Off to the border for our most complicated and potentially hazardous day. But before we leave Kyrgyzstan I need to tell you about caps. Traditionally the Kyrgyzs wear different coloured caps depending on their age. Children under 6 wear a light blue one, the young children wear another. After puberty, the colour changes again, all the way up to 63 when you get your white cap. Way to go, labelling people as old.
Off to the nearby border after breakfast, passing a convoy of 75 empty buses with a police escort front and back.
A bit of background. When the Soviets carved up the Fergana Valley in the 1930s into four districts, they paid little attention to which ethnic groups lived in each district. After all, they controlled it all, and were only interested in delineating administrative districts, and later on they went and altered them several times. However these administrative districts became country borders in 1991 when the Soviet Union collapsed, and no country wants to concede an inch. So now you have Tajiks living in Kyrgyzstan and every other combination of the four countries that share the valley. One place in the valley is the point where three country borders meet. It could only mean trouble.
A border war has erupted frequently between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan over the exact border (and in truth its very hard to map crevices on craggy mountains), so the border is shut, and we had to enter Uzbekistan then leave again and cross a second border to get from Uzbekistan to Tajikistan. All in an hour.
So at 8:30 we walked across the border to Uzbekistan, pulling our luggage behind us, found our new guide and new bus, drove down the road a few kilometres, got our luggage off the bus, pulled it through the Uzbekistan exit and the Tajikistan entrance, found our new guide and his new bus, and off we went again.
A real performance, but the good news is that the Australian Government is wrong. The Smart Traveler website says that all land borders to Tajikistan are closed, and patently they aren’t. It also says that you need a PCR test done in the last 72 hours, but they didn’t even ask us for our vaccination status. Lots of relieved faces as we could have been stuck in remote Uzbekistan.
So at 8:30 we left Kyrgyzstan, 7:30 we arrived in Uzbekistan, and at 10:00 we mutinied for a toilet stop and a coffee, and boy did he pick a continental cake shop worth stopping at.
Our bus seemed to be missing a few gears, and we seemed to stagger along until we got up to cruising speed, but when we did, we zipped along the Fergana Valley.
One third of the country’s population live in the valley. 93% of Tajikistan is mountainous, and the average monthly income is only US$150, so almost every family sends at least one child to Russia to work and support the family once they reach working age. No wonder the Tajik president is one of Putin’s most ardent followers. He’s been in power for 40 years, and our guide voted for him last time as ”he was the only person who cared enough about the country to stand”.
The Fergana Valley is the food basket of Central Asia. Traditionally there has also been a lot of cotton grown here, but with climate change and the reduced amount of water available (cough cough – they are diverting it), they are now moving more and more to grow vegetables and fruit.
Unfortunately the highway we were on forms the border for around 10km, and you can hardly build a fence down the middle. It housed a dozen or so large petrol stations, and in September this year a border war broke out on the highway (as there is no border fence to separate people). Several hundred people were killed, all the large petrol stations were trashed and set alight, and now its a fairly eerie scene. It’s all quiet now, so the travel advisory has been lifted. However, the two sides really dislike each other, but have no idea how to solve it if nobody will give an inch.
Khujand is the countries second largest city, and we arrived mid afternoon. The centre of the city contains the big mosque, and the central market/bazaar known as Payshanba, and that’s where we started our city tour after getting some local currency. Then it was back on the bus, and off to view the river, the large park, and the very impressive Historical Museum with its huge mosaic murals featuring one of the city’s most celebrated visitors – Alexander the Great. Whilst he actually attacked and subdued the city, he married one of the local girls so all was forgiven.
The hero of the city is Ismoil Somoni, founder of the 10th century Persian dynasty that is considered the first Tajik state. After the fall of the Soviet Union, every Lenin Street, Lenin Park and everything else Lenin was named Somoni. They even named their currency after him.
A couple of minutes of free time at the hotel (first in days), then it was off to a wonderful lamb kebab dinner.
Hotel Firuz, Khujand
Good old Stalin… he had a way of dividing people. I’m learning heaps… keep up the journaling.