Dushanbe

Another rest day, I must be getting soft. However it was nice to relax & recover on a second day. It has been easy to stay in Dushanbe. It has a number of decent & easily accessible Internet cafes & as an especially appreciated bonus there's lots of food around.

Unfortunately unlike other rest breaks I've taken this was a bit disappointing on the human company front. I got the sense that my substitute host wasn't entirely comfortable with my presence & I didn't get a chance for a proper chat. I'd hoped to get a little more of the inside story over dinner on the operation of NGOS in Tajikistan, however I dined alone. I hope I'll be able to meet & talk to aid workers along the way through the Pamirs in the coming 3 weeks. I also hope that I meet some other cyclists going the same way.

For the first period of the trip in Turkey I relished being solo on the trip. Connected by phone calls & emails to friends & family. I didn't meet any other cyclists until Iran & even then 'teamed up' on the road only briefly. Traveling alone has never bothered me in the past. Traveling for this long is unprecedented for me & I now realise that I'd rather do it in company. The trick for future trips will be to work out how to arrange this while remaining in charge.

I spent the day cruising around various Dushanbe bazaars. They were fun places, all covering large areas, filled with small plot holders. These were not markets for tourists as there weren't enough of them about. In these places a foreigner like myself, especially wearing shorts & pushing a bicycle, would seem more like an alien than a potential buyer of silly tourist trinkets. The market plots were pretty basic, organised in a grid, sometimes under a cover or for the big ones, spread around the central covered area. They were so busy, the plots piled with merchandise, with people coming & going. It was hard to imagine that at closing time all the vendors would pack up the unsold goods leaving the previously occupied space to look like an empty carpark. None of the stalls had means of securing the goods overnight as did the bazaars of Turkey & Iran.

Even though I ate alone the dinner was interesting. I went to an Ecuadorian restaurant (who'd have imagined finding such a thing in Central Asia). It was popular with expats, a group I hadn't seen en-mass since Turkey. There was a wedding party going on in a hall adjacent & when it ended or at least moved on a succession of Tajiks emerged in sparkling robes.

It was a bit of a day being an expat. I went to a European style cafй for breakfast & had a real coffee (the first in about 2 1/2 months) with scones & a chocolate brownie. I think I even read a sign that the coffee was from Starbucks. Go figure! The cafй was run by a NGO dedicated, to the best of my memory, to providing good food, at Western prices to expats. On reflection perhaps it's time I left this town before I become too cynical.

I cycled 0 km