Jesse and Diana in Tajikistan

What happened to March?

2010-04-05T09:58:00.000-07:00

Wow, again it's been a long time since I last posted. The past few weeks have been quite busy for me at work, as we've been analyzing data and preparing abstracts for a couple of conferences and I prepared and delivered a training on a software package. Since I didn't know the software myself six weeks ago, there was a lot of learning going on before figuring out what to teach. That training took place last Thursday and Friday and went well, although both the Country Director and myself are wondering how much will 'stick', because the staff will only be using the software occaisonally. I gave 'homework' for everyone to have an opportunity to practice their new skills, but I'm not sure that I'll receive many completed assignments back.

The big news now is that tomorrow I'm headed to a place just south of Kulyab, near the Afghan border, where a large proportion of the 6,000 villagers have tuberculosis. A nearby village with a similar problem was highlighted in a BBC article/video last year (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7773139.stm). Project HOPE wants to determine how much multi-drug resistant tuberculosis is there, and I'll be testing out my questionnaire for my own, smaller project.

I hope to take lots of pictures while I'm there (if local people are okay with that), so I hope soon you'll be able to get a sense of what life is like in a Tajik village, and perhaps how TB is affecting individuals and society.

Roghun

2010-02-14T03:34:00.000-08:00

As you've read here, and perhaps in the Financial Times or NY Times, Tajikistan has energy problems. The current administration is addressing those problems by building a huge dam. They plan to finish a partially constructed dam over the course of several years. The Roghun (pronounced Roh-ghoon, with the 'gh' like a gargling sound from the back of your throat) hydroelectric power plant was started back in the 80's under the USSR, but then scrapped when the empire collapsed. When it's finished, it will be the highest dam in the world, about 1000 ft, and will supply enough electricity for all of Tajikistan.

The thing is, the Tajik gov't hasn't been able to raise the money from external sources, so each citizen is being asked to buy a 'share' in the plant. The president has reiterated that this is a voluntary contribution to the future of Tajikistan. Here is a poster, one of many around Dushanbe and the entire country, encouraging Tajiks to buy shares. It reads: "Roghun, beaming and bright, warmth of the nation and the development of our dear and incomparable Tajikistan"

Another one, across the street from our apt, reads: "Roghun, the beaming light and foundation of Tajikistan". Hopefully, Roghun will be finished on time (2014-2016 for the first phases) and supply Tajiks with enough power for everyone to be warm all winter.

Vodka

2010-02-14T03:24:00.001-08:00

Vodka is everywhere in Dushanbe, although the number of people that drink here seems to be fewer than in Armenia, and the amount consumed much less. Walking through a supermarket, I was excited to see this familiar bottle, usually a sign of quality vodka. Then I noticed that it was not the brand I was familiar with, but another. Look closely.

Yes, only in Tajikistan can you find 'White Goose' vodka. Grey Goose must have ripped off the image and label, and changed the flag colors from red/white/green to red/white/blue. The Tajik producer should sue. What's especially amazing about this product (besides the taste, I'm sure) is the fact that it's 'Made in Tajikistan', and yet at the same time 'Imported'. The brand team managed to convey nationalism and quality through this unique combination of terms.

Winter (shiver)

2010-02-08T22:13:00.000-08:00

Our greatest fear upon arriving in Dushanbe back in September '09 was the cold of winter, given that we heard horror stories about electricity being out for days at a time in the homes of expats paying >$1000 per month, and our housing budget was significantly smaller. We spent 2.5 weeks looking at different apartments, trying to figure out if the central heating would really work (landlords all swear it does, in order to get you into the apt), or, if the place didn't have central heating, would the electricity supply be constant, or rationed?

What kind of windows does it have? What kind of walls? Stalin-era buildings are known for insulating because they're made of porous rock, which acts as insulation. But Brezhnev-era buildings are made of thin concrete, and they're often colder than outside because they radiate cold during the day.

The place we settled on is a Stalin-era building, and the landlord said he had worked on it to make it comfortable for the winter. Of course, many landlords had told us the same thing, and we really didn't know what that entailed. But we took this place, figuring that, all other things being equal, we liked it the most.

As it has turned out, this winter has been relatively mild--to our immense relief. The temperature, even at night, has only dipped below freezing a few times. Days have been downright warm, regularly reaching 55 degrees. Yesterday it snowed several inches for the first time, previously the most we'd seen was a dusting. Today is cold again, but tomorrow is supposed to be warm again. All this means that people aren't running heaters 24 hours per day, so there's been no rationing of electricity in our part of the city (although there has been in the center, where the higher rents are!!) Thus, we have been warm :)

People are beginning to talk about Navruz, the spring festival, which will arrive on March 21st. There are only about 40 days until then, although we've been told this is the 'chila', the coldest 40-day period. At this point, though, we're reaching the end of the winter season and if it's cold for a couple of days, there's light at the end of the tunnel. The number 40 is important here, as it was in Armenia, as well. The 40 days after a wedding, funeral, or birth are special periods during which certain rules must be strictly observed--for example, only relatives are allowed to see a newborn.

When Navruz does arrive, there will be celebrations all over the city. In Iran, and maybe Afghanistan?, there's a week off from work, although here the vacation is only 2 days (inherited from the atheist Soviet Union). There will be large feasts, and Buzkashi matches. Buzkashi literally means, 'Goat Dragging', and it's a game like polo, played on horseback, in which players must reach down off of the horse to grab the body of a headless goat (~150lbs) and carry it to a 'goal' circle, dropping it in the circle to score. It's every man for himself, with 20-30 riders, and you can punch, kick, or run over your opponents in order to get the goat from him. There is no 'field', so spectators must occasionally dodge a stampede. I can't wait to go and watch.

Look up 'Rambo buzkashi' on YouTube for an example.

Tajikistan Travels, Jan 2010

2010-02-08T21:09:00.000-08:00

A map of the places we've gone so far in Tajikistan:

I traveled to the south, to Kurghon-Teppa and Kulyab, to assist physicians, who were conducting interviews for a Project HOPE survey, to choose the patients they would interview. Our trips to the north, east and west have been for pleasure, to hike in the Varzob valley north of Dushanbe, and to see the towns of Vahdat and Hissor, to the east and west. Both of those towns are 20 minutes away from Dushanbe, but have rationed electricity supplies in the winter. So, they have electricity for 2 hours in the morning and 2 hours in the evening. Many people use wood stoves to heat the house.

The area to the east that is very mountainous is called the Pamir. Marco Polo wrote about it on his trip to China. It is a high-altitude plateau, much like Tibet. We hope to travel there in the summer, when the road is open (and there are fewer rivers to cross by car).

Learning Tajiki

2010-02-08T20:47:00.000-08:00

I've been studying Tajiki for six months now, although I'm not sure I've gotten anywhere at all. Tajiki presents several difficulties for me that other languages haven't, and my studying methods have been different, as well. I'm thinking about this a lot right now, as I just conducted a training in Tajiki (although I don't know how much I trained and how much I confused), and to prepare for it I asked several sources to help me translate and convey the correct message. They all gave me different answers.

Tajiki draws vocabulary from several languages: Arabic, Farsi and Turkic/Uzbek mainly, but the word for anything technical is Russian, because of the Russian and Soviet influence from the late 19th century until now. I can't think of any examples right now for synonyms in all four languages, but, for example, the word 'condition' could be one of the following:

vaz' (Arabic)

vaz'iyat (Arabic)

hol (Persian)

holat (Persian)

khel (Persian)

This is fine, we have synonyms in every language, but it makes comprehension difficult when speaking with those who are unfamiliar with my level of understanding. In addition to the official, dictionary words, there are tons of slang words thrown in to mean the same thing. The slang used depends on the geographic origin of the speaker. There is a different dialect in Sughd region, Khatlon, Dushanbe, and the Pamir (where many speak a completely seperate, though Persian, language). The result is that, unless someone speaks in literary Tajiki (nobody does), with correct syntax (ditto), using the synonym I know (Murphy's Law), I will be thrown off by something in the sentence. If the average sentence contains 3 or 4 key words that modify the meaning dramatically, the chances of my understanding are low. In reality, I only completely undersstand when individuals make a concentrated effort to communicate with me--although I catch much of what's going on otherwise, it's not enough to give answers or make decisions.

When studying Armenian, while there were definitely plenty of synonyms, the roots of words were usually unchanging, and grammatical forms had fairly set constructions. So,

happy-urakh : sad-tkhur

happiness-urakhutyun : sadness-tkhrutyun

happily-urakhutyamb : sadly-tkhrutyamb

And any word that contains 'urakh' automatically means something about happy. In Tajiki, however, the ending 'i' or 'y' changes the word from a noun to an adjective--although if you don't know the word already, you don't know if it's an adjective or a noun. Further, another, additional 'i' can be added to either an adjective or a noun, in which case it makes the noun either an adjective or possessive, and an adjective becomes a noun--but you have to have known that it was an adjective otherwise you might mistake it for a possessive noun. The context gives clues, but there's a lot of decoding going on while trying to listen to the rest of the sentence.

Part of this confusion arises from the fact that Tajiki used to be written in Farsi/Arabic script, and then was changed to Latin letters by the Soviets (because they implied 'modernisation'), and then to Cyrillic by Stalin because serving in the army was easier if people could read the Russian instructions on, say, a tank. In the transition, decisions were made on which letters would 'replace' the old script. There is no 'double i' ending in Farsi script.

Aside from the synonyms from different languages and confusing 'i's, creating further mental mayhem is the fact that many technical terms are now being shifted to Tajiki/Persian words from Russian. Anything that involved science or higher education in the sciences was taught in Russian, or used many Russian loan words. The only authority on how these should be translated into new Tajiki words is a government body that releases new words every once in a while. The only way people find out about them is by listening to state television, where anchors are often obviously speaking a language that is new to them, as well.

So, when I ask my three tutors, "How do you say, the 'target group' of a study?" I get 3 different answers. Someone at work tells me the way they say it in Russian, because they don't know what the Tajik is. I prepared the training in English, translated it to Tajiki, then got my tutors' advice, then changed everything when the Project HOPE translator proofread it, then changed the technical terms that we had directly translated from Russian into the official, 'new' translation with the help of a technical monitoring officer who was up to date on these things (but doesn't speak English so I couldn't work with him from the start).

I'm nearing the end of my language study grant, and I'm glad that I won't be running around the city anymore trying to get from lessons to work to lessons. I'm also glad that I'll be able to just focus on picking up vocabulary and syntax from conversations with Tajiks, instead of being too exhausted from lessons to engage people. On the other hand, I'm pretty sure I'll miss the opportunity to have someone to answer all my questions for 3 hours. I think I have picked up quite a bit of the language, after all, and I'm confident that I can get around just fine here, or in other Persian speaking areas. I have to take a test at the end of the language grant period, and it will be interesting to see how I am graded, and how that compares to other Persian learners here. I feel as though I'm at the same level I was after 4-5 months of Peace Corps--which is good, since I had the benefit of a host family and full immersion there, whereas here my immersion is watching local TV.

So, now on to Russian!

Update: I wrote this about 3 weeks ago, and since then we traveled to Romit, a small village on the Kofarnihon River to the east of Dushanbe, and I had the chance to speak with the national park ranger there. We had a normal converstaion, I understood him clearly! He spoke 'clean' Tajiki, that is, the Tajiki I know, so that I didn't need anyone to translate to either English or literary Tajiki. It was nice to have happened upon a location where my language skills came in handy--finally!

New Year's Eve

2010-01-03T20:40:00.000-08:00

Diana and I had plans to watch Russian movies with some friends at their place, but then at the last minute those plans fell through, so we decided to spend a quiet New Year's at home, relaxing. We had heard that there would be fireworks at 8pm, which made sense, because in Dushanbe everything closes and the streets are always empty by 8:30. Whenever we've been out past 9pm, it feels like a ghost town. While in Armenia everything happens at midnight, like in the States, we just figured that, like everything else happens earlier, so would the fireworks.

I think the 'earliness' is due to the civil war, which, when it was fought in the streets of Dushanbe, was on a schedule which began at dusk or dark. Everyone had to get home before the fighting started, so the theatre took place at 4pm, work ended at 5pm at the latest, and usually began at 8am to account for the early closure.

So we jumped into a tangem at about 7:30 and headed for the city center. As usual, the streets on the way there were already barren. But as we arrived at Rudaki, the main drag, we saw that this night was not at all like all other nights. Crowds of young boys mobbed the streets, joking with and pushing each other. Police lined the streets. The gunshot-like pop of single firecrackers rang out repeatedly. We had heard these near our house from early December, but that was just once in a while, and now it was every couple of seconds.

One of my teachers had told me that, immediately after teh civil war ended, it was difficult for many to listen to the firecracker bangs and not be worried about gunshots. While far less dangerous than guns, these firecrackers were wielded by young males who didn't share the same sense of personal responsibility for others' safety as many of us do. The teacher one time had a jacket ruined because someone tossed a firecracker into the air and it exploded near her shoulder, burning off a patch of fabric.

Having heard that story just several hours before Diana and I got out of the tangem and entered the downtown mayhem, I was somewhat 'on guard'. We cautously made our way towards where we thought the fireworks would be, watching every passing group of boys for signs of firecrackers. Bangs did go off around us, but thankfully on the ground and not too close. The police were also watching (unsuccessfully) for firecrackers, because they're illegal, and thus can be confiscated... for great profit.

While neither of us felt comfortable in the crowded streets, it probably wasn't as dangerous as I might have made it sound--there were families with children, and girls out as well. I think it's safe to say that we were more accustomed to 'safety culture', though, and judged the situation with a different perspective, which is why we eventually decided to head back home early.

Trying to find out what was going on, and why people seemed to be moving towards the Ismoili Somoni statue, Diana asked a family, "What's going on over there?" The wife replied in Persian, "Sorry, I don't understand Russian. We're from Afghanistan."

When Diana's language skills don't work, I take over in Tajiki. "We were trying to find out what's going on over there, and why the police aren't letting poeple through," I said. "There's going to be a concert, and they're checking people. The concert isn't going to be until 9pm, though." "Do you know if there will be fireworks?" I asked. "We heard at midnight there will be fireworks. Where are you from?"

"America." For a split second, the husband and wife both looked like they had been slapped, the woman's face seemed to tighten and her eyes became wide with something I didn't catch, but they quickly regained their composure. "We live here now," I explained. "Well, the Police will probably begin letting people through now," the Afghan man said, "Happy New Year!"

"Happy New Year!" I replied, and we walked away in opposite directions. I don't know what they were thinking or what caused them to be taken aback when I said I was from America--it could have been that Diana spoke Russian and I spoke Tajiki--but the problem is there are currently so many negative reasons for them to have reacted that way that I was filled with a sense of shame.

It was New Year's Eve, though, and since I can't change my country's course from here, we decided to people watch and take some pictures. I had forgotten to bring my passport, registration and visa copies with me, so passing the police lines might have meant paying some bribe if they decided to ask for those. We probably missed an amazing lip-synched concert, but we'll live.

At the entrance to Rudaki Park (formerly Lenin Park, formerly with real trees, now with electric trees in a country with energy issues)

Selling...something food-like
A firecracker launches

After taking some pics, dodging firecrackers and watching the crowds for a while, we found a tangem and headed back home, where we celelbrated New Year's with each other for the first time. Hope everyone had a similarly interesting and exciting New Year's celebration, and, in the words of many an Armenian Tamada, may 2010 bring you happiness, success, good health and the fulfilment of all of your dreams!

I just don't know what Santa ('Winter Grandpa' here), a bear and a tiger have to do with each other, but I think for a couple of somoni you can have your pic taken with one of them.

Seeing people out this late made Dushanbe look very strange.

Ismoili Center

2009-12-18T22:47:00.002-08:00

The Ismoili Center of Dushanbe is one of several like it around the world. The spiritual leader of the Ismoilis is the Agha Khan, who lives in Switzerland and went to Harvard. He has a development network that does lots of good work around the globe in health, microfinance and other sectors.

The new Center is far and away the most beautiful and architecturally interesting building in Dushanbe, and I was wishing as we walked through and around it that others would attempt to imitate it instead of the much more popular Soviet architecture. To some degree, many are limited by materials available--rebar and concrete only go so far. The bricks for this building were made specifically for it in Samarkand, 3 million of them, and then shipped here. Not everyone has that kind of money, but some of the new big construction projects are just boxy.

The Ismoili Center isn't fully open yet, but they are giving tours. There is an amazing prayer hall inside, which you can see at http://www.theismaili.org/cms/891/Gallery-Architecture-of-the-Ismaili-Centre-Dushanbe

Designs on the Ismoili Center. The blue bricks are actually script, but it's far too difficult for me to read it in this form.

Diana and one of her English students, Uktam, in the inner courtyard of the Center. Uktam is a really nice guy.
The Death Star--I mean, Hyatt Regency Dushanbe. It is nice inside. It sits just opposite to the Ismoili Center (unfortunately).

Read more about the Ismaili community here:

http://www.iis.ac.uk/view_article.asp?ContentID=104448

Hissar town and fort

2009-12-18T22:15:00.000-08:00

Hissar is just 25 minutes west of Dushanbe, towards the Uzbek border. Hissar town is the capital of Hissar district, which lies just below the Hissar mountain range. We took a day trip to the fort and did some bargaining in the bazaar there, and found that the Dushanbe bazaar is cheaper.

Pepsi seems to have forgotten about this installation. Their branding in Tajikistan may suffer.

2 guys sitting on top of wood sheeting. They invited us to their house after we talked for a while. People outside of Dushanbe are very hospitable.

This is the Hissar Fort. It was built a long time ago, I think in the 15th century. It's been reconstructed since, but I'm not sure to what degree, that is, how much of the original remains. There are forts like this all around Tajikistan. Until the 1920s, when this area was incorporated into the Soviet Union, it was part of the Khanate of Bukhara. Political boundaries shifted often, and forts were necessary defense posts.

Diana and the view behind the fort to the Hissar range
An older gentleman walks towards the Fort. He would circle around the fort and come in from the opposite side, where Diana snapped a shot of him, below.

no they're not amber waves of grain. They're amber waves of uncultivated hills with the Hissar range in the background. This scene reminds me of Colorado, but it's just outside of Dushanbe.

This is Diana's photo. This guy was just cool. He told me I was a mensch for learning Tajik.
Some kids at the top of the hill behind the Hissar Fort
Looking back towards Dushanbe and the mountains from Hissar, from the top of a hill.
The Hissar Fort, with villages towards the southwest.
The trip to Hissar was nice, because we were able to navigate our way around easily, the first time we've been able to do that, so far. My Tajiki finally started to come together, too, so that I could chat with people, explain where we were going and why, what I do in Tajikistan, etc.

Vahdat and Cold Winters

2009-12-18T21:37:00.000-08:00

These are pictures from Vahdat, a town about 20km east of Dushanbe. Vahdat has good connections with Dushanbe, many people commute into Dushanbe for work, there is always transport and the road connecting the two cities is very good. Vahdat, however, lacks electricity in the winter. Homes are supplied with electricity for only a few hours each day. I came to Vahdat once before with the World Food Program, who distributes food-aid to patients on TB treatment. Talking with a nurse at the health facility there, I said I liked Vahdat more than Dushanbe because it was a little calmer and quieter. She immediately offered me her house in trade for our apartment in Dushanbe, laughing, and said, "You have electricity there! You need to come back to Vahdat in the winter and see how you like it then!" She's right, I'm sure I would find it more difficult to live there in the cold.

Electricity is rationed for most places outside of Dushanbe, so that people have 3-4 hours per day when they can cook. Apparently this has to do with the water level in the main resevoir that supplies hydroelectic power to Dushanbe and most of the country. There is natural gas in the country, but the main supply is Uzbekistan, which doesn't like Tajikistan for various reasons ranging from ethnic feuds to water rights. Uzbekistan quotes Tajikistan a high price for natural gas, Tajikistan threatens to cut off Uzbekistan's water supply, etc. The political systems of each country are such that the population does not greatly influence the outcome of negotiations, and nobody really knows how deals do or don't get made. All people know is they have no way to cook or stay warm in the winter. Diesel and gas generators are popular, small ones produce enough electricity for lights. Only wealthy families have large generators that produce enough watts for heating.

Only the governments of our two countries know, but if all the gossip is true then Tajikistan is selling electricity to the US in Afghanistan. The US government likely pays more per KW than the rate charged to Tajiks, so this benefits the Tajik government. Frankly, I don't see how, when our electric bill for the month is under $10 even while running heaters, the electricity company makes any money. At the same time, for many rural Tajiks a rate hike would be similar to no electricity at all. However, a rate hike would allow people to make rationing decisions themselves.

A grandmother chatting with another grandmother

a guy with a sack of something. The robe he's wearing is called a Joma, which translates to clothes, basically. Clothing for the legs (poi) are called "poi-joma", which is likely where the word "pajama" comes from.

a house
I chatted with these guys for a while. The guys on the right lived in New York last year, working as a waiter and something else. Now he owns his own shop selling construction supplies. We talked about America, Tajikistan and why my passport doesn't have a 'nationality' listed. In the Soviet Union and post-Soviet states, passports have one's nationality (as decided by the Soviet Union) listed. This was partly for nation-building in the early 20th century, but I don't know why it stayed around, except as a means of control. So, since my passport didn't have my nationality listed, they asked me, "what nationality are you?" I said, "American." "no, that's not a nationality. America is made up of people from other places. You're not American." Having heard this quite often in Armenia, I gave my stock answer: "Half of my ancestors are from the Ukraine, and half are from Poland. They went to America about 150 years ago." "Ahhh" they replied, satisfied to know that I was Ukrainian or Polish. I don't even bother to get into the fact that I'm Jewish, but more atheist or pantheist or Spinozist than anything. Perhaps I should make a copy of my passport and photoshop in all of those things, just to mess with people.

Selling carrots and potatoes out of the back of trucks

Carpets at the Bazaar

A man working in the small plot of land between his house and the street.

A cement truck.

Apartment buildings in Vahdat.

The president of Tajikistan on a billboard overlooking the main square in Vahdat. The sign says, "Our politics are advantageous to people"

A village outside of Vahdat. I love mountains.

The bus stop in Vahdat.

These guys were attempting to load this cow, whose legs were bound together, into a wheelbarrow. It took them several tries, but eventually, with three men hanging off of the handle of the wheelbarrow, they got the cow up into it. I asked several people why they were moving the cow, but nobody knew--everyone else was just there to watch, too. If it were my cow, I would walk it on its own legs to where ever it needed to go, and then tie it up.

Varzob Picnic

2009-10-30T10:54:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, instead of going hiking with the usual big group of expats and Goulya, the organizer, Diana and I decided to leave the hustle and bustle of Dushanbe by ourselves and head to a nearby village to find a picnic spot in the mountains around it. Tangems to Varzob, 15km north of Dushanbe in the valley of the same name, cost just 50 cents and we jumped on one of these. We got off just before reaching Varzob, at a bridge across the river to a small village. We began to explore up the hill behind the village, not knowing where the path would take us.

It turned out to turn back around and skirt the upper edge of the village we'd just left, and instead of finding a perfect grassy spot we found several cows and lots of poop. After trying another little valley and being turned back by steep rock waterfalls, we gave up and headed back down into the village, but on a different path than the one we'd come up. As we walked the path down between houses we found ourselves descending through people's yards!

An elderly woman looked at us a little less shocked than I expected (since a guy with a Red Sox cap and a girl in an UnderArmor sweatshirt just popped into her yard) and invited us in to her house for tea. We were still in the mood for some more walking, however, and told her that we were headed back to Dushanbe for a wedding, so we couldn't stay. Thankfully, hospitality here is not as warm as in rural Armenia, where she would have taken my arm with a vise-like grip and told me that one cup of tea would not slow us down.

We made our way down through the village and all the way back to the river, where there was a gated-off children's summer camp. We asked a guy with a soldering iron standing near the gate if we could come in, and he said sure, not seeming to mind too much. This is one of the nice differences between America and the former Soviet Union: the camp used to belong to everybody, so anybody could use it. In the States we would have had to sneak in or consider ourselves lucky to be let in and use 'private' property (or worse, pay a 'user-fee' for something we'd already paid for with taxes).

Down by the river there was nobody around, and we sat on a small wooden platform and finally had our picnic. A cow and some sheep wandered around the premises, munching on grass. The grounds were so quiet and peaceful, with the faint sound of the river coming up over the wall that separated us from it--in other words, a nice way to spend a Saturday afternoon :)

A summer house, and a cow grazing on the slope above the town. We thought about trying to go up there for our picnic, but took a path to the opposite hill instead.

On the way back out of the village, we passed this pomegranate tree, which Diana stood under, waiting for one to fall. Unfortunately we ended up buying some from the market when we got back to Dushanbe. This tree gets an 'F' for effort!

This is the shot I just barely missed--a split second earlier and the little girl's face would have been in the sunlight, and this could have been a decent photo. Oh, well, maybe next time.

These kids were just horsing around in the streets.

Looking upriver, away from Dushanbe, with summer dachas of wealthy Dushanbe-ites on the left bank.

We don't know what the tower/monument is for. Varzob town is just behind me.

A little boy looks out of the house gate in Varzob town.

Dushanbe Life

2009-10-30T10:24:00.000-07:00

Back in Dushanbe, this is the northern bus station. The vehicles in the front are tangems ('tang-gem' with the second 'g' pronounced hard). We take these things all over town. They fit six people, and don't overcrowd like marshrutneys. The fare in town is about 20 cents. Many drivers are young men, and within that group probably the ones that insurance companies in the States refuse to cover. In other words, they drive 'aggressively'.

I was stuck in a traffic jam in a tangem one day, and the driver decided to pull up onto the sidewalk, honking for people to get out of his way. We drove on the sidewalk for several hundred meters, but that didn't get us past the traffic, so we turned into a mess of buildings and drove between them for some time on something that can only be called a path, passing underneath hanging clothes and hitting dangling trousers, crossing a footbridge over a small drainage canal, eventually coming back out onto pavement, but not before surprising two guys who obviously didn't expect to see a vehicle coming up behind them on the sidewalk. I thoroughly enjoyed this diversion, and was happy to reach the city center much faster. Those who have had the good fortune to be my passengers might be nodding their heads in understanding.

Inside a tangem.

In the past couple of days there have been some earthquakes here. They appear to be aftershocks of a 6.4 earthquake in northern Afghanistan. As I write, there is trembling in the building, and last night there was a sudden jolt which prompted us to leave the aparment momentarily. Our building is a 'Stalin' building, however, which has walls nearly 1-meter thick and was built more sturdily than 'Brezhnev' buildings, which are quite thin and prone to things which buildings should not be prone to. Ummm, thanks Stalin?

ps I might have the Brezhnev buildings mixed up with Khrushev buildings, check the Wikipedia article if you feel like it.

Our yard.

This is a picture of our building.

The exit to the street and our beautiful trash pile on the left.

Buildings near our apartment lit up at night.

This is a picture inside a cafeteria. This kind of eatery exists all over the city and offers cheap

standardized dishes at cheap prices. This one in particular has posters, portraits and banners of Lenin all over the walls, though.

A new office building sits empty with a 'for rent' sign at the entrance. The financial crisis didn't

destroy savings here like it did in the states, but it froze up capital so construction and business

came to a halt.

Look at the woodwork above the entrance to this Havli (house). The detail may not be visible in the picture, but it was very impressive, and stood out all the more set against the drab wall and simple gate. This kind of woodwork seems to be done for a lot of houses when they remodel.

A street sign, Mirzo-Rizo.

The car of the owner of the new house across the street. There is money in Tajikistan, it's just not spread around very evenly, largely a result of the U.S.-backed policy of charging towards capitalism without paying attention to the need for regulatory bodies. Try 'Globalization and its Discontents' for more.

An exchange point. The dollar is dropping, unfortunately :(

This shop in the bazaar sells smokestacks and rain gutters. It just looked like an interesting collection of metal to me.

In the bazaar. The seat in the foreground appears to have a hole cut in it and a bucket placed beneath. I have no idea what it's supposed to be, there are normal porcelain sit-down and squat toilets in this country. Perhaps this is for the winter when one wants to avoid using an out-house???

In Shoh Mansur bazaar. Shoh means 'king', probably recognizable in its Farsi form, Shah. In Tajiki the a's often turn into o's. The cart on the right is useful for doing a lot of shopping at one time so you don't have to carry 20kgs of potatoes around on your shoulders or back. It costs 50 cents to rent while you shop. At least, this is what we pay, I'm sure the regular price is less. Sometimes men, but mostly boys, push the cart and watch your groceries while you shop. This bazaar is huge, maybe almost a football field in area. In different sections there are fruits, vegetables, electronics, household goods, clothes, construction and hardware materials--everything you could ever want (except for Gouda cheese and Red Bull, which you have to get at the supermarket).

We shop here at least once per week, to get fruits and veggies at 1/3 the price of the supermarkets, and about 1/5 the prices in the states.

Per kilo we pay:

apples $1,

pears $1.25,

carrots $.20,

grapes $.50,

sweet peppers $.75,

eggplant $.20,

cauliflower $.50,

pomegranate $1,

loaf of bread $.30-.50

just to give you an idea of how far money goes here.

In front of the bazaar.

The entrance to Shoh Mansur bazaar.

The building next to ours lit up at sunset. Not the most spectacular piece of architecture, but it was nice in the light.

Unfinished construction.

Samo

2009-10-18T02:12:00.001-07:00

http://www.bactria.net/samo.html

Samo is a band from the Pamirs, the eastern region of Tajikistan. They were being recorded by some visiting Finnish sound technicians and needed an audience for the recording session at the Gurminj Museum, a Dushanbe museum of music and musical instruments. The setting added to the great music. The room was filled with traditional Tajik and Central Asian instruments, some of which were several hundred years old. One of the musicians explained that some of the string instruments were always crafted from Apricot or Mulberry wood. This was surprising, because there is so little forest cover here in the northeastern reaches of Persian cultural influence, and made me think about the similar importance of these two fruit-bearing trees back in Armenia, at the western end of Persian cultural influence.

Cultural note: The Pamir is a high plateau that makes up the entire eastern region of Tajikistan. It is mountainous, with the highest peaks exceeding 7000m (24,500ft). The plateau itself is about 12,000ft in elevation (3500m). It has been called a moonscape and is almost devoid of vegetation. It is a desert, and most water is from snowmelt, of which there is a constant supply from glaciers and snowfields. During the Soviet era, the region's economy was highly subsidized by Moscow, with products coming into the region via train to Dushanbe and Osh (in Kyrgystan), and from there by truck. The long border with Afghanistan gave the region strategic significance and therefore guaranteed its sponsorship.
After 1991, the civil war in Tajikistan pitted ethnic groups against one another, and the Pamiris were involved in the struggle for power, as well. Most Pamiris are Ismoili--a sect of Islam that broke off from the Shia branch in 765CE--while the overwhelming majority of Tajiks are Sunni. The Ismoili bid for power failed, there was ethnic cleansing in the capital, and until today the Pamir region receives little support from the central government.

The Ismoili spiritual leader, the Aga Khan, provides significant support to the Pamir region and people, and just last week opened an Ismoili cultural center in Dushanbe--a testament to the healing that has occurred since the civil war ended 12 years ago, or perhaps to the Aga Khan's influence in the country.

Samo's performance, therefore, was more than just a display of traditional Pamiri music, but was part of the reemergence of Pamiri culture in Dushanbe. They performed just two songs for the recording, but each was about 15 minutes long. One was very strings-heavy, the other was solely drums and voices. We were just six in the audience--the room was too small for more, but we six would suffice to make the band feel as though they were performing live, instead of for microphones alone. Oli, the sound tech, said the band had much more soul when we were there compared to when they had performed without an audience, so although we can't be heard on the recording, we are taking full credit for the extra 'oomph' factor.

Samo regularly tours Europe and has traveled to the States a few times, so you may be able to catch them in major metropolitan areas if there is a Persian/Central Asian/Traditional music festival near you. Check out the below link for more info and samples of their music!

http://www.bactria.net/samo.html

Climbing!

2009-10-18T01:46:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I went climbing with a couple of expats. I am trying to remember the last time I went climbing outdoors. It may have been before Peace Corps, perhaps as early as 2004.

We set up topropes at this cliff, and setting up the anchors felt foreign to me. I realized that I'd forgotten how to tie some of the knots and hitches that come in handy, and was having trouble visualizing the anchor set-up (it was somewhat inconvenient, and the longest anchor I've ever seen). It was a strange feeling, because everything used to be second-nature. One of the guys I went with is an accomplished climber, and we were able to set up a safe system.

After we set up the anchors, I rappelled first, feeling the rope run through my hand while backing myself over the edge. At first I felt like I was doing everything in slow-motion, while checking and re-checking my steps in my head. It was going to take some time to get comfortable on rock again.

Everyone did a couple of climbs, and a Tajik local who lived near the cliff showed up, with his own shoes, and climbed a couple of the routes.

Here's me on the first route I tried.

Eric rapelling

This is Jumaboy, the local climber.

Ziddi Valley Hike

2009-10-06T21:11:00.000-07:00

An hour's drive north of Dushanbe, through the Varzob valley, leads to the village of Ziddi. From there, the road continues north towards the Tajik city of Xujand and to Uzbekistan, climbing up from Ziddi to the 3500m (12,500ft) Anzob Pass over the mountains and then down into another valley.

There is a tunnel now that allows drivers to bypass the Anzob Pass, which is closed from October to May, making the trip much shorter and easier. The tunnel was finished last year, is a few miles long, and is, unfortunately, constantly flooded with water up to 1m deep. Until someone figures out how to pump water out fast enough, or keep it from leaking in, the tunnel is closed to all traffic, and drivers must cross the Anzob, a dusty, single lane path winding its way up the mountainside. Oftentimes there is not enough room for two vehicles to pass each other in opposite directions, so one must back up and let the other pass, then continue its own trip.

Two weekends ago Diana and I traveled up to Ziddi with Goulya's weekend hiking trip, along with about 50 other expats, for a nice hike up the Ziddi valley. By stopping in Ziddi, we avoided the bumpy, dusty, Anzob Pass road, and still got in some great hiking.

Diana did some hiking in Armenia, though since then she's met me--a gearhead. A gearhead is someone who is fascinated by the latest outdoor equipment and feels a proper American materialistic urge to purchase the 'coolest' gear available, but only after analyzing the technology and materials used for a product, and reading all the hype and reviews about it. Therefore, Diana had a lot of new gear to bring to Tajikistan, and this was a good hike for her to use and test some of it, before we head off into the mountains for multi-day trips. If Diana wasn't happy with her new stuff, I'd have a lot of questions to answer, and my gearhead status would plummet among REI employees and climber dirtbags everywhere.

On the road into the Ziddi valley, just after passing Ziddi town.

Looking back out of the window of the marshrutney (Russian mini-bus) towards several of the expat caravan vehicles.

The huge group at the start of the hike.

The group heads into the valley.

At the beginning of the hike, after we had just entered the narrow part of the valley.

Diana crossing one of the bridges over the river. They were very well constructed, most likely because herdsmen bring animals up the valley to graze in the summer.

Diana and I at the meadow where we all stopped for lunch. The guides bring tea, coffee and cookies with them for everyone to share (that's what you get for paying a guide--that and transportation). At this point, Diana had no complaints about gear, and had even said that the backpack was comfortable!

A shot of the valley that we had walked up. This is on the way back, as we were descending the valley.

Diana and Manijeh (another Fulbrighter) coming down the valley.

Diana and Manijeh. Manijeh is teaching an economics class at one of the local universities. In the winter she'll head back to her home near Albany, NY. Look at that smile on Diana's face--the backpack is obviously quite comfortable, no?

Diana near the exit of the valley, at the end of the hike. All of the gear comparisons that took so long in the States paid off, as everything worked out great on the hike! (Phew!) My pride intact, we headed back to Dushanbe relaxed from a day in nature.

The fact that we met a lot of other expats on this hike also made it fun. Several of Diana's students from the international school came along with their parents. Many of them have been diplomats or NGO workers in different countries, and some of them had been in Armenia or Georgia, so we had some common experiences to relate. Most importantly, I got quite a response from my Red Sox cap, demonstrating yet again that opposition to the Evil Empire exists even in the farthest reaches of the globe!

The Obi Garm Waterfall

2009-10-05T20:39:00.000-07:00

This past Sunday, while Diana was busy planning English lessons, I snuck off and did some hiking with the regular Sunday expat trip run by Goulya Petrova. Both the first time that I went alone, and the second time when Diana came along, there were probably 50 people in the group. This was nice for meeting people, but 50 people are a lot in the mountains, and that large of a group doesn't make for a true 'mountain experience'. This weekend saw fewer hikers, although there were still 15-20. The group opted for a hike that was in the same area but more difficult than the one that had been planned. After an hour drive out of Dushanbe, we stopped just short of the resort of Obi Garm (where you can spend a week in the hotel for $150, all expenses paid) and started hiking up, up, and up a narrow valley.

Up the valley!

There was snow beginning from about 6,000ft, a low snowline, but this was a narrow valley that only got sun a few hours each day. The river also keeps the snow cool, although here it has cut a channel underneath the snow and left a treacherous snowbridge which hikers try not to fall into when crossing above.

Hiking up the valley

Though most of the hike was on a rocky, difficult path, here we've crossed to the snow to finish the last several hundred feet up to the waterfall in the distance.

Some of the group making their way up to the waterfall. We had left our backpacks just below, where we ate lunch.

The canyon walls were nice--too bad I didn't have any climbing gear!

At the top of the hike, this waterfall was really nice. About 20m high and there was a significant amount of flow!

Testing the ability of the water to cool down hikers after 2000 feet of elevation gain.

Going down the snowfield is often more difficult than going up. Here, hikers with sneakers try not to slip and slide down to the rocks below. (It wasn't that bad.) My boots prevented me from 'skiing' down, though--they had too much traction :(

The valley behind us was beautiful, and there was a view of a high meadow where it might be nice to camp sometime.

On the way down. Just to the right of me, in the background, is the flat meadow that would provide great 360 degree views for nice camping.

Some of the path was very rocky and required careful steps to avoid, well, falling into the river. There was nothing too difficult and everyone made it alright, although I think everyone slipped and fell at least once on the hike because of the rocky trail. The guides Goulya provides made sure to help people cross the more difficult sections, including one river crossing that was quite tricky. Overall this was a great hike, with just enough adventurous sections to keep things interesting! All this only an hour outside Dushanbe--what an attractive location for a summer home! As soon as there's clean water and full-time electricity in this region, anyway.

OVIR

2009-09-22T08:49:00.000-07:00

OVIR registration

In the short play, “No Exit,” Camus paints a picture of what Hell actually is as being stuck in a room with people you don’t like—forever. Although I like his analogy, Camus did not know about OVIR, the civil registration service that still exists in parts of the former Soviet Union. Imagine an organization with no real purpose, no accountability, and the power to kick you out of the country if you don’t please them (within 72 hours of arriving in Tajikistan).

OVIR is a leftover of the USSR, when you were registered at an address and you had to get permission to move. It controlled the labor force, essentially preventing mass migrations that would undermine the planned economy. It continues to exist today probably in order to employ several thousand workers at, likely, between $20 and $80 per month (a gross estimate of government salary ranges). This is not enough money to live on, so the public is obliged to provide the remainder of the wage. That is: the government pays a part of the worker’s salary, and when you encounter that worker in the registration process, you are given the opportunity to provide additional financing for that individual’s salary, directly, with an amount decided upon by that worker which is going to be commensurate with the worker’s eye-ball estimation of your wealth. For this reason, and the uncertain timeline and outcome of each step, OVIR resembles Camus’ room.

Lonely Planet recommends avoiding, at all costs, registering by yourself. Of course, I went there alone. At the window, the worker told me I needed a picture. I went across the street to an entrepreneurial 14-year old’s shop and he took a visa picture of me. I went back to OVIR and gave her the picture. “You need a copy of your passport.” I went back across the street to the same shop and got a copy of my passport made. Back to OVIR. “You need your landlord’s signature.” I called her and she came. “She needs a copy of her passport.” She went across the street. “Now give me 5 somoni ($1.10) and go to this other branch of OVIR. You can’t get registered here.” The windows through which you speak to the workers are particularly small, I think to prevent two arms from reaching through to the neck of the OVIR official.

OVIR also requires an HIV/AIDS test. Diana and I both got tested in the States prior to leaving for Tajikistan, because I had read about this requirement. During the registration process, I was not asked about this because I’m on a shorter visa, temporarily, until I extend it for the entire year. Diana presented her results to OVIR when they told her it was mandatory. They looked at the paper, dated mid-August (just three weeks ago), and told her she had to be tested here in Tajikistan. One might think that being married and having a recent negative result from a reputable laboratory might be enough, but Tajikistan requires its own test. I am now looking forward to re-registering with my longer visa and receiving additional reassurance that I am HIV-negative. At this rate we’re being tested faster than those in the adult-film industry.

Ramazan

2009-09-22T08:45:00.000-07:00

Since we arrived, until the 21^st of September, it had been Ramazan, which meant that many Tajiks were fasting from morning until evening. Cafes and restaurants were generally slow during the day, but at 7pm they began to be flooded with people. Not everyone is expected to fast here, for example children and students, or those who are ill or diabetic, do not fast. There are many adults who also don’t fast during the day.

Everyone, though, celebrates the end of Ramazan with a large feast. Yesterday, the 21^st, everyone cooks tons of sweets and food and opens their house to guests to come and share. One of my tutors invited us to her house, and we visited for a while, during which time we were fed cake, soup, bread, sweets, an oily-spiced-bread-ball (?) and tea. At one point when I had nothing on my plate left, our host explained that Tajiks like to fill-up their guests, so if one’s plate is clean it should be re-filled. This had been the custom in Armenia, also, and even though I had been brought up to ‘clean my plate’, I eventually adapted. Switching between American and Caucasian/Central Asian customs takes a concentrated mental effort before it becomes habit, and I realized that I have a lot of adjusting to do here in order to: 1) not offend people and 2) feel comfortable in my interactions with Tajiks beyond just the language.

2009-09-22T08:35:00.000-07:00

Finding a new apartment

Before coming to Tajikistan I had arranged to rent an apartment for the month of September with the possibility of extending the lease for the entire year. The previous Fulbright student that I got in touch with recommended the apartment because it was decent and had electricity year-round. Electricity can be a problem in the winter here, because everyone heats using electricity since gas is supplied from Uzbekistan only when relations are good, and relations change seasonally. The utility service cannot meet the winter demand for electricity, so they brown-out sections of the city at different times, rationing the supply.

We’ve spent the last two weeks unsuccessfully trying to find out what sections of the city are more or less prone to having their supply shut off. Landlords swear they have electricity year-round, while lay-people say it doesn’t really matter where you live, or that the center is better than the outlying suburbs, but the center loses electricity sometimes, too. Recently, an expat told us that even in her very expensive apt, they lose electricity regularly during the winter, and that expats in $1500 per month apts lose theirs, too.

So we decided to rent a place that is very inexpensive but a nice apt, just outside of the center, and if we have electricity issues in winter, we’ll use our savings to take a vacation to Goa, India. It is warm there.

In an interesting coincidence, as we were viewing the apt that we would eventually take, we walked into the bedroom and on the bookshelf was, “Introduction to Biostatistics”, typically a book only MPHs are interested in. Then on the wall I saw a diploma from Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health. It turns out the landlord is in the same field as I am, and he’s currently in London doing a PhD. I hope to contact him and chat a bit.

2009-09-09T01:28:00.000-07:00

Every Sunday, year-round, a woman named Gulya organizes hikes to different parts of the country surrounding Dushanbe. I had arrived early Saturday morning and was still jet-lagged, but decided that the hike would be worth it, and perhaps tire me out enough to sleep through the night. The description in the expat newsletter sounded beautiful--the hike would start at almost 3000 meters (10,000 feet) and climb up to a pass at 3500m, past alpine lakes and streams. I would also meet other foreigners and hopefully make some friends in an unfamiliar city.

Saturday night I hoped I could sleep and get some rest before the hike, but at 1:30am I woke up and was unable to get back to sleep, so I got up and studied Tajiki for an hour and then fell asleep for a little while before my morning alarm went off. I forced myself to get up and organize all of my hiking gear. I hard-boiled some eggs, grabbed a piece of bread and the snacks I had purchased for lunch and headed out the door. At the meeting point, there were already about ten people waiting. I introduced myself and met Swiss, French, Germans and Hungarians. British and Americans came later as the crowd started to grow, and by the time the trip leader arrived we had become a group of about 50 people!

There were to be two hikes, because there were not enough 4x4s to take everyone to the higher trailhead. I had signed up late and was scheduled for the lower, easier hike. This hike would be more appropriate for me, since I had just arrived from sea-level and hadn't acclimatized or been at altitude in a long time, and I wasn't exactly in tip-top shape. However, being me, and with Diana arriving only in several days and therefore unable to talk sense into me, I requested to switch into the higher, more difficult hike if there was room. After dividing the group into cars, there was room in the back of a Land Cruiser for me!

The back of a Land Cruiser may not sound like the most comfortable place to sit for a 2.5 hour trip on windy and bumpy roads. However, I lived in Shamb and rode Tigran's marshrutney weekly, a trip on which little children inevitably threw-up and from which everyone exited with a thick coat of dust, feeling ill. The back of a Land Cruiser is heaven. I jumped in and hoped that I wouldn't get altitude sickness at 12,000 feet 3 hours from a polyclinic on my second day in-country.

The ride to the trail was beautiful, and our driver was the wife of the director of the Swiss development agency and had been in Tajikistan for several years. She pointed out interesting sights along the way and seemed to know a lot about the country. We were one of about seven cars headed up to the mountains for the trip, and many had diplomatic plates. To Tajiks we passed, it probably looked like a head of state's visit, but inside the cars were a bunch of raggedy hikers, not suit-clad politicians.

The first hour was nice, on a paved road, but after that it got bumpy and slow, although I was feeling fine when we got to the trailhead. One of the guides said there would be two groups: a fast group and a slow group. Good, I though to myself, I'll be able to take it easy. About fifteen minutes into the hike, though, I was behind the main group but ahead of several people when another guide caught up with me and asked, "So what have you decided? Will you go up with us or not?" I had assumed I was in the slow group, but apparently there was only one group that was going to do the while hike, and I wasn't in it!

"I'm going," I told him, and picked up the pace, which was tough, because there didn't seem to be much oxygen and I was already breathing consciously. After a couple of minutes I caught up with the group, who was taking a break. As I took off my pack to grab some water, the guide at the front said, "ok, break's over, time to go!" and everyone up and left. I swigged some water, put the bottle back in my pack, and found myself at the back of the line again, racing to keep up. This happened basically everytime the group stopped. It was like an army march, with only quick short breaks, and if you're the last in line, the break ends as soon as you arrive, meaning there's essentially no break for you. After this happened to me a few times, I took off ahead of the main groups before a break was over, arrived early at the next break spot and sat down exhausted, my first break in about two hours.

Resting felt good, and allowed me to take in the scenery around us. It was beautiful.

Although talking and hiking and the same time was a little difficult in the thin air, I was managing to hold half of a conversation with some Hungarians who were volunteering long-term with Habitat for Humanity in Dushanbe. I also met a British journalist who edited the Odyssey guidebook for Tajikistan, a huge, 700-page tome with some great information for those looking for hiking and climbing beta, or just to find out more about the country than you'd be able to from a Lonely Planet or Brandt guidebook. I'm hoping to meet one of the authors, who worked for the Aga Khan health service in the Pamir mountains and is arriving here in two days.

About two-thirds of the way into the hike, I was completely exhausted. There was little air to breathe and my legs were obviously not used to hiking uphill. I considered calling it quits. Gulya would likely run the hike again, and I would probably do better to let my body relax instead of go higher and risk altitude sickness. I had been drinking lots of water, though, a good defense against AMS, and I didn't even have a headache, which I usually get when hiking up high. What the hell, I figured, and continued climbing. Let's see what happens.

When we got close to the pass, the path was covered by snow. It felt good to be on snow in September, something I haven't had the good fortune to do in a while. I felt a burst of adrenaline and sped up the final hundred meters. The view was worth it.

The mountains surrounding us topped out at about 4400m, small for Tajikistan. Yet there were alpine glaciers running off from multiple sides, and the peaks were jagged and steep. I couldn't help but imagine the possibilities with some more time, a tent and some climbing gear, and it was all I could do to keep myself from doing the Homer Simpson drool.

Everyone hung out at the top for a while, took pictures, talked about the possibility of continuing down the other side of the path to another village some kilometers away, about how tired we all were but glad that we had made it. After 15 minutes we had to begin the trip back down, in order to make it back to Dushanbe before evening. The trip was a great introduction to Tajikistan's natural beauty, and I'm looking forward to getting outside quite often!

Dublin and Riga

2009-09-07T11:03:00.000-07:00

This is my blog for our one-year stay in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, while I carry out public health research on a Fulbright grant. That grant actually begins in November--until then I’ll be studying the Tajiki language on another State Department grant.

Disclaimer: I haven't figured out how to arrange pictures yet with this blog, and my internet connection is relatively slow, slow please excuse the fact that I've just left pictures kind of hanging around all over the place.

I arrived in Dushanbe early (read: 3:10am) Saturday morning after three consecutive overnight flights from America to Dublin, Ireland, then to Riga, Latvia and finally to Dushanbe. Diana will arrive here on the 10^th,on a much more convenient itinerary. State Department regulations about which airlines I could fly with government money effectively prevented us from travelling together, however this way we were able to squeeze in more baggage, which helps when you’re trying to move with only 20-50 kilograms of stuff.

My itinerary left me with extended layovers in Dublin and Riga, and I left the airport for the cities both times. Upon check-in in Boston, since I was traveling on two separate tickets, I asked the Continental agent if I could make sure my bags were transferred in New York, because there would be no opportunity to wait for them if they didn't make it to Dublin. He said, "Well where are you traveling on to? Are you on Continental?" "I'm going to Tajikistan on Air Baltic." He just looked at me blankly.

My bags did arrive safely in Dublin. I somehow managed to place myself in an exit row seat without paying an extra fee, so I was able to sleep a little bit on the flight. The next two legs would be on Air Baltic, a European low-cost carrier. "What's your final destination?" asked the ckeck-in agent. "Dushanbe." Another blank stare. C'mon, people, don't you know where your own airline flies to? After checking in I headed up to the gate area, wondering what the crowd would look like on this route. Do Dubliners visit Riga? Would there be Central Asians returning home on routes similar to mine? Actually, when the gate area filled up, I ended up feeling like I was in Russia. From the language to the style of clothes to the way the line formed in several different directions as soon as the gate agent announced the boarding process, it seemed I had already left Dublin.

Air Baltic has low baggage weight limits, and carry-on bags could only be 8kgs (17lbs). I found out why when I boarded the plane—there wasn’t even room to put my bag under my seat! My knees did fit behind the seat in front of me, luckily, although the guy next to me kind of spilled over into my seat. All of a sudden the plane was moving away from the gate—no announcement or anything—and we were taking off. It was like a marshrutney of the skies. There were food and drinks available for purchase—not even water was free on this four-hour flight. I’d had quite a bit before take-off, so I just closed my eyes and kept my elbow clear of the aisle as the flight attendants raced through them without much care for passengers.

I got a fair amount of sleep on the flight, but I was still pretty tired walking around Riga in the early morning. The flight had gotten in at 6am, and having not eaten a proper dinner, I was looking for a place to sit down and chow. The only thing I found open, though, was a combination coffee/sweets shop. I asked the girl at the counter if they had decaf, because I didn't want to mess up my body's clock any more than it would already be. She said no, but she could put water in the coffee if it was too strong for me. "No, I'll just have a regular coffee, then." Later that day I stopped at the same cafe to pick up some water on my way to the airport, having wisened up to Air Baltic's no-service policy. The same girl was there, and she asked how I liked Riga, and why I was going back to the airport after only a day. I told her Riga was beautiful (which it is!!), and that I was headed to Dushanbe, Tajikistan. Yet again, the blank stare.