Uzbekistan odd bits

Uzbekistan Odd BitsThursday October 21, 2009 Reaching the end of a country or tour, I like to put down the odd little bits and pieces that I have learned or gathered that just didn't fit into the narrative in any other place or I just forgot to put them in where they belonged. So here are the Uzbekistan ones. This information is gathered from our guide or observation.Social system:There is no unemployment in Uzbekistan (or if there is, it is negligible). People do not need a visa for Kazakhstan or Russia so if they aren’t finding anything at home; they pop over the border to find something. For those needing help, it is more of a family and extended family network rather than social services or social security. In fact, while there are pensions and a social security network in place, most do not rely on it but instead plan on having their relatives take care of them when it becomes necessary. There are also no mortgages. Children get married and live with their parents or their parents help them buy a home but no mortgage. Exports, Imports, BusinessUzbekistan exports wheat and cotton and tobacco and gold. I’m sure it exports more too but these are the items we discussed. Their tobacco is not of a great quality so it is used more as filler rather than the sole leaf in cigarettes. And as such then, they also import tobacco and also they import wheat. That’s an odd one, importing and exporting the wheat. They can grow just about everything else they need except for citrus. They might be growing their bananas in hothouses or they are importing them. We had the great banana scam all throughout the trip as bananas ranged in price in any given city from 500 Zum apiece to 2000 Zum apiece. They must also import their petrol as they have plenty of natural gas but no petroleum.They have joint ventures with many companies but the largest and most noticeable to us were the Uz-Daewoo cars on the road. They also have a joint venture with Case which manufactures tractors and other heavy equipment but our guide said it wasn’t very good equipment. And a big joint venture is with the British-American Tobacco Company. A very successful joint venture is Carlsberg beer which makes the local tasty brew of Sarbast beer which comes in red label of 4% and blue label of 7%.Hadja stories:Not sure if I am spelling the name right but I have heard these stories before. Hadja is a Muslim man who is wise but also kind of a trickster and his stories are teaching lessons and morals in a joking way. We got two stories from our guide.Story #1) Hadja was having a large party and didn’t have a big enough pot for his soup. He went to his neighbor who was rather a greedy man and asked if he could borrow a big pot. His neighbor reluctantly loaned him a big pot and admonished Hadja to take care of it and return it tomorrow. Hadja went home, cooked his soup, and had a wonderful party. The next day Hadja went to his neighbor and gave him back his big pot but also gave him his own small pot. The neighbor was very surprised and asked Hadja why he was giving him the small pot as well. Hadja replied, "Your pot was pregnant and had a baby pot last night. Since it is your pot I thought it was only fair that you also get the baby pot." The neighbor is quite pleased and takes both pots leaving Hadja with none. So when Hadja comes to borrow the big pot again, the neighbor is quite willing to loan Hadja the pot thinking that when he gets it back, he will get two pots back again. But the next day comes and Hadja never comes over with the pot. Finally the neighbor goes to Hadja’s house and asks for his pot. Hadja tells him that his pot has died. The neighbor is furious and says, “How can a pot die, it is just a pot.” Hadja replies, “You were willing to believe that the pot could have a baby so you must also be willing to believe that a pot can die.”Story #2) Hadja had an appointment with a friend to meet for dinner. But Hadja went to the market and forgot about his appointment. The friend went to Hadja’s house and knocked and knocked and knocked on the door and grew quite angry when Hadja never answered the door. So he took a large market and wrote “IDIOT” in big letters across Hadja’s door. When Hadja came home from the market he saw the word “IDIOT” written on his door and remembered his appointment with his friend immediately. He went quickly over to his friend’s house to apologize. He said to his friend, “I am so sorry that I forgot our appointment but when I came home I remembered immediately as soon as I saw your name on my door.”Samarkand stories: All the bread we were served was usually this round bread with a flat part in the middle. This flat part was caused by bread stamps. We all were enamored with them and I think I ended up purchasing 5 but have already given one away and others were also buying them to use as gifts. The stamps had two purposes. Purpose one was to flatten that part of the bread so that it didn’t rise during baking. The second purpose was to identify the bread as coming from a certain bakery as each bakery had their own specific stamp. Our guide also told us that Samarkand bread is quite famous and delicious and everyone loves it. When people from Samarkand go to Tashkent to visit friends or relatives they must always take some Samarkand bread with them as presents. It supposedly lasts around a month and can weigh up to a kilo for one loaf of the round bread. I’m thinking at the end of the month you probably have to soak it for another week to be able to eat it but I might be mistaken. He told us a Samarkand bread story of a ruler who came to visit Samarkand and was so enthralled with the taste of the bread that he got at a certain bakery that he wanted the baker to come and live in Tashkent and bake his bread. The baker said that it wouldn’t be Samarkand bread. So the ruler had him bring all the flour and water and yeast and pans and stamps and everything else he needed to Tashkent to bake the bread. But when he did, it just wasn’t as good. The ruler asked the baker why it didn’t taste the same. The baker replied that he had brought everything except one ingredient and that was the Samarkand air. So the ruler let him go back to Samarkand and bake his bread there. On October 18 a few years ago, Samarkand celebrated its 2500 years of existence. Shortly after that celebration, there was proof discovered that Samarkand had been in existence for 2750 years. So there was another huge celebration for the 2750th birthday. These events were only about 3 years apart. A friend of Marat’s (our guide) had been there for the 2500th birthday celebration, was gone and returned to suddenly find the city celebrating 2750 years. He remarked that he knew he hadn’t been gone that long. Now the city claims there is proof positive that Samarkand is 3000 years old. But city officials won’t let them celebrate yet. They say it is too soon to celebrate so wait a few years and then we will. The city hall in Samarkand is an old rich Russian merchant’s house. He moved there for business and found that it was not healthy for his family so he had his people plant trees all around his house and up and down his street. Now this is a very popular area to come in the summer as it is always a bit cooler and nice underneath the trees. On driving out of Samarkand, we passed through the “Iron Gate”, a small pass between two mountains. This was easily guarded and had been by Tamerlane to keep people out of his city unless he wanted them to come. Also on this road is a more recent type of warning, a cardboard police car, full size, set up to warn people not to speed.Soviet Tales: During Soviet times it did not bode well to draw attention to yourself as everyone was supposed to be the same. People were very careful to build houses that all looked alike from outside. They didn’t want to show their wealth by having a bigger house or a nicer house because if it looked like you had some money, too many questions would be asked. Our guide said that Uzbekistan is a “semi-democracy” but that many people would like to return to Soviet rule. In general, people were taken care of then. They didn’t have to think for themselves, they didn’t have to worry about health care or housing or jobs. These were all provided in one fashion or another. Now they have to pay for all of these items and worry about them and for many whose parents grew up in Soviet Uzbekistan and who also lived during that time, the choices now are too much for them and the worry too much and the freedom not necessarily worth the price. At one time there were many ponds and pools in the different cities and while many of them had clean and fresh water others were full of guinea worms so when the Soviets came and were getting these worms, they just ordered that all the ponds be filled. Soviet style apartments and blocks were built very cheaply. The walls are paper thin and you can pretty much hear all of your neighbors and know what they are doing. Having stayed in different soviet apartments over the years, I do agree with this assessment. They usually also have short ceilings. I have also noticed over the years that buildings associated with and people associated with a Soviet history will have double doors but only one door is ever unlocked so everyone funnels through this bottleneck. It is also said that these Soviet apartments had such small bathrooms that you had to back into it if you wanted to use the toilet. General odd bits: Almost all the tree trunks in Uzbekistan are whitewashed up to about 3-4’ above the ground. This is to prevent damage to the trees from insects. One of the dishes you get at a fancy dinner is salted almond pits. They are quite tasty but they are a lot of work to get the small kernel of tastiness out of the pit. If the pit has not cracked open during the salting and roasting process, there is no getting out the tasty bit so I think they are way too much effort and I didn’t buy any. Other tasty foods we ate were plov, shashlish, dumplings, and lagman. Plov is the rice mixture usually with mutton and different spices depending on who is making it. Shashlish are kebabs but usually they were just meat on a skewer. When you ordered a kebab you might get a plate of raw onion slices to go with it but never any veggies cooked with it. The dumplings came either with a meat mixture (meat and rice) or with pumpkin and again they were tasty depending on who was making it or rather bland and unappetizing. I had both kinds. Lagman is a soup and I never figured out exactly what kind of soup but it had mutton, vegetables and noodles. Driving from one part of the country to another are many police checks and barricades. We were never stopped at one but we did see other cars being stopped. It’s probably a “don’t bother the rich tourist thing”. But the police at Registran Square in Samarkand are bribable, kind of. For around $5, they will let you into the rickety minaret to climb to the top and look out of a hatch. We had a magic password in most places. Our tour included admission prices to all monuments but not photo prices so we would buy a photo permit. When we had free time we were always welcome to go back to any monument again for more photos or a better look. Our password was our guide’s name. supposedly if we said his name, we would be able to get back into the monument without having to pay again. I only tried it one time and it worked.Men’s hats are a square-ish affair that sits toward the back of their head. Most are a dark color and decorated with four white paisley shaped designs around the upper part and then a border design around the bottom. There are several explanations for the designs. The paisley shape is either an almond or a pepper. They believe that a pepper keeps away the evil eye. You can find this paisley shape on many of the women’s scarves and shawls that they sell as well. For the border shape, we got a story from Natasha, our guide in Tashkent. A traveling man would always bring home a gift for his wife. Every gift he brought home was always spurned by her and put aside. He could find no gift that she liked. He was getting quite frustrated and spent a lot of money on a very find shawl one day to bring home for her. It was beautiful, silk, colorful and expensive. He came home and gave it to her and she did what she always did and spurned the gift and said it wasn’t a good gift and he wasn’t a good husband. The man was finally so angry that he slammed his fist down on his hat and shouted NO. The shape of the flat side of his fist is supposedly the shape of the border that goes around the hat. There are many different hats for sale and they each have a specific meaning. There are small turban-like hats that boys are given before their circumcision. Men have their square hats with the specific patterns. Women have hats that are colorful and embroidered. Newly wed women wear hats that have beads hanging down from the side or both sides. We saw one woman wearing this and asked when she had gotten married and she said 2 months ago. Our guide, Gulia, said it was high time the woman stopped wearing her “just married” hat and moved on. Taxis do not have meters, anywhere. In Tashkent they don’t even have signs a lot of time. Most of them are Daewoo Matiz cars and you see one coming, you just flag it down and then negotiate a price. In Samarkand, they are labeled that they are a taxi but you must still negotiate the price. They also all drive incredibly fast and will often drive faster with a tourist to show off their skill. A Taxi Story: A taxi picked up a tourist. The taxi drove very fast and at each red light he just sped through it. The tourist was quite scared but finally realized that they were ok so far and tried to relax. Finally the taxi came to an intersection where the light was green and he slowed down and stopped. The tourist asked him why he stopped for a green light when he ran through all the red ones. The taxi driver replied, “Because there is probably another taxi driver like me coming the other way.” The train and the road out of Tashkent to other parts of the country used to go through a small smidgen of Kazakhstan but relations have soured to the point where the road and train both take a longer route and don’t go through that little bit. Yet they still can go there without a visa. You bargain everywhere in Uzbekistan. We never thought to bargain at first at the market because we aren’t used to bargaining for food. I finally started though and sometimes they are willing to give you a break on the cost. What is interesting is that shops ALWAYS only get $1. No matter what the item, no matter what the cost you start with or bargain down to, the shop is “only making $1” on the sale. I heard this from almost every shop owner where I made a purchase or tried to bargain for a purchase.Tamerlane stories: Tamerlane means “Timor the lame” which he was from necrosis of the bone. So Uzbeks don’t call him Tamerlane but call him Emir Timor. There are some states/provinces that honor him for a hero and for others he is a villain as he conquered them. Supposedly he had several grand palaces but he never slept in them. He only used them for official business and to greet his guests. He slept in a yurt in his garden. And there were many yurts in his garden so he slept in a different one every night. Timor’s army was massive. He had hundreds of thousands of soldiers. He controlled an incredibly large area but he never lacked for soldiers even though they were required to pay for themselves. They had to buy their own weapons, horses, food, and clothing. Their rewards would be to take whatever they wanted when they had conquered a town or village. The best would be saved for Timor but they could have anything else. Pomegranates were believed to be very effective at fighting disease and it’s true that we know today that they are full of vitamin C and quite good for you. These days even babies in Uzbekistan are given pomegranate juice mixed in with their milk. In Tamerlane’s day, he required his soldiers to have pomegranate juice every day in their diet. It probably kept his men relatively healthy.