Sixty One Degrees
An occassional journal of an Asia-overland adventure
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Kerman, Iran
I was befriended today by three teenage girls, Roksana, Aida, and Ava. Visiting Roksana's house gave me a rare insight in to real life in Iran. The most striking thing is that as soon as they are through the door they take off, with some relief, the headscarf and long coat that they must wear at all times outside. Even to open the door they must be wearing the scarf.
When we first met they took me to a cafe for a drink. Heads definitely turned with these three girls talking to a western guy. A male friend of theirs, who was working at the cafe, suggested that maybe it wasn't appropriate. Luckily just then Roksana's brother, Romi, turned up which eased the tension a little.
Life in the home is very relaxed though, with western music on the DVD player and Roksana and Ava giving an impromptu display of Iranian dancing. Such a different world on one side or the other of the front door.
Roksana is 17 and Romi is 18 but their mother is only 34. She was married when she was 12. Even so she now works at the local university and had just been accepted in to a Masters degree. More than half of all university students are female.
Roksana had a brief taste of freedom a couple of years ago, when she had just had a quite short haircut. Her friends dressed her up as a boy and she walked down the street without the long coat or headscarf. Such liberation! But she won't ever be able to repeat that unless some drastic changes occur in the country.
Mashhad, Iran
Mashhad. Holiest city in Iran. Home to the shrine of Imam Reza, eighth Shiite imam and direct descendant of the Prophet Mohammed. Imam Reza was murdered in 817AD and his shrine has been a place of pilgrimage ever since.
As an obvious foreigner I was stopped at the outer entrance to the vast site and assigned an escort from the Office of International Relations. I was not allowed to enter the vast mosque or inner shrine but I could go to the library and museum and pick up a couple of books. I selected "The Truth About Christianity", a cogently written tome with many well thought out arguments in favour of Islam. Despite its compelling thesis however I ultimately decided to opt for a religion that offers a flush toilet.
We left the library and headed for the museum. At the museum my escort left me to ponder the haphazard collection old doors and paintings. No sooner was he gone that I slipped back out and around to the vast mosque. Mostly open-air and with about a dozen entrances it was not hard to get lost amongst the crowd. Could I enter the shrine?
Stepping through the throng of pilgrims in the mosque I work my way towards the inner sanctum. The forbidden doorway lies ahead. It's now or never. I remove my shoes and join the masses squeezing through the doors. We shuffle together. No-one stops me. The inside opens up in a dazzling display of tiny mirrored tiles. Like living on the inside of a mirror-ball. A voice to my left calls out a cry of praise. Others return the call. Attendants with brightly coloured feather dusters tap the heads of mis-behavers. I shuffle past but do not feel a tap. We work our way through the rooms. Men cover the floor, praying, reading the Koran, or simply sitting still. Everywhere the mirrored tiles. Round another corner. Another cry of praise and response. The tomb looms ahead. A golden cage surrounded by an impossible crush. Children are passed overhead to kiss the elaborate bars. Men are weeping, laughing, smiling. The river of humanity flows on, taking me past the tomb. Back to the outer rooms. More bright walls. More chants. Sunlight streams in through the entrance door. I stumble out on to the carpet of the open air mosque, sun bright above me. Minarets towering overhead. People everywhere. I put my shoes back on. Across the courtyard and out. Back on the streets of Mashhad. Food, carpets, hawkers, noise, cars, crush. Back to reality.
Ashgabat, Turkmenistan
I'm often asked how much I earn in Australia. I usually lie a little but to someone earning maybe $50 a month anything I say will seem like a huge sum.
I try to put this in perspective by explaining that costs are much higher in Australia also. A good example is bus fares. Here a local bus costs a phenomenally low 500 manat. That's about two cents. Compared to that the US$2.50 (about 60000 manat) I used to pay for the bus in Sydney seems ludicrously high.
I'm paying less than that at my hotel, a pleasantly decrepit establishment. 53000 manat a night actually. They initially wanted to charge me $30 for a dirt-encrusted coffin but I held out and now have a dirt-encrusted four-bed dorm all to myself for a princely $2. Although I won't be showering in the shared bathroom anytime soon. The locals pay just $1. All of which makes the Sydney bus look pretty expensive.
Konye-Urgench and Ashgabat, Turkmenistan
Turkmenistan. What a place!
There was some doubt if I could even get here. Getting a regular tourist visa is pretty difficult, you need to have a fully booked itinerary. Transport, hotels, the works. But I managed to get a transit visa in Tashkent. A whole five days! Would I even use it all?
There are no real restrictions on the transit visa but I knew this would be no ordinary country when, after listing on my immigration form a random hotel in Konye-Urgench I was advised in a quiet voice by a nice guard at the immigration post that I need to really stay there, and not at some unofficial homestay. Sure enough, on my arrival at the hotel they not only take my passport details for the local registery, but then immediately phone it through to some official. Looks like they're definitely checking up on me.
It became even more bizarre when I went to a local museum. Just a small place with a handful of rooms showing the usual broken pottery and slightly scary diaramas of life in the olden days. As I asked for a ticket the attendant asked for my passport. She proceded to copy down my passport and visa details. It's just a museum!
All around are posters of President Turkmenbashi, alongside his ubiquitous slogan: "Halk. Watan. Bekir Turkmenbashi". "People. Nation. Great Turkmenbashi". He models himself as a nation builder, in the mold of Kemal Ataturk of Turkey but seems to have replaced vision and foresight with meglomania.
Nowhere was this more evident than in Ashgabat, the country's capital. I had long anticipated seeing live the fabulous rotating golden statue of the god-like Turkmenbashi and I was not disappointed. It sits atop the tall Arch of Neutrality. Arms outstretched high it greets the sun as it rises in the morning. It then majestically follows, or perhaps guides, the sun through the course of the day before bidding farewell at sunset. A more moving sight can not be imagined.
Other delights in Ashgabat include the enormous speaking book. At 9pm precisely this huge tome majestically opens to stirring music, a deep sonorous voice narrating as the glorious Turkmen history is projected on to the pages of the book. Liberal images of Turkmenbashi abound through the presentation but the highlight is at the end when we are given, not some stirring national symbol or maybe the flag, but the face of Turkmenbashi proudly emerging from the rays of the sun. I had tears in my eyes.
Ashgabat is a worthy capital for such a strange country. It's the weirdest city I have ever seen. And I've been to Las Vegas. With all the oil and gas wealth of the country Turkmenbashi is frantically building Ashgabat in to a truly world-class city. Tree-lined boulevards, gleaming marble and glass apartment blocks and offices, extensive parks and fountains. Everything meticulously neat. But there are no people. The new buildings are empty. The streets are deserted. The fountains play to no-one. It has the surreal effect of looking exactly, and I mean exactly, like one of those little plastic architectural models of a new development. Right down to the perfect trees and a complete absence of people.
The old city still lives on, particularly at the marvellous Tolkuchka Bazar, with everything from carpets to camels. But Turkmenbashi seems to be living in a completely different world to all his people. They still crowd in to the hustle and bustle of the buses and the market whilst he has the main Turkmenistan motorway closed for one hour in the morning and afternoon so that he can drive from his villa to parliament without disruption.
If it ever all comes together, if the population grows in numbers and wealth to match the monuments, Turkmenistan may one day have the finest capital in the world. But right now it just seems like mis-spent folly. It is a city of a few hundred thousand struggling people and one man with grand illusions.
Nukus, Uzbekistan
Ubekistan boasts the second highest cotton production figures in the world, topped only by the US.
So why are all my bedsheets six inches too short?
Moynaq, Uzbekistan
Moynaq is the end of the earth. Once a thriving fishing port on the shoreline of the Aral Sea it now lies in the midst of desert, four hours from anywhere, the sea having all but disappeared due to Soviet mismanagement.
The idea was to outdo the US on cotton production. With the acquisition of the Central Asian states and all that empty land the opportunity seemed ripe. All that was needed was water to feed the thirsty crops. Much of that water ultimately came from the rivers that fed the Aral Sea, and so the sea began to dry up.
Some poignant attempts to stem the tide of change were made by the residents of Moynaq. Canals were dug from the town to the ever receding shoreline. It was a hopeless task. The canals now lie bone dry, the rusting hulks of fishing ships resting in the sands. The shoreline has now disappeared completely from sight, yet the town remains.
The town of Moynaq stretches over five or six kilometres. One main street and a couple of side streets. Equal parts occupied buildings, abandoned buildings, and empty lots. The remaining two thousand residents have not consolidated in one part of town but live scattered throughout the former city. There is no agriculture, no industry, and seemingly no reason to be here. As you walk the vacant streets and the dust blows it feels positively post-apocalyptic.
Yet those that remain seem happy enough. I'm the only guest at the crumbling two story Hotel Oybek, the only lodging in town, but the three or four guys hanging around cheerfully make me meals, show me the outdoor cold-water shower, and invite me to watch TV. The lady down the road will open her small shop if someone happens to want to buy some dry biscuits or a soft drink. The children are all friendly as they play in the dusty streets.
As I take the long bus journey back towards the rest of the world I know that most of the residents of Moynaq will not follow me on this journey. There's no reason to stay but if they left, where would they go?
Tashkent, Uzbekistan
And I thought Tajikistan had a heavy military presence...
My first week here in Tashkent (interminably waiting for visas) and I've been stopped by the police in the metro thirteen times. At first I thought they were looking for a chance to confiscate "counterfeit" money but now I'm not so sure.
The encounters are usually fairly friendly, although by about number ten my patience started wearing out. Sometimes it's just a fairly quick check of the passport, sometimes they haul you off to an office for more thorough questioning.
The interrogation usually runs along the lines of:
Them: "Criminal?"
Me: "Nyet"
Them: "Narkotik?"
Me: "Nyet"
End of intense interrogation.
They usually want to check my backpack as well but even then they only check the top section (full of books and such) and not the bottom (with camera and money). In any case, a request to see their ID usually puts a halt to proceedings.
The last time I was hauled off to the same office for the third time I started to lose patience. "Look", I said, indicating a big poster on the wall behind them with about a hundred mugshots, "Terrorist", then pointing to me, "Tourist", pointing to the mugshots "Terrorist", me, "Tourist". "Understand?"
I actually can't work them out. I don't think they are angling for money. They can't seriously think I'm a potential terrorist. Their checks for drugs are cursory. I think maybe they're just bored and it's much more interesting to flick through a foreigners passport, with all those exotic stamps, than a locals.