Halk, Watan, Beyik Turkmenbashy

In case you were wondering, “Halk, Watan, Beyik Turkmenbashy” is a sign you can see all over the country. It means, “People, Homeland, Great Father of the Turkmen” and you can’t go more than 5k on the highway without seeing a sign or a shop or a monument bearing that inscription. I’ve also learned how to say Golden Age in Turkmen (Atlyn Asyr since you asked), because that too is quite common to see written around these parts. Turkmenbashi declared his reign the 5th Golden Age of the Turkmen. The other 4? Don’t ask. I promise you haven’t heard of them. Let’s just say that my friend Magtymguly the poet led one and two were led by mythical fictional characters.

I set out on Sunday morning for Tolkuchka Market just outside of Ashgabat. Market days are Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday, with the latter being the most animated. Indeed it was. I tried on a ridiculous number of traditional Turkmen hats. Somehow, I just couldn’t see myself wearing one in the states. The good news, I can always rethink that and acquire a similar one in one of the other Stans. Actually, there was one hilarious salesman. He spoke great English and was trying to sell me on a Daghestani (Caucuses) wolf and/or fox hat. I said that I was looking for authentic Turkmen souvenirs and he said, “fine, it’s from Turkmenistan, 15 dollars?” I also saw my first Americans at the market. Needless to say, this doesn’t rank up there with Italy and France as popular tourist destinations for Americans.

Tolkuchka is an amazing place. The only market I’ve seen of comparable size was in Istanbul, but Tolkuchka is different. For starters, it has Soviet flair. For example, today I bought roubles, soviet ones and some worthless Manat paper currency. Literally, I paid 40 cents for a 1 Manat bill worth .004 cents or .00004 dollars, i.e. it’s not worth the paper it’s printed on. But I can think of a few nieces and nephews who might be amused by that fact. Not to mention eBay. There were also loads of Soviet medals/ribbons/awards for sale. It was sad to think that people worked for a lifetime to accumulate these things and then overnight they became worthless. Tolkuchka is also different in the sense that they have a livestock section. I got to see camels, goats, sheep, horses, and cows all being loaded up onto trucks. I even made friends with a cute black sheep (the owners were only too happy to sell him to me, but I had to explain that I still had over a month of travel left and I didn’t see how I was going to transport him). Oh yeah, people were stuffing their newly purchased goats/sheep into the trunks of their cars. Good thing PETA wasn’t around, it was a bit disturbing.

About traveling by car. At first I was convinced that my driver was aiming for potholes to check out the suspension on our Toyota SUV (turns out it’s not great), but then I realized when he didn’t hit the cow that meandered in front of our car that in fact he’s been avoiding the potholes because everyone knows that hitting a cow is worth at least 10,000 points. I guess the roads just aren’t that hot. As for driving on these roads…I have seen it all. I have seen what I’ve dubbed “the three car pass.” Yes, that would be when one car passes the first car, but a third car decides you’re not passing past enough and goes alongside. Let me clarify, these are not three lane roads. In fact, there are no lanes. I’ve also seen a pretty nasty accident on the side of the road with an overturned truck and burned out BMW. I just keep on thinking “flying is the least safe way of traveling around Central Asia.” I read this in one of my wise travel guides, but I’m not certain of its “truthiness.”

Along the road to Mary (the city right next to ancient Merv) we (my guide who’s name I’m intentionally omitting and Vladi the driver) made two separate stops. The first was to a pilgrimage shrine. And because it was Sunday, there were lots of pilgrims. They leave pieces of clothing tied to the trees and build little stone teepee-like structures. They walk around the shrine and/or grave 3 or 7 times, depending on the particular shrine. The second stop we made was to see the medieval ruins of Abiverd. Not so much to see there because it hasn’t been well excavated since the government (and past governments) have been more concerned with ancient sites such as Merv. But to you aspiring archeologists out there…

How has Turkmenistan changed post-Turkmenbashi? Why, thanks for asking and what a good question. I have never asked this question indoors because most places here are bugged. But I’ve gotten a range of answers: Ministers are actually willing to make decisions instead of waiting for word from above, Checkpoints along the road have been removed except in border areas (used to be every 30miles or so), Ministers have become more corrupt, the internet is more widely available, and so on. It’s interesting, because there are posters of Turkmenbashi all over and none of his successor. Moreover, I feel like every time I say Turkmenbashi people cringe slightly, not out of fear, but out of respect. It’s like Lord Voldemort (again, lacking the evil quality) and calling him “He Who Shall Not Be Named.” Turkmenbashi in this country is “The President.” Not Niyazov, not Turkmenbashi, but the president or our first great president.

Merv/Ancient Merv. After making my way to Mary, I spent the night in a guesthouse and got up very early (this morning) to drive further east to Merv. Merv was an ancient city, which peaked during the Silk Road era. It was mostly destroyed by the Mongols and later reestablished by Tamurlane’s empire. What’s interesting to note is that instead of building on top of previous settlements, each time a settlement was made in this oasis area its location shifted slightly instead of rebuilding on top of the older settlement. This makes excavations very easy. As I said, being mostly destroyed there are a few structures which are still visible, including some mausoleums and the city walls. Some of it is amazing. The main standing structure is a mausoleum that was restored with help of the Turkish government. I saw some before and after pictures and the difference is stunning, it looks like the older structure was ready to collapse and now they’ve restored some interior design and the actual structure. The one thing they did not restore was the turquoise dome, which made this mausoleum a sight to see. It is said that caravans could see the city from a day’s camel ride away, because of the sun shinning off of the turquoise dome. Overall, it was a good entrée to the cities of the Silk Road. Alas, it was not fortunate enough to survive, but the other cities I’m headed toward were (Khiva, Bukhara, and Samarkand to name a few).

Did I mention that I went to the theatre in Ashgabat? It’s another one of these white marble newly constructed buildings to glorify the Turkmen people. It wasn’t full and I got a good seat for roughly 60 cents. Of course I didn’t understand a word, but I got the gist of it. It was a comedy (people were laughing); rural parents not wanting their daughter marrying a city boy, crazy father, crazy sibling and it resolved itself quite nicely. I also had a chance to interact with some Turkmen people while at the theatre. I met one who spoke English pretty well…turned out she was an English teacher. Her kids are certainly learning the word “therefore.”

After the theatre I wandered around town and met another English speaking person. This guy had the cutest little baby and an English speaking daughter as well. In fact, I’m going to meet up with them tonight. One thing I have found frustrating here is the requirement for a minder (ahem, guide). It turns out my guide doesn’t really want to be a guide, he’d rather be in business management, but this still is a command economy. So instead of providing serious detail/insight into what I’m seeing, I get a pretty canned version. But at least he’s nice.

Overall, I have to say that the Turkmen people are just amazing. The way the dress and interact, it’s been such a pleasure to be here and see it all. The traditional dress is also great. The women all wear these scarves, which are wrapped in a unique way. And they have these nice colorful dresses as well. The girls and boys wear these designed skullcaps traditionally and the men wear these big puffy hats made from wool. Wow, how American did all that just sound?

I actually had two totally different interactions with locals today. Two days ago, when I needed directions this nice man with an adorable baby helped me (as I mentioned above). He gave me a number to call when I returned to Ashgabat. So I decided to give a call tonight and I met up with his daughters. We went to café to sit and talk. The eldest, Maral, has finished school (it only goes to 10th grade here) and is completing her mandatory national service before she goes to university to study medicine (her father is a doctor too). The younger daughter, Mehri, is finishing up school and hopes to study art history and make art. They were so intelligent and curious – it was great to sit down and talk with them. They asked all about America and I explained as best I could and then we spoke about life in Turkmenistan. They are clearly not your average Turkmen teens, their English is really good and they’ve traveled to England, but nevertheless it was insightful. Maral kept on speaking about Duff and it took me a little while to realize she was not referring to the beer, but rather to dough. Silly English spelling. We spoke briefly about the uncovering of the recent JFK plot. Her thoughts “Think of all the mothers that will cry for their children, and the children that will cry for their parents. Why would people try to do this? To innocent people. I do not understand.”

On the other end, I met up with some expats at the British Pub in the center of town. It was there that I met a lot of Turks working here, one Turkmen, and one Tajik (and yes we spoke in Persian). They too were very curious about America, but very angry with the administration and Iraq. Murad (the Turkmen) was the most adamant about Bush and his policies. “You know what’s wrong with America? First, Iraq. Second, Iraq. Third, Iraq.” Then he had some choice words for our President. But throughout kept on saying how much he loves Americans and America, but not the government. I explained that the best thing about the US is that you can say these things freely (in contrast to where we were sitting). I asked a Turk who has been working in Turkmenistan for 7 years if he had noticed any changes since Turkmenbashi died. He quickly turned to me and said “you’d be wise not to ask such things around here.” It’s an interesting country.

Tomorrow, I am heading north in the afternoon into the Kara Kum (Black Sands) desert, where I’m overnighting near a burning gas crater. Then I’m continuing on into Uzbekistan. I promise another post on Turkmenistan, but it might be from Uzbekistan. So don’t worry if the blog is silent for a couple days…my laptop is great for taking notes and posting later.

P.S. – I am in possession of some Turkmenbashi watches, including a pocket watch. It one-ups Starmanbashi’s watch.
P.P.S/ - It's too late and I'm too tired to deal with uploading pictures. They will make it here.