You want mechanical bits? They have mechanical bits. Electronic bits too.
You want cookware? They have cookware. They even have big cookware.
How about other round things? There’s lots of round things.
Clothes? Strangely foldable Soviet memorabilia? A whole bunch of stuff? It’s all here. Along with (mostly) full warehouse spaces.
One thing you’ll see, particularly on the weekends, is people setting up their own stalls.
I’d like to think they’re just cleaning out the house or reselling something they bought at another flea market, but, in few cases, I got the feeling they were selling whatever they could to keep the lights on.
Every day, all day, bakeries are pumping out huge round loaves of bread. But this ain’t no Wonder Bread operation. All the loaves are made by hand, stamped with a pretty design in the center, and sprinkled with seeds.
Then it’s one guy’s job to stick his head into a hot brick oven to slap the flat loaves onto the walls. Over and over.
Fortunately, no one has to use his hands to get the hot loaves out.
Heck, with the paddle, it looks easy, and not like you’re baking your face and hands into shoe leather.
After three days in Samarkand, we were ready to take the train to our next stop on the Silk Road, Bukhara. As we were rushing to board, however, Abby slipped off the (single, very high) step leading into the compartment. Instead of falling to the platform, she fell backward directly onto the tracks and fractured her skull. She was insensible for perhaps the most frightening 10 minutes of my life, and about 20 minutes after that we were in an ambulance headed straight to Samarkand’s finest hospital.
We stayed there a few nights while Abby recovered. While there were no amenities apart from a private room with its own washroom, the medical personnel were very attentive, and they took good care of Abby (apart from the ENT doctor who missed seeing the wad of cotton jammed up in her ear canal for two days). They also wouldn’t take a penny from us for her treatment. When Abby felt ready, we discharged ourselves and went to rest in Tashkent before proceeding to London on medevac for follow-up consultations.
So, what’s to see in Tashkent? Markets, of course!
First we have Chorsu Bazaar. Basically, if you eat it, they sell it.
If you don’t need onions or more onions, they have potatoes, spices, produce, and someone who’ll give you the stink eye for photographing the produce.
The real action is in the central building, which was built in 1980.
You want meat, you got it. You want bones, you got them. You want enormous sausages? You got them, too. Just be sure you know what critter you’re getting all of them from.Also, delicatessen meats and cheeses, multiple varieties of farmer’s cheese, and photogenic pickles.
COHN17 