Halloween Hike: Tian Shen-ish Mountains

Even though we like Tashkent so far, it is still a big city, and with big cities there are big headaches: noise, trash, pollution, traffic, harried life. If you squint on a good day against the haze, you can see the western end of the Chaktal Range of the Tian Shan Mountains from the city, and we were aching to go hike them. Getting there wasn't easy though - because there are no hiking guides and no maps (that I have found). Roads are often blocked off for secret military reasons, so you are forced to detour. Forget about consistent GPS and cell phone coverage. Then, if you get to where you want to go, trailheads are not marked and the word "trail" itself is relative, leaving hikers to make it up as they go.

We hired a local guide who kinda knew where to go. She shared some interesting details about the dynamic landscape and boasted about meeting Paul McCartney once. Unfortunately, she also had a lot to say about politics and current events, nothing of which I cared to discuss on my family hiking trip. And her singing was terrible. There had to be a silver lining somewhere. By not having a proper trail - I could socially distance as much as I wanted. 

At this time of year, the mountain's plants are brown and brittle but the spines were as sharp as ever. Only the juniper trees were green and thriving. They made excellent hand holds when we were sliding down or scrambling up. We ate tiny fruit off a tree, which looked like yellow cherries with a pit and tasted like apple-mango. We watched eagles, sparrows, and vultures glide overhead against a panoramic view of snow dusted mountains that spread into Kazakhstan. My children summited the extinct volcano like champs, and the charm of the vastness was enough to put me in a cautiously good mood for the rest of the day. 

donkey: осел (pronounced osel)

Vendors on the R12 highway at dusk.

Khazrati Imam Mosque and the Old City Neighborhood

If I ever go on a walking tour of Tashkent again, I promise to remember the following: 

1. Public bathrooms are very hard to find on walking tours. 

2. Bring water, but not too much (see #1). 

3. Bring snacks. Avoid the kind of hangriness that even ice cream and fresh non can't cure if you wait too long. Also, making unannounced pit stops where the group is likely to lose you before venturing into a maze of unmarked streets is probably not a good idea.  

4. The city is huge. Before we got to the good stuff, we covered long boring distances over littered and broken sidewalks, neglected landscaping, and rows of temporary fencing, all while listening to the roar of urban traffic and construction. 

5. Free walking tours means literally all walks of life could be on the tour: masked, half-masked, non-masked, jerks, cool people, whiners, dog-walkers, nosy and intrusive photographers, networkers, smokers, etc...

6. Beauty is everywhere, especially in between the noisy spaces. You just have to look. It's etched into the stone and wood, sewn into the fabric, glowing from the children, and illuminating the neighborhood paths.

Photo credit: Mark

tradition, chic, & tech

Photo credit: Mark

Details I missed but Mark caught - 

near the statue of Abdulla Qodiriy, a famous Uzbek playwright.

Photo credit: Mark

Khazrati Imam Mosque

Spare Prayer Rugs

Shoe rack

Pre-spaced devotion

Old City and the Kolkouz Canal

Old City alley

 

Street Snax in Tashkent

Along a pedestrian path, a man sells cups of "salqin ichimlik" dispensed out of a large yellow tank hooked up to a cooling unit. Roughly translated as cool-drink, it looks like tinted sugar water and tastes vaguely like a cross between Gatorade and Kool-aide. A small cup costs about 10 cents, a large is 20, and 50 cents for a liter. The cool drink's competitor sells kbac (pronounced kvass) and she charges about a third more. Around this region, kbac is far more popular than cool-drink. It's a traditional fermented Slavic/Baltic beverage commonly made from rye bread. Kbac tastes a bit sour, a bit sweet, and a bit nutty. And, it is overwhelmingly refreshing. In my opinion, it should be served very cold and consumed quickly because flat, warm kbac tastes like sadness. 

Either drink pairs well with fall days and street snacks so long as it is chilled. Interestingly, I found that most restaurants ask customers twice if they want iced drinks over concern for illness - ice is not really a thing here, but cold drinks? Yes. 

For a starch fix, buy a cup-o-corn or cobbed corn seasoned with liquid margarine and served in a plastic bag. The corn doesn't have the esteem of Iowa sweet corn, but it does has an impressive, strong flavor. Savory, Central Asian pastries called somsas might be filled with meat or chicken, pumpkin, or potato and are well worth the price of 25 cents. They are best eaten immediately out of the oven to minimize soggy pastry dough and heartburn from the onions and garlic - which blessedly are staple ingredients here. 

It goes without saying that meat kebabs (shashleek) is always a good decision, as is plov, Uzbekistan's amazing meat and rice dish. Both can be found for about 1 dollar. But it's the fresh lepeshka that makes my eyes roll to the back of my head and sigh with contentment. Most of the road side signs and store fronts advertise it as "non" but it has many names: lepeshka, patir, naan. It's a simple round bread loaf made of high gluten flour, milk/yogurt, yeast, salt, and sugar and is cooked in a tandoor. A whole loaf easily feeds 2-4 people but I will happily eat one by myself. They are cheap too, about 20-25 cents each, so I knew I was getting ripped off by the stone-cold, masked grandmother charged me 50 cents. But no matter. All is right in the world when you get tear (don't ever cut it) into warm lepeshka. Better than that - getting to experience snax with someone you adore. 

Cool drink tankard

Non/Naan/Lepeshka/Patir

Somsa

there's something in the air (besides covid)

I am paying attention to a new thing here in the Uzbek capital: air quality index (AQI) which is data published by the U.S. Embassy Tashkent. When I stepped outside for a lunch time walk, the air had a low laying haze and an AQI of 159, literally topping today's worldwide ranking for cities. I thought something was off today when I couldn't breathe through my nose and the grit clouded my eyes.

Side note: I didn't think it was possible to injure myself with nasal spray, but I did. I guess was so excited to moisturize my nasal passages after our walk that I pinched my lip in the nozzle and ripped off some skin like I was some sort of snort-hound. My own daughter shook her head when she saw my bloody lip. For shame.

https://www.iqair.com

Botkin Cemetery

Tashkent summers bring the kind of heat where everything seems to sag and wilt. It's so hot, the wind blows halfheartedly, and sweat and tears evaporate like they never existed. The sun lays down a heavy blanket of UV rays, the color of an overexposed photo. Not a single soul moves faster than they need to, unless of course, they are driving. Sidewalks might exist or might not, and the roads are a constant work in progress, so it is anybody's guess to how a neighborhood walk might go. Even though wearing a mask and hat should in no way hinder my ability to walk around potholes, roots, and chunks of broken sidewalk, I struggle to keep my bearings underneath all the fabric. I'm pretty sure locals understand exactly how awkward I feel, but then maybe they smirk because no sane person should meander in such heat without purpose.

I had no purpose on this particular Sunday other than to get out of the house, lest I explode on my family for doing what all normal people should be doing on the weekend: relaxing  I don't relax particularly well. Leaving in a huff propelled me down a road that was lined with stores selling construction materials and home furnishings. I passed mechanics, for-hire laborers wearing rubber sandals, and women selling packs of gum and sweets from their two wheeled carts. Hugging any shade I could find, I turned a corner and walked beside a blissfully cool wall surrounding the Botkin Cemetery where flower and headstone vendors were in full swing. The sharp noise of faces and names getting engraved onto pieces of granite cut through the non-moving air.

When I lived in Namibia, a touristy visit to a cemetery was never encouraged - they were supposed to be places where people visit perhaps annually and/or during solemn ceremonies. But here, there were visitors gardening, picnicking, and even napping in the shade. A clarinet busker played near the fountains used to fill up jugs of water meant for gladiolas and mums, though a number of people were washing their shoes too. Two young women were changing into long skirts outside the Orthodox church entrance and a cyclist was making a delivery to the tiny store selling religious relics. Most of the headstones had the deceased's face and/or entire body etched onto them. Some displayed Orthodox crosses and others had red stars. Most plots were cordoned off with wrought iron fences and nearly all of them had had visitors at some point. I wound my way through narrow paths avoiding jagged edges of unmaintained fences, crunching through waist high yellow grass and had to talk myself down from panic when I thought there might be snakes or lions hiding in the brush. Funny how old habits die hard. 

I realized perhaps my panic might have been related to sun exposure and dehydration. But I had no money and no water to safely drink. In a full on rage of immaturity, I had skulked off with only a phone which meant I had a lovely time making my way home, blistered, sunburned, and thirsty, and a tail between my legs. 

Surviving Boredom

After two isolated and lonely weeks, we got internet back today. I was so excited that I handed the kids iPads and I haven't seen nor heard from them since. These past two weeks were spent entertaining ourselves without the pleasure of streaming and having none of our stuff, so in addition to the usual quarantine activities (day drinking, reading, sleeping) we made up stories or themes for the different rooms in the house.

Vanity Hall: Andie Walsh's makeup check

The Sleepless Reader

The Nighthawk Diner breakfasting at home.

The Pillow-top Wall: indeed is NOT soft.

Hall of Mirrors Chandelier on loan.

The Filter Room: nothing but tubules and loops of Henle.

Summer of Quarantine and Travel: VA to MO to CO to UZ

When arriving to a new country, the excitement of taking in new sights, sounds, and smells usually make up for the hassles of flying, jet lag, and bewilderment of navigating unfamiliar expectations. Exploring neighborhoods and wandering through grocery stores are among my favorite activities for not only finding calm and gaining independence, but also to help with the activation energy that is needed to overcome an eleven hour time difference. Instead, we were sequestered inside the walls of our new home (a wonderful home to be sure) for a strict fourteen days, relying on grocery delivery services, our shitty grasp of Russian language, and the good will of Mark’s work sponsor to be our connection to the outside world. 

We knew our arrival to Uzbekistan would be super isolating but it was still a surprisingly hard adjustment. It didn’t help that one of our computers crapped out and the internet went down after the first day. Jet lagging exhaustion came in waves and it took all I could muster not to pass out on the couch, so I took running the stairs or pacing the hot tiles of our inner courtyard. Nothing seemed doable in the fog of nausea and there were only so many movies, games, and reading material we could stomach and rewatch for the tenth time. Every afternoon we’d take a strict, one hour nap. Getting up afterwards was brutal and for rest of the day we all looked like we had raging cases of pink eye. We’d pick at dinner and crawl into bed, hopeful that this time, we’d get to sleep an extra hour… five. Only to have our bodies bing us awake at 2:30am, 4:00am, and 4:40am like some sort of effed up clockwork.

We are lucky. We have our own beds and space in which to reacclimatize to Tashkent’s timezone and quarantine. I was told the repatriated citizens who were on the the charter plane with us from NY would be required to do the same at a state run facility. I keep this in mind when I get a case of the whines. 

Getting here at all took a lot of heavy lifting by the embassy crew. I am humbled by the travel team who waited hours long lines to add us to the long waitlist. I am grateful for the team who prepared our home, left us food and drink, and delivered our weary bodies to the doorstep. Boredom and jet lag are a small price to pay for us being able to move our lives forward after months of waiting, cancellations, and the annoyingly all-too-common anxiety of not knowing what’s what with life these days.

Speaking of gratefulness, I would be remiss not to mention all the joy and valuable family time we got to spend in Missouri and Colorado. Mark finished his training at the end of June which meant our lease was up in Virginia and we had all of July and possibly all of August to take home leave. At the time, we couldn’t find any airlines flying pets so we opted to rent a car for our travel. Aside from Margo vomiting into the wind while we were driving on the highway causing apple-pastry scented spray-back throughout the car, the drive was unremarkable. It took us many wipes, towels, and attempts to clean it up. Even the dog needed a bath. 

It took us 15 hours in one go to get to Missouri where we spent our days road biking, canoeing, and boating. Mark often complained that cycling in Missouri meant never finding a rhythm because of all the short and steep hills, but I loved it. I did well with the short bursts of energy needed to climb and descend. Deets all but lived in Grandpa’s garage woodworking, and Margo was her Grandmother’s wee sidekick, making cookies and swimming in their hot tub. We blew up fireworks, watched Hamilton, and ate blackberries from their backyard.

In Colorado, we enjoyed our first ever family reunion with my parents and my brother’s family. It was such a special experience introducing the cousins while we hiked until our knees gave out and grilled all the meats. Road biking CO-style brought back brutal memories of Mark effortlessly prancing up long-ass climbs while I heaved for every breath in the saddle. Visiting my home state made us remember how much we loved living there. Mark and I decided that Salida would be our backup retirement location, should the Slovenian mountains not pan out. 

I use the memories and hugs, photos and mementoes, and laughs and tears we collected during this time to carry me through the sadness of moving away from the U.S. I wasn’t ready to leave, especially under the circumstances that no one knows what’s going to happen next. It was a gift to spend the summer with my MO & CO family, and not just because they willingly accommodated 4 people, 1 dog, 1 kennel, 8 bags, and all the miscellaneous crap/essentials we thought with us. It was also a gift to know that regardless of what happens or where we go, we will always have more than one place to hang our hats and hearts.