Bukhara

Monday 5^th October

Bukhara

Quite a long drive from Samarkand to Bukhara.  Some fertile plains with apple, apricot and other fruit trees. Tomatoes, melons of many varieties, grapes, sorghum and other crops.  Much of the land is very barren.  

Stopped at the ruins of the Rabati Malik caravanserai, built in the 11^th century. 

Reference: Uzbek Caravanserai http://www.uzbekjourneys.com/2011/10/uzbek-caravanserais.html

***All references are from Penelope Prices Uzbek Journeys blog.

Staying at the Komil Hotel in the old city of Bukhara.  A renovated merchants house.  Some of the rooms are very grand.  

My room - more French provincial

The courtyard.  

Uzbeks often sprinkle courtyards or the outside of the house with water 

to keep it cooler and keep the dust down.

The upstairs courtyard

Win's room

These plaster panels in the walls are typically Bukharan

Tuesday 6^th and Wed 7^h October

Bukhara

Two days in Bukhara visiting architectural wonders such as the    9th century Ishmael Samani Mausoleum, a perfect cube made of baked bricks in basket weave pattern.

·      Bolo Hauz mosque. (2 still operate)

·      Kalyan minaret (which served as a beacon on the Silk Road)

·      Ark fortress,

·      the Registan area

·      the last Emir’s summer palace. This palace, an over-the-top Russian/Central Asian confection built in 1911, also houses the excellent Bukhara Museum of Decorative Applied Arts.

Old Bukhara is beautiful.  Many adobe buildings.  The more grand buildings such as Mosques and madrases are built of cream coloured bricks.

Stalls with beautiful old carpets and storage bags for yurts. 

Crafts people fill the former caravanserais and madrassahs with marvellous carpets, woodcarvings, silk weaving, suzani, woodblock printed cottons, gold embroidery, jewellery, metal work and skullcaps.

Visited Mr Akbar’s shop – amazing collection of Uzbekistan textiles.  Had dinner at his home a beautiful restored merchants house.  He is grumpy but his wife is lovely.  She has a shop in a madrassah and sells new and old textiles.  She spread out layers and layers of beautiful embroideries all over the floor for us to look at and buy.  She is involved with a project for disabled girls where they learn embroidery and sell what they produce.

Win, Sam, Sari, Rose and I went to the 16^th century Hamman where for $25, we had the full treatment.  Didn’t enjoy it – the scrubbing and massage were fine.  Didn’t like lying on a sheet on the hot stone floor.  It didn’t help that women have been lying on that hard stone since the 16^th century.  What a hard job for the women 2 women who scrubbed and massaged us. They work in their knickers only in that hot steamy atmosphere scrubbing and massaging women all day.  Local women still use the Hamman, but this was a day off apart from us. 

Puppet show in the evening about the marriage of Nasra Nerrudin’s son. 

Saw water colour miniatures by Ulughkbek Mukhamedov.

References: Bukhara’s Puppet Theatre

http://www.uzbekjourneys.com/2013/05/bukhara-puppet-theatre-uzbekistan.html

Bukhara's Summer Palace: Sitora-i Mokhi-Khosa

http://www.uzbekjourneys.com/2014/02/bukharas-summer-palace-sitora-i-mokhi.html

Bukhara’s Contemporary Art Museum:

http://www.uzbekjourneys.com/2014/08/bukharas-contemporary-art-museum.html

Chor Bakyr, City of the Dead, Near Bukhara:

http://www.uzbekjourneys.com/2014/09/chor-bakyr-city-of-dead-near-bukhara.html