#4 - My first pomegranate

Uzbekistan, 2012

I was leaving the ancient city of Bukhara, one of the most picturesque places in Uzbekistan and a perfect example of how to develop a modern city around historic buildings while preserving its character. Even the soviets were considerate in their era, keeping their communist grids away from the historic centre. Nothing looks out of place in Bukhara and many of the buildings have stood unmodified for almost a millennium. If you ever get the chance to go there, it's well worth your time.

I decided to try doing a car share from Bukhara to my next stop, Khiva. My host gave me a lift to a service station on the outskirts of town. Here I found several dozen men hanging around in the car park, leaning on their cars and attempting to solicit passengers to fill their cars. Armed with a piece of paper with 'Хива' written on it and the amount I was prepared to pay, I wandered around until somebody made an approving grunt.

I sat in the car while my driver went about finding more passengers. However after about 15 minutes things started getting a bit heated outside and one of the other men started getting aggressive with my driver. They were shouting in Uzbek and I couldn't tell if they were just fooling around or not. A moment later the man threw my driver against the side of the vehicle, still shouting at him. He then shifted his attention to me, speaking loudly in Russian (most people assumed I was Russian). He made hand gestures to suggest that my driver had been drinking and beckoned me to get out of the car.

Slightly startled, I considered making a bolt for it, but ultimately decided to stay put. I figured that I was probably overpaying for the journey and my driver had just got into a "friendly" scuffle with another driver who was jealous. At least that's what I told myself.

Eventually my driver managed to locate another three passengers to squeeze into the car with us and I found myself wedged between two portly gentlemen in the back. We weren't on the road for long though before we turned off the main road and onto a narrow dirt track. I had no idea what was going on, but the other guys seemed unperturbed, so I decided not to worry about it. It turned out that we were making a short stop at the driver's house to pick up some additional cargo. He also brought out a bag of pomegranates that he said (I think) he'd grown himself and handed one to each of us.

Back on the road again, we quickly left civilisation behind and headed out on our 470km journey across the Kyzyl Kum desert. Early on in the journey my fellow passengers began a game of guessing where I was from, but didn't speak English so were reliant on my equally non-existent Russian. After a long succession of 'nyet's we eventually got there, as one of them guessed Angliyskiy and I nodded 'da'.

Despite the language barrier, one thing I did pick up on was that we were low on fuel and needed to find a petrol station. This wasn't helped by the pot-hole riddled road, putting us on a serpentine path on an uneven surface, quickly burning off fuel. The landscape was vast and barren. We saw few other cars on the road and passed nothing. When eventually we did reach a petrol station, it turned out to have no fuel.

We trundled on, but after another hour went by it was clear that we were now running on fumes. The others had gone deathly silent and I sat squashed in the middle, clinging onto my pomegranate. If we broke down here it would probably be quite serious and I suspect it'd be a long wait to find alternative transport.

Thankfully we eventually were able to refuel though, and after a very long journey (it was probably around 8 hours in total) I made it to Khiva, exhausted and relieved. Once I found a hotel, I celebrated by cracking open my pomegranate and pondering why I didn't just take the train.

#3 - A rough landing in Uzbekistan

Uzbekistan, September 2012

Last summer I decided to travel alone across Uzbekistan for 10 days, in a bid to educate myself on a part of the world that I knew very little about. This entry covers my arrival into Uzbekistan.

You may remember that at the time, a poorly researched American film called "The Innocence of Muslims" sparked widespread (in some places violent) protests across much of the Muslim world. On the day that I was due to travel, the protests showed little sign of abating, however the Foreign Office suggested that they'd yet to hit Uzbekistan (a country where 90% of the population are Muslim). As a precaution, I registered my movements with the Foreign Office, then headed to the airport.

I flew to Uzbekistan via Moscow. My flight was filled with mostly Uzbek families, who all seemed to be returning from Russia with new flat-screen TVs and PCs, all as "hand baggage". I watched in bewilderment as a man made numerous futile attempts to cram a 32" flat-screen television into the overhead compartment.

Uzbekistan Airways: Good luck

My arrival into Tashkent (the capital of Uzbekistan) was a decidedly miserable experience. Landing at 3am, it took me over two hours to get out of the airport. By the time I made it outside, I was desperate to get to bed. Blearly-eyed, I staggered out into the morning sun to face the throngs of eager drivers, all looking for their first fare of the day.

After some half-hearted negotiation, I was shown to a car. The driver spoke only a few select phrases in English, so he spoke to me mostly in Russian, hoping that I'd understand. I did not. As he fired the engine up, music suddenly blasted through the stereo at a volume that would make astronauts stationed on the ISS jump. "Why do I recognise this song?" I thought to myself, before the unmistakable lyrics of Euro-pop abomination Aqua slapped me unceremoniously across the face: "I'm a Barbie girl, in a Barbie wo-o-orld. Life in plastic, it's fantastic!". Great.

Any hope of my driver turning down the music evaporated as the third Aqua track came on. Occasionally we slowed down as he tried to solicit business from passing pedestrians. This was a little alarming at the time, but I eventually discovered that you can't really hire a taxi in Uzbekistan, you merely hire a seat in one. 

As we arrived at my hotel, the driver pulled up across the road from the entrance gate. "You want to change money?", he looked at me expectantly, "I give you black market rate!". Now... I vaguely remembered reading something about this in a travel guide. It had either said "never change money with taxi drivers" or "take advantage of changing money with taxi drivers". I was fairly sure that it was the former, so I gave the man $200 (US dollar) and in exchange he gave me a pile of money about four inches thick (not an exaggeration). I was too tired to count through hundreds of notes, so I merely flipped through them to check that they were all indeed notes.

Just some of the money that I was given by my taxi driver

After a short nap, I decided to venture into Tashkent. This was it, I was finally in Uzbekistan!

The first thing I noticed about Tashkent was how foreign it felt. This might seem like an odd statement to make, however there are two good reasons for this: 

1. Thanks to a brutal massacre instigated by the Uzbek government in 2005, there are now next to no foreign brands in the country, with the exception of a few Russian and Korean ones. Consequently there are no recognisable hotel chains, fast food companies or fashion outlets in the country.
2. The Uzbek language is incomprehensible unless you know Russian. Most things seemed to be written in modified Cyrillic, so for example, the city of 'Khiva' is written 'Хива'.

Tashkent is a nostalgic throwback to Soviet times. Drab concrete buildings line the uniform grids of streets. At night the roads are illuminated predominantly by starlight. Fading propaganda slogans adorn every façade, while the ubiquitous police patrol the streets below. 

I spent half a day trying to buy a train ticket to get out of Tashkent. Initially I couldn't find the railway station, as it was cunningly disguised as a government building. I then couldn't find the ticket office. Nobody I spoke to could speak English and none of the signs contained information that I could understand. I eventually found the ticket hall hidden around the corner, quite a distance from the station. Unable to read any of the signs at the counters, I joined three incorrect queues before I found one that led to a counter willing to sell me a ticket.

Exhausted, but victorious, I left the station in search of dinner. Little did I know that the following day I would find myself wearing a burka and getting invited to a wedding....

To be continued

#2 - Four strangers in a lift

China, June 2011

I'd just visited the coastal city of Qingdao (where Tsingtao beer comes from) and was on my way inland to Jinan. It was a five-hour train journey trapped inside a cramped and overheated carriage. Every inch of space in the carriage was filled with either people or bags. I was lucky enough to get a seat, but as it was a ying zuo (hard seat) carriage, the seats felt like they were originally designed to torture people accused of "subversion of state power". My buttocks would never forgive me.

Sat across from me on the train was a shy-looking girl, about 20-years old. She wore a bright yellow t-shirt and thick rimmed glasses. From the moment she sat down she'd started staring at me intently, a nervous smile hovering on her face. I occasionally met her gaze and smiled back. Every time we made eye contact her eyes lit up and her small nervous smile grew into a huge beaming grin. It was infectious. As much as I resisted, I couldn't hold back the grin from stretching across my face too. Moments later we both spontaneously broke out into laughter. A few heads turned to witness two strangers laughing at each other on train for no apparent reason.

Her name was Meng Jing. She was a student in Jinan, returning to university for the new semester. She didn't speak any English (I suspect she knew a little), but we got by in Chinese. At this point I was quite used to curious people coming up to talk to me in China, but Meng Jing seemed almost star-struck to have met me.

"What will you see in Jinan?" she asked me, eyes still fixed on me at all times.

"I don't know yet," I answered honestly, "I'm not familiar with Jinan. Do you have any suggestions?". 

Meng Jing wrote down the names of some sites I should visit, sat back thoughtfully for a minute, then started typing something on her phone. A moment later she lifted her head to ask me "do you have a hotel yet?". I hadn't. She then smiled to herself and got back to what she was doing.

While Meng Jing busied herself on her phone, the people around us, who'd been largely silent up until that point, began to quiz me on my itinerary. I got out the envelope that I'd scribbled my intended route on.

"You can't go to Qufu!" exclaimed the old lady sat next to me, "You won't be able to travel to your next stop from there. Why don't you go to Tai'An instead?". 

The guy sat next to Meng Jing, who'd been asleep the entire journey, woke from his slumber to point out another flaw in my plan. Then disembodied voices, drifting from behind bags and other people, also began opining about my plan. Very soon I had a robust itinerary laid out for the rest of my trip. The consensus was that it was the most interesting route to Nanjing, although a couple of the voices maintained that the routes they'd suggested were better.

As we approached Jinan, Meng Jing explained what she'd been doing on her phone earlier. "My friend is going to meet you at her campus across town. She can help you find a hotel and will take you sight-seeing tomorrow". I was speechless. This was incredible! I couldn't thank her enough. The guy who'd been sat next to Meng Jing promised to help me get across town, as he lived in the same part of the city. Together we rode the bus to Meng Jing's friend's campus and sure enough, she was there waiting for us when we arrived.

The friend's English name was Sofia. Another girl had also come out, curious to meet the Englishman who can't plan a trip properly. Once introductions had been made, we headed over to the university campus hotel. The guy I'd taken the bus with decided to tag along too, not wishing to miss out on the fun. 

For a university that boasts of its international credentials, curiously the campus hotel in Jinan didn't have a licence to host foreigners. Sometimes hotels are willing to bend the rules a little, but this one couldn't be budged. The receptionist suggested that we try a 4-star hotel just outside the campus instead.

So onwards we marched, across the campus to the aforementioned hotel, just outside the gates. Thankfully this one did accept foreigners. My entourage negotiated the room rate for me and Sofia insisted that we all see the room first before I paid for it.

As we headed up in the lift, the absurdity of the situation suddenly hit me. Apart from the two girls, who knew each other already, we were all strangers. Essentially I was in a lift with three people I'd just met, and who didn't all know each other, heading up to inspect a hotel room together. This was weird. Wonderful, but weird.

The consensus was that the room was okay, so I dumped my bag and we headed out for dinner, which Sofia insisted on paying for. Over dinner we discussed the plan for the next day. I agreed to meet Sofia at 8am for breakfast, then we'd climb Thousand Buddha Mountain together with a couple of her friends. I was blown away by Sofia's kindness towards me.

I returned to my crowd-sourced room that evening with the biggest grin on my face. I sent Meng Jing a text message to thank her for making this all possible, then fell asleep, still smiling.

Me with Sofia (far right) and her two friends on Thousand Buddha Mountain

#1 - The worst date I've ever been on

Over the coming weeks I'll be covering some of my more memorable experiences in China, Uzbekistan and other far-flung places. But I wanted to start this blog much closer to home, both geographically and spiritually, with a delightful tale about the worst date I've ever been on. Enjoy!

About a year ago I decided to give internet dating a second chance. I'd tried it briefly once before in 2010, but didn't really get into the spirit of it and only met one person. Much to my surprise and delight though, the one girl I did meet was adorable and we hit it off from the start. We were only together for a short time, but I look back on that experience fondly. 

Secure in the knowledge that sometimes internet dating can work, I signed up with another website and made more of an effort to meet people this time. As a result, I had my first date lined up within a few days. We agreed to meet at a pub in East London and the scene was set for what promised to be a pleasant evening.

How wrong I was.

The date was doomed from the start. She was an actress and a published poet, who usually spent her evenings performing; either on stage in theatrical productions, or in bars for her poetry evenings. By contrast, I'm an introverted self-confessed nerd who likes to spend time learning Chinese, constructing things out of paper and travelling alone. To say that we had nothing in common would be an understatement. I tried my best, but we simply spoke different languages and within minutes the conversation had dried up to the point where we were both contemplating our exit strategies.

Before we could escape though, a member of the bar staff came over to our table and asked us to move downstairs to the basement, as the show was about to start. "Show?" I inquired of my date, slightly confused. "Yes," she said, "there's a free comedy show in the basement this evening. Let's go down!".

Caught slightly off-guard by her sudden enthusiasm for this date to continue, I followed her downstairs, where the only remaining seats in the room were located on the front row. My stomach churned as we squeezed through the audience towards the one spot where clearly nobody wanted to be.

While we waited for the compère to begin the show, my date recounted her last experience at a comedy club. "...so I got dragged up onto the stage by the comedian, who took off all of his clothes and then forced me to shove a bar of soap up his rectum. It was disturbing at the time, but pretty hilarious looking back on it". A little shocked, the only words that found their way out of my mouth were "That doesn't really sound funny to me. More.... illegal". And with that we had reached our conversation quota for the evening.

After a brief warm up by the compère, the first comedian sprung onto the stage and looked around the audience. "So who here is on an internet dating website?" he asked. My jaw dropped. This was the opening line of the opening act of the evening. "You've got to be shitting me" I thought to myself. I suddenly felt like a sitting duck on the front row. I glanced nervously at my date to see if she'd put her hand up. Thankfully she had not.

Barely had I breathed a sigh of relief though, when she started heckling the man on stage. The first of what turned out to be many heckles that evening. When asked by one of the acts what she does for a living, she responded "I'm an escort", at which point I buried my head in my hands and cursed myself for not escaping when I'd had the chance.

Mercifully the last act eventually took to the stage and, as had become customary by that point, engaged in some banter with my date, asking about her life as an escort. "And who is your date?", asked the comedian, suddenly turning his attention to me, "You guys have been sat together all evening and he hasn't said a word to you!". It was a bit of a low blow, but undoubtedly a fair point.  Without missing a beat I piped back "I'm her manager!", which got a laugh from the audience. A minor victory in the midst of a train wreck.

After the show finished we headed back upstairs and went our separate ways. Needless to say we didn't contact each other again, but I felt like I'd established a new low, and that was something. From that point on, any date I went on couldn't possibly go worse.

An Introduction

My name is Matthew and I write a lot of notes. My notes are sporadic and typically consist of a series of disconnected thoughts and observations taken from around the world. To list but a few examples: I've made notes halfway up a mountain in China, in the middle of the desert in Uzbekistan, while freezing in the Arctic Circle and while lost in the Middle East. They rarely make sense, but they're usually quite entertaining.

In an effort to start writing more and find a more permanent home for these notes, I've decided to tidy some of them up and publish them to a blog. I have quite a lot of material to draw from, so I should be able to post new entries once a week for the foreseeable future. I'll see how it goes.