My mystery destination — revealed!
I’m in a “Central” location
OK, but there must be quite a few hotels of this brand around the world, although it’s the first time that I’ve stayed in one. (Very good service, by the way!)
Here’s another little clue to my destination, for those of you who might know less well-known airlines:
I’m actually in Central Asia, and in what has often been considered the center of Central Asia. The next major clue to my exact location, is in the next image, literally a few minutes’ walk from my hotel.
This museum, presumably shaped to resemble the Amir’s hat, is dedicated to the Amir Timur (1336 -1405) and his descendants. We know him as Tamerlane, the founder of the Timurid empire. The museum sports a large number of paintings and some artifacts from the days of the Amir and his various sons and descendants. According to the descriptions next to the paintings, most of them died violently (either killed in battle, by arrows, or “stray projectiles”, or by being “murdered”). I get the impression that there wasn’t too much love lost between these princes.
Outside the museum, I was welcomed by the bright sunshine, but don’t let that fool you, though. It was marginally above zero degrees, so that the snow on the ground (from more than 10 days ago) was melting extremely slowly. The weather here has been unseasonably cold. Not so much the fact that there were nights below -10 degrees C, but more that it has lasted so long and didn’t heat up much during the daytime. Looks like global warming is providing energy to the cooling system around here.
So, I am in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. At least for the remainder of the day, then I head off back to Zambia. Where it’s much warmer, and a lot wetter. (Read Anne Bonfert’s stories about her trip just outside the southern edges of Zambia if you want to hear about rainfall in that part of the world.) Looks like global warming is energizing the shower system down there.
Anyway, I digress. About Tashkent.
It is a large and very modern city, these days. The population is estimated at 4–5 million people. Historical and soviet-era buildings are somewhat pushed aside by new towers with glass facades. There’s a busy and well-functioning system of roads, and apparently, also a metro (which I haven’t seen). I’ve been shuttling between the hotel and the offices where we were doing business this week, so today was my only chance to see a bit more.
Talking about beer, that’s also good here.
So that was my mystery destination: Tashkent, Uzbekistan. If I get another opportunity to come here (maybe for some more consulting, one day?) then I’ll definitely try to add a few days, so that it would also be possible to visit Samarkand, Khiva and Bukhara, old cities where the history of Uzbekistan and the Silk Road is more obvious.
Now that I’ve set the example, why don’t some of you out there let us guess where you are or were?
