Sacks of cash

We walked into Uzbekistan, past the construction site that is the border, past the border guards who were sitting at little wooden tables in the sun, past the boarder guard’s friends who had more questions for us , purely out of interest,  than the border guards, past the Uzebk women in brightly coloured, velour, floral dresses (seriously there is more velour for sale here in one market than in the entire country of Canada during velour’s heyday) heading for a day of cross border shopping and in to a country that was at the heart of the silk road. The caravan’s of camels and ancient trading cities are long gone and so even is the bustle and liveliness of Kyrgyzstan. Uzbekistan is a rather quiet, empty country with some very laid back people. The bazaars are there and busy but everyone stands quietly at their stand and calls you “sister” and people push their carts calmly between the aisles compared to the insanity in Kyrgyzstan where people are pushing carts, bicycles, wheelbarrows and driving cars through the already crammed market yelling “besh besh” (if you don’t move immediately I will run you over).

Tashkent is the capital of wide streets, more hideous soviet buildings than you could ever imagine, many decorated with aging soviet slogans or newer Uzbek ones, numerous statues and other monuments to Timur( the bloodthirsty tyrant of the 15th century who was lame in one leg but had a soft spot for beautiful architecture)  but few restaurants, stores or people. Seems like people prefer to stay in the their countryards and sip tea.

Tashkent has the only subway in Central Asia and man did they go all out. Some of the stations have chandeliers in them and the walkways are lit by gold gilded lamps while other are a tribute to the cosmonauts and done up in shiny blue tiles with murals of Yuri and others peering out of “portals”. And all this for less than a quarter a ride. Equally as grand as the subway is the opera and ballet theater that has a different performance every night…for 2.75 cents you get the best seat in the house and the pleasure of watching an obscure Italian opera sung in Russian with a cast of 70 and a full pit orchestra. The 37 of us who came to watch tried to clap really loud for the cast which seemed to include people on their way home from their construction jobs and others who were begged by their neighbours to just come and stand in the back, no singing required.

The oddest thing in this very orderly place, is the currency. The largest bill is worth less than 1 dollar and people have to bring shopping bags full of cash when they want to buy pretty much anything. Chris changed 7 Kyrgyz bills and the man had to give her a sack to contain the cash as no wallet could do it. On the other hand you do get to feel very important slapping down 20 bills to pay for dinner.

We drove from the Kygyz border to Tashkent in 5 hours and our driver did up and undid his seatbelt no less than 15 times…done up to pass through all the military check points and at any hint that he might be passing a cop and undone for the cool, free feeling of potentially hurtling through his windshield. Cops stand at the side of roads everywhere with orange batons and seem to wave cars over at random, you then need to get out ( yes, you go to the cops here) and hand over a stack of money. We just can’t figure out why people don’t just keep driving as the cops often have no veichle.