Coming to Turkmenistan

Turkmen Flag

Ok…so just where in the world is Turkmenistan? Unless you are involved in the oil/gas business or are a hardcore international affairs wonk like me, you probably have no idea where Turkmenistan is. No worries, when I told people I was traveling to Turkmenistan, I was met with a lot of blank stares and weird questions like my trainer who asked me if Turkmenistan was located in the Southern Hemisphere? Try again; you’re just off by an entire hemisphere and 10,000 some miles. However, this comes as no shock since Americans hardly know where Canada is located! In answer to the question, The Republic of Turkmenistan is at the western end of Central Asia aka The Silk Road and just north of Iran. Their neighbors are: Iran (south), Russia (only by sea), Kazakhstan (Borat’s home), Uzbekistan and finally last but not least our 51st state, Afghanistan….The Republic of Afghanistan! 

I landed in Turkmenistan early Halloween morning after a quick hop across the Caspian Sea from Baku, Azerbaijan. I knew Turkmenistan was a bureaucratic nightmare and sure enough the moment I walked off the plane the hassle began! As I approached the Passport Control window, I heard the guard yell “NO, BAААААNNNNK!!!”. I was like..…BAAANK, what the hell was he saying? Finally it dawned on me he said “BANK”, but with a heavy accent!!! Ok message received, go to the bank window just a few feet to the left of passport control and pay some type of bullsh*t fee. However, I wondered why I needed to pay anything when I had paid for my visa (an entry document, not a VISA card) in advance. Oh well I thought, this is Turkmenistan, not The Cook Islands (where I’d traveled the year before), so “When in Rome, do like the Romans do”! I grudgingly paid my $12 phantom visa fee and proceeded to baggage claim, which oddly enough was not in the usual place like most airports. Instead it was located behind two wide doors that looked as if it was the entrance to an operating room. I entered the  operating room baggage claim and there she was, my bag sitting there alone in a big empty room! Once I exited baggage claim, waiting for me was my guide and driver. In order to enter Turkmenistan I had to hire a guide for the duration of my trip.

Statue of Turkmenbashi

After arriving at the hotel at about 2:30 AM I went straight to bed. Luckily I woke up later that morning refreshed and ready for a full day of sightseeing around Ashgabat, the nation’s capital! As we zipped down the wide streets of the capital I felt a tinge of déjà vu…as if I had somehow been there before! Hmmmm…. a city in the middle of the desert, countless lights, over the top water features the size of Mt. Everest, and shiny glass/marble buildings… Just where had I seen this before? Oh yeah…. LAS VEGAS!!! I really doubt Ashgabat would want to be labeled “Sin City”, but it was an irresistible comparison!

Turkmenistan Ministry of Education

Anyway....the buildings and city itself were amazing! Two of the most interesting landmarks that came to my attention were, The Ministry of Education and The Ministry of Oil and Gas building. Usually such sights would trigger nothing more than a yawn, however these two were exceptions. The Ministry of Education was in the form of..........wait for it........a book! And, The Ministry of Oil and Gas was shaped like.........a lighter!

Ministry of Gas and Oil

Our whirlwind city tour concluded at a small nonchalant café in the city center. There we would meet up with “The Barber from Mary (a city in Turkmenistan)” for lunch. Sounds pretty formal eh? Nah, we were just meeting my tour guide’s good friend, Marud, who worked as a barber in Ashgabat, but was from the town of Mary. He had heard my guide had an American client (me), so he was very anxious to come by and practice his English! Although he only knew a few phrases, words, etc… he seemed determined to impress me. I would give him an A+ for effort! After all it is not easy to learn a foreign language, just ask me….. I’ve studied Russian for over 20 years and I still have my moments. 

Sunset over Ashgabat

Lunch was quite good plus “The Barber of Mary” was treating us all to lunch. What could be better than sitting around with good company, enjoying a warm late Autumn day and eating delicious Russian/Turkish food! It didn’t get any better until………the kamikaze flies showed up! Suddenly out of nowhere came several flies one of which took a kamikaze dive-bomb straight into my delicious pelminy (a Russian dumpling) soup. There he swam helplessly, eventually succumbing to a tidal wave of sour cream brought about by my spoon. My appetite quickly vanished!

After more sightseeing around the capital, my first day came to a close! I thanked my tour guide for the great day out in Ashgabat and went to my room for some r&r. I flipped through the channels on my TV and nothing looked interesting. The channel lineup was the usual assortment of channels you’d find, like: BBC News, Euro News, a Russian news channel that you could barely make out and some other boring government station all in Turkmen. Then my remote stopped on the Turkmen version of MTV aka Channel 5 Turkmen Owazy. I thought about changing the channel, but there was something about the music videos that just sung to me (no punt intended)! Maybe it was the sheer amount of dogma and propaganda in the videos depicting Turkmenistan as some modern utopia, where everyone lived so happily and loved their dear leader! Unfortunately, not being a speaker of Turkmen or Turkish, I could not understand anything; nonetheless I felt I got the point, as propaganda knows no borders! Thanks for reading! Stay tuned for more stories about my time in Turkmenistan. Спасибо за внимание!

Turkmenistan's current President!