Adventures in the Wild West: Nukus, Urgench and Beyond. August 2003

On Friday August 8th I got into a share taxi on the outskirts of Tashkent, with three other individuals and we began our 13-hour car ride, west across more than half the breadth of Uzbekistan, to the city of Urgench in the Khorezm province. What follows is an account of those 11 days in the cities and deserts of western Uzbekistan.

10^th of August, 2003—

In Nukus now, the so-called capital of desolation. I got in yesterday morning after spending all evening and night in a car. Most of the early morning we were speeding through a narrow desert road, dodging potholes the whole way. I didn’t sleep much and don’t remember seeing anything along the way except at about 3:30am we pulled over and these guys filled our tank with the containers of gasoline they had. A few hours later, just after sunrise, and briefly passing through Turmenistan, we reached Urgench—a city of 130,000 wedged between the Amu-Darya River and the Turkmen border, 450-km northwest of Bukhara.

There I transferred cars to get the remaining two hours to Nukus, the capital of the autonomous Karakalpak Republic. This is home to the disappearing Karakalpak nation. But not only they claim home to Nukus. Several other ethnicities have representation here including Kazahks, Koreans, Russians, Tartars, Turkmen, and Uzbeks. The Karakalpaks are a Turkic people whose language and traditions actually have closer links to the Kazahks, than to the Uzbeks. They settled in what is now Karakalpakstan near the end of the 18^th century.

But before I got to Nukus I had to change cars in the small town of Beruniy, which just celebrated its 800^th year of existence. To Beruniy I caught a ride with a car full of watermelons. The man promised me a space, and as soon as we loaded up the whole of the car, we left the Urgench bazaar for the interesting little desert town named after the 10^th century mathematician al-Beruniy. There I switched cars and rode the remaining way to Nukus. The city appeared after a long hour stretch through yet another piece of barren desert—250,000 people in one of the most remote corners of central Asia.

9^th of August, 2003—

This morning two friends and I decided we would try to visit Chilpak—an ancient Zoroastrian burial mound called a dakhma. I say try because there’s no public transportation there—it’s just on the side of the highway, 35 kilometers out in the desert. Locals say the structure was built in the 1^st century, but we’ve also heard 6^th century from other sources. Zoroastrian peoples used a dakhma in their burial rituals. They would put their dead on the top of a dakhma so vultures could eat at the flesh. It was closed from the bottom however, so wolves couldn’t get at the corpses. Then after a certain amount of time, they would go up on top and collect the bones.

So we hired a taxi to take us round trip for 13 dollars in sum. It was about a half an hour down the road towards Urgench from Nukus. Then we could see it—a huge, flat-topped mound rising out of the desert floor, about 3 miles off the main road. So our driver turned onto the dirt roads. We told him to stop the car in order to walk in the last 15 minutes ourselves. We were taking lots of photos the whole way and finally climbed up the hill and into the ancient monument. There were no people, no signs, no park, no nothing. This was just a 2,000-year-old burial mound in the middle of the desert. We made it to the top with the wind blowing hard. It was amazing to be up there, looking out across the empty expanse.

At that point, we decided we would have to return to Chilpak to sleep for a night. But before that day we would take the two-hour ride up to Moynak, on the former edge of the Aral Sea.

11^th of August, 2003—

Yesterday morning we hired a taxi to the former seaside town of Moynak. It’s the only way to make the two-hour trip there if you want to return to Nukus the same day. Moynak is pretty depressing. There’s no other way to say it, and no reason to hide it. Everyone knows what has happened to this once wealthy community. 40 years later, it has nothing to show for itself.

Moynak used to lie on the southern shores of the great Aral Sea. Since 1960, the Sea has shrunk nearly 50% and is now more than 70 kilometers from Moynak. The town’s once thriving fishing industry is entirely shot. The weather, once made stable by the sea, has grown hotter in the summer and colder in the winter. Now winds pick up and blow the salt and chemical enriched debris left on the dry seabed that now surrounds the town. This has no doubt contributed to the severe decline of the local population’s health.

On arrival to Moynak, our driver took us to the WWII memorial up on the hill, dodging herds of skinny cattle most of the way through town. “The water used to come up to the bottom of this hill,” our driver commented. “Now you can't even see it.” Just then a local, tattooed and with sun-darkened years behind him, approached me at the edge of the cliff near the monument. He began questioning why I came here. I hesitated and answered him defensively. How could I tell him the truth?

He began, “You’re young now…You don’t really understand the concept of history. 30 years ago, when you came to the monument you could see the water.” And we both looked out—seeing only shrubs on the desert floor and rusting ship skeletons in the distance.

We left the monument that stands to preserve the memory of those from Moynak who died in WWII, most of them being Slavic family names, to drive across the sea bed for a few miles to the main ship graveyard. This is a group of old ships that haven’t seen water for years and all the available scrap metal has been stripped from them. We climbed on them as if we were children at a playground.

I could only think how incredibly frustrating it must be for them to live here where outsiders (bureaucrats on a central economic planning committee) ruined their environment, ecology, health, and livelihood. And it was hard for me to justify why I had come to visit their misfortune as a tourist attraction. I felt kind of strange visiting this town. It was the most like an outsider I’ve felt while being a Peace Corps Volunteer in Uzbekistan.

On the way out of town, we stopped at the museum, which contained many remnants of what once made Moynak proud—fishnets, a boat, preserved fish and a photo album of the old fish cannery. There was children’s artwork on the walls depicting the rusty ship skeletons that surround their daily life.

After that, we drove out of town, sitting mostly in silence, until we reached a more hospitable Nukus.

12^th of August, 2003—

Today we woke up to a desert sunrise at Chilpak. During the night the moon was so bright, it drowned out most of the stars. We stayed up most of the night talking, eating melon and just enjoying the warm night air. After breakfast we packed our gear and walked down the steep hill and hiked out to the road. So there we stood at 7:30 am, on the side of the road in the middle of the desert somewhere between Urgench and Nukus looking for a ride. Cars passed and within five minutes a bus stopped for us—three dirty Americans with big packs. They were coming from their village on their way to the Nukus bazaar. As we stepped on, we could tell by the looks on their faces that they knew we weren’t from around here. And so we rode into the city with curious eyes watching us the whole way.

A few hours later in Nukus city.

We washed up back at the apartment and at 5pm went on an urban mission that would prove to be most interesting and satisfying. We heard that the old Lenin statue from the main square in Nukus was lying in a junkyard somewhere inside the city. When we heard this, we had to find it, despite any of the risks involved. Before an hour, we were able to locate the junkyard, right next to the Russian cemetery. We decided not to sneak in, hoping the men working there would let us pass through the front gate. So we went in the main entrance, walked right past some people working and we were in. After rounding the corner, there were three statues lying there—Lenin included. We photographed them like mad for about ten minutes. I mean there was Lenin—just lying there. We climbed over him, and stood on his 20-foot body and smooth, bald head. He was huge, but dead. He didn’t mean anything anymore. He wasn’t needed by this generation. This decade didn’t care about him. The once mighty father of the greatest state on earth was lying there before me and all I could do was photograph him like a novelty. So I did. And if I had thousands of dollars I would have had him shipped back to the U.S.A.

After we got our fill and began to think about leaving, we noticed a Russian guy that worked there peeking around the corner at us. We were nervous, but it turned out that we were ok. He greeted us and began to question us. “Who are you going to show these pictures to?” We assured him that they were only our personal pictures, we wouldn’t develop them here and they of course wouldn’t end up on the Internet or anything like that. Being an ethnic Russian he appreciated the fact that we were interested in his city’s Soviet past. “History is forgotten,” he preached as he pointed over his shoulder to the pile of scrap metal. “We call it peristroika.”

We told him we understood and slipped out of the junkyard as quietly as we came in.

14^th of August, 2003

In the early 19^th century, the Russians sent two separate army campaigns to Khiva, with neither getting anywhere near the powerful central Asian Khanate. (It wasn’t until the third in 1873 that would prove to be successful for the Russians.) Their official mission was to free Russian slaves that the Khan had kept for years, but many think the Russians were after more than that. After all, they had to keep pushing south with their sphere of influence since the British had just made their move north into Afghanistan.

At 3:30 p.m. a friend and I got in a share taxi to Khiva. I had to see this place for myself—the former Khanate that I had read so much about. I was filled with curiosity as to what its splendor was like.

We entered the north gate of the high-walled old town and stepped into the inner city (Ichan-Kala). There were madrassahs and mosques scattered among the mass of individual low houses. We went directly to climb the tallest minaret, Islam Khoja, said to be the last great architectural achievement in Central Asia. It was built in 1910 and afforded an amazing view that stretched beyond the earthen-colored enclosed town to the irrigated fields surrounding it. Back on the street level, we continued strolling. As time passed, the sun was getting low and the town was changing shades. So I began photographing. Then we went up to the spot where the Khan used to get to look out at his powerful and infamously cruel city-state. The sun was setting. It was simply amazing. We were above the whole Ichan-Kala and it was all orange, glistening in the huge, hanging sun. We kept glancing back with the sun eventually closing on the horizon.

Soon after we caught a taxi and rode the 30 minutes back to Urgench in the dark. I knew as I was riding home that I wasn’t finished with Khiva.

15^th of August, 2003

This morning I got up at 6:30 am and went to Khiva again, this time alone. I wanted to see the sun from the other direction. I knew the shadows would be different, and in Khiva they are fascinating. Something about the structure of the houses and the narrow, crooked streets makes a person notice shadows when he or she normally wouldn’t. And by going in the morning it would be possible to avoid the brutal mid-day sun.

I arrived and went into the Ichan-Kala through the back entrance again. I walked all the streets before the workday just to see what was going on. It was still before 8am. Some men were sitting out and some kids were up already. Most people were sweeping and spreading water on the sidewalk. That’s what they do in the morning here—prepare the city. A day of being walked all over, spat on, sat on, rolled over, then rested at night. So I continued walking and photographing, even before the museums were open. Then I left the Ichan-Kala and went over to the park. I saw what remains of the old outer city wall. The park was in disrepair. I got an ice cream and made my way down towards the local Peace Corps volunteer’s school. Next to her school stood the Khan’s old summerhouse. It’s all locked up, not really restored, and not very old. But I walked around it, examining and appreciating it, probably better than anyone had in years. Then I took a marshrutka back to the bazaar and entered the Ichan-Kala from the side bazaar entrance. At this point, I went through the museums, starting with the handicrafts one. I went inside and to an upstairs part and photographed an older man at a well in the courtyard. The next stop was the nature museum. To my surprise there were some preserved fetuses, snakes, and fish there. Besides that it was a pretty poor museum. My astonishment continued as I saw preserved conjoined twin fetuses in the next museum. I called it a day after that and rode back to Urgench to spend the night.

18^th August, 2003

On the last morning I walked to the train station and bought myself a one way ticket from Nukus all the way to Tashkent—a 24-hour trip in all, half of it through the Kyzylkum Desert.

12:05

We just pulled out from Tortkul—an old Russian garrison town from the 19^th century. There was a lot of fanfare at the station: people, sellers. It’s hot again and I’m back on the train—Nukus to Tashkent. 24 hours. First half through the desert. The ride out of Nukus was a long stretch—but I was tired. Only scrub brush and sand was there. We passed Chilpak—the 1^st century Zoroastrian burial site where we had camped the week before. It just rises out of the desert. Now we’ll turn east and head through another enormous desert to Uchquduq.

17:35

Through the long stretch of desert now. It’s amazing. There are absolutely no buildings, no development—just shrubs and small plateaus in the distance. We’ll be getting to Uchquduq soon.

18.57

We just pulled out from Uchquduq station. The town must have been far away because I couldn’t see it. I stepped outside. There were three yurts at the station with a sign that proclaimed: UCHQUDUQ. Mountains in the distance. Desert all around. I don’t think I’ve ever been so remote on land in my life.

19:45

The sun just went below the horizon. It’s still all red. Just a minute ago the orange rays lit the inside of a train car. Old men sit near me, each with their own style traditional hat. Now they are eating watermelon. It is moments like this where I have to stop myself to recognize that I'm sitting in a train car alone in the middle of a desert, in the middle of the largest land mass on earth, far, far from home—and it doesn’t feel all that strange. I don’t really feel all that out of place.

Now we are stopped at Qizilquduq. I was just watching what looked like a group of criminals coming off a bus. Guys with guns were looking after them. It’s hot in here. I’ve been sweating all day. Night is coming.

19^th of August

5:35

On the verge of sunrise, somewhere between Samarkand and Tashkent. The horizon is orange once again. Everything is ready. It’s light out, but still no sun. We’ve been going for almost 20 hours now. I bought some Samarkand non when we stopped there. The trip has been relatively relaxing. Most of the passengers in our carriage have been with us the whole time, so there hasn’t been too much commotion at each stop.

8:08

I don’t know where we are. I hope we’re past Gullistan. I thought we were nearing Tashkent, but according to the time we still have two hours to go. The conductor already collected our sheets. So I’ll sit here and look out the window.

9:21

The conductor woke me up. I just slipped into sleep with my head against the wall sitting in my seat. He wanted the mat I was sitting on rolled up. I asked him for my ticket back but he hasn’t brought it. He said, “Look out the window, we’ve come to Tashkent.” But thirty minutes later we were still way outside the capital. They’re already rolled up the carpet. Now we’re all sitting here ready to get off after 23 ½ hours of being on this train.