Travelling by Rail in Uzbekistan

The Trans-Caspian railway finally reached Bukhara in 1888. The Emir had been suspicious, and viewed trains as the 'Devil's wagons'. To cross his territory, he demanded just recompense be paid in German silver shipped all the way from Hamburg and an assurance that the railway would not pass within ten miles of the holy city. So the Russians built a new railway settlement outside in nearby Kagan. At the same time the so-called 'Political Agency', a special organization for diplomatic affairs between the Russian Empire and the Bukhara Emirate, was also located in Kagan.

The Talgo 'Afrosiabs'

It is said that within a few years, Bukharans were squatting in railway carriages for hours waiting for the remarkable sensation of locomotion and that the Emir could be found riding in a mock carriage in his summer palace as servants fluttered bits of coloured paper outside the window to give the impression of speed!

Today, a railway modernization project is making Uzbekistan a regional leader in rail transport. With railways the primary mode of transportation, a better railway system boosts internal trade by cutting travel and business costs. And it is great for tourists.

The first of two Talgo 250 trains travelled from Spain via Saint Petersburg and arrived in Tashkent on 22 July. The second train is due to be delivered in September. The trains are set to cut journey times on the 344 km Tashkent - Samarkand route from 3½  to 2 hours. Later the service will be expanded to Bukhara and Khiva.

The schedule has not yet been announced. Hopefully on Uzbek Journeys tours we will be able to ride the new trains. If not, we will travel on the excellent air-conditioned express 'Registan'. Either journey is better than the 5.5 hour bus trip and maximises time in Samarkand.

Update June 2012: The Talgo 'Afrosiabs' operates daily from Tashkent to Samarkand, departing Tashkent at 8:00 a.m. and arriving Samarkand at 10:30 a.m. It is an outstanding service, with a light breakfast sandwich and green tea served as breakfast. Good espresso coffee is available for 4,000 soums.

Take a peek inside some Uzbek trains. (3 minute video clip below)

Related posts: Tashkent's Open Air Railway Museum 
Steppe Magazine - Images of the Tashkent Metro 
Azerbaijan: Baku's Metro
Almaty, Kazakhstan - Riding the New Metro 

Langston Hughes: An African American Writer in Central Asia in the 1930s

Central Asia abounds in fascinating stories of remarkable people. Langston Hughes, America's 'poet laureate of the 1920s Harlem Renaissance', spent 5 months in Central Asia in 1932-33.

Langston Hughes, 2nd left, in Central Asia

Hughes was invited to the Soviet Union, along with a group of African-American actors and musicians, as part of a film Black and White, that planned to expose race relations within the United States. When the project fell through, Hughes decided to travel in the region. As he wrote "I was starting out from Moscow...bound for Central Asia to discover how the people lived and worked there". By chance in Ashgabat, capital of present day Turkmenistan, he met Arthur Koestler (who at that stage was a journalist and member of the Communist Party) and the two writers travelled together for some weeks.

Hughes, as an official guest of the Soviet Writers' Union, spent time with artists, writers and musicians. He interviewed Tamara Khanum, the first Uzbek woman to dance publicly, and wrote extensively about Uzbek dance and music. He also visited several cotton collectives. At one cotton farm, about 60kms outside Tashkent, he met a dozen African American immigrants who had spent three years crossing Uzbek and American cotton seeds. They finally produced a new cotton strain that matured in 25% less time than traditional seeds.

Arthur Koestler, 4th from left  in Central Asia

As scholar David Cioni Moore notes, Hughes became the first American writer to be translated into any Central Asian language: the State Publishers of the Uzbek S.S.R. commissioned a volume of fifty of Hughes' poems to be translated into Uzbek by the eminent literary figure Sanjar Siddiq.

A slim volume of Hughes' essays A Negro Looks at Soviet Central Asia, was published in a print run of 1500 copies in 1934 by the Cooperative Publishing Society of Foreign Workers in the USSR.  Today only two copies are known: one in the Leningrad library and the other in Yale. Hughes identified strongly with working-class internationalism, and the book contains glowing descriptions of the USSR as a worker's paradise where people, regardless of colour, were equal.

Langston Hughes in Ashgabat

Hughes abandonned a memoir From Harlem to Samarkand. However, in his 1956 work I Wonder as I Wander, his Central Asian sojourn fills 90 pages. Photographs he took in Central Asia are available at Yale University's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. The same library has audio and video recordings of Hughes reading his works.

I end this post with an excerpt from his poem Lenin.

Lenin walks around the world.
Black, brown, and white receive him.
Language is no barrier.
The strangest tongues believe him.

Related posts: Tamara Khanum: Legendary Uzbek Dancer
From Kremlin to Kremlin: African Americans in Uzbekistan 
Remembering Muhammad Ali’s Visit To Uzbekistan

Silk Road Tea House and Spice Shop, Bukhara

 Sacks of spices. In front, charming chekichs used to stamp bread

Bukhara is a city to roam and discover by foot. Taking small alleyways and wandering into caravanserai and courtyards is delightful. Sooner or later you'll need to quench your thirst and one of the best places to do so is the Silk Road tea house and spice shop.

Owned by Mirfayz Ubaydov, whose family has been in the spice trade since 1400, the tea house is heady with the smells of cardamom, clove, coriander, nutmeg, cinnamon, anise, caraway, fennel and peppermint.

Here you can stretch out with a pot of ginger or saffron tea, or a freshly brewed cardamon coffee. Select from delicious accompaniments such as sesame or pistachio oil halvah, traditional crystallized sugar candy, or dried fruit and nuts.

Mr. Ubaydov is passionate about the health properties of teas and spices; he gathers ingredients not just from Uzbekistan, but from neighbouring Central Asian countries, Sri Lanka and the Middle East. He has also participated several times in the Terra Madre Slow Food fair in Turin, Italy.

Mirfayz Ubaydov 'Spice Man' of Bukhara

Aromatic spice teas in small Uzbek silk pouches make lovely souvenirs. Find the tea house at 5 Halim Ibodov Street, Bukhara, close to the second cupola, Telpak Furushon.

Related posts:
Chekichs: Uzbek Bread Stamps 
The Glory of Uzbek Bread
Khiva: Bread Making Master Class

Arminius Vámbéry: a Dervish Spy in Central Asia

Arminius Vámbéry 1863

Meet Arminius Vámbéry, a Hungarian-born linguist and scholar who, in the mid 19th century, travelled through Central Asia and Persia dressed as a dervish.

Born into a poor Jewish family, he revealed an astonishing aptitude for languages and, at 20, moved to Constantinople.

There he made his living by teaching languages and reciting Turkish and Persian poetry in coffee houses. In 1858 he published the first German-Turkish dictionary; he claims to have learnt 20 Ottoman languages and dialects.

Taking the name Resht Effendi, he disguised himself as a Muslim dervish and set out for Central Asia, travelling with a band of other dervishes.

He arrived in Khiva, via Shiraz, in 1863 where he managed to keep up appearances during an interview with the Khan. He continued on to Bukhara and Samarkand and then returned to Constantinople via Herat.

The journey would have been extremely dangerous as well as arduous: Vámbéry was lame in one leg. To maintain his disguise he could not openly record his experiences, and scribbled in lead pencil on various scraps of paper which he secreted in the wadding of his beggar's dress for months on end.

He returned to Europe in 1864 and published the account of his journey Travels in Central Asia, which catapulted him to international fame. He visited London, where, given the high interest in Central Asia, he was feted as a celebrity. His writing provides one of the last glimpses of the Central Asian khanates as they stood on the eve of their Russification.

 Portrait of Vámbéry by Mihaly Kovacs

He returned to Hungary in 1865 as professor of Oriental languages at the University of Pest, where he continued his scholarly, linguistic research. Vámbéry died in 1913 aged 81.

Remarkably, in 2005, the British National Archives made files publicly accessible: it was revealed that Vámbéry had been employed by the British Foreign Office as an agent and spy,  whose task it was to combat Russian attempts at gaining ground in Central Asia and threatening the British position on the Indian sub-continent.

Bram Stoker met Vámbéry twice and some biographers believe that Vámbéry acted as his consultant on Transylvanian culture and introduced him to the Dracula legend.

The character of Professor Van Helsing in Stoker's novel, Dracula, is sometimes said to be based on him, though there is no solid evidence.

You can download Vámbéry's 1889 autobiography Arminius Vámbéry: his Life and Adventures and also read the entertaining Travels in Central Asia as a free e-book.

Related posts:
Alexander 'Bokhara' Burnes - Great Game Player 
Mennonites in Khiva 1880 -1935
Langston Hughes: An African American Writer in Central Asia in the 1930s

Uzbek Flag: Colours and Symbols

Uzbekistan's flag, adopted 1991

In November 1991, Uzbekistan became the first former Soviet republic to adopt a new flag. Over 200 proposals were submitted in a design competition.

Blue is the symbol of the sky and water. It represents eternity and life. The banner of the national hero, Amir Timur, was also blue. The white stripe is the traditional symbol of peace and of moral and spiritual purity. The green stripe symbolizes nature and youth. The red stripes signify life force.

The white crescent moon embodies the historical and religious legacy of Uzbekistan and also the country’s 'rebirth' and independence. The 12 white stars represent the historical heritage of astronomy and science as well as Uzbekistan's ancient, solar calendar.

Uzbek SSR flag adopted 1952

It is interesting to compare the new flag with the former Uzbek SSR flag, adopted in 1952. Here blue represents the sky and red is the revolutionary struggle of the working masses. The white stripes represent cotton (Uzbekistan is the world's 3rd largest cotton exporter), the hammer and sickle represent the peasants' and workers' union, and the red star is the symbol of the proletariat.

As you travel around Uzbekistan you will see the flag flying everywhere and the blue/white/green combination often used in architectural detail.

Related post: Turkmenistan's Carpeted Flag

Uzbek Divas: Capturing the Poetic Traditions of Central Asia

Women from Karakalpak and Khiva feature on volume 4 of the Aga Khan Music Initiative in Central Asia series. In collaboration with Smithsonian Folkways, the series aims to present leading exponents of Central Asia's rich and diverse musical heritage to listeners outside the region.

Cover of Bardic Voices CD/DVD

The social tradition of music was severely ruptured during the 20th century, when society and culture in Central Asia were forcibly reshaped under the influence of Soviet modernisation.

Yet much of the region's rich and diverse musical legacy survived, albeit in forms that were altered or incomplete. Today, this legacy is being actively recovered and revitalised.

Bardic Divas comprises an eclectic compilation of soloists and small ensembles carrying on the oral, poetic traditions of the region. Komila Mattieva, from Khorezm, in northwest Uzbekistan, represents the cutting edge of a new generation of young women who are appropriating traditionally male performance genres.

With ensemble members Dilbar Bekturdieva and Gozal Muminova, they exemplify the art of the khalfa. Khalfas are women literate in Arabic who perform a variety of religious, ceremonial, and musical functions for other women.

Injegul Saburova is one of the few Karakalpak women who plays the ghirjek (spike fiddle). She learned the instrument from an uncle who, having no sons, broke with tradition and took her as his pupil. She performs with dutar player Ziyada Sheripova.

This 5-minute video clip from Bardic Voices highlights these Central Asian performers. You can learn more about this musical initiative at the Aga Khan Trust for Culture.

Related post: Manaschi - Bards of Kyrgyzstan
Samarkand's Musical Traditions
Uzbek Jazz is Alive and Well in Tashkent

Uzbek ikat robes feature in Russian textiles book

Browsing through one of my favourite magazines, Hand/Eye, I came across a marvellous interview with Susan Meller, founder of the Design Library and author of Russian Textiles: Printed Cloth for the Bazaars of Central Asia.

This is a book you will treasure. The photography is outstanding and the research meticulous. In the 1870s patterns were used mostly for the lining of robes, and a decade later they started appearing more on the outside of the robes. Sometimes three or four different patterns were sewn in blocks across the garment's front and sleeves creating beautiful juxtapositions of designs.

The author explains that "by the 1880s, Russian mills were flooding Central Asian markets with inexpensive Turkey red cloth in brightly colored prints that were impossible to achieve by traditional woodblock methods. Bold colors were favored not only on imported fabrics, but in locally woven stripes, ikats and embroidered tent hangings. The vast barren steppes bloomed but briefly in the spring, deserts covered 60% of the land, and the towns were dust-covered and drab, save for the splendid tiles on the crumbling monuments of long ago. No wonder Central Asian nomads and city-dwellers alike craved color".

A visit to Urgut's Sunday market, part of an Uzbek Journeys tour, provides a good chance of finding these pieces. Read the Hand/Eye interview.


Related posts: Feruza's Ikat Store, Bukhara
Ferghana Valley Silk Ikats
Basso & Brooke Meet Ikat on the New Silk Road Project 
Uzbek Ikat as Interior Design Element 
Nargis Bekmuhamedova - Samarkand textile designer
Oscar de la Renta's Love Affair with Uzbek Ikat
Central Asian Ikats: Colors of the Oasis