Uzbekistan, the country of love

by Sheila on 21 Aug, 2014 - 4 comments

Much to our relief, entering Uzbekistan was not nearly as complicated or lengthy as leaving Turkmenistan. Of course, there were still forms to be handwritten, but everything was done and dusted inside an hour. A couple of young trainee customs officials were exercising their very decent English on us, and enjoyed talking about Canada and how they were eager to visit. Little did I know that that was a precedent for more declarations of love to come.

On the ship to Turkmenistan the implications of marriage and ‘getting together’ had begun, but in Uzbekistan they took it to a whole new level. As our car was going through the quick but required physical search, all the guards had gathered around to admire the car (I thought). One guard came up to me and asked if I had a pen. Thinking he wanted to sign the car, I handed over the silver ink pen. He and the guards then appropriated our entire rear windshield to write, “I love you Sheila – Uzbekistan”. Well, that took forwardness to a whole new level.

Making our awkwardly hasty retreat from the Uzbek border casanovas, we made a beeline for Bukhara. The ancient Silk Road city is not far from the Turkmen border, but the combination of our border fiasco along with only marginally better roads meant we reached Bukhara around 10pm. We did manage to find a decent hotel for the night, and we were rewarded for our find with a great breakfast and beautiful Bukhara in the morning light.

Words cannot compare to seeing the wonders of Bukhara, so I will let the pictures speak for themselves:

Much to our regret, the delays brought on by the cargo ship and passing through Turkmenistan meant that our timetable had to be pushed forward, and we departed for Samarkand the afternoon of the 15th.