Beacon of Hope

No rain or snow today, so it was time to venture out and visit the main sights of the city. Normally I take the car, so Rexby does not need to plot along through masses of people and noisy traffic, but today I didn't feel like driving through the city again so I decided to go by taxi; cheaper than driving and stress free. The owner of the shop I just visited kindly offered to hail down a car (that's What one does here, this are private cars that take you for some fee), but after 4 failed attempts we gave up. Dog? No way! Perhaps if I had a sheep??? Yandex, the Russian version of uber made it possible at the end.
First we went to the Chorsu Bazaar, not inside, too crowded for the dog, just around, still causing quite a stir with Rexelby, coming past some more of those cradles and some bread stamps. Now finally I know how they get those pretty patterns onto their bread. After some bit to eat, which for the first time in months I was able to eat whilst being seated, with dog!!! we made our way to the Kast Imom, a big religious complex. Beautiful mosque flanked by 2 x 54m high minaretts. Time to make come pictures, but. ... battery is flat. Doesn't matter, got my charged powerpack in my bag. When I pull it out, I realise, the charging cable is not there. Hm, ah well, no pics then. And then slowly it dawns on me: no phone, no map, no address of the hotel, no yandex = no home. Bugger!!! What now? Need cable. Anyone of those IT'd up twens around? No, none to be seen, just oldies like me, that might have a phone if you are lucky! Next option Phone or electronic shop. Off we go. Normally you can find them anywhere, but of course not when you need one. We need another idea. Somebody else's phone to find the address of the hostel. After some attempts I get lucky, we find the address of the hostel. I have no pen or paper to write it down with and my rescuer has neither. So we ask some passerbys, none of them has a pen only the suggestion to write it into my phone. Yeah, thanks! During our quest to find a pen we come past a toilet block ( people travelling in Islamic countries take note: once in need, you will always find a toilet in the mosque complex). There will for sure be somebody with a pen, he says. What makes you think that, but I don't intercept. So here he disappears just to return some time later, triumphantly swinging the core of a toilet role. Written on it is the address of the hostel once in Latin and once in Cyrillic lettering.
I am full of gratitude, don't want to keep him any longer has he spent enough time with me. I am one step closer but far from being home yet. So I set off with my Beacon of hope in form of the roll in my hand to find somebody who can find a taxi for me willing to take home me and my dog.
The first young man I ask cannot find the address, hmm... So I finally find an American lady, working in Tashkent, who organizes my transport home.
Here I am thinking I was really well prepared for my day of excursion and then my explorer spirit gets knocked down by a typical modern day dilemma. We so fully rely on our mobile phones to do so many tasks for us. Particularly on this trip: it gives me information where to find a hostel, a petrol station, how to find my way through any city on the world, it more or less usefully translates into the strangest of languages, how many Som do I get for my Oz dollar, I can call friends and family anywhere in the world, do my banking and the list goes on. I ran into some difficult situations during my journey, but none has thrown me in a state of panic as I was in today, lost in a completely foreign city in a completely foreign land, not knowing where I was and where to go. But there is always a beacon of hope. It may even come in the shape of the core of a toilet roll. Czytaj więcej