My first week of ‘work’ is almost over. Friday we stop working earlier at the embassy, so finally I have a spare moment which I will dedicate to a little update. I realized that it was a very good idea to have spent those first 10 days travelling around Uzbekistan in order to get familiar with this place, its people, customs etc.

It was a gorgeous trip and I enjoyed almost every moment. People are infinitely kind here and it never came to the point that I would feel lost or helpless. Besides, Uzbekistan is such a save country that there was no problem at all for me travelling alone. My Russian is just about at the level that I can get by with almost anything, as long as I don’t have to indulge into political discussions.

My first destination was Bukhara. This somewhat magical oasis town and once important crossroad of the silk road has left the deepest impression on me. I stayed longer there than most tourists do (it was full of French and Italian tour groups at the time who try to cram a dozen mosques, medressas and caravanserai into max. 2 days). I took my time, visiting only a couple of them a day, for the rest I got lost in the old town with its dusty little alleys, taking endless pictures of Uzbek kids I took a fancy in. I lived in the Jewish quarter, at Mubinjon’s, a famous lonely planet backpacker place. There I could hang out with those backpacker folks who travel the world for months and years from all over the world. And there were indeed some fascinating people. The most hilarious one was the owner himself – a former sprinter and participant in the Olympic Games. He was quite moody, but I seemed to get along well with him and could stand his oddities. And then I got to know Parviza, a local girl who works in a hotel across the street and it was one of the best encounterings I have had since a long time. She has a great personality, a wonderful sense of humour and we spent the remaining days together. She showed to me so many things in Bukhara, which I would never have found on my own. For example she took me to the service of her Protestant church in the outskirts of Bukhara, which was a lovely experience and my last night was a highlight too, because a friend of her’s invited me to come to a traditional Uzbek wedding, which was absolutely awesome. There were bellydancers and very – in European eyes – strange traditions. I have understood quickly that the woman in Uzbekistan has a completely different status and duties than back in Europe.

I was quite sad to leave Bukhara, but my plan was to travel further north so I had to go on. I went by train to Navoi, a minor industrial city in the middle of the desert. This place became sort of my undoing. Maybe I should never have gone there, because I realized that I had 6 instead of 2 hours waiting time until the next train and that was in the middle of the night. So I was looking for a place to eat. Seeing a tourist once in a month this place was totally hostile to foreigners and very dark – literally. I overlooked a huge ditch and fell into it. With a few minor injuries I managed to get out again, but it was rather bad for my mood. However, I found a restaurant and helpful people who gave me disinfectant etc. There was a young waiter who was thrilled when he heard that I was German. He ran home immediately and came back with a pile of old exercice books. Actually he had studied German for 3 years and I was the first German he met in his life. So we spent the next few hours looking at German textbooks (even those are full of propaganda – incredible) and he taught me some Uzbek as well – the time flew by. It was a good night of sleep – surprisingly – for a little later I found myself in a crowded 3rd class car of the overnight train to Urgench. Still, I had my own bed and was too exhausted to mind anything around me. Besides, I noticed that Uzbek trains are quite clean, except for the toilets, but I have never seen clean ones in trains anyway. I met nice people in this train with whom I chatted the next morning. The journey through the desert was tiresome, though, because there was nothing but the same desert landscape to be seen from the window and then the air became stuffy and it was increasingly hot. The train arrived with 3 h delay. I was totally wrecked, but the family I had travelled with insisted  inviting me to their place in Khiva. We shared a taxi from Urgench to Khiva and in the afternoon arrived in the former capital of Khorezm. The people were very nice, but I should have refused the invitation. The food was delicious, but no surprise I became quite sick afterwards for having literally been forced to try so many things, completely unknown to my poor stomach.

The first day in Khiva was naturally a little troublesome, but during the second one I appreciated this old fortressed city. It is very beautiful and there are some great minarets, mosques and medressas. The sunset atmosphere on the top of the fortress tower is priceless. Still, I found that Khiva made more of an artificial impression, being completely dead and emptied of tourists in the evening. Few local people who are not involved in the tourist business still live inside the old town (ichon qala). I found a nice little hotel outside. Also, people seemed to be more pushy and more focused on tourists than in Bukhara where everything was lively, but more dozy at the same time.

From Khiva I went together with a German guy I already got to know in Bukhara (it’s this funny phenomenon that you keep bumping into the same tourists again and again), some Polish people and the owner of our hotel right into the desert. There is a circle of ancient fortresses in Khorezm, which are all in rouins but still quite impressive. So we went to visit some of them.

At the end of the day I was the only one who decided at Ayaz Kala to remain in a Yurt Camp. That was a wonderful experience and I don’t regret it for anything. I had always dreamt of spending a night in the desert and it was made true. There was a lake nearby which I went to and it was one of the best moments of this trip. I need to get some pictures uploaded soon! Promise! But the ultimative was the evening and first half of the night under a starlit desert sky. There were some camels too (probably on purpose for the tourists), but somehow it felt authentic. For example no real fridge, just a hole in the ground and a solar panel for the production of electricity. The food was amazing, too.

The next morning I joined the group of some Argentinian businessmen who were on their way to Turkmenistan (the sort of people who have seen and experienced already everything, just the odd authoritarian regime missing on their list). They were so kind to give me a lift to the next city – Berunyi.

From there I caught one of those ‘marshrutkas’ to Nukus. Just one word about marshrutkas. In my opinion it’s there where you really get to know Uzbek people and they can get to know you. No matter to who I talked the list of qts they asked me was always the same: 1 Where are you from? 2 What are you doing here?  3 Which year were you born? 4 Are you married? 5 What’s your name? 6 Are you Russian? (because of Nadja) It was quite hilarious.

Nukus, the capital of the former autonomous republic of Karakalpakstan, kept me for another two days. It’s a real remnant of Soviet times. The best about it is its wonderful art museum. I spent an entire day inside with a wonderful guide who just explained everything to me in such a detail and with so much enthousiasm and passion that it was simply a pleasure to listen to him. The founder of the museum basically tried to save all the banned dissident art during Soviet times. He accumulated an incredibly collection of over 10.000 items, of which only a little part is exhibited. I would have assumed that after having lived in Paris with its Louvre etc. I would already be overloaded with artistic input, but somehow this particular collection touched me much more than anything I had seen in the artistic metropols. Maybe just due to the simple fact, that it is so unexpected in this quite nondescript place. I would have loved to have spend more time in Nukus, and maybe eventually gone to the Aral Sea. This time I renounced, also for not wanting to travel for hours only to deplore the misery of one of the biggest environmental catastrophes which has become a somewhat infamous and questionable tourist attraction. I flew back to Tashkent from Nukus with Uzbekistan Airways. And curiously enough it was a very unspectacular flight, everything went alright despite having flown in a Russian Tupolev airplane (luckily, because they are big, the small yaks are much scarier). Nevertheless, I was quite glad when I was back on the ground and even more when I was back in my Tashkent appartment. Needless saying that the trip was far too short, but it prepared me well for everything yet to come here in Tashkent.

And about my work in the embassy…sorry, but highly confidential :) I am not getting bored, that’s what I can say after this first week.