uzbekistan: khiva

Getting from Tashkent to Khiva in Uzbekistan wasn't quite as straightforward as I'd hoped. Uzbekistan doesn't have as much tourist infrastructure as I think it should, especially between some of the most popular places to visit in the country.

My day started when a taxi picked me up at 0600 to take me to the airport. My flight was supposed to depart at 0750, and we boarded on time. Then we sat. And sat some more while eating a snack. And sat.

Eventually we deboarded, and went back into the terminal. Announcements were made, but they were in Uzbek and Russian, so I had no idea what was happening. After a while we reboarded, and finally took off around 1015.

A few hours later the plane landed at Urgench airport. Since it was a domestic flight and I had my bag with me, I basically walked straight through the airport, out to the parking lot. 

My original plan had been to catch a bus into the city center, then catch another bus to my next destination of Khiva. Since the flight had been delayed, I no longer wanted to take the time to do that, and opted for a taxi instead.

I agreed on a price of $20 with a taxi driver, and off we went. He pointed out a few things as we drove (including cotton fields, one of the water hungry crops grown in this desert country,) and took me right to my guesthouse in Khiva. 

When he dropped me off he tried to raise the price, saying that I'd been by myself. I gave him the $20 we'd agreed on, and got out of the taxi. I hate it when people try to do that.

I was able to check in straightaway, something I always appreciate. I ended up taking a small nap, which wasn't my greatest move. I need to get better about checking in somewhere, dropping my bags and walking back out straightaway to start exploring, instead of wasting time.

The weather wasn't amazing, which was one of the reasons I ended up dozing off. It wasn't as warm as I'd expected, and it wasn't sunny. At all. It was windy, chilly, and constantly threatening rain.

My first area to explore was right across the street from the guesthouse, I think it took me about 3 minutes to walk to the entry gate. There is no entry fee just to walk around the area, so I opted to wait on buying an entry ticket. Also, the ticket office wasn't immediately obvious, another reason to wait on ticket purchase.

As I walked through the gates I could see a group walking along, including two women wearing wedding gowns. It didn't take a genius to figure out that they were having wedding photos taken, I guess it was a double wedding. Very cool to see.

The old city of Khiva is still surrounded by its walls, which were first mentioned in history in the 10^th century. The khanate of Khiva is one of the areas that now make up Uzbekistan, but was independent and geopolitically powerful back in the day. 

The old city of Khiva is what visitors come to see, the modern part of the city isn't very interesting. (Though I do wish I had explored a bit more.)

I spent the next few hours wandering around the area within the walls. I found a short, very fat minaret that was never completed. I found a tall, skinny minaret that provides a good view of the entire old city. I found a couple mosques, and a couple madrassahs. I found quite a few museums, some of which sounded far more interesting than others.

I did pay one entrance fee for the day, to enter a mausoleum. I don't know why, but this mausoleum wasn't included in the ticket that covers the majority of the inner walled area. The tiling on the walls and ceiling was incredible, multiple shades of blue mosaic designs. I also noticed that prayers were being sung constantly, by one man who sortof sat in the corner.

I entered the Jama Masjid, the 'Friday Mosque' and could immediately see how old it is. Throughout the prayer area the roof was held up by carved wooden columns. Some of the columns were in better condition than others, not surprisingly. There were no windows in the walls, so it was really dark inside. I'm not sure what kind of lighting is normally used.

I noticed that I must've been traveling during low season, as the souvenir stalls were very lackluster. Many of them weren't stocked at all, and those that were open had very quiet vendors.

Another indication that I was traveling in low season was the closure of some buildings. I could be totally wrong, and those buildings are closed for another reason, but they just seemed so sad and empty.

It was impossible not to notice that every building was made in the same colour. A beige colour, very bland. The only colour came from the beautiful blue mosaic tiles used for decoration on the front of madrassahs, mausoleums, and mosques. With the gray sky, it seemed a bit ho hum.

Eventually I walked back out of the walls and went back to my guesthouse. The owner gave me some ideas for where to get dinner. Fortunately, one of the places was nearby, as I just wasn't in the mood for walking a long way. (I was cold, and not mentally ready to be cold, if that makes sense.) Food was good, and I came back to the guesthouse full and ready to sleep.

The next morning I got to experience a fantastic Uzbek breakfast. I ate a crepe, half a piece of French toast, sweet potato, another vegetable, rice, mashed potatoes, pickled something, bread, cookies, and tea. Not only did it all taste good, it was presented really well.

After a few more hours of relaxing, I went out for the day around noon. Yes, I wasted half a day doing a whole lot of nothing. I went back to the entrance gate, and paid for the city ticket, a whopping 100,000 som. (Which worked out to $11/12 US dollars.)

The ticket office also sold postcards, so I took advantage to get a few of those. The photos weren't nearly as good as I thought they should be, but I don't make the postcards.

I started my sightseeing by walking to another palace that I thought was included in the ticket. (My guidebook said it was.) It turned out not to be included, and the additional entrance ticket would've been 40,000 som. 

Since I hadn't yet seen anything included in the first entry ticket, I decided to skip the extra palace, and hope that I didn't miss anything spectacular.

I walked back to the old city area, and found a palace inside there, called the Ark. (Not the one Noah sailed when the world flooded.) I'm not sure what each section of the Ark was, I felt as though I was seeing a series of stages. I'm sure I could look it up, but I never got around to it. 

The appearance of each stage was quite fantastic, with nice decor, and wide open areas. Each tile design was different, and the undersides of the ceilings were awesome.

I found stairs which led me to the top of part of the Ark, which provided views over the entire old city. I loved it, and if it hadn't been so windy I would've stayed up there for at least an hour.

After leaving the Ark I visited a few of the museums spread out over the old city area. I saw the history museum, a music museum, and more. Despite the season (winter,) there was no heating in any of the buildings, so I was cold. The biggest museum I visited was the handicraft museum, which was mostly a wide open and empty space. There were small rooms around the area, also emtpy. The undersides of the ceilings were decorately with different designs, which were very very photogenic.

After checking out all the museums I found a set of stairs leading me to the tops of the walls around the city. I walked as far as I could in either direction, though some of the construction seemed rather soft in areas. It was nice to see the old city from a different level, and gave me some exercise.

After coming back down off the walls and walking through the area again I passed a couple school aged kids. They saw I had a camera and asked me to take a photo of them. Who was I to say no?

After the kids, I decided I was mostly done for the day. I walked back to the same cafe where I'd eaten the night before, and managed to clean my plates.

The next morning I got to have the same fantastic breakfast, then pack up my stuff and check out. The owner of the guesthouse had arranged a shared taxi for me to get to my next city, and it showed up on time.

uzbekistan: tashkent

It took me a while to decide where I wanted to go for my 'spring' holiday, I finally settled on Uzbekistan. Since I am American, that meant I had to get a visa before getting on the plane, which was not fun. Finding information online as to how to get the visa was a bit confusing, as there are different rules for different nationalities, (of course,) different fees for different nationalities, (of course,) and I think differing procedures depending on which country you're in when you apply. Sigh.

For me, after asking several people, I found out that I did not need a letter of invitation, thank goodness. I had to use a link online to fill out an application, then print that out and take it to the local Uzbek consulate. (Note, the consulate is not the same as the embassy, and I didn't know this ahead of time.) I got lucky when I arrived at the embassy, as someone asked why I was there, and when I said I wanted to apply for a tourist visa they said it should be done at the consulate then walked with me to the consulate. 

Then the guy helped me get through security, and showed me where to go in the consulate. Then he got the people who were taking their lunch break to step out of the office to accept my application. In other words, it took me about 15 minutes total to apply for my visa. I'd heard horror stories of people waiting for hours, so I was thrilled. I was told to check online to see the status of my application, and come back when it was confirmed.

I went back to the consulate a week later, paid my $160 (lucky Americans have a higher fee than other nationalities,) and passed over my passport. The guy at the window (I had to wait this time, but only for 40 minutes or so,) put the visa sticker in the passport and sent me on my way. YAHOO!!

Getting to Uzbekistan was easy, I had a direct flight each way to the capital city of Tashkent. The flight arrived in the middle of the night, which was not so awesome, especially as the airport in Tashkent is not a major world airport. 

I found a chair, but it wasn't comfortable, and was close to the exit door, so it was rather cold.

When morning rolled around and an exchange stall opened up, I exchanged $100USD. This gave me 815,000som, a pile of money. I could easily be a millionaire in Uzbekistan :)

Tashkent is a modern city in an ancient country. There was an earthquake in 1966 which destroyed most of the city, so what is there now has mostly been built since then. 

A few buildings survived, but hundreds of thousands of people were made homeless, and a couple hundred people died.

I walked out of the airport and found a bus stop to take a local bus into town. I'd already downloaded a local map, and marked the location of my hostel on the map, which made everything easy. I only had to walk a little from the bus stop, and was able to check in immediately.

I spent a few hours in the hostel charging my electronics, figuring out what I wanted to see in the city, and figuring out the local time. (Uzbekistan is two hours ahead of Moscow.) This hostel had separate male and female dorms, and they were across the building from each other. I don't know about the male dorm, but each bed in the female dorm had a curtain that could be pulled across the bed, creating total privacy. Also, each bed had double plugs, which was also fantastic.

My first stop of the day was the main train station of the city. It wasn't nearly as fancy as I thought it should be, considering it was the main station of the capital city. Oh well. Across the street was a memorial for something, though it was written in Uzbek so I had no idea. To cross the street to get to that memorial I had to go through the walkway under the street, which had exits leading to several streets on either side of the main street.

As I walked, I saw at least three buildings with giant murals on the sides. I miss seeing these in Moscow, as I got used to seeing them in Kyiv. I walked through a park, but it wasn't very pretty as the trees were naked. (It was the middle of winter, and all the leaves that had fallen during autumn had been swept away.)

Eventually my walk took me past a Polish Catholic church. This surprised me, as I knew that Uzbekistan is mostly Muslim. 

At first the church appeared to be closed, but I found an open door on a lower level. As the church was made of stone it was quite cold inside, but the windows made it feel light and airy.

Near the church was something called Eco Park. I don't know how eco it was, but I liked the specific walking paths, and managed to avoid getting run over by the bikes not staying in the bike lanes. In this park was an 'I love Tashkent' city sign, of course I took a photo.

Eventually I got to what passes as the city center in Tashkent. The state hotel (I assume) called Hostel Uzbekistan was one of the most boring buildings I've ever seen. I really hope the interior was better than the exterior. Across the street was a massive, white government building. There were gates and guards, so I didn't get too close.

In the middle of this area was a giant statue of Amir Timur, a conqueror who lived mostly in the 14^th century. He was the founder of the Timurid empire in Persia and Central Asia. Uzbekistan is right smack dab in the middle of this part of the world.

Not too far away was the state history museum. There was an entry fee of 6000som, and they wanted 10,000som for permission to take photos! I opted not to pay the fee, out of sheer stubbornness. 

I understand the idea of making money, but prefer they just add a little to the entry fee for everyone, and don't charge an extra photo fee. Also, I have a sneaking suspicion that tourists are the only ones hit with that fee, not locals who come to the museum. 

The building in which the museum is located used to be a mosque, and is still absolutely gorgeous. The center atrium is huge, and there are several large mosaics to see. Absolutely lovely.

Along one hallway was a series of paintings, each of a leader in the Timurid dynasty. Since I didn't know anything about the history of this part of the world, it didn't help me to learn who was the son of who. Each painting had the name of the leader, as well as how/when they died. The one that made me laugh said the guy died when he "fell into the abyss after falling out of his pigeonry."

After leaving the museum I ended up at a park, one that is probably a whole lot nicer in spring or summer. With the empty trees, the park seemed a bit sad, especially as there was no grass, just benches and sidewalks and naked trees. Along one sidewalk many artists had set out paintings for sale.

Independance park was across the street from this mini park. Now this was a proper park, with an entrance gate and everything. 

Inside Independence Park I found an eternal flame, complete with a WW2 memorial. This memorial was pretty incredible, and unique. Large 'pages' had been created, and hinged to walls. Each page listed names of those who had died.

Continuing my walk brought me to the building of the ministry of agriculture and water resources, a ministry doing a terrible job. 

Uzbekistan is mostly desert, and yet the main crops it grows and exports are water intensive. The procedures taking place over decades have taken so much water that the Aral Sea in the west of the country has shrunk almost into nonexistance.

I also passed the circus building, which has what I think of as a 'typical Soviet' architecture. (Typical Soviet circus architecture, that is.)

As sunset started, I walked past a mosque, one of the few buildings that survived the earthquake. As it was originally built centuries ago, that meant there were heaps of gorgeous mosaic tiles all over the front. Beautiful.

At this point I was getting tired and hungry. I ended up buying some snacks from a street stall, all of them fried. I'm not all that sure what I ate, but they tasted good :) Who doesn't love fried food?

On the way back in the direction of my hostel I passed Hotel Uzbekistan again. At night it looked slightly better than in the day, as videos and photos were being shown against the building. Very cool. I did wonder if you could see the lights if you stayed in one of the rooms, as that would probably be rather annoying.

I decided to walk all the way home, which ended up being a lot longer of a walk than I'd envisioned. Ooops. By the time I got back to my hostel I was truly tired, and somewhat cold. I slept well :) 

The next morning it took me longer to get going that I wanted, but that's life. Maybe I could just blame it on me still being on Moscow time?

As I walked this day I passed a statue of Taras Shevchenko, the national poet of Ukraine. This surprised me, since I don't know that the two countries have much of a relationship these days. Or maybe the statue is from Soviet times, when all the Soviet countries sortof worked together, and sortof viewed themselves as a single entity.

Another surprise was a bust of Yuri Gagarin (the first astronaut/cosmonaut.) This was in another random park.

Eventually I got to my first sight of the day, a monument to Islam Karimov, the first president of the Republic of Uzbekistan. His statue was in the scientific and enlightenment memorial complex, which was surrounded by a fence and a security gate. I had to go through an xray check to get in!! Karimov is still very much in the minds of the Uzbek people, as he passed away in just 2016.

On the way to my next sight, I passed city workers sweeping water out of the street. I'm not sure why, but it struck me as something different. I'm pretty sure we don't have city, state, or federal employees in the states who sweep streets.

My next sight was another park, Alisher Navoy park. The front of the park is basically a giant platz in front of a theatre. I love the architecture of the theatre, I'd call it Soviet style. Behind the theatre was a sports stadium.

Finally behind all that I finally got to the green section of the park. I climbed up stairs to get to the statue of Alisher Navoy, it was under a cupola of sorts. There was a fence around the statue, so I wasn't able to get as close as I wanted, oh well. Since I wasn't visiting during high season I was the only one there.

From there I walked to a big market, called Chorsu Bazaar. That is the name given to what turned out to be quite a large area. It's a local market, with a LOT of vendors. I got the impression there is an official area of the market and an unofficial area just outside, with vendors selling the same things.

I could've bought pickled things, dairy foods, meat from a variety of animals, cooking oils of various types, fresh produce, ready made food, etc... 

Basically, I could've bought almost anything involved in the world of food. In the main building there was a second floor, where all the stalls were selling nuts and dried fruit.

After seeing all the food but not having any way to travel with it, I found a small cafe. I initially went in because I saw the employees placing uncooked dumplings in a steamer, which just looked neat. When I went in I saw people eating so I told the waitress I wanted what they had. YUM.

After walking out of the cafe totally stuffed, I went to find a metro station. I'd heard and read that the metro stations in Tashkent are worth seeing, so I wanted to see for myself.

I don't remember where I heard that the metro stations in Tashkent are worth seeing, but that place/person was totally right. I rode the length of one of the metro lines, (there are three,) stepping out of the train to see each of the stations. Trains seemed to come every ten minutes or so, something like that. My favourite stations were Alisher Navoy and Kosmonatav.

I finally exited the metro system from the station closest to the location of my hostel, and walked the remaining way home.

The next morning I was up really early, as I had to catch a cab back to the airport.

russia: istra

Claire and decided we needed another day trip, so we went back to my Russia guidebook for ideas. We came up with Istra, a small town about 40 kilometers west of Moscow.

Claire and I met up at a metro station, then went to find the correct commuter train station to buy our tickets. We were again on an elektrichka (electric train,) which was a smooth ride. (Even if it did stop what seemed like every 30 seconds.) 90 minutes later we were in Istra.

The train station of Istra is basically a platform, with a small indoor area big enough for buying tickets and going through a turnstyle. After turning my phone around several times, we figured out our orientation and started walking.

Since we were traveling in the middle of February, the streets (and sidewalks,) were covered with ice and slush. It was not fun to walk through, we had to figure out every footstep, there was no direct, smooth way to walk. Oh well.

We walked straight up the main street, called Lenin Street. Not too far from the train station we passed a small park, which had a giant pinecone. Obviously it was a sculpture/art piece, not real. I took a cheesy photo trying to pull it with me.

More walking took us to another park, this one with the supremely original name of 'city park.' We found the exit and walked through, almost all the way through. Just before we were about to walk out, I turned to the left and saw two things that caught my eye.

The first was a WW2 memorial, which is pretty much standard for any Russian town. The second was another WW2 memorial, but a much more interesting one. It was a sculpture of a plane taking off. Due to the weather, part of the plane was covered in snow. Very original. There was also a map of some of the major battles of the war. 

We finally walked out of the park, turned the corner, and finally glimpsed the main sight of the town: the New Jerusalem Monastery (which used to be called the Resurrection Monastery.)

The monastery was founded in 1656, and I read somewhere that this sight was chosen because it resembled the Holy Land. The river flowing through town is supposed to represent the Jordan River, and the buildings in the monastery are supposed to represent holy places in Jerusalem. I didn't really 'see' all this, but I did love the monastery. I tend to love all religious places I get to see.

As happened to many other religious places in Russia, the monastery was closed down in 1918, and became a museum a couple years later. Unfortunately the German army was no kind to the monastery/museum during WW2. When they retreated from the area, they basically blew up the entire complex. So sad. As also happened to all those other religious places in Russia, it became religious again in the 1990s. A huge restoration was funded by the government starting in 2009, with a grand reopening in 2016. I'm glad we saw it when we did, not while it was under renovation. 

The entire monastery is surrounded by white walls, which were particularly gorgeous in the snow. We entered the grounds by walking through a gate in the bottom of a bell tower.

Walking in the very first thing you see is the main church, sitting right in the middle of the grounds: the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The domes are beautiful, the exterior is beautiful, etc...

Even though the church is beautiful, we decided to walk along the walls first. The walkable area of the walls goes around at least half the complex, it is really nice. It was freezing though, we could feel the wind most of the time. Eeeek. 

Right at the very back of the complex I managed to drop one of my gloves. Since there is only one way up to the walkable section of the walls, I had to run all the way back to the front, go down the stairs, and run all the way back to the back to pick up the glove. Just call me butterfingers.

At that point Claire had walked back around the walls, and met me near the main church. We put on headscarves and walked in. The entry area was no great shakes, but the moment we walked into the 'sanctuary' area I knew I'd found my favourite ceiling ever. It was amazing, just amazing.

Right in the middle of the sanctuary area was a small chapel of sorts, with a queue of people waiting to go inside for a minute. Claire found out a couple weeks later that there was a rock (or something like that,) inside that came from Jerusalem, and it was treated as an icon. We didn't go in, because I was too busy staring up.

The iconostasis at the front was also beautiful, mostly gold with painted sections as well.

We also walked around a 'hallway' that went around the outside of the sanctuary area. I've never seen anything quite like it, there were smaller chapels off this hallway.

We also found a set of stairs going down under the church. We followed them down and found a crypt area. It was humid and warmer than anywhere else we'd been that day.

After feeling as though we'd seen everything in the complex, we exited the gate and walked back up the street. We found yet another war memorial, complete with fake flowers and wreaths. Unfortunately, it was mostly snow covered, so I don't know exactly what was being memorialized.

We walked back in the general direction of the train station, finding one last sight necessary to having seen a Russian town: a statue of Lenin. This one was quite small, but then again, so was he.

At that point we decided we were hungry, so we looked for a cafe of some sort. We were almost back at the train station when we found a cafe. Clearly Istra is not a town with cafe culture. Our food was okay, at least we weren't starving when we got on the train back to Moscow.

I love day trips.