"Ladies and Gentlemen, Turkmenistan Airlines, The Turkmen State Aviation Authority and President Saparmyrat Turkmenbashi the Great welcome you on board this Boeing 737, flight 702 to Ashgabat"
Every trip to Turkmenistan should start with a flight on the fantastic Turkmenistan Airlines. They have safe, comfortable aircraft, somewhat friendly Flight Attendants and serve plenty of food. Everything you could possibly want for a 3 hrs 15min flight to that beautiful country. But no, that's not all you get. Upon entering the aircraft you are immediately faced with what is to become the familiar face of the Turkmen President, His Greatness Saparmyrat Turkmenbashi ('Turkmenbashi' means 'father of all Turkmen'). Yes, on the bulkhead immediately facing the door is a lovely photo of what me and my travel partner came to call simply 'HIM'. The size of an A4 paper in a gold frame, can't possibly resist a smile upon boarding. And only to add to the enjoyment, we were of course seated in the first row of economy, and who do you think was smiling at us from the wall separating the two cabins? Yes, 'HIM' again!
I of course had the honour of occupying seat 11 D, with the lovely portrait looming over me for the whole flight, a brilliant source for all kinds of tales we made up and jokes to pass the 3 or so hours flying.
Landed in Ashbagat in brilliant weather, a warm welcome from the single-digit Moscow weather.
Landing in Ashgabat was only the start of the sheer surrealism of the 4 days to follow. On approach we saw out the window a mosque under construction which we later learned was being built to honour Turkmenbashi’s parents, only logical, eh?
Well, immigration and customs was not a problem as we had a legit visa and weren’t importing any dubious goods. Exiting customs in Ashgabat is the same story as in Moscow, as you’re met by a hoard of taxi drivers eager to give you a ride to your hotel at prices normally unheard of by normal Russians, or, in this case, Turkmens. Anyway, talked to a guy who offered to drive us to our hotel for $5 (which probably should have been more like 50 cents, but we figured that everybody gets ripped off on their first few hours in an ‘exotic’ country, right?), that same driver was to become our local guide to Ashgabat, and during the following days he was to take us all over the place, to places normal tourists wouldn’t even think of visiting, not that the country gets many tourists at all, if any. Oh, and of course, at the airport we got our first sighting of a proper billboard of Turkmenbashi, where else but above the name of the airport, “Ashgabat Saparmyrat Turkmenbashi the Great International Airport”!
Now, Ashgabat... what a city. Actually not that easy to describe, but if words can be put down to say something about it I would say if you can picture the grandness and madness of Stalinist/Soviet architechture, the open plans of the proposed Third-Reich cities and then mix in Disneyland, then you’re close to what the capital of Turkmenistan looks like, but of course with a hint of post-Soviet grunge (I do hope that’s a word, anyway, it fits).
Nevertheless the people are friendly and posess that distinctive Central Asian sense of hospitality and making one feel welcome. That includes being offered tea by guards in one of the parks given to ‘the people’ by Turkmenbashi at 1 in the morning!
As with other dictatorial closed off countries there is a flourishing black market for foreign-currency exchange in Ashgabat, and just aswell, since the official rate to the US dollar is 5000 Manat, whereas on the black market it hovers around 21,000-23,000 Manat. Of course changing your dollars on the black market is stricly illegal, and it was all pretty hush hush when our driver walked into what seemed a pretty normal residential house with an old lady sitting on the porch, especially since there’s literally a policeman on every streetcorner. But everybody does it, so why not us aswell? And of course when given a price in dollars on the market but paying in Manat, you’re automatically given the black market rate, since nobody uses the published rate.
Ashgabat is architecturally quite mad and grand. Turkmenbashi has a policy of tearing down old crappy blocks of flats and instead building grand new blocks made of marble and granite, although it’s doubtful whether the new grand blocks will house the same residents as the old ones on the same patch of land. But to an unassuming tourist (I don’t exactly classify myself as one though), it all looks fabulous. The same can be said for all the new palaces, museums, official buildings and monuments being built all over the place. I must give the city planners credit though for incorporating so much green space in their city plans. Ashgabat definitely has an advantage over Moscow in respect to the sheer amount of green, open spaces which must make the people’s lifes nicer, especially in the scorching summers. However, as with all public spaces, an Ashgabat park is not complete without the ubiquitous gold statue of Turkmenbashi, a handful of fountains and dozens of workers working hard scrubbing the marble fountains and cutting the grass with what seem to be miniscule scissors (nah, only exaggerating a bit there, but seriously, the grass looks like it’s been cut with such a device).
Wining and Dining
Going out in Ashgabat doesn’t leave you with a lot of choices restaurant-wise. In fact, there’s only a handful of them in the centre and if you want to have dinner on a Saturday night, ‘Diamond’s’ is the only place that isn’t hosting a wedding reception! Mind you, Diamond’s isn’t bad, it’s where we had our first dinner in the city and I was quite impressed. Well, it was only a chicken kebab/shashlik, but tasty, well garnished and inexpensive.
The second evening we were recommended a restaurant called ‘DipClub’ by the hotel reception girls, they mentioned especially that there would be a show, as this was a Friday night. Probably one of the poshest restaurants in Ashgabat, but not at all expensive, only 1,267,000 Manat! (For the un-enlightened that translates to roughly US$39!), but that includes a 3-course dinner, cocktails and wine! The food was delish, but never mind that. It was the show that absolutely made the evening. As the food had a Middle Eastern theme, but the restaurant not, we were kindof expecting a couple of belly dancers dancing to Turkish music or something of the like. How wrong we were. Ok, I will admit that the first part of the ‘show’ started in something like that direction, suddenly the music was turned up and two girls of obvious Russian-decent rushed in wearing a bad attempt at belly-dancer costumes and swirled around the room to a Turkish-ish song. After this there was an interlude of around 15 minutes, when the music was turned down to a normal volume and people continued to chat and eat. Then the lights were dimmed, some crazy rock music was put on and in came the same girls as earlier, only this time, they were dressed in a S&M-like leather outfits providing minimal coverage, chains and all. Gudrun and I were having problems keeping our drinks from spurting out of our mouths everytime they did a ‘kick’ (way funnier than it sounds), and luckily they focused on ‘dancing’ around a table where a party of 10 men were sitting, luckily because if they’d gotten any nearer to our table I seriously don’t think we’d been able to keep a straight face.
Even though we did have a meal at a restaurant every evening of our stay in Ashgabat, walking through the market on the other side of the street from our hotel was a feast for the eyes food-wise. As you can see on the photos I’ve posted on my webfotogallerie (link on the left) the intense colours of the freshest vegetables and fruits was seriously a mouthwatering experience, and the sight of it made me want to buy bagfulls of fruits and veggies and go home to make a fabulous meal. Oh, and the bread, that was delicious too. And the fantastic nutcakes which we did buy a bagfull of to take home were divine.
Now, markets.
As in most Central Asian countries, the local market, known as a Bazaar, is THE place to do your shopping. The bazaar next to our hotel was mainly a food bazaar, but did also sell some clothes, CDs and other necessities. But to get some real Turkmen stuff our driver took us to the main bazaar, a few kilometers out of the city, quite near the airport. There greeted us an array of ancient buses which brought together swarms of Turkmens from all over the capital region and probably from further afield aswell. Of course the colours of the famous Turkmen carpets were fabulous aswell as all the array of stuff people were selling. Not only exquisitely detailed colourful carpets but also all sorts of old silver jewellry, clothes, hats, bags and much more, as the "souvenir-y' part of the bazaar was only a tiny part of it, the rest covered with merchants selling everything from camel-heads and milk to shampoo to strings to warn off an evil-eye! Of course we returned home loaded with goodies, ranging from ancient pots and silver necklaces to a hideous orange handkerchief. Fun fun fun.
Allright, I realise this is getting quite lengthy but I hope not too boring. You see, it's all Turkmenbashi's fault. I've been so inspired by his philosophy and writings that I can't stop writing about his lovely country. Turkmenbashi's philosophy and main writing is of course the ever present 'Ruhnama', loosely translated as something like.. well, I'm sure somebody told me just can't remember at the moment, nevertheless, must be something highly poetic if i know my friend Turkmenbashi correctly! But yes, the Ruhnama is studied in every single Turkmen primary-, middle- and secondary school. In fact, if you get less than 100% on your Ruhnama tests, you don't graduate from school in Turkmenistan!
And of course, in true Turkmenbashi style, there's a park and fountain with a huge model of the wonderfully pink and green book dedicated solely to 'the Book'.
Now, as twisted as I am, I loved Turkmenistan, and if you ever have the opportunity of going there, then DO, because it's really something else.
I'll leave it to my photos to finish this commentary (as always: the link is on the left!)
