The Blog Must Go On

If you're still working your way through the Italy blog, you can get to it here:

http://theroadmoretraveled-nicksblog.blogspot.com/2010/05/great-italy-adventure.html



But the adventure continues in Dushanbe and so does the blog. Getting back into work has been relatively easy, but getting back into Dushanbe has been tougher. It was amazing how, just after three weeks, it felt almost like we were coming here for the first time again when we got back from Italy. The feeling didn't last long, but it was interesting to have to adjust again.

I think I mentioned in my first post after we got back that one of my top employees was leaving for another U.S. Embassy - in Oman. He's gone now, but we had a good time sending him off. He hosted us for a big night out, which reminded me how lucky we are to be here. Anyone can visit, but we get to experience local culture in a way that most tourists never could.

We were also invited to a party at his house - with all the excessive eating that goes with it. This was just one of many events on our very busy Memorial Day Weekend. We got to go to a couple of BBQs, which was nice since it felt like home.

We've more or less given up on our hunt for a car, or even a driver. It's just too complicated and is eating up too much of our time. We slowly realized that we got by without cars in New York and Washington, and it's really no more difficult to do here. When we want to go out of town, we can hire someone to take us.

Another adventure has been trying to find a replacement for our bazaar. The one near us was closed by the government while we were gone so that they could build something else - no thought for where the people who worked there would go or how it would affect people living nearby, but that's par or the course. At first we thought we'd have to go to the Green Market every weekend, which isn't very convenient to us and is also very hectic.

Some friends of ours told us about a bazaar to the north and it turns out to be more our speed. Plus, we can catch the marshrutka right in front of our house to get there. We've really been enjoying the fruits of spring (literally) and have been stuffing ourselves with mulberries, apricots, plums, and cherries. The selection will only get better as time goes.

Last weekend, we went on the hike. We didn't have to go far, but it was a huge difference in scenery. In town, the hills are already turning the dull brown of summer, but in the mountains, it's still green and there are plenty of snow capped peaks to go around.


We started our hike near the sanatorium - it's a health spa built by the Russians to take advantage of natural hot springs that give of radon gas.


Yes, you read that right. People go there to breathe in radioactive fumes. Bypassing the radiation hazard, we enjoyed a nice long hike up to the snow line, which is still melting and giving of fresh clear streams of water.

We had to watch out for this one plant that apparently causes a burning rash - it's the one that looks like dill in this picture.

It was absolutely everywhere and despite our best efforts we both brushed up against it. Fortunately, a good scrubbing at home seems to have spared us any ill effects.

We ate lunch on some rocks next to the snow pack-

- and I was startled to see something huge lumbering towards us. It was so big it took me awhile to realize it was a bird - an eagle actually - and by the time I got my camera out it was already in flight. Pretty amazing.

On the way back, we were in a race against time to beat in incoming thunderstorms.

But that didn't mean we didn't have time to take some pictures of the locals or to appreciate some fossils in the rocks.

It's hard to believe that at one point these mountains were at the bottom of the sea.


Click the image for more pictures from the hike.

Hike 060510 jpgs

So here we are, and we've already been back longer than we were gone. The good thing is that the vacation still seems much longer in my mind than the last three weeks. We've already found a replacement for the employee that left, and life goes on...