Bush: Goodbye Uzbekistan, Hello Tajikistan

by William O. Beeman

(PNS) DUSHANBE -- Now that the United States has been kicked out of its air base in Uzbekistan for daring to question why President Islam Karimov ordered the slaughter of hundreds of protestors in the town of Andijan, suddenly Uzbekistan's neighbor Tajikistan is beginning to look much more interesting to Washington. This is especially so because of its long borders with Afghanistan, where 65 U.S. troops have been killed in the last six months.

Tajikistan was long ignored by the United States as too poor and remote to bother with, but Tajikistan is deceptive. In fact, through Tajik eyes it looks like the center of the world, perched high in the Pamir Mountains of Asia. It is the United States that seems peripheral and distant.

All one has to do is sit down at any wedding banquet table in the capital, Dushanbe, to see that world spread out in front of one's eyes. To the left are Indian samosas, to the right, Chinese-inspired dumplings and noodles, in front, Middle Eastern kababs and pilaf and a little farther, Russian salads, cheese, sausages and borscht with sour cream. For the non-abstemious, vodka and beer complete the table, along with both green and black tea, and an array of soft drinks, including a vibrant green soda, Waldmeister, once popular in East Germany (sweetened with Aspartame).

Looking around the room of one of the highly literate denizens of the capital, one sees a bookshelf with an amazing collection. Pushkin sits next to Lao-Tsu, Tagore, Rumi, Ibn Khaldun, Aristotle and Ernest Hemingway. The Bible, the Koran, the Analects of Confucius and the Mahabharata all sit together on another shelf. On the floor are Persian-inspired rugs and cushions for traditional seating; and in one corner, French provincial furniture for more Westernized occasions. A traditional two-stringed dotar hangs on the wall over a piano, with a saxophone propped in the corner. The radio plays Puccini's Nessun Dorma, and then Central Asian classical Shesh-maqam music, Hindi film music, Brittany Spears and finally Iranian pop tunes fresh from the vocal studios of Los Angeles.

The ladies of the household wear traditional long dresses in colorful native silk fabrics with headscarves. Older men wear Indian kurta shirts and cotton pants, and the young men and women don jeans and Adidas T-shirts. The mother works at traditional embroidery while next to her, her daughter surfs the internet on her laptop. The son sends text messages on his cell phone to his older brother studying in Hyderabad, and his younger brother in Beijing.

It's hard to get to Tajikistan, but the flights that do go there show its regional interconnections. Planes come in from Urumxi in Western China, New Delhi, Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates, Moscow and other cities in Russia, Istanbul, and Munich, as well as two other Central Asian large cities, Almaty and Bishkek.

None of this is surprising when one realizes that Tajikistan is the center of the Silk Road, the historic crossroads between East and West, north and south in Asia. It was the northernmost point for Alexander's conquests, and on the southern path for the Mongol Invasions. Historically it was the center of the Great Persian empires of the 15th to 18th centuries. Its population is tri-lingual: Uzbek, Tajik and Russian, reflecting the Turkic, Persian and European background of its residents.

Consequently, for young people in Tajikistan, the world is an open book. One young man I met recently over lunch, Rustam, named after the great Persian hero of the epic Shahnameh (Book of Kings), wanted my advice on graduate school in structural engineering.

"I could go to the United States, but it is expensive, and it is really hard to get a visa," he explained, "so I've been thinking about China, India, Iran, Turkey and Russia."

I look at the table in front of us, and see all those places reflected in our meal. "Well, what about the languages," I ask.

"Well, I already know Persian, because it is so close to Tajik. I just have to learn the Arabic alphabet (Tajik is written in Cyrillic letters). Of course, I know Russian, and Turkish is almost like Uzbek. I know enough English for India, and my friends who went to China say that the language is really easy."

Later, at the airport, I meet two young high-school graduates, Mahmud and Abbas, headed for Shanghai to do an undergraduate degree. "Do you know Chinese," I ask. "No," says Mahmud, "is it hard?" I pull out an elementary Chinese grammar and give them the benefit of my own rudimentary studies.

"Oh," says Abbas. "The characters are like pictures. That's really excellent. It looks like fun."

I asked them why they chose China.

"We were going to Moscow, but then my father said that China was the best place for business today, and then India, and that's what I want to study," said Abbas. "Then the Chinese government gave us both scholarships," chimed Mahmud.

"How about the United States," I asked.

"Why go there?" said Abbas with a shrug.