Crime and Straf

In the city where Dostoevsky once lived, David is getting ‘Straf’ (Punishment) for making a left turn where it is not allowed. The “we don’t speak Russian” method (and we hardly do) seemed helpfull and we were allowed to drive off without any payment. Leaving behind a frustrated policeman with a half filled-in form.

Kazakh non-styles

It is an empty land and the drive from the south border to the north was warm, dusty and a bit boring after Kirgyzstan although it had its charms. We had two more campsites before arriving in Semey, Russia’s former nuclear testground. This is our last stop before entering Russia and we got our supplies for Mongolia, the end of this week, ready!

An empty land

On a mosquito infected campsite David is longing for an Amsterdam beer… or is it a beer in Amsterdam?

Kazakh style

Our last Stans stop before entering Russia and Mongolia… It all started exciting, with the easiest border crossing ever and a great first night camping near an impressive canyon in South Kazakhstan (GPS coordinates upon request). We were joined by eagles in the sky and scary big insects on the ground but no human creature to be seen for miles across the horizon. That’s because all the human creatures were busy driving their posh landcruisers across the dirty streets of Almaty. During the day at least, because at night the streets turn into large rivers due to all the rain. Impressive too, but different. But we got our last visa sorted (for Mongolia) and met up again with white van couple Phil and Angie and with motobiker Edde – which makes the expensive expat lifestyle in this city much more bearable. Today hopefully back into nature, heading northeast to the Altai republic and via Semey across the Russian border for some radioactive rebooster. More on that later…

Some pictures of our campsites

In the middle of nowhere:

Time to move on:

Trekking in the rain is no fun

Here some pictures, the story follows later.

Kyrgyzstan part II: the anatomy of the sheep

So we had the euphoria of our first dip in the ice-cold mountain lake, the perfect camping spots in the wild, the beautiful mountain peaks, the little rivers and waterfalls, the idyllic horse noises at night and the well weird local flora. One element we had not been quite that engaged with concerns the locals. Kyrgyzstan has wide and isolated areas of big nottingness, with only some occasional yurts and horses around. From nature we got well into culture when some local nomads paid us a visit at one of our camp sites, invititing us to their yurt for a cup of fermented mare’s milk (which, we can report, is quite an acquired taste). From there on memories are a bit blurred (or well mixed with locally produced vodka) but in some order the following events took place:

From drinking kymys (the mentioned mare’s milk) and tea to chatting with the family over lunch and looking up polite sentences in the Russian dictionary:

All of a sudden lunch was over, the family jumped up and rushed outside for prayers to Mekka, and there was wild gesturing of cutting throats – which worried us in more than one sense:

We are still not exactly sure what it was we ate, but David had sheep cheek while the animal’s eyes went to his neigbour. For sure the Kyrgz are very economical about their sheep, and none goes to waste… Anyway, the morning after we got horses for a trip to lake Song-Kol, a few hours away over the mountains:

Kyrgyzstan part I: lakes, mountains and camping in the wild

Uzbekistan fever

Another episode in the adventures of the curly blondes… They call it Uzbekistan. After our promising start in the desert we arrived in Bukhara (Boxara is apparently the more correct spelling for the cultural-historical members of the audience). It’s a city. Quite an old city but definitely a city. Something to do with the Silk Roads we read somewhere. So we had bazaars on every corner, blue mosques and minarettes in between, forts and dungeons, city walls or what was left of it and in total about 3 restaurants mainly catering for group tours. Our first encounter with Central Asian tourism! But admittedly a beautiful city. Probably even more beautiful if one is not ill. Not to say we missed most of it, but we did spent way too long in an overpriced hotel recovering from some smelly bug – was it in the water or the food, or just caused by an overkill in culture?
Last Monday we continued our trip to Samarkand, that other Silk Road giant. Maybe we should mention here we had already seen quite a few mosques with blue tiles. There was more to come. So many blue tiles everywhere one starts to wonder how many bathrooms they have torn down in order to build these huge buildings. But it was impressive and it was fun to climb to the top of a minnaret at Registan (the main blue tiles square in Samarkand) with perfect views over the city. But after this we had enough of blue tiles, especially in combination with death historical figures from long before MTV. So anyway, we had a few beers to reflect on all this old stuff, stayed over in a nice guesthouse (needless to mention here it provided views over another blue tiled mosque), got into some blue-tiled conversation with money-exchangers that couldn’t count, met a nice German couple travelling overland in the kind of Jeep we could only be very jealous of (so we ignored them for as much time as possible after swopping vital information about road conditions) and travelled up further North to the capital. This time we were not so much slowed down by bad roads (well, we are probably just getting used to the potholes and traffic chaos by now) but by the many police controls on the way. It’s usually a matter of just showing documents and a little chitchat about our trip, destination, where we left the children (coming up with original answers here all the time) etc but one copper decided we had been speeding and tried to talk us into paying fines. It’s a Lada for F sake. Anyway, we were saved by some more senior police officer who decided it was too much hassle trying to get money out of us. It’s a Lada for F sake…

We got to Toshkent, the Uzi capital, last Tuesday. Now that IS a city. Couple of million people, no internal logic in traffic or street ’system’, but with a very nice homestay where we would spent more time than we ever planned or wanted. The main reason people visit this place is on transit and to get visa. Now getting a visa is of course not the same as applying for a visa. Indeed, Toshkent is a convenient place for those wanting to waste their time on local bureaucracies. So we had multiple and extended dealings with the Kazakh embassy in an attempt to change the exit date of our existing visa. After two days of begging and not so much pleasing anymore this led to a personal invitation to explain to the ambassador himself why exactly we wanted to visit the country for that long and what we were thinking, really, of doing there. By now these had become Good Questions. But we got what we wanted. Plus the good thing is we haven’t spotted too many blue tiles yet. Getting the documents done for Kyrgyzstan was much easier and fixed in no time – this while the embassy was officially closed. Bravo to the Kyrgszhsz – we are on our way!

Bukhara

Samarkand

It took a little photoshop to get decent pictures for the visa applications.

Impressions from Turkmenistan

Country of Turkmen – not to be confused with Vegas, Dubai or Disneyland

Let’s not give the impression here of Turkmenistan as a bureaucratic country thriving on police controls and road checks that the old Soviet paperworkers would have envied. Nor linger on the complete absence of internet connections or free media whatsoever, or the silly little rules that make daily life such an interesting effort (a curfew for tourists that includes no driving after dark, but also only overnight stays in official hotels and the keen eyes of agents and the ministry of tourism, not to mention all the road rules and the no smoking in public… of course these rules are only active when blue uniforms are around and most importantly are supposed to be ignored in the absence of police). The country is actually amazing, the locals very friendly and curious (yes they have seen Ladas, but not usually driven by curly blondes) and the experience of actually visiting the place is magic.

A long and tiring pothole-fuelled drive on the first day led us to the capital Ashgabat. What a place. Is it the many statues and billboards of a smiling (but now dead) megalomaniac president popping up on every corner and building, the overkill of marble lanes and palaces, the huge artificial waterfalls in the city centre or the colourful dresses of the beautiful women around here that makes it such an incomprehensible experience? While waiting for our exit visa (don’t ask) we explored this city of complete madness and confusion. Temperatures rose to over 40 degrees, adding to the bizarre sights of a golden statue of the president which revolves following the sun, next to a huge bronze bull statue in memory of the earthquake that destroyed the city and killed most of it citizens in 1948. Government buildings around here include the Ministry of Fairness and of course the Ministry of Defense. After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Turkmenistan became blessed with a president that built squares and palaces in the name of independence, while whole areas of town were torn down to make room for even more impressive marble monsters and the renaming of streets, buildings and any concrete really after Turkmenbashi the Great (eg the president himself). What can one say? This president was not just a great leader (to be compared with Lenin, Stalin and Ataturk in the words of our guide) but also an eager author. The second most important book in the world, after the Koran, is the Ruhnama, in which the president gives his citizens guidance on spiritual and practical matters. We couldn’t resist buying an English language copy so don’t hesitate to sign up for some wise pieces of advice.

A lot of stuff is state sponsored here, and locals pay an almost symbolic rate of about $5 a year altogether for gas, electricity and phone (which is not too bad with average wages of some $120 a month). The best thing of all for us is the petrol prices. A 40 liter tank cost us 15.000 Manat which is about $0.60. Our British friends with the van paid less than a dollar for 160 liter of diesel. Don’t you just love dictatorial regimes. And spare jerrycans to fill up.

With new visa in our passports we continued our way to Mary, a city not too far away from the ancient site of Merv. Impressive remains of a citadel and fire temple, city walls, holy places from different times and religions… Considered to be the fifth civilization in the world (after Egypt, Mesopotamia, China and India – or was it The Netherlands?) and conveniently located at one of the crossroads of the Silk Roads there is still a lot of excavation to be done in this area. Simply a very humble feeling to walk around the mudbrick fortresses and holy sites with superb views over surrounding villages with their minarets.

A scenic drive through the desert brought us to the Northern border with Uzbekistan. Of course the Turkmen border crossing was one big paperwork exercise again, but we managed to get away within a few hours, while the Uzbek border took some time because all customs forms were in Russian. Yes we are learning, but not that quickly. The big bonus was our first overnight stay in the desert. Think tent in the sand and sand in the tent, great stars in the sky at dark, proper camping food on a little gas stove (courtesy of Angie), leftover Turkmen beer and wine followed by Moldavian red from 1994 (yuk), scary sounds at night and sheep herds passing by in the morning. Ideal.

This morning we arrived in Bukhara, one of the two main ancient Silk Road cities in Uzbekistan. More stories and some pictures later, as we ´re facing a temperamental internet connection again.