteless modern mansions line the river, the vast majority, according to my Tajik friends, built using drug money (the rest from government corruption). The only export Tajikistan has in any quantities is cheap labour for Russian construction sites.

As you can see from the map, mountains are the one thing Tajikistan has in abundance.

Fanatic

A slight disaster: the last post I wrote regarding arriving to Dushanbe did not get published properly. Furthermore the drafts were also lost. I have contacted Blogger and will hopefully retrieve the post and put it up again, in the meantime, rather than write it anew I will carry on from where it finished.

Having put in my application for the Kyrgyz visa I had a week to kill before I could set off along the Pamir highway. My destination was the town of Panjikent in the Zerafshan valley and the Fan mountains to the south. The Fan are an outlying spur of the Pamir-Alay range and with peaks reaching up to 'only' 5500m, and as such are a more accessible and amateur-friendly range than the giant Pamirs to the east. Getting to Panjikent required a little backtracking towards Istarafshan, but only crossing one pass, before getting off in the valley hoping to catch some onward transportation along the wild and narrow Zerafshan valley. My onward transport happened to be an old man in his battered Moskvich who picked me up and took me all the way. The road was in a poor state, but at least the views were compensation, with the scenery reminding me of a small version of the Karakorum Highway, with only 200m drops rather than 600m (although, at the end of the day, both are lethal should you try to test them out).

Along with pot-holes and dodgy drivers, herds of sheep are also a natural obstacle to be  negotiated on Tajikistan's roads.

Eschatology

Along my travels there are certain historical characters I keep bumping into, the most notable being Alexander the Great. I've seen traces of his conquering ways in northern Greece, Iran, Turkey and even in the Egyptian desert. And now, in the northern Tajik province of Soghd I've come across his furthest outpost, Alexandria Eschatae ("Alexandria the Furthest" - Alex wasn't particularly imaginative with the names he gave cities, naming at least 13 Alexandria), although now it is called Khojand (after a brief incarnation as Leninabad). There isn't really anything to show that Alex made his way through here, except for the unintentionally kitsch and funny local museum where 'authentic' marble mosaics depict Alexander's various exploits.

There Are Some That Call Me Tim

I wrote a couple of posts back that I preferred taking the train. Here is a little vignette showing why. I'm sitting at Termiz train station waiting for my ride to Samarkand. The Dushanbe-Moscow express has just passed by on its 4800km, 3-day journey. Although the Soviet Union imploded 20 years ago, its railway network still trundles on, with trains criss-crossing the former Communist behemoth linking most of its former countries (the Baltics and the Caucasus being the only exceptions). So it is possible in Nukus to hop aboard the Tashkent-Kharkiv train and be directly transported to Ukraine in a few days, crossing three international borders, a journey that has taken me over 7 months in the opposite direction. As a slight aside, the word for train station in the ex-Soviet world is vokzal. Those with more than just a passing knowledge of London may find it oddly familiar, sounding very much, as it does, like the district of Vauxhall. In the 17th to 19th centuries Vauxhall was the site of luxurious pleasure gardens (which may come as a surprise to current inhabitants of the borough) that were emulated throughout Europe, including Russia. When the first train line was constructed in Russia it was just to such a garden, and so was called Vokzal, after which all train stations gained the name.

Soon the Tashkent train that would take me to Samarkand slipped into view and people started climbing aboard. I joined them, and was relieved that I had drawn a low bunk as it would allow me to stash my rucksack in the compartment beneath it. I was sharing my immediate compartment with two middle-aged men and a son in his thirties. Across the aisle from us an imposing matron set up her throne, flanked by her daughter and two grandchildren. She seemed austere at first, until she pulled out a portable boom-box from her handbag and which started blaring Uzbek pop. There wasn't much conversation to begin with until people started pulling out their supplies: bread, tomatoes, cucumbers, tea, salami, mackerel (in a tin), pastries and, of course, vodka. All this was piled high on the creaky table between the bunks. Everyone pitched in and everyone (in our small section of the carriage) was invited. As soon as the vodka started flowing so did the conversation. I can't say I remember much but it certainly beat sitting in a cramped, sweaty bus.

Party time on the train to Tashkent (via Samarkand).



You Can Have Any Colour You Want, As Long As It's A Daewoo

I had wanted to take the train back east from Khiva, and had my eye set on a particularly useful departure, but I had underestimated the popularity of trains here in Uzbekistan (or perhaps how much people detest the crappy roads). There are few buses and often the only other form of intercity transport is the shared taxi, not a means of getting round I particularly enjoy. It's not very efficient and taxi drivers are notoriously rapacious and will stop at nothing to squeeze every last penny out of you. From Urgench to Bukhara I knew the price shouldn't be more than 40,000 som (the Uzbek currency), which is the equivalent of $17 - a hefty sum for me (pun intended). Not only did the driver start off by quoting me twice that to begin with, but when I remonstrated with the other passengers they told me that they had been instructed not to tell me how much they themselves were paying. Nevertheless I managed to get the ride for 40,000, but it cost me unnecessary time and annoyance. It also reinforces my belief that taxi drivers are amongst the lowest and least scrupulous forms of human life.

See The Sea Before It's Sand (aka The Importance Of Carrying Out Environmental Impact Assessments And Heeding Their Warnings)

From Bukhara I followed the Amu Darya on its northwesterly course. It cuts a fertile, verdant swathe through the otherwise inhospitable landscape of the Karakum desert to the south and Kizilkum to the north (the Black Sand desert and the Red Sand desert respectively, although, to be honest, both looked pretty sandy coloured to me) and is, and has been, the life-blood of the region for millennia where water is the most treasured commodity of all (an interesting, if useless, factoid, except for those who participate in pub quizes, is that Uzbekistan is one of only two countries in the world - the other being Liechtenstein - that is doubly landlocked i.e. a landlocked country that is itself wholly surrounded by landlocked countries (the Caspian and Aral seas don't count as they are technically lakes)). On its way the great river passes the historical cities of Khiva and Urgench before passing by Nukus, the capital of the autonomous republic of Karakalpakstan, and finally emptying into the Aral Sea. At least that's what older maps would have you believe. That's before the Soviet authorities, in their infinite wisdom, brought about the world's greatest environmental catastrophe, perhaps all the more catastrophic for the general worldwide ignorance and apathy that has accompanied it.

A couple of rusty boats sitting high and dry where the sea used to be at the "ship graveyard" at Moynaq.

Sitting Down. Getting Picked Up.

Sometimes you have to travel far and go through great efforts to make rewarding contacts or rewarding experiences. On the other hand sometimes you have to just stop and sit down. I left Bukhara bound for Navoi, a town some 100km to the north, where I had booked a berth on the twice weekly Tashkent to Urgench train*. But along the way I stopped off at the town of Gijduvan, known for its shashlik, large market and medieval madrassa. When I arrived at the latter with my heavy rucksack the quiet, shady courtyard seemed like the ideal place to sit down, rest and catch up with my diary writing which I had neglected of late. I didn't get much writing done though. First the guard came over to inspect my thoroughly suspicious behaviour: "where are you from? what's your name? what are you doing? year of birth (here, rather than ask you how old you are, they ask you for your birth year)? how many children do you have? why aren't you married? The final question automatically follows the one before it and is asked with a mixture of inredulity, amazement and pity - 30 is already well past the best before date as far as Uzbekistanis are concerned. Next came the caretaker with exactly the same questions. Then the lady selling souvenirs, the odd-job boy, and finally the imam. Even local visitors would crowd round me, curious to know what this strange foreigner was doing in their madrassa with his oversized bag and his book of cabalistic scribblings. Come lunchtime I had only managed to write a couple of entries and was feeling rather peckish when right on queue souvenir-lady came over and motioned for me to a small chamber where the others were sat around a low table each with a bowl of mutton stew and several loaves of round bread broken up in the middle. There was an empty place set aside for me. And so the next few hours were spent idly chatting away with my new "temporary family" trying to make ourselves understood, and usually managing after a somewhat convoluted manner.

Hanging with the madrassa boys. Lamb stew, bread and green tea. Mmmmm!