Naz Gul called a taxi for me to take me back to Bazar-Korgon where I was supposed to find a connecting ride (in the form of a shared minivan ride, or as they’re known in Russian, “marshrutka”) to Bishkek, an 8+ hour journey. Due to a misunderstanding, I found out I had to pay for…
Arslanbob
After a series of marshrutka rides taking me from Osh to Jalal-Abad to Bazar-Korgon, I entered the Chatkal mountain range and into a region famous for its expansive surrounding walnut forest, one of the largest in the world. My destination was a small, rural village called Arslanbob. After getting dropped off in the village center, I went…
The conversation in the Lada
“Ya ne ponimayu.” No matter how many times I repeated that phrase (and with a smile), the guys in the Lada kept speaking Russian to me. “Guys, I don’t understand!” I guess they believed that with enough persistence, I would finally give in, admit I do speak fluent Russian, and have a conversation with them….
Osh – and where we all said goodbye
Back in 2010 when I first set off to travel the world, I met some guys in a hostel in Turkey who had cycled all the way from Germany. Back then when I first knew that people could ride that far, and even now, after meeting many others who’ve done long-distance bicycle journeys, I am…
Keer-geer-stan – The Journey to Osh
I pride myself on being a decent speller. After all, I was once a reserve on my 3rd grade spelling bee team, combing the Oxford dictionary to learn and memorize multi-syllabic words that I or most normal humans would never use in our daily lives from the day the spelling bee competition ended. (We didn’t…
RIP Pickle
A few weeks ago, our family dog Pickle had to be put down. He had heart troubles as well as several conditions from his old age that affected his quality of life severely. I was glad I got to spend two weeks dog-sitting him while my family was back in Malaysia. Each morning, he would…
The Highway of Dreams
One way to experience the legend of the purported Eighth Wonder of the World, the Karakoram Highway (or KKH for short), is to travel from Kashgar to the town of Tashkurgan. Although Tashkurgan itself isn’t much of a destination, it’s a great place to rest for the night after a six-hour journey. I’d been told that there…
The Kashgar Livestock Market
As I showed a taxi driver a picture of the Kashgar livestock market I found on the internet, I told him, “Wo yao chi zhe bian” (“I want to go here.”). The Uyghur-looking driver looked at me and replied back in Mandarin as we looked at each other, him in a questioning and I in…
Practicing Gratitude
March 14, 2019 This morning, somewhere on the East Coast of USA, I woke up early to walk to the beach to watch the sunrise. I don’t remember if I’d ever watched the sunrise on the Atlantic Ocean so this marked a first for me. Watching the sunrise reminded me of a practice I’ve been…
Ōu’ěr Dáxīkè Night Market
No matter where you travel to in the world, night markets always provide fascinating things to look at, interesting people to watch, and delicious food to sample. Late one evening, I was wandering the streets near Id Kah Mosque when I came across the “Ou Er Da Xi Ke” Road night (technically, “evening”) market. Entrance…