The Plan B Adventure

Wow….the Silk Road and it’s amazingly rich history is really fascinating. This is an area of the world you just don’t learn enough about in Western history classes and we both feel that’s very disappointing. Central Asia, the Silk Road, the power shifts, religious influences, and assimilating cultures all present an opportunity to learn about a truly unique part of the world. Over the past two weeks we have been in awe of depth of this region and look forward to sharing that with each of you.

After our glorious jaunt through golden Samarkand we pointed our camel (well, car) out west to Bukhara, the religious center of all Central Asia. But before we reached Bukhara we made a quick stopover in Shakhrisabz, the hometown of Timur, who is proudly honored in Uzbekistan as the ruler of the vast “Kingdom between Two Rivers” after the fall of Jenghiz Khan’s descendants. Timur is credited with bringing together the many fallen empires to the people of Central Asia and they are extremely proud of his Central Asian origins. The town itself can be seen in the middle of green meadows as you descend from the Zarafshon Mountains and was popularly known as Timur’s summer getaway. It consists of a very small population but the tourist trade is alive and well with proud Uzbeks coming from all over to honor their past leader. The sights are a bit sparse as many of the building, monuments, and mosques where razed by egomaniacal Khan’s after Timur’s descendants lost power in outerlying regions. However, due to the hordes of local tourists you get quite an opportunity to see Uzbek life in a relaxed state. Something we really enjoy is interacting with these local tourists, answering the “Hellos”, and snapping photos of some of the adorable children.

Additionally, the shopping bug finally bit us in Shakhrisabz. As many of you can imagine it is almost impossible for us not to buy everything but we have been budgetarily responsible for too long. In travelling through the old Silk Road towns you can’t avoid the beautiful Suzanes (hand-crafted silk embroidery). Each of these masterpieces has it’s own regional designs, bright colors, and many of the women selling them have had them in their family’s homes for decades. To handcraft a Suzane each family from certain artisans in town take the responsibility of sewing a piece and the a ‘master’ puts them together in their final design. Ceramics, artwork, knives, jewelry, carpets, hats…..they are everywhere you turn and meticulously hand-crafted, locally designed and brightly colored so you can’t possibly avoid them forever. We found that “unavoidable” Suzane just outside Timur’s Crypt and Becca enjoyed playing with the seller’s children while Jeff negotiated the price. Can’t wait to show it off to all of you when we finally have a home of our own, again!

As we have previously mentioned Bukhara is Central Asia’s holiest city and one of the seven Noble Islamic cities of the world. We didn’t have the foggiest idea about those facts and were amazed with the depth of education we received here. Just a few hour jaunt from Shakhrisabz on the famous Silk Road Bukhara seems to be teeming with activity just as it was centuries in the past. While many famous sights were built during Timur’s period in his capital of Samarkand, Bukhara contained (and still does!!) a mosque or medrassah on almost every corner as the Islamic faith entered this region in the early 9th century far before Timur’s and, even, Jenghiz Khan’s rule! Fortunately for us the man’s tomb whom is credited with popularizing Islam as well as studies like art, science, and mathematics throughout Central Asia had been covered by sandstorms before Jenghiz’s armies marched through Bukhara. This allowed us to view one of our favorite architectural structures of the entire trip. Ismail Samoniy’s tomb is delicately constructed with terracotta bricks in creative directions so that the look of the building changes as the sun shifts. We could have stood there and watched it for hours but the rest of Bukhara’s fascinating history was calling us. As we moved through the city we encountered the Great Ark, where the evil 17th-18th century Emirs lived and the Ark plaza where the Emir would employ brutally public executions……we marched up the hundreds of stairs inside the Kalon Minaret to view Bukhara from above….and strolled through many a mosque as Babur educated us on the inner workings of Islam. The evenings in Bukhara allowed us the opportunity to explore the old town with it’s quiet corridors and lively children as well as enjoy the fabulous cuisine of Uzbekistan, Bukharian style.

After a few days in Bukhara we saddled into the camel (or car) again and were off again on the Silk Road to Khiva. As we knew in advance, the trip to Khiva was not a short one. The trip takes you down a tight stretch of highway in the Khorezm province, which is neatly situated between two mighty desert. The drive itself is interesting as you get a chance to view Turkmenistan over the drying Amu Darya river as well as thousands of desert turtles that are slowly negotiating there way across the bumpy highway. It’s quite something to think that many an explorer did this on camel or horse back during the treacherous winters and dry hot summers of Central Asia or to think of the many nomadic herders whom still spend their time frocliking among tumbleweeds and desert snakes.

Khiva is an extremely sleepy town with many different customs from the rest of Uzbekistan as it lays far to the west and was controlled by many different cultures during its history. We arrived fairly late in the evening and settled into our medrassah-turned-hotel (cool, huh!) for the night. In the morning we were introduced to Khiva and its UNESCO-protected, old city of Ichon-Qala. This is a very interesting place in comparison to the other old cities of the Silk Road we have encountered. The Khan of Khiva in the 1800’s decided to relinquish his town to the Russians after much subterfuge in order to spare many of the historical relics. This act saved the beautiful Khivan monuments from the complete demise of many of the other city’s monuments. Additionally, the Russians found it a wonderful money making opportunity during their reign over these lands. The ancient inner city is completely restored and well cared after by the locals. The past and current governments have limited city-dwellers to only those families who have resided there for previous centuries so the streets are empty until the tour buses empty out at the western city gate. And on Sunday afternoon that they did!!! The streets were packed with school kids and teens and as usual we stuck out like two sore thumbs. Now, if you ever want to know what it feels like to be a celebrity enter a scenario such as this. You are constantly bombarded with stares, snickers, and unsolicited photos. Frequently, teen age girls and guys will giggle while they try to figure out how to ask for a picture with you. We enjoy being as accommodating as possible and offering to take a few pictures with ‘our fans’….especially Jeff when he is swarmed by the local harem. As we only had a solo day in Khiva we made it worth it by enjoying a great local meal for lunch, viewing the city from far above in the Minaret (yes, another climb!!), meandering through the Khan’s old harem quarters where four wives and forty concubines resided, and finally hearing about the local legend of patron saint, Pahlavon Mohammad, a Khivan champion wrestler who lost his only match in order to appease his opponent’s dying mother.

The history lesson finished and the western Uzbek section of the Silk Road fully explored we jumped a plane back to Tashkent and met Tahir, our guide for the onward journey to Eastern Uzbekistan and the Uzbek-Kyrgyz border of Dostlik.

This entry was posted on Saturday, April 29th, 2006 at 8:19 am and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.