Ten observations about Turkey

Panda-monium

June 16, 2009 By Matthew Gain 1 Comment

Feeding time at the Giant Panda Breeding Base, Chengdu

This post doesn’t need too many words, the little black and white fury fellas tend explain themselves and elicit ooohhh and aaahhs pretty well without them.

So I will keep it short. Given scientists studying pandas in the wild can go for years without actually seeing one we knew our best option for getting close to these lovely creatures was a visit to the Giant Panda Breeding Base, located in Chengdu in Sichuan Province. The breeding base is home to about 50 pandas and is the world’s most successful panda breeding centre.

I have some video that I will upload to YouTube when it is easier to do so, but for now I have uploaded a very short one. Fingers crossed this it works, though if not, enjoy the images.

This is the life

Panda blue steel

The bamboo flute

Panda job interview

There are a few ore on Flickr, which you can see here.

Filed Under: China, Personal Posts, Travelling Tagged With: Blogsherpa, Chengdu, China, Giant Panda, Giant Panda Breeding Base, Panda, Panda Cub, Sichuan Province

Build ‘em long, build ‘em wide and build ‘em tall

June 14, 2009 By Matthew Gain Leave a Comment

Elizabeth and I at the wall

Growing up in amongst giant bananas, guitars, cows and even clams one learns to appreciate things done on scale. Though long before the fibreglass model memories of my childhood, the Chinese were building them bigger, better and Buddha than ours.

As such, this post is dedicated to The Great Wall of China, The Terracotta Army and the grand sitting Buddha known as Dafo.

Great Wall

With rain falling, fog so thick we often couldn’t see much further than 15 metres ahead of us and with the stones beneath our feet scheming sliding incidents, we hiked the Jinshanling to Simatai section of the Great Wall.

History buffs can read about the section we hiked , but in short – what a feat of human engineering! The steep cliff-like hills the wall traverses and the sheer effort required to accomplish such an undertaking is truly staggering. Restored in some sections, you can appreciate what the wall looked like in its heyday, but it is the un-restored sections and the fact they have fared the 2,300 or so years since construction so well that is the truly remarkable thing. Our walk past 30 watchtowers and eight kilometres of the wall took roughly two hours. To walk the entire length of the 6,400 km wall would probably take around 320 days, assuming you cover 20km a day but our trip clearly didn’t allow for that kind of undertaking – next time maybe…

The wall through the fog

Terracotta Warriors

Teracotta archer upclose

Forget an open casket or ashes being scattered across the ocean, how about going out in the style of China’s first emperor Qing Shi Huang, with a few thousand individual soldiers to order around in the after-life.

The site, discovered in 1976 by a farmer digging a well, is astounding in its scale with more than 6,000 figures in the largest pit alone.

For the last 20 years all further excavation of the site has been halted while conservation technology can catch up to deliver better methods for the preservation of the artefacts. When first uncovered the figures were resplendently painted in bright colours though the air quickly oxidized the paint rendering the warriors the dull grey colour they are today.

Armed with new technology archaeologists are due now to recommence digs. Let’s hope they are successful.

Terracotta warrior with some colour on his collar

Grand Buddha Dafo

Dafo the Grand Buddha

The Grand Buddha of Leshan (known as ‘Dafo’) in Sichuan province is one of those historic sites where imagination is not really required. Upon entering the Dafo Temple grounds you can immediately feel his presence. Not surprising really given he takes up the whole side of a cliff and that even his fingernails are bigger than a standing human.

At 71 metres high (and he is seated) Dafo is the largest surviving Buddha in the world. A Buddhist Monk named Haitong began the massive undertaking of carving him around 713 AD, in the hope that the Buddha’s presence would calm the rough waters in front caused by three converging rivers. Well it worked. The rivers today converge in a relatively calm fashion; the surplus rock from the carving did the trick, though I like to think Dafo plays some part.

Dafo and his human sized finger nails

With panda images and video still up our sleeve, expect post soon, we are headed tonight by night train to Yunnan province and the town of Lijiang. As of today we have one month until we arrive back in Sydney. So we better make sure we make the most of it and get out there!

All of our China images can be seen here.

Filed Under: China, Personal Posts, Travelling Tagged With: Blogsherpa, Chengdu, Dafo, Dafo the Grand Buddha, Grand Buddha of Lashan, Great Wall of China, Jinshanling, Lashan, Simatai Wall of China, Terracotta Warriors, Xi'an

Bright lights, big city, Beijing

June 11, 2009 By Matthew Gain 4 Comments

GUEST POST – Elizabeth Dawson

The famous portrait

After a few weeks trooping along the Silk Road, taking in small towns and villages and enjoying the great outdoors, it was high time us champagne-swilling, urban PR-types headed to our true spiritual home – the big smoke – and when it comes to big smokes these days they don’t come much bigger than Beijing.

(Beijing is in fact quite literally a big smoke – according to our pre-Olympics Lonely Planet guide, health experts say that breathing in the air of Beijing is the equivalent of smoking 70 cigarettes a day).

Staying in great hostel in the buzzy Nan Luo Gu Xiang hutong area we were right in the thick of all the fantastic bars, restaurants and shops that we were slightly craving. No street snack or other taste sensation was safe with a rolling feast of bubbling chilli chicken hot pots, Peking Duck pancakes, oodles of noodles, delicious dumplings and lashings of ice cold Tsingtao just some of the treats for the taking.

Nan Luo Gu Xiang Hutong

Our first day of sightseeing Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City was fairly laid back compared to the epic bicycle tour escorted by the wonderful US ex-pat Christine who we met back in Kyrgyzstan. A Chinese resident for the past four or so years, Christine whisked us through the hutongs, around the lakes, right up to the Olympic site, across the city to the fabby 798 Art District before dropping back down to cruise past the retail and expat/embassy enclaves of Sanlitun. The persistent rain saw us don jaunty red ponchos for much of this journey which served us well in highlighting the inexperienced western cyclist in the midst of the Beijing traffic (those nifty bike lanes even on the ring road were also a boon it has to be said).

The Bird’s Nest and drowned rats

By night we joined the fun and the masses milling around Hou Hai. As we wandered around the lakes, it seemed there was a bar, restaurant, shop or other diversion there for everyday of the year. Everyone of every age and inclination seemed to be out and about enjoying the scene. From the young locals sipping beers and enjoying the (sometimes rather cheesy live music) in the bars, teenagers flirting and playing shuttle cock, families cooking dinner outside their homes to the senior citizens gossiping and stretching it out with some evening calisthenics.

Hou Hai at night

One of the highlights was our first encounter with the Chinese penchant for engaging in lively outdoor mass participation dancing. Obviously standing on the sidelines is not an option and we were dragged into a bit of the old ‘right, left, turn around and go, go, go’ action soon enough! Check out a video of Matthew go, go going here.

With just three full days in Beijing city we felt we had just started to scratch the surface and were very sad to leave. It was made all the more fun hanging out with Christine– our translator, navigator, restaurant expert and all round guardian angel. We will be back.

Some more pics from Beijing:

Elizabeth with the wonderful Christine

Temple of Heaven, Beijing

Forbidden City, Beijing

Bell Tower at night, Beijing

All of our China images can be seen here.

Filed Under: China, Personal Posts, Travelling Tagged With: 798 Beijing, Beijing, Beijing 2008, Blogsherpa, China, Hou Hai, Nan Luo Gu Xiang

Rockin' the Kashgar

June 11, 2009 By Matthew Gain Leave a Comment

Old and new Kashgar

Kashgar, in the far west of China in the Xingjiang province was our first stop in China after crossing the Torugart Pass from Kyrgyzstan. The place was roughly 200km or so from Naryn in Kyrgyzstan, but in many ways we felt a million miles away.

Since the days of the Silk Road, Kashgar has been a market town where people of all different ethnicities, nationalities and religious persuasions came to buy and sell goods. Its massive Sunday livestock market is still today one of the biggest around. We unfortunately missed it by a day due the border being closed for the Dragon Boat Festival.

Located in an oasis and surrounded by furnace like desert regions, Kashgar is a strategic crossroad on the Silk Road and has from time in memoriam been the site of cultural conflict and cooperation. Today the local Muslim Uighur people (who look nothing like the typical image most westerners have of the Chinese – see below) live side by side with Han Chinese who are arriving en-masse from the more eastern provinces and a whole host of other minority groups.

It is easy to see that Kashgar is undergoing great change. Large sections of the old town are being levelled to make way for high-rise apartment buildings. But you can’t help but feel Kashgar has always adapted according to who was in charge at the time, or what goods have been available to sell. Sure there are more cars, mobile phone sellers and high-rise apartment blocks now, but as the picture above shows there is still plenty of the traditional Kashgar. Amongst the shiny new fast food stores are the sights and smells of the street side food vendors offering everything from smoky shish kebabs, pastries, watermelon and all manner of curious cuisine. Donkeys and scooters jostle for space on the old town alleys and there is no doubt that the hammering of copper bowls still drowns out the tinny music blaring obnoxiously from teenagers mobile phones.

As Lonely planet aptly says, “Kashgar was globalised before globalised was grammatical.” And the evolution continues.

We spent out our time in Kashgar soaking up the sun and walking around the bazaars and markets of the old and new town. Below are some of the pictures from our visit.

Market trader making noodles in Kashgar

Uighur men near the Id Kah Mosque in Kashgar

Watermelon trader in Kashgar

Kebab vendors

Elizabeth eating watermelon streetside

All of our China images can be seen here.

Filed Under: China, Personal Posts, Silk Road, Travelling Tagged With: Blogsherpa, Kashgar; China; Xingxiang; Silk Road; Uighur

Observations from Kyrgyzstan

June 3, 2009 By Matthew Gain 2 Comments

Sarala-Saz Jailoo

Yesterday as we drove from Naryn, Kyrgyzstan over the 3,752 metre Toruguart Pass into the Xingjiang province of China we bid farewell to Kyrgyzstan and in fact Central Asia. Thus as has been my tradition with the previous countries, this post is dedicated to our ten observations from Kyrgyzstan.

As I have said previously, when making observations about Turkey and Uzbekistan, these are merely my observations, drawn from a very short stay in a complex country, where I didn’t speak the language and only visited a handful of places. So needless to say they are not definitive.

1. Mountains – even a blind man couldn’t miss the mountains in Kyrgyzstan. They are spectacularly beautiful and a very welcome wake up jolt to our lazy flat-London leg muscles.

2. Russian influence – unlike Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan has retained many of the hallmarks of its Russian occupation. They Kyrgyz still use the Cyrillic alphabet (thankfully Elizabeth taught herself this so we could read things) and seem rather partial to lashings of vodka, which is scarily comparable in price to bottled water, is available in abundance. You could also be forgiven for thinking the USSR was still in existence given the number of Lenin statues and busts that litter the towns and cities.

3. Less obvious state control – unlike Uzbekistan, policemen were not a sight on every street corner, our accommodation each night did not need to be registered with the government and the internet appeared to be unfiltered and uncensored. That being said President Bakiev is figuratively omnipresent – peering out of the myriad billboards on the roadsides an in towns and villages.

Ever-watchful President Bakiyev

4. Community Based Tourism (CBT) – CBT is a nationwide network of community based tourism projects that marry westerners with local Kyrgyz families and communities. The scheme, whilst a little on the pricey side when compared with other options, is an excellent one and enables local people to continue to live their traditional (in some cases nomadic) lives whilst capitalising on the tourist dollar.

5. Beers with straws – ladies drink beer with a straw in Kyrgyzstan, something Elizabeth found simply too strange to comprehend.

Elizabeth never quite got used to drinking beer with a straw

6. Limited historic built environment – unlike the grand structures and monuments we encountered in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan had relatively few historical building or sights. I can only assume this is due to the fact that the Kyrgyz people were nomadic for much longer after the Uzbeks .

7. German cars – like used Japanese cars in New Zealand, it seems all of Germany’s used cars end up in Krygyzstan. Every second car it seems is an Audi 100 and there are also plenty of BMWs and VWs too.

Audi 100s are everywhere in Kyrgyzstan

8. Fabulous felt – from shyrdak rugs, the ak kalpak hats, to the covering of their yurts, the Kyrgyz people sure do know their felt. We were so impressed in fact that we bought ourselves a rug that we are currently trying to send home.

9. Young population – it seems everybody in Kyrgyzstan is young! There are kids everywhere and rarely do you see an aksakal (which directly translates to white beard). According to the UN children and teenagers (age 0-15) comprised 38.1 percent of the population in 1999 (National Statistical Committee 1999).

10. Cemeteries – It seemed that on the outskirts of every town there was a cemetery. Though don’t imagine some modest affair, they were often times massive, housing enormous tomb like monuments with sandblasted images of the deceased staring out at you. Interestingly many people performed a subtle Muslim blessing that looked as though they were washing their face when we travelled past a cemetery in a bus of shared taxi.

So with this post we have completed our tales of Central Asia. The region has been difficult travelling in many ways, with the fairly ordinary food and the fact that we forgot out Russian phrasebook being the two standout items. Both the countries we visited, though incredibly old in history, still feel like they are finding their feet after their Russian occupation. Though, if the pride and the determination of the people are anything to go by, this will change. The sights we have seen and the experiences gathered will be with us for a long time yet.

Posting this I am sitting using Wi-Fi (something that was for us non-existent in Central Asia) in Kashgar having just last night having potentially the best meal of our trip so far. The marvels and quirks of China lay ahead of us, so best get out amongst them.

All of the Kyrgyzstan images can be seen here.

Filed Under: Kyrgyzstan, Personal Posts, Silk Road, Travelling Tagged With: Audi 100, Bakiyev, Blogsherpa, CBT, Community Based Tourism, Kyrgyzstan, Shrydak

Yurt baby, yurt!

May 29, 2009 By Matthew Gain 1 Comment

Elizabeth and the yurt

So,Elizabeth has fulfilled one of her childhood ambitions of sleeping in a yurt. What is a yurt you ask? Why it is that funny looking shelter in the picture above. Traditionally the nomadic Kyrgyz people would live in these and move them to high ground in the summers and back down to the warmer valleys in the winter. Nowadays though it is typically only the shepherds who use them during summer as they tend their flocks on the jailoos (alpine grass plains).

The yurt is covered by sheep’s felt on the outside and decorated with shyrdak (felt) rugs on the inside. Complete with a fire, for burning sheep dung (don’t worry when burnt it is fully dried and not smelly), soft mats for sleeping on and a skylight to let in the light, it was a cosy little place for us to spend the night – it had to be, it was bloody freezing outside!

Over our stay we went horse riding and hiking around the hills up around the patches of remaining snow clinging on into summer. It was great to get a glimpse into family life up in the mountains – definitely a no frills way to live. We made a video and got some photos which hopefully paint a picture better than I can with words.

Our hosts Mr and Mrs Bobby

The yurt and our guard dog at dusk

I took this photo shortly before we retired for the night. The temperature was rapidly dropping, but the little fire burining dried sheep dung inside the yurt ensured we were cosy as we drifted off to sleep.

Elizabeth horse riding near the snow capped peaks of Sarala-Saz Jailoo

Horses on the Sarala-Saz Jailoo

The day following this shot all the foals were speperated from their mothers so that the mares could be milked to make kymys , a local low alcoholic drink. Like home brew in Aus, each household has their own take on it and everybody thinks their’s is best, so you have to try a few.

Mr Bobby's wife

Having been chased out of Kochkor as a result of my heavy internet using habits (long story), we are now back in Bishkek as we wait out the Chinese Dragon Boat festival and the reopening of the Torugart Pass. The next post, assuming all goes well, should be from western China!

View all our Kyrgyzstan images taken to date here .

Filed Under: Kyrgyzstan, Personal Posts, Silk Road, Travelling Tagged With: Blogsherpa, CBT Yurt Stay, Kochkor, Kyrgyzstan, Sara-Saz Jailoo, Yurt

Altyn Arashan

May 28, 2009 By Matthew Gain Leave a Comment

Altyn Arashan

A couple of days ago we hiked out of the alpine town of Karakol to Altyn Arashan, joined by Christine from the US who we met in town (and who gave us some awesome travel tips for China where she has been living for the last four years – thanks Christine!).

Given the elevation of the valley is 3,000 metres we were a little out of breath at the end of the hike, but the views the whole way were well worth it, as was the presence of hot springs at the top to ease those post-hike aching muscles! We spent the night in a home stay mountain lodge – definitely on the chilly side after sundown. After two and a half years living in the bright lights of London it was awesome to see a night sky carpeted with stars.

The place is beautiful and we were incredibly lucky to get such sunny, clear weather. Pics and video below:

Sunset in the Altyn Arashan Valley

Hiking in the Altyn Arashan Valley

Horses in the Altyn Arashan Valley

To view all our Kyrgyzstan images go here.

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Filed Under: Kyrgyzstan, Personal Posts, Silk Road, Travelling Tagged With: Blogsherpa, Kyrgystan; Altyn Arashan; Karakol; Kyrgyzstan Trekking, Silk Road

Observations from Uzbekistan

May 20, 2009 By Matthew Gain 2 Comments

Uzbek police officer in Samarkand – you are rarely far from one of these fellows anywhere in Uzbekistan

So in the tradition of the recent Turkey post, here are some of my top observations from our time in Uzbekistan. It should be said loudly and clearly that these observations should be taken with quite a few grains of salt. I don’t speak Uzbek or Russian, which no doubt would have altered the experience considerably. I also only spent two weeks in the country and I have only visited a handful of places.

That being said, we have enjoyed our time here in Uzbekistan immensely. We were nervous to say the least about the police presence and were expecting to be stopped regularly for passport checks and to be quizzed about our travels – though this only happened once and was a painless experience. We were also a bit wary of the cash situation with a dearth of ATMs and the subsequent need to carry wads of USD to exchange for bricks of Uzbek sum, but again this all seemed to be relatively painless. The ancient monuments and cities in Uzbekistan, as my previous post has highlighted, are spectacular and the people so friendly and accommodating. We even got an unexpected dose of Uzbek hospitality on our last night in the country in the city of Andijon where we were pulled off the street to join a massive wedding reception.

So without further ado let me observe:

Police – as per the caption under the image at the top of this post, you can’t help but notice the police in Uzbekistan. It would be fascinating to know the ratio of police to civilians – they are everywhere.
Money – you certainly need to be cashed up in Uzbekistan – more in the literal sense than the figurative. You see, the biggest Uzbek note is roughly worth 60 cents, carrying the relatively small amount of $100 US was a unique challenge.
Elizabeth with the equivalent of $100 US dollars
Food – carbs and fat aren’t hard to come by that’s for sure. Uzbeks are very proud of their national dish plov, an oily fired rice topped with poor cuts of meat, meat fat and tripe combined with strips of carrot and perhaps raisons – it tastes as good as it sounds. That being said we hardy starved and they must have some of the prettiest bread in the world.
Outdoor relaxation – not unique to Uzbekistan of course, but they certainly do have lounging al fresco sorted what with the cushy tapchans (tea beds), hidden leafy green courtyards and seemingly never ending pots of choy (tea).
Decoration – be it interior, exterior or personal decoration, Uzbekistan knows how to so it with colour, detail and splendour.
Beautiful interior decoration at Mubinjon’s in Bukhara
Tashkent Metro – the Tashkent Metro stations are staggeringly beautiful. Each has its own look, from cathedral like arches, cosmonaut inspired space scenes or ballrooms with chandeliers – words cannot describe. Unfortunately for me, they were also designed to serve as nuclear bomb shelters, so taking photos is strictly forbidden.
Korea – in addition to large ethnic Korean communities across the country, Uzbekistan has a strong trading relationship with Korea. Uzbekistan sells uranium to Korea, the two countries are both testing for oil and Korea has large Daewoo manufacturing plants based in the country (as evidenced by the extraordinary predominance of Damas, Nexias and little Matizes on the road)
‘AYGEN Styled in Italy’ plastic bag – this random bag is absolutely everywhere in Uzbekistan and when I say everywhere I mean every second shop and every single stall owner at the bazaars were handing them out. I assume it was meant to say agency, but somebody stuffed up along the way and they sold the mistakes onto a large plastic bag distributor in Uzbekistan. (PS – it seems these babies are also flourishing in Kyrgystan along with, randomly for our UK readers and Australian readers respectively Morrisons and Sportgirl bags)

bag Observations from Uzbekistan

This shot was taken in Samarkand, but really could have been anywhere that bags were being handed out

Hand on heart – accompanied by a gentle tilt of the head, this simple gesture of placing one’s right hand on on one’s heart is commonly used by Uzbeks to show thanks, acknowledge a compliment or in greeting. We even found ourselves doing it – using it to express our feelings where our language failed us.
Grangos – when in South America we were on the Gringo Trail – gringo being the term used there to identify westerner tourists. But here, amongst hordes of empty nester travellers from Europe it felt at times like we were on the ‘Grango’ Trail.

Next we travel east to Kyrgyzstan where we expect to be hiking hills and around lakes, riding horses and fulfilling a lifelong dream of Elizabeth’s to sleep in a yurt.

We are now inKyrgyzstan and uploading images where and when we can, though connections tend to be slow.

For all our Uzbekistan images go here.

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Filed Under: Personal Posts, Silk Road, Travelling, Uzbekistan Tagged With: Blogsherpa, Silk Road, Tashkent Metro, Uzbekistan

Mosques, mausoleums and medressas – the marvels of Uzbekistan

May 12, 2009 By Matthew Gain 4 Comments

The amazing Registan in Samarkand is a complex of medrasses (Islamic academy/seminary) and a large mosque

When we flew into Tashkent from Istanbul a little bleary eyed at 4am we were already a tad hot under the collar. From what we had heard of the Uzbek immigration/customs process we thought it was going to be complicated to say the least and we had a connecting flight to catch at 7am. Every piece of cash on us was accounted for on our forms along with a full declaration of our ‘radio communication devices’ (our mobile phones) and ‘printed matter and data carriers’ (books and our laptop). When we were first met by people in white coats and face masks wielding thermometers for the inevitable Swine flu screening we crossed our fingers that we were really cool customers underneath our sweaty, stressy exteriors.

We passed through the health and customs check in flying colours and we made it to the domestic airport in super early time for our next flight to Urgench. Mission accomplished!

Having thought it would be a bit of an earnest backpacker scene we have been surprised to find rather it is THE hotspot for hordes of French empty-nesters on tour. Who knew? We were clearly wasting our time researching on the internet when we could have just given my sister’s French parents-in-law a quick call for all the top tips!

So all the talk of it being being a hard place to get into and around is obviously greatly unfounded. People couldn’t be friendlier or more accommodating and we always seem to find someone who can speak some English. Language here is a diverse concept – the official language is Uzbek but most people also speak Russian along with some of the other ethnic tongues of Tajik or Karakalpak. Elizabeth is swotting up on the Cyrillic alphabet so we can at least make out some of the Russian signs on marshrutkas (little public minibuses) etc.

The Uzbekistan we have seen so far is a mix of the old and the Soviet, jammed up against each other. Ancient Muslim mosques, medrasses and mausoleums are here in amazing glory, restored to reflect the grandeur they once exhibited in antiquity. Apparently some historians and bleeding heart Lonely Planet authors have taken offence at this preferring to leave the structures as they were. Not me though. The big ticket items (like the Registan above) are stunning. In my mind providing ongoing maintenance to reflect how the original creators had intended a structure to be is in no way a bad thing. But each to their own I guess.

So far we have visited the ancient khanate (kingdom) capitals of Khiva, once a bustling slave trading centre, Bukhara and the ancient and the legendary Samarkand, where I am writing this post. All have had their charming old town centres and Soviet built new towns. We have spent most of our time in the old towns, but next up is Tashkent where by all reports there is oodles of Soviet architecture to enjoy. Now enormous Soviet style, concrete heavy, monuments aren’t everyone’s cup of tea, but for me they are heaven. I am very much looking forward to getting up early and photographing these without too many people around.

There is more to tell you, but I might save some of that until we are in Kyrgyzstan. Enjoy some images until then – I will post more on Flickr, once I find a fast internet connection.

NOTE – I am not sure when this post will appear on my blog. WordPress appears to be blocked here, along with a few other things.

Islam-Hoja Minaret, Khiva

Uzbek women in Khiva. We only wish the woman on the left had flashed us her full set of gold teeth – quite the thing here

Sunset over the West Gate in Khiva

The beautiful Kalta Minor Minaret.

Apparently this minaret was started with the intention that it would be well over 100 metres tall. The khan who commissioned it, Mohammad Amin Khan, died before it was finished. The tradition was that the tower was credited to the ruler who finished it. Not wanting his dad discredited with the tower the new khan, Amin Khan’s son, halted construction so that it retained his dad’s name. Nice.

Elizabeth researching transport connections on a tapchan (tea bed) in Khiva

Cleaning time at Guri Amir Masusoleum in Samarkand

Korean lady at the Bukhara bazaar.

After a lengthy interaction that involved a lot of miscommunication due to language difficulties we purchased some tasty noodles from this lady. We have learnt to seek out the Koreans, locals here following a large forced migration after the second world war, who sell items that do not consist solely of meat and carbohydrate.

I think she enjoyed the experience, they don’t get too many westerners in the bazaars.

Technorati Tags: Registan,Samarkand,Islam-Hoja Minaret,Khiva,Kalta Minor,Guri Amir Masusoleum,Bukhara

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Filed Under: Personal Posts, Silk Road, Travelling, Uzbekistan Tagged With: Blogsherpa, Bukhara, Guri Amir Masusoleum, Islam-Hoja Minaret, Kalta Minor, Khiva, Registan, Samarkand

Ten observations about Turkey

May 5, 2009 By Matthew Gain 3 Comments

Atatürk

Well people, the masthead at the top of this page needs changing as today is our last day in Turkey. We fly for Uzbekistan tonight and then will be travelling overland for the next few months through Central Asia and China.

Turkey has been an amazing and fascinating. It is my first visit to the country, Elizabeth’s second (she was here exactly 11 years ago). Whenever she mentioned this fact to the locals they would, without fail, respond with ‘a hell of a lot has changed in the last ten years’, and Elizabeth agreed. The days of westerners travelling around like a colonialist inspecting a far flung outpost of the empire are over. Turkey is no longer cheap – a beer at a bar is roughly $5 AUD or £2.50 – and there is a large middle class of domestic tourists that drive shiny new cars and surf the net on their iPhones. Of course beyond making a bigger dent in our budget than expected this is not at all bad thing.

It is impossible to sum up such a vast country in a short blog post, so instead I thought I would list the ten things, in no particular order, that stood out for me:

Atatürk – the father Turk may have died in 1938, but he is still omnipresent. There are statues of him it seems in every town square, every main street seems to be named after him and his photo adorns the walls of every establishment be they large/small, touristic/official or otherwise.
The special relationship – the Turks seem to really respect that Australians will travel to the other side of the world to honour and respect the men who fought in a battle in World War I. They consider the relationship with Australia a very important one and I expect will become more regular tourists of Australia in the coming years.
Rising middle class – as I mentioned above there is a real sense of prosperity in this country and a middle class that Elizabeth didn’t remember from last time.
Bus services – the complimentary drinks and snack services on the Turkish coaches would put many airlines to shame – and I am not talking about one of those nasty budget airlines.
Half finished buildings – there seems to be a hell of a lot of people in Turkey that can build concrete slabs many stories into the sky. Though there appears many less people who can build walls, doors and windows. This may be the result of ye olde credit crunch?
Turkish music – In the Turkish top 20 there appeared to be not one Western song. The entire chart was made up of what I assume are local Turkish artists. Not that they are ignorant to Western music – they just seem to like their own better.
Seasonal tourism – the coastal towns in the south of the country appear to survive solely on the tourist dollar. Given we were visiting these places before ‘the season’ many were completely empty. Some of the smarter tourism operators we spoke to advised they were working on ways to attract tourists through winter via walking tours and the like.
European Union – It seems EU entry is still a way off for Turkey, but none of the people we spoke to were too concerned about that and figured that Turkey was doing just fine on its own.
Smoking – every man and most women smoke it seems. And unlike Europe, US and Aus there is not yet a ban on smoking indoors. Funny how quickly one forgets how nasty cigarette smoke is. Apparently the restaurant smoking ban is due to hit in July which will be a shock to the system.
History – there is just so much history packed into this one country. There are so many historic sites that they have only excavated about 30% of them – there is just not the resource to do it all.

Turkey in short has been amazing, but our next stop, Uzbekistan, calls. I don’t think it will be as easy as tourist-friendly Turkey. They are a little more wary of outsiders there and they are much less likely to speak English, which will no doubt pose a bit of a problem given we speak absolutely no Russian or Uzbek. As such we requested the lovely lady who has been helping us with our visas to write out a passage in Russian for us to give to the immigration officials when we land:

Пожалуйста могли бы Вы оформить нас побыстрее у нас утренний рейс в Ургенч в 07.00. Мы боимся не успеть на него.

We hope it informs him of the fact that we have a connecting flight to catch and that we need to move quickly to catch it. Though it could just as easily say that we think Uzbekistan is a sham nation and that we intend to wipe our asses on their national flag. Wish us luck!!!!

See all our Turkey images here.