Dhe junk surprises then. Anchored in a large lake, it looks like a lost selfie backdrop in front of the massive Silk Road Samarkand complex. This is a tourist resort at the gates of Samarkand in Uzbekistan, with all kinds of 5-star hotels, a congress hall and the “Eternal City”, a kind of “best of” the old Silk Road cities, including replicas of well-known monuments.
But why the junk? Didn’t the traders come here with camels? “Probably because of the investors from China,” suspects Mokha Nasirova, who has been guiding visitors through her hometown for five years. And indeed, the area was partly financed with Chinese loans. President Xi personally paid a visit last September to the summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, a coalition of China, Russia and other South and Central Asian countries.
It’s hard to escape the blue in Samarkand, like this girl at a painting class at the newly built Silk Road Samarkand complex.
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Image: Martin H. Petrich
“But the world has been meeting in Samarkand for a long time,” says Mokha, proudly pointing to the famous Afrosiab murals. In 1965, researchers discovered the image fragments while excavating a 7th-century princely palace. Presumably the scenes decorated the audience hall. An oriental princess on an elephant is shown, followed by merchants and warriors on camels and horses. Even the Emperor of China is shown, with his wife in the boat. Although the two were not in Samarkand, they sent envoys with silk fabrics and bunches of cocoons. This is also clearly visible. Even more astonishing are the shades of blue, which look pretty fresh even after 1400 years.
Desirable destination for locals
All that blue! One can hardly escape it in Samarkand. The domes of mosques and mausoleums are blue, while the magnificent facades of madrasahs shimmer in navy blue and turquoise. Three of these Islamic universities flank the famous Registan, as the former main square is called. But it has long since ceased to be about teaching, rather about haggling: “Take a look!” they call out alternately in English, Uzbek and Russian to lure tourists into one of the many shops. Where once Islamic scholars and students bent over books, art and junk are now piling up. Bobble hats, coats and plastic crowns are ready for tourists to dress up for the photo session. Large families and school groups stroll across the square, and Samarkand is also very popular with locals. The city on the Silk Road is easy to reach: the express train from Tashkent takes just two hours.
Samarkand is number one in Uzbekistan tourism, and it is to be expanded significantly. In the three years before the pandemic, the number of international visitors rose rapidly from 2.7 to 6.8 million. By 2026 it should be 9 million. It’s also good news for 35-year-old Mokha, who works as a guide in the high season and teaches English to young students in the evenings. “Tourism has completely turned my life upside down,” says the mother of two, who met foreign tourists for the first time in 2007. Back when the country, which was once part of the Soviet Union, was ruled with an iron fist by President Karimov, few visitors strayed here. Growing up in a traditionally Muslim family, Mokha’s path was actually predetermined: 2009 arranged marriage, then the children, her husband wanted to keep her at home.
View of the world famous Registan: Samarkand is a popular travel destination for both local and international guests.
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Image: AFP
But she had her own ideas, got her tour guide license and started showing tourists around. Now she earns significantly more than her husband and finally feels respected. “The old tell the young what to do? Those days are over. We want to make our own decisions,” she says with determination and feels confirmed by high-level officials: “Ulugh Beg already emphasized that women also have the right to education,” she explains. The great scholar of the 15th century is something like the Galileo of Uzbekistan, his mathematical and astronomical calculations were ahead of his time. The sentence is attributed to him: “The pursuit of knowledge is the duty of every Muslim.” Remains of an observatory and a madrasa on the Registan remind us of him.
Kutbija Rafieva was always a little ahead of her time. As a German student in the Soviet era, she wrote her thesis on Hans Fallada’s novel “Everyone dies for themselves”. In 1997 she opened the Antica restaurant with her sister and later expanded it into a pretty boutique hotel. The sixty-year-old has been committed to city preservation for a long time.
Image: FAZ card you.
“See the wall around our neighborhood? The government built it in 2009 so that visitors to the nearby Timur mausoleum don’t have to see real life,” she says, and laments the obsession with renewal: “Many old buildings were destroyed, and in many places long-established residents are pushed out.” At least today they can defend themselves. Plans to expand the 150-year-old university boulevard lined with old trees were stopped after protests.
“For us women, tourism has also brought a lot of good things,” emphasizes Kutbija: “Look at the many homestays and guest houses. They are almost all led by women and are often named after them: Durdona, Barno, Mokhina – beautiful, euphonious names! We are all doing our part to preserve the authenticity of Samarkand.” The misguided Chinese junk was probably planned by men.