Osh Spice

I walked a short while and then caught a local marshrutka presumably heading for the centre of town.  Whether this is where we were heading I had no idea and had no idea of verifying but I was just feeling adventurous and why not, right?  Why not get into an unmarked vehicle in southern Kyrgyzstan?  #YOLO didn't exist yet, but that doesn't mean I wasn't living life to the fullest.  It turns out the marsh was going to the centre but I started to panic when more and more people piled into the Daewoo van* and I was actually at the point where my face and body was squished into something (either the side of the van, another person, a seat, my backpack, or all) and I actually found it hard to breathe.  This was one of those moments where I thought, "Okay, so if I die, I guess it's my fault" because I was about as smothered as can be.  Suddenly the marshrutka ground to a halt for me to decide that enough time had elapsed for it to be possible I had reached the centre, and also that I needed to breathe and could afford another 10 cents to pay the next marshrutka that came by in case I still needed to go further.  

This is Osh in the morning.  The drunken crowds of men who were fighting in the streets the night before had given way to angry crowds of old ladies trying to catch hot deals at the bazaar and not afraid to fight each other for it.  

When I emerged from what had become a veritable cocoon I noticed the driver was also out on the street and was engaged in an altercation with the driver of the marshrutka in front.  They started screaming and then suddenly started beating the shit out of each other.  I took this as my cue to leave walk and I realized that I had actually passed my stop.  I walked back in the direction I came to an intersection with a major road and asked the shopkeep for directions.  The woman directed me up the road to where the Aeropag store was (evidently my hostel was behind it.  Worst directions ever) so I walked and found it with remarkable ease.

The receptionist at the hostel told me that there was no room.  I thought this was ridiculous because I had been in email communication with the hostel and they told me they had a bed reserved.  They ended up giving me one of the beds the staff normally sleeps on and then told me that my proposed route to Tajikistan was bollocks and I could remain in Osh for a couple of days for another group planning on taking the Pamir highway and that it would be something like $250 to get me to Khorog.  As soon as I heard the price tag I did a pretty good spit-take and begged his pardon.  At that point I knew that maybe I should not be arranging these sorts of things through hostels and that surely it would be cheaper to just try my luck on the street.  

The next morning I woke as early as possible and headed towards the centre where I was told the group taxis left for Batkan.  I figured Batkan was my best shot because maybe I could go the opposite route and start on the Pamir Highway from Dushanbe.  So I found the starting point for the taxis and was able to not-so-shrewdly negotiate a trip to Batkan that didn't involve a bifurcation of the Uzbek enclave that inexplicably stood in the way of me and my goal.  For a price tag far above what I thought was reasonable, the driver agreed to take me and two Kazakhs along the "northern route" which circumvented the enclave.  We also brought a Tajik, or someone who also wasn't totally keen on going through Uzbekistan because he also wasn't allowed.**  While I didn't trust my taxi driver, I trusted the fact that, if need be, I could easily overpower him and take control of the vehicle, so I was ready to get er done.  

This mural of Mischa from the 1980 Olympics was on the side of a building down an alley in Osh and it kind of reminds me of this picture of me riding a rocking horse in 1987. 

*LOLz, I know, right?  Daewoo.  Like, wow.  Where did that come from? I think my biggest takeaway from travelling to Central Asia is that Daewoo still exists and there is a market for them.  

**Okay, is now a good time to talk about Central Asian politics?  Is ever a good time?  Holy crap.  I don't even want to talk about it because I feel like so few people in the world actually care and I have no interest in educating anyone who doesn't care enough to at least read the Wikipedia page so the only thing I will say, once again, is holy crap.