13. TASHKENT - WHERE PIZZAS ARE FLOWN IN FROM SEATTLE

REUNION IN TASHKENT

My journey through the Stans was coming to an end.  I said my goodbyes to Lara and the desk girls at the hotel in Samarkand. They assured me I had plenty of time to make the flight to Tashkent, and I had the correct time on the ticket.

Of course they had it wrong, again.  Instead of a short hour or so wait, I spent the next four hours waiting for a connecting flight.  That Moscow clock was wreaking its havoc yet again.

It was dark when my cab finally drew up to Tashkent's imposing Hotel Uzbekistan and I tumbled out with my solitary travel bag.  A man approached  asking if I was Mrs Robyn and why was I so late.

He didn’t even wait for a reply just herded me quickly to the desk where I was booked in, given room number and key and ushered up to the ninth floor.

A key woman took over assuring me she would be on duty all night should I need anything.   

Next morning I made a mild complaint about the noisy party in the next room to which she clucked her tongue and said ‘They are Egips and know no better.’

The foyer of the modern and impressive 14 story Uzbekistan Hotel was a hive of activity with guests mingling with locals in a constant surge of meet and greet. Money making entrepreneurs hovered about offering every scam known to man, including an artist in a corner complete with easel and sign advertising quick portraits for US$25 a pop.

A sign in the elevator even advertised Pizza flown in from Seattle at $US40. Though some one had scribbled "Who can afford" across it.

I approached the front desk and asked Intourist to confirm my Aeroflot flight to Singapore. She was on the phone for ages and then told me the flight didn’t leave until Saturday, two days away.

Impossible I replied, please check again.  She wasn’t pleased and for a few seconds we glared at each other before she picked up the phone again and began a shouting match with someone at the other end.

‘You must go yourself with this ticket to the airport.’  I was being given the flick.  ‘We cannot help you here.’

I figured I would need my passport and asked the receptionist.  She pointed to an office down a corridor.  Inside sat a man and again I asked for my passport.  He frowned, not understanding, and I repeated the question.

‘Speak Russian’ the request sounded like a command.

‘Nyet.’

‘Is foolish come here and not speak Russian,’ he lectured.

‘Up to now it hasn't been a problem,’ I couldn't manage even a smile, ‘my passport please.’

I snatched it and slammed the door as I left.  In the frame of mind I was in now, pity help the airport people.  The taxi driver started to haggle and I curtly told him 25 roubles and cut the crap.  My anger cut through all language difficulties.  It was a fast silent drive.

At the Aeroflot office I soon discovered how fortunate I had been on  domestic flights around the country.  Now I was one person in a pathetic milling crowd, standing in long queues that never seemed to reach the windows.  I was the only westerner; the majority were young Africans, with a few Afghans and others who seemed to accept the intolerable wait as normal.

After what seemed like an age I finally reached the counter and a bored young woman glanced at my ticket and told me I was in the wrong queue.  Back to the tail end, and then after slow shuffling progress another woman looked at the ticket and said ‘You already have ticket, what you want here?’

Absolutely seething I went through the morning’s ritual and asked for confirmation of the flight.  She looked at the ticket again and said ‘You are booked on plane, okay.’

What time should I check in?

‘Midnight.’

Why did I have the feeling she had pulled that time out of thin air?

It was getting close to the lunchtime rendezvous with Cari  set up back in Frunze when he kindly offered to look after those bulky art books.  I bargained another taxi ride back to the hotel, watching the streets of Tashkent flash by, an entire morning wasted at the airport.

Cari with the art books

Cari was waiting just inside the vestibule, how lovely to see a friendly familiar face. His eyes lit up as he saw me, ‘You are here; I was worried.’

 ‘Yesterday I phoned the hotel in Samarkand and they said they had never heard of you.’

I shrugged, shaking my head, so much for being one of the girls back in Samarkand...

Cari’s apartment wasn’t far from the hotel and he lunched there every day so the waiter knew him well and quickly settled us both at a table.  I told him of my encounter at the airport.

‘And you have confirmation,’‘ he asked.

‘Verbally’ I nodded, ‘there’s nothing in writing’.

‘My company has the same problem every time we send a man back to India.  It is always a big gamble.’

‘What should I do?’ I asked him between the cabbage with meatball soup, and lamb ragout.

‘You will do nothing, I will take your ticket to the airport and see some people I know while you go and see what you can of Tashkent’.

_____

Tashkent was destroyed in an earthquake in 1966 and even though one of the former Unions oldest cities, originally founded over 2000 years before, the buildings I now passed in the central city were all contemporary or chocolate box classical.  Russian influence and money could be seen in every detail.  It had been the same with Frunze’s architecture.  

I followed the crowd down steps to one of the underground stations near the hotel.  A narrow pedestrian tunnel led into an elaborate marble cavern with giant size statues and murals of Soviet hero’s decorating the walls.

Railway station more suited to a museum

In the underground thoroughfare, linking the road above to the station below, young men sat at clumsy stalls selling music tapes and mildly pornographic magazines.  Later, in the park bordered by Leningrad Avenue, I saw a couple selling sex manuals and health diet books while across from them on a grass verge a young woman was unpacking a carton of shampoo.

On the corner of Leningrad and Proletarskaja I found the only private art and curio shop of my travels through Central Asia.  Every inch of wall space was covered with oil and water paintings, carpets, pottery and ceramics...a lovely shop to browse through.  While I was there a woman came off the street and took three old glass vases from a shopping bag, the owner appraised them and money changed hands.

TASHKENT PARK - SELLING SHAMPOO


MICKEY MOUSE IN TASHKENT

In the same rambling building, it actually opened onto the park, I happened across two rooms where videos were being shown of incredibly old black and white American cartoons, Mickey Mouse before he became the cutesy hero of Walt Disney.  Three young men were handling ticket sales, their customers seated about 20 to a room on odd kitchen and dining chairs.

 

The atmosphere was pathetic; the viewers were in a 12 to 18 age bracket, dressed in clumsy ill matched clothing, hair closely shaved.  No one appeared to be enjoying the cartoons; they just sat glum and serious.  If I hadn't known better I would have guessed they were drugged patients in an outdated psychiatric ward.

FOUR CUBES OF SUGAR

I was due to meet Cari back at the hotel at 6 o'clock.  He was there on the dot with my daughters heavy and bulky art books bought in Frunze, under his arm.

‘I've spoken to a friend at the airport and she has faxed Moscow to confirm you are on the flight list.’

I started to thank him and he interrupted...’That doesn't mean a thing, she will send another fax to Moscow when your flight takes off.’

‘But why?’  I was puzzled, just how many confirmations did I need?

‘You have seen how corrupt life is here?’

I nodded, and he continued ‘Flights leaving Moscow are always full, people queue for days to get tickets.  Your flight will leave for Tashkent with one seat empty.  What Aeroflot employee will care that Robyn from Australia misses out on a seat when someone else will give him many roubles or even dollars as a bribe?’

Not for the first time I realised how naive I must seem.

‘For now we will enjoy the evening, nothing more can be done until your aircraft leaves Moscow.’

Cari had booked a table and ensured we would not share it with others.  He had also brought with him a bottle of Cognac and a liqueur to have with our coffee.

The waiter suggested we start with caviar, only pink was available, but an extremely generous serve.  There were various salads and cold meats on the table and the main course was beef stroganoff.  Cari suggested I try a lime tea and the waiter who knew this was a special occasion presented the piece de resistance...four cubes of sugar, the first I had seen since leaving Singapore.

Meanwhile the band had started playing and the huge dining room swung into party mood.  A table next to ours was celebrating a birthday and sent over glasses of vodka which of course custom dictated we down in one gulp.  I was swept onto the dance floor for some spirited dancing and was glad to return to Cari when the music stopped, my Russian partner suffered from an excess of body odour and a lack of deodorant.

A bunch of red roses and a bottle of champagne appeared, a gift from another table on hearing I was returning home that night. The music alternated between modern upbeat tunes like ‘Woman in Red’, to the soulful twang of the balalaika and the music of Russia.

 Upstairs in my room I still had some Australian souvenirs, kangaroo stick pins, a tiny furry koala and some key rings and this was the perfect time to give them away.

WAITING FOR A PLANE THAT MIGHT NOT ARRIVE

Meanwhile Cari had slipped out to telephone his airport contact who by now would have faxed Moscow to check that the plane had left with my name still on the passenger list.  It had.

I thanked Cari for all he had done, it was now approaching midnight; from here I would be able to manage alone.

‘But I'm coming with you to the airport,’ he said.

‘Cari,’ I protested, ‘the plane doesn't leave until 4 o'clock in the morning.’

‘And the next few hours are the most crucial,’ he told me. ‘There is absolutely no guarantee you'll actually board that plane.  In fact there's a good chance you'll be back here for breakfast.’

I couldn't believe what Cari what taking such pains to tell me.  Perhaps it would have been easier to just fly into and out of Moscow in the first place.  So we spent the next hour down in the foreign currency bar sipping coffee and cognac and getting on famously like the old friends we had become.

The time passed quickly, we talked about his family in Bangalow and his friends in Tashkent.  To his parents dismay he hadn’t yet married, but ‘there is a lady here that I am interested in.  Perhaps...’ he raised his shoulders and I gathered he was in no hurry to settle down.

Then it was time to leave for the airport, Cari had called for a taxi and we made the short trip to the airport through darkened streets.

 I was surprised to see the fare was only four roubles.  No wonder my various taxi drivers had been so solicitous, I had been lashing out with a small fortune.

I felt sad, the marvelous adventure was coming to an end...  or was it?

__________

FINAL EPISODE 14   SAYING GOODBYE IN RUSSIAN

©Robyn Mortimer 2010

10. IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF TAMERLANE

Registan Square - its sheer size amazing.

BREATH TAKING SAMARKAND

 had been dreaming of Samarkand for so long and now I could barely believe I was here, treading the same path taken so long ago by Genghis Khan and Tamerlane.

Streets that had seen so much history were now  broadened and concreted, traffic a curious blend of modern trolley buses and old cars, horse drawn carts and donkeys, and people dressed in the loose flowing garb of Islam. I was so engrossed in the buildings and shops; even the Arab way of stacking fruit on the pavement that the square itself appeared before me like a sudden apparition.

Its sheer beauty took my breath away.  Registan Square, for me one of the seven wonders of the world. I stood across the road, across Registanskaya Street, utterly overwhelmed and wishing I had someone with me to share the moment. 

Then I crossed the six lanes of traffic and stood on the opposite footpath, my back to the noise and fumes of the 20th century.  In front of me was a square that hadn't changed in hundreds of years, a scene that could have been taken from the Bible, or from the Koran.

Three ancient buildings comprised and dominated the square, the fifteenth century Ulugbek Medrese, the almost identical Shir-Dor Medrese and in the middle the Tillya-Kary Medrese all with detailed mosaic work in brilliant shades of blue.  Minarets and soaring arched facades, perfectly formed, yet with the tiny imperfections demanded by the law of Islam.

The incredible blue of the domes and intricate tiles merged with the clear blue of the sky, the vast paved square with stands of trees and pockets of lawn completed a perfect setting.  I sat on stone steps, centre front, absorbing the magic, until the light went from the sky and I became worried that the night would overtake me.

The ‘People to People’ buses had arrived from Bukhara and Jerry called out that he'd located some locals with black-market antiques for sale; did I want to tag along? But I had already arranged a night at the theatre.

Next morning, I started out very early on foot.  Intourist had no maps in English but I did have a roneoed copy of the streets of Samarkand thoughtfully provided by Mitzi when she handed me that questionable visa.  Throughout the day I would cross the paths of various Sputnik buses, waving to familiar faces as we each touched on the various points of splendour.

I was drawn again to the square, and sat there completely absorbed in the atmosphere of Registan.  No other place on any of my travels has held such a powerful sway over my imagination. The hordes of Asia passed by my eyes, conquering nomads, heroes and villains.  War and peace and revolution, cruelty and kindness and survival.  I was close to tears, quietly emotional. I sat there for ages more before starting down Tashkentskaya Street where life seemed to have frozen to a time some centuries before.

The twentieth century ended at the start of the street, at the bus depot, where not only trolley buses turned around to return the way they had come, but all the buses from outlying districts deposited people in town for the day to either buy or sell at the grand bazaar.

At the bus depot

Around the depot entrepreneurs set up long charcoal braziers, and smoke and the smells of cooking meat and garlic wafted in the air.  There were outdoor teahouses with tapchans and groups of men in deep discussion and through all this mass of people surged excited family groups.  

Young girls with long black braids, like butterflies in their gaudy striped silk dresses and embroidered caps, plump matrons clutching small children eyes bright and darting. Their menfolk walked apart, some proudly carrying a small child, all wearing the black and white embroidered skull caps of the Uzbek.

Tashkentskaya was a long narrow street that led from Registan to the ruins of the beautiful Bibi Khanum Mosque and beyond to the grand bazaar itself. Along both sides of the paved street small shops sold materials and ribbons, foodstuffs and books and utensils; and in front of the shops, on the footpaths, stallholders duplicated everything inside the shops. 

It was busy and noisy and carefree and everyone seemed to be enjoying what the day had to offer.  In the middle of the street, ignoring the spill over of pedestrians, pony and donkey drawn traps journeyed back and forth, saving weary feet the long trek from bazaar to bus for just a few kopecks.

A welcome ride from Bazaar to bus depot

I hadn't realised it was Sunday, and I was very lucky because the Sunday market was the biggest and best. I entered the vast enclosed complex near the melon sellers where towering mounds of watermelons were displayed on worn and faded carpets of such beauty I nearly wept at such neglect.  Trucks reversed through milling crowds with even more melons.  In separate sections were fruit and vegetables of every variety ...carrots, tomatoes, egg plant, onions, horseradish...a riot of colour spread out on row after row of tables.

Every conceivable item was on sale, singing birds in cages, coarse grains, exquisite shawls in the finest of wool, cheese and carpets....even a woman wearing the paisley design scarf of the Uzbek women standing rather forlornly by herself selling her hair, a long black twist, so long it must once have reached past her waist.  I couldn't bring myself to photograph her.

My camera was suspect, so was I.

 I drew comments, blondes stand out in Asian crowds, and  often asked where I came from.  Those who looked blank when I replied ‘Australia’, more often responded to ‘kangaroo’.  A Soviet made documentary about the outback was a recent hit on local television.

At the hotel preparations were under way for the ‘People to People’ caravan flight back to Moscow, the supply of twine and wrapping paper nearly exhausted.  Jerry had by far the most excess luggage with carpets, shawls and local hats by the score.  In my room I found a note from Dawn in case she missed me downstairs in the foyer...when I made it to Alaska, her home was my home.

I would miss these friendly people; the sole Japanese in the group who stuck close to me in Bukhara because, I suspect, I took the time to listen to his halting English; dear Dr. Katie, recovered now from being stuck in the hotel lift; Jerry and the Ecuadoran industrialist who managed to put away copious amounts of vodka; the Gautelamalan who had twelve foster children back home and bought souvenirs by the dozen.

Jeff, the lanky farmer from Missouri showed me a fob watch he had bargained off a street seller for ‘only $20, how about that?’ Amid calls to ‘you write now, you hear’ and a cheery wave from Lena from Moscow, the big sputnik buses pulled out into the traffic for the short drive to the airport.  I might prefer traveling alone, but it is fun meeting people, and sad sometimes to say goodbye.

Though I wasn't to remain alone for long...

_________

EPISODE 11 -  FILM CREW IN SAMARKAND

©Robyn Mortimer 2010

8. DEJA VU IN BUKHARA

A LANEWAY IN BUKHARA

A STRANGE WALK THROUGH STRANGELY FAMILIAR PLACES

Next morning after the usual breakfast of flat bread, glass of thick yoghurt, black tea and fried eggs, I set out to walk through the old city of Bukhara, the Moslem quarter where homes were hidden behind high walls and narrow alleys led to domed market places. 

I had only walked a few hundred yards down the street when a car pulled alongside.  It was Sasha with a Missouri farmer called Jeff and a Guatemalan plantation owner.  They were on their way to a local tea house; would I care to join them?

 ‘We are going to my most favourite place in all of Bukhara,’ Sasha told us as the car negotiated winding alleys and narrow lanes.

He parked the car in a quiet almost deserted square where all the buildings had high walls and no windows. There was not another soul around. I stepped out of the car and looked about, feeling a sudden and inexplicable surge of recognition. How on earth could I explain this strange sense of belonging, these familiar surroundings?

 I felt completely at home.  Was this odd feeling of awareness  what some people called déjà vu?

Sasha opened a wooden gate in a high brick wall and we entered an oasis of beauty and shade...an open courtyard dominated by spreading mulberry trees.  Under the leafy branches were six tapchans or wooden beds for locals to sit upon and play backgammon, sip tea or just count their beads.

The tapchans were varnished and highly polished and covered with a bright kelim or carpet in the middle of which was a small table. The teahouse was part of an old madrassah or school and the buildings surrounding the open courtyard housed an artisan’s commune where coppersmiths and weavers worked their craft. A huge copper samovar polished to a golden sheen dominated the servery where our tea was being prepared.

With Sasha and Jeff the Missouri farmer, and the Gautemalan sitting at a tapchan in the open air tea house

Following Sasha’s lead we took off our shoes and sat up on the tapchans, leaning back on the bed ends.  Our host sat easily, his legs crossed, Jeff and I, both tall, draped ourselves ungainly under the little centre table while the more plump Guatemalan sat crossways with his feet on the ground.  

Two men on a tapchan next to ours played backgammon; Sasha sat back, relaxed, and fingered his beads as Greeks do their worry beads.

The teahouse attendant brought our green tea in an orange teapot with four glasses and a plate of Arab sweets...nougats and sugary confections.  A radio played in the background, the music of the Arab world, shrill and discordant but not unpleasant. 

The atmosphere was tranquil, like being in a private world.  If I lived in Bukhara this would be my favourite place too...perhaps it once had been.

We passed the time discussing everything and nothing, from Missouri winters to the price of coffee.  I was very aware how privileged I was to be included, Uzbek women by and large don’t join in their men’s social lives.

We next visited an artist friend of Sasha, Dumond Park, his family were of Korean origin.  His studio was in a run down part of Bukhara in a partially demolished and very old building.

His paintings were large and many and my companions from the tour group bought a number to ship home.  I had to be content with a few of his smaller postcard size etchings, one of them the introduction to all posts in this series, another seen below.

I had decided to walk back to the hotel and left the others to return in Sasha’s car.  He had given me directions but I didn't need them.  In the maze of walled alleys and lanes it seemed I picked my way unerringly, turning corners and crossing streets until I found myself in a narrow paved thoroughfare divided by a man made aqueduct.  

The stream or canal was narrow and contained within waist high brick walls on which small children played, chasing each other and balancing, arms outstretched.  

Ahead, gossiping and enjoying the sunshine, three older women sat on a section of the wall. They were dressed in their traditional costume, paisley shawls and head scarves in red, green and blue patterns over matching floral dresses. Each outfit was colour co-ordinated with plain wool socks and cardigans and soft felt slippers.

Three ladies of Bukhara

They smiled a greeting and I was startled by the resemblance of the lady in the middle to my long dead grandmother....the same features, olive complexion, even her expression as she gestured to my camera.  As I took photographs I almost expected her to call me by  name. 

We conversed by pantomime and finger counting, the lady in the middle was in her mid seventies and between them they had 12 grandchildren. The old ladies wore tasteful jewellery of old gold, bracelets and rings, and in their pierced ears delicate emeralds and rubies. The walled house across from where they sat belonged to the youngest of the three.

When I left the three ladies of Bukhara I continued on my way, past little shops that sold sticky sweets and sacks of grain, a tiny barber shop with room for only one customer. I caught up with a man on a donkey who averted his face when I lifted the camera. 

But strangely, in this maze of nameless streets I didn't have to ask directions, without hesitation I turned corners, traversed streets,  found the way out of that old quarter through a park into Lenin Square and back to the Intourist hotel.

I try to keep an open mind on the mysteries of life and death and possible reincarnation, to me all is impossibly possible, but of this I am sure, in Bukhara on that day, I experienced a sense of history, of a belonging that I cannot possibly nor rationally explain.

The ‘People to People’ caravan left early next day in their air-conditioned sputnik buses for Samarkand, 230 kilometres across the desert.  I asked Mustoora where I could find the local bus for Samarkand.  She was horrified.

‘The journey would take all day,’ she warned me.

I didn't mind, I wasn't on a strict timetable.  She went on to insist that women didn't travel alone in this part of the country, a woman alone would command no respect, she said.

Such a short distance, surely I wouldn't offend anyone...I really wanted to travel by bus.

‘If you had a companion it would be possible, but for you alone...the driver would not sell you a ticket.’

‘If you spoke to the driver....’ 

‘No.  It is out of the question.’

She spoke with such finality I could do nothing but put myself in her hands.

‘There is a flight leaving later this afternoon, I will see if they have space for you.  Come back after lunch.’

As it happened Mustoora had confirmation almost immediately and joined me in the dining room.  I invited her to share chai with me, and of course I questioned her about her life.

She was Uzbek born of an ethnic Uzbek father and Iranian mother.  She had studied languages and travelled abroad for Intourist as an interpreter.

‘For many years I enjoyed my life travelling and seeing the world, but my father was not pleased.  He insisted I return home and marry.’ At this point Mustoora extended her hand in a futile gesture the palm upturned, ‘I held off as long as I could, but when I turned 32, my father arranged for me to marry an Uzbek engineer.’

Through the story Mustoora maintained an offhand, resigned attitude. She held the most senior position here at the hotel and was a tough lady as her interrogation of me the night I arrived had demonstrated.

‘That was twelve years ago, and with marriage my travels ended...’she shrugged, ‘...but at least my husband understood my need to have a career.  So he allows me to work here, for Intourist.’

‘Are you happy,’ I asked her?

‘Happy?’ She paused to mull over my question before she finally replied, ‘I have a son, he is my life.   No I'm not happy, but I tell you this...I am lucky.’

She had already told me that her name, Mustoora, means obedience.

________________

  

Episode 9  Flight to Samarkand  Flight to Samarkand

 

© Robyn Mortimer 2010

      

7. IN BUKHARA THE AGONY OF TIPPING

In the once grand gardens of the harem

WHERE  LONE TRAVELER'S ARE SUSPECT

The flight west to Bukhara was over increasingly arid country.  

Mile after mile of dry sandy plain with only occasional dams and narrow waterways.  The plane landed on dusk and I stepped from the tarmac into a rose scented garden of tangled vines and fairy lights.  This airport terminal was smaller and more informal than those at either Tashkent or Frunze.  Waiting friends and relations had the friendly manner of country people; everyone down to the smallest child was greeted with warmth and handshakes.

The Intourist office had closed. I searched through the small building for someone who perhaps spoke English, no one did.  A young man took my bag and found a ‘tax-ee’ to take me to an ‘o-tel’. The cab was really a private car, but the young man stressed the driver was alright with the universal thumbs up sign and then counted to twenty five roubles, the fare I should pay.  He refused a tip and I gave him a kangaroo pin instead.

Bukhara on the banks of the Zeravshan River was deep in desert country, the Kyzyl Kum or Red Sands Desert and the Russian ‘dobraye utra’ would now become the Moslem salutation ‘Salaam Aleikum.’

We drove through empty streets into a huge open square and pulled up in a side street by the modern multi storey Intourist Bukhoro Hotel. I guessed that because his wasn't an official taxi he couldn't drive up to the front door, so I dragged my belongings up twenty steps to the swinging door of the entrance and asked reception for a room.

For a moment you could have heard a pin drop.  Had I been a Martian from outer space I doubt my arrival could have caused such suspicion. Where had I come from...did I have a voucher...where was my visa?

The receptionist called a superior who promptly got on the phone to someone else.  A lot of Russian was flying back and forth.  A woman looked through my visa and told me I had no permission to even be in Bukhara.

I was no expert in the Russian alphabet but I could recognize the letters that stood for Bukhara amidst all the other towns Mitzi back in Singapore had randomly included in my application and humbly pointed them out to her.  Now wasn't the time to be stroppy.

I could see the hotel reception was thronged with tourists. 

Maybe they didn't have room for me.  The inquisition was running out of steam, the lady in charge asked what I was doing in Bukhara, was I a journalist?  I assured her I was just traveling through, a housewife if she needed an official designation.

 

The lady in charge identified herself as Mustoora and said they would give me a room but I would have to pay in hard currency, US$ dollars.   She quoted seventy five dollars and I presumed this covered the same meals as Frunze.  She asked if I had eaten and then took me across to the dining room.

‘The head waiter will find you a table,’ she said, ‘it is best you reward him now before you eat.  He has, what you say...absolute power about what food you get.’

I couldn't believe what she was saying and thought she must be pulling my leg. But no, Mustoora was very serious though I did sense a touch of sarcasm, obviously there was no love lost between the two hotel employees.  I wondered if it was simply that the head waiter was Russian and she was Uzbek.  In any case I thanked her for taking the trouble to warn me.

It was a very large dining room with a stage at one end and to the side, through sliding glass doors, a long ornamental pool. The waiters were dressed in black trousers and white shirts and wore the black and white skullcap of the Uzbeks. The head waiter sat at a table just inside the door.

I pondered how much I should slip him and in which currency.  Not roubles, I decided.  They really weren't worth very much, yet to give him five or ten dollars as I might in Australia was really out of all proportion to the cost of the meal. I was thinking fast, remembering clumsy past failures at bribery,  oh well I decided...as I was going to be in Bukhara for a while  I may as well gain the reputation of a big spender.  I discreetly palmed him a US$10 note, or if you looked at it another way, a month’s wages.

 

The maitre'd bowed slightly, showed me to a table and food was brought.  The dining room was a hub of activity. At this late hour there were no tourist groups eating but every table was taken by locals.  A band played western music and couples danced. I could see the head waiters desk, and not only did he have power over the food he also decided who got a table and who didn't.  He spent the entire evening pocketing bribes and tips.  I found mine well spent if only for the way dining staff sprang to attention when next I entered.

The Bukhoro Hotel had a hard currency bar in the basement for foreign guests.  One drawback in being female and traveling alone is that in most places you're restricted to staying indoors after dark.  Bukhara would probably have been safe enough, though Cari's warning in Frunze still rang in my ears.

Playing it safe, I wandered down the spiral stairway to the tiny bar, a long narrow room with a strobe light for atmosphere and shelves against a mirrored wall well stocked with foreign spirits and wines.  There was an espresso machine that I never saw used, and high up on the end wall, a colour television showing a news bulletin from Moscow.

American tourists were grouped at tables.  I bought a coffee, instant from a jar, and angled my seat at the bar towards the television.  A tall man in a blue cotton sweat suit invited me to join his table, he spoke in a Texan drawl and his name was Jerry.
 

We exchanged introductions; Jerry was part of a tour, the highly organised ‘People to People’ caravan comprising specialists from such diverse fields as medicine, farming and industry.  At first they thought I was part of their hundred strong tour group and achieved minor notoriety when they learned I was alone.

Jerry, who appeared to be the shaker and mover of the tour, had discovered some black market Bukhara rugs for sale in a nearby home.  Together with Dawn, who described herself as the groups official trouble shooter, and two others, we slipped away to find the house where Sasha lived.

With Dawn the trouble shooter - later in Samarkhand

 Finding our way along the unlit streets armed with a solitary torch, or as Jerry called it, a flashlight, we located Sasha’s apartment on the ground floor of a double story block within walking distance of the hotel.  

We slipped our shoes off at the door and were shown into a lounge room lined with books in many languages.  Sasha’s wife and daughter made no appearance though a little later his six year old son was introduced.  The carpets were displayed on the floor.

They were beautiful and very reasonable but I left the bargaining to the Americans.  Unlike the others I had to carry my own baggage and instead I bought a colourful embroidered ‘Suzanna’...a large cotton throw over, once a part of every young Uzbek girl’s trousseau.

 Sasha slipped out of the room, and returned with a tray of refreshments.   I thought it odd that his wife had made no appearance, particularly after he mentioned she was from Germany.  

Next morning I asked Mustoora for a map in English so I could find my way around the town.  There was nothing in print, she explained, and all the English speaking guides were with the four huge air conditioned ‘Sputnik’ buses from Moscow carrying the ‘People to People’ caravan.  At that moment Sasha walked up to the counter and recognized me from the night before. 

Mustoora explained my problem and Sasha said there was plenty of room on his bus, why not simply join the group for the days touring. I didn't think it would be that easy and suggested to Sasha that surely those in charge would object.

‘Come,’ he took my arm, ‘we will ask Lena from Moscow, she is in charge of everything.’

Lena from Moscow, a thin waif-like girl in her early twenties, looked me over and nodded and I boarded the bus to find I was sitting behind Dawn the trouble shooter who was surprised the Russians had allowed me to tag along, but nevertheless was pleased to see me.

With the suave Sasha as our English speaking guide we set off for the Emirs Palace, a series of single story wooden buildings with blue paint work weathered by countless dust storms and the passage of centuries.

14th CENTURY EMIRS PALACE BUKHARA

Inside was a treasure trove of ancient ceramics and paintings but I preferred to wander outside in the gardens of the harem and imagine the women who had lived there in the past.  

Very little of the garden had changed, perhaps the landscaping would have been more formal back then, and of course people like me would never have been allowed inside. It took little imagination to hear tinkling music and the chatter of women against softly trickling water. Sitting under shady vines within those same walls, I wondered how the women of the Emirs harem had felt,  privileged or  prisoners held against their will.

 

Lagging behind on our way back to the bus, I turned a corner and came upon a group of Turkmen from Turkmenistan, bearded old men with long brown duster coats edged with colourful braid over western style suits. 

What made me excited though were the brown, lamb’s wool headgear they wore.  Probably made from the karakul sheep the hats were like an immense shaggy version of the bearskins worn by the Guard at Buckingham Palace. 

It gave the men a wonderfully fierce appearance and I desperately wanted their photograph but I hesitated to just barge up and start clicking.   Turkmen are orthodox Sunni Muslims who still regard their women as second class.  I approached a Russian man with them and held up my camera. I needn't have worried; the old men posed self consciously but wouldn't let me go until I had captured each one of them on film.  One of the many times I regretted not having a Polaroid camera.

GENTLEMEN FROM TURKMENISTAN

The bus stopped next at the infamous 6th century Ark Citadel or fort where the British explorers Connolly and Stoddart were brutally executed in 1842 after a lengthy imprisonment in a snake pit. Watching Sasha entertain the tour group with dark stories of Bukhara’s history it was hard to realise only 150 years separated this charming and articulate man from his torturous and bloodthirsty forebears.

Across from the Ark Fort, we walked through the beautiful Balo-hauz Mosque, an exceptional 18th century example of Islamic architecture.  It's most breathtaking features were the twenty elegant carved wood columns fronting the marble and mosaic facade.  

The columns soared almost 80 feet high and reflected in the waters of a large round pond gave the mosque its other name - The Forty Columns. A teapot and cup by the side of the murky green waters, said to be health giving, indicated people still drank from the stagnant pool. I tried not to think about it.

On the bus I met an Australian with the program, Dr. Katie from Canberra who said she found the American support team amazing with interpreters, trouble-shooters even an entire medical support team able to cope with any emergency.  Organisers had thought of everything, she said, right down to the slightest detail like supplying twine, sticky tape and carry bags for souvenirs that wouldn't squash into suitcases.  She told me the 13 day tour had cost around US$5,000 per person.

Dawn later told me the medical team comprised doctors and nurses with supplies of oxygen, plasma, and western equipment.  If necessary the doctors with the group were even equipped to perform surgery. I gathered local hospitals were best avoided. Later in Samarkand, an elderly woman became ill with a heart complaint and was flown out to Moscow and then on to an American base hospital in Germany. 

The People to People tour, Dawn explained, was part of the Citizen Ambassador Program, a private non-profit non-political organisation head-quartered in Kansas City, Missouri, which encouraged communication among the peoples of the world.  It had been founded by President Eisenhower in 1956.

That night I joined a small party in the basement bar.  Sasha was telling the story of a young Jewish girl from the Ukraine fleeing the Germans during world war two and meeting a young Moslem man in Bukhara...his mother and father.

You see,’ he extended his hands,’ I am very fortunate, through my mother...in the Synagogue, I am a Jew....and through my father...in the Mosque, I am a Moslem...I have access to both worlds.’

Sasha hinted at the underlying ethnic problems facing Uzbekistan and the threat of Islamic fundamentalism.  He said there were no true Uzbeks in Bukhara.  Mostly, the people here originated from Kazakhstan or Turkmenia, Iran, Afghanistan, Arabia ...even from Turkey.  But when the Russians realigned boundaries they said only Uzbeks could live in that particular region to be known thereafter as Uzbekistan.  

People could no longer call themselves Turks or Iranians...if they insisted then they must return to those countries.  So families that had lived centuries in Bukhara remained and fell under the general mantle of Uzbeks.  The majority spoke Farsi, the language of Iran and similar to that of Turkey. He suggested that should Uzbekistan be invaded in the future, the threat would come from those two countries. 

 

We quizzed him on conditions since perestroika and he shrugged, ‘We have suffered in the past, fools have run the country and food has been scarce.  But now we keep for ourselves the food we grow. We have greater worries though... little countries with large bombs.’

 

Not so very long before Sasha wouldn’t have dared venture his opinions in public; especially with foreigners.  He went on to say it was the old people who found it hard to accept that the world had changed and Russia was no longer their master.  As an example he told us about his mother.

‘She is getting on now, I try to see her each day or at least speak on the telephone to her. To amuse, I tell little jokes about my work and perhaps the joke might be about the Kremlin or the K.G.B.’ ‘You must remember,’ he went on’ my mother lived through terrible times...first the Nazis and then the purges of Stalin.  Old people are still very frightened; they don't believe their status has changed. 

My mother says to me ‘...Sasha, Sasha...be careful what you are saying...walls have ears.  They hear everything.  You must leave the house quickly, now, go to friends...don't stay the night.’

‘My son,’ Sasha added ‘may Allah be praised, will never experience such terror.’

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Episode 8   Deja Vu in Bukhara

©Robyn Mortimer 2010