A Carpet Ride to Khiva: Seven Years on the Silk Road (17 page)

‘The Kazakhs, they were so hard. You know, we used to make jokes about the Kazakhs. We thought they were simple, and now here we were begging them for work. Everything was more expensive there
and people were earning much better wages. We had to build a school, and it was winter and really cold. They showed us an old railway wagon with no heating and told us that we would live there. They gave us such thin blankets and old corpuches to sleep on. We had to work really hard and we kept asking them when they would pay us and they always promised it would be soon. In the end they cheated
us out of everything. They didn’t even pay for our transport home. Coming back, the border guards stole my jacket – my one decent piece of clothing. I came back to Khiva with no hope. My wife cried when she saw how thin I was, and I had such a fever from the cold.

‘Aslan, I prayed to God and asked him why this was happening. Why was he punishing me? What had I done wrong? My wife, she was
so worried about me, even more worried than about the children and how we would get money. I did some odd jobs for my brother, but that wasn’t enough. Then the workshop started and now I have a job and I’m learning the skills of my forefathers that we have forgotten. Now I can lift up my head again. I will always work as hard as I can for you and for our workshop.’

* * *

Madrim’s story
was a common one, and tales of unemployment and desperation repeated themselves around the country. Factory after factory had closed, unable to run on market principles and unsure what to do without orders issued from Tashkent or Moscow. Petty trading with Russia and neighbouring countries took off. Large women, capable of hefting their bodyweight in bazaar bags, were prominent on every train
or bus – usually shouting at a guard or policeman angling for a bribe. The ‘kiosk economy’, as it was known, had kept former Soviet countries afloat during the first rocky years of independence. As the fortunes of Russia and Kazakhstan improved, manual labouring jobs became more popular and now, every spring, convoys of clapped-out buses left for Orenburg, Kazan and Perm.

This changed the
whole demographic of Khiva. In winter I would sit for up to two hours waiting my turn at the barbers while being interrogated about the price of meat in England, the price of a loaf of bread, a car, a trip to the brothel, the wage of a teacher or football player. How much did I earn, was I circumcised, had I ever been to Liverpool, Newcastle, Arsenal or Manchester? In summer, the barber greeted
me like a long-lost friend, desperate for business. It wasn’t long before he too packed up his shop and followed everyone else in search of work.

The annual migration split families, giving little time for newlyweds to get to know each other after an arranged marriage. They were often virtual strangers, and living with extended family, a new bride spent more time with her mother- and sisters-in-law
than with her own husband. A friend once called me with the good news that he was getting married in three weeks and that I must come and give a speech at his wedding. I congratulated him and asked him who the bride was, but he still wasn’t sure – his parents hadn’t told him yet.

Children grew up without their father’s discipline, and boredom drinking was becoming a serious problem in the
latter winter months. Women had mixed feelings about the forced separation. Many missed their husbands, brothers, sons and fathers but also enjoyed greater freedom and responsibility while their husbands were away. There were stories of teenage boys seduced by desperate housewives, though generally speaking it was the men who kept the brothels of Russia and Kazakhstan in business.

In fact,
there was a marked double standard when it came to sexual practices. Young men boasted of their exploits with donkeys or ‘bad girls’ but expected blood on the sheets after the wedding night as proof of virginity. After marriage many men continued to frequent brothels, using the tenuous argument that the Prophet had more than one wife. When I asked how they would feel if their wives behaved in the
same way, they got upset, suggesting that I questioned their wives’ honour. Over a bowl of tea, one friend asked me if I would permit my future wife to place my tool in her mouth. I mumbled something non-committal as he expounded on the wickedness of this practice, assuring me that this was something he did only with ‘bad girls’. Asked what his wife would say if she knew this, he simply shrugged.
She didn’t.

Morality, as far as men were concerned, seemed to be a case of not getting caught; but this was certainly not so for women. If there wasn’t blood on the wedding sheets, the new bride would be thrown out on the street and returned to her parents, where a thrashing awaited her. Women were expected to endure rather than enjoy sex with their husbands, merely lying back and thinking
of the sons they would produce – their character questioned if they exhibited too much pleasure. Bored with their wives, men would seek out prostitutes or, if they could afford it, take a mistress or share one with a few other men. A friend from a village told me how hard it had been for his father, sleeping in the same room as all his children. My friend would lie there, listening to bedclothes
rustling and then his mother’s whispered hiss: ‘You came to me last night. Just give me some peace. How many donkeys do we own? Can’t you bother them?’ His father would slink out to the stables, my friend ensuring that his own nightly forays never coincided.

The differing expectations of men and women were engendered young in life. Little boys were spoilt and coddled, spending their days
swimming naked in the canal or playing football with friends. Their bodies were fawned over – tiny penises tugged affectionately by older relatives. Little girls were taught to feel shame over their bodies, even toddlers expected to cover up. They learnt to sweep and to help their mother and older sisters prepare food for their brothers, ready for when they charged into the house, exhausted by play.

The spectre of AIDS hung over Uzbekistan, with its large population of promiscuous and itinerant men who knew little about sexually transmitted diseases. I asked friends if they used condoms and they usually just shrugged, saying, ‘May God save us’; or they explained that they always washed carefully afterwards.

‘I only use the good girls’ was another common response. My neighbour’s
son told me about a doctor who, for a bribe, administered injections that gave protection from all sexual illnesses for three months.

To fend off the bombardment of questions on my sex life each time I visited the gym, I asked my companions instead about their own habits. If I raised the issue of marital fidelity, the reply was always the same. ‘Aslan, do you like plov?’ they would ask,
to which there could be only one answer. ‘Yes,’ they would continue, ‘but you wouldn’t want to eat it every day, would you?’

I parried with a culinary question of my own. I asked my friends if they enjoyed steamed meat dumplings, fried meat pastries or boiled meat ravioli, pointing out that they were the same dish, just cooked in different ways. Often the root cause of married men visiting
brothels was that their wives had been taught that sex was a sinful necessity in order to produce children, and that they should simply accept it as a duty. I found myself dispensing simple bedroom tips – the type found in any women’s glossy at home – to spice up married relationships a little.

* * *

I felt that the development of the workshop was going well, but my feelings weren’t
shared by Barry, whose passion for carpets had made him a little too involved in the project, leading him to micro-manage from Tashkent. I baulked at being ordered around and reminded him that we were partners and that he wasn’t my boss.

‘Yes, but who’s paying for this project?’ Barry threatened after a fraught discussion over the phone.

‘If it’s a question of money, Barry, I’m sure
Operation Mercy would be happy to provide funding as well. We could go halves,’ I countered, and the matter was promptly dropped.

However, phone discussions remained terse and visits were worse. Barry monitored a number of locally-run regional projects and was used to Uzbeks anticipating his arrival, ensuring that everything looked perfect and ran smoothly, at least for the duration of his
visit. Whenever the President visited Khorezm, the electricity, gas and water all magically functioned, the roads were swept, buildings – even private houses along important streets – were painted and flowers planted in a grand charade of progress. I saw this as papering over the cracks and wasn’t about to do the same with Barry. He was keen to visit the workshop every few months and would usually
begin by complaining and nit-picking.

‘Why have you drawn this design in two different shades of red?’ he demanded once, sitting in the office cell.

‘Because they’re two different shades in the miniature. Here, look,’ I replied, handing him the original picture.

‘No they’re not!’

‘Yes they are.’

‘No they’re bloody well not!’

‘Barry, you can swear at me if you
like, but it doesn’t change the colour. There are definitely two different shades of red in that miniature. Take the book out into the courtyard and look at it in natural light.’

Barry returned a few minutes later, complaining about our lack of decent office lighting in lieu of an apology.

Our strained relationship was saved a few weeks later by Barry’s fall down a flight of stairs.
He was rushed to Paris for an operation and six months’ recuperation. I felt guiltily overjoyed, hoping for some peace and quiet and space to get on with things.

With Barry gone, I felt more at liberty to pursue an idea which Barry had vetoed. I loved our Timurid carpet designs but also wanted us to weave something unique to Khiva. The beautiful majolica tiled walls of the old city, complete
with field and frame, already looked like hanging carpets and the designs were original. There even seemed to be a link between the Timurid designs and the oldest tiles in Khiva, found on the tomb of Sayid Allaudin. The tiles were contemporary with the Timurid miniatures and featured the same stylised Kufic knots found in Timurid carpets. I visited the tomb and asked for permission to climb over
the barrier and explore it more thoroughly. The old lady in charge, keen to offend an ageing mullah who had recently installed himself on her turf, happily guided me through.

The tiles were raised in a subtle relief and of a higher quality than the more commonplace 19th-century ones. The design and colour palette of deep blue, turquoise and white worked well, and a repeating octagonal pattern
found on top of the tomb would make an excellent field.

Madrim was keen on the design but nervous of Barry’s response. Still, Barry was in Paris and would stay there for some time, so I put plans for our ‘rebel rug’ into action as we prepared for our first wage day.

8

The dawn sweepers

‘You would never believe it,’ he said, ‘how our women are spoilt among us Sarts (Uzbeks). You can often see Kirghiz women working in the fields, or Russian women too, but you’ll never see a Sart woman doing so. Even in the house they do not do much; they can’t even cook a decent plov, they only spoil the rice.’

—Paul Nazaroff,
Hunted Through
Central Asia
, 1932

Money-changing was part of my initial orientation in Tashkent. On my arrival in 1998, a dollar was worth around 240 som in the bank and around 280 som in the bazaar. Changing in the bazaar was easier (the service was much better) but illegal. Over subsequent years, the gap between the bank and bazaar rates widened considerably until there was 700 som difference. Key government
ministers amassed a personal fortune from this two-tier system despite the financial ruin it was causing the country. International businesses despaired and left. The private sector dwindled and the police enjoyed the bribes they collected each day from the money-changers in return for turning a blind eye to their practices.

I was introduced to a shop selling underwear and perfume in Mirobod
bazaar next to the Operation Mercy flat in Tashkent. The majority of other customers also came for illicit monetary exchanges. We would hand over our dollar notes and linger until a stout woman returned with a carrier bag bearing the equivalent in som. The system worked well until a policeman drew close, at which point we immediately feigned interest in displays of thongs or a mannequin leg festooned
with garters.

The Khiva bazaar – keen to exploit unwary tourists – was not a good place to change money. My policy was to count the bundles of greasy som notes before handing over my dollars, ignoring the impatient assurances that the money was ‘with guarantee’. As the dollar devalued, changing money surreptitiously became less simple. The handing over of a dollar bill was no problem, but
the bundles of som given in return were a little more conspicuous. The largest denomination was 500 som – around half a dollar – and suitcases full of money were needed to make transactions for cars or to buy plane tickets.

Early on the morning of our first wage day in the spring of 2002, I went down to the bazaar with Madrim. We passed the fish-sellers, stalls of stationery and toiletries,
reams of bright polyester material for dresses, and crates of vodka, arriving at a group of men loitering next to a clothing stall. We were immediately solicited with calls of ‘Dollar, Rusiski!’ announcing the two currencies used alongside the som. I wanted nothing smaller than 100-som bills and we found someone willing to change, assuring us that we could bring back any bundles missing a note
or two. Filling a sturdy bazaar bag, we heaved the contents back to the workshop, where there was a general air of festivity. Weavers sat in gaggles outside, discussing an especially glittery pair of shoes they had in mind, or the material they’d seen in the caravanserai which was expensive but particularly shiny. Work had ground to a halt.

Ulugbibi and Safargul, the weaving ustas, joined
us in the office cell as we tipped out the bundles of som onto the table and began counting. The smaller notes were held together with nothing but grease, sweat and dirt. Women tended to keep their money in their bras; and in summer, returned change was moist to the touch, especially after a plump matriarch selling cherries had rooted around in her cavernous bra for the correct notes.

The
weavers filed in, loom by loom, to receive their wages. Outside, they fanned their bundles of notes at those still waiting, laughing, joking and keen to hit the bazaar as soon as possible. The dyers swaggered in like khans, ignoring heckling from the weavers, and strutted out waving their wages in the air to mock applause. The actual wage was pitiful, but for many in the workshop it was the first
time they had ever received such a thing, and they were relishing every moment. I hoped that we could increase these basic apprentice wages to something more substantial once we began selling carpets.

I wasn’t being paid a penny to run the workshop, but I received more than enough payment watching the younger weavers discuss what gifts they would buy family members, or seeing women like
Sanajan the widow quietly fold her bundle of notes into her bra, knowing that she would be putting food on the table for her children.

After our first wage day there was a deluge of women wanting to work with us. We started a list on a first-come, first-served basis, undeterred by applicants who attempted sobbing or seduction in order to jump the queue. The weavers, feeling flush, bought
enough material to make into a kind of uniform, returning with reams of black polyester fabric covered in large neon-green and yellow bow motifs. Wasn’t this the most beautiful fabric? I was asked, lying in reply.

Shirin invited everyone to her house for her birthday and we enjoyed the first of many social gatherings outside the workshop. Friendships were forming, along with a corporate
sense of identity. I was limited in how much time I could spend, as a man, with the weavers. Most were deferential, at least at the beginning, although there were some definite exceptions. Dark Nazokat was one of them. A continual source of worry to her mother, her dark skin colour reduced her chances of ever finding a husband, further dampened by her loud, boisterous character. She was usually at
the centre of workshop gossip or scandal and developed a worrying crush on Madrim, who dreaded every encounter with her.

‘The darkness of the heart shows itself in the skin,’ tutted one of the older weavers, quoting an Uzbek proverb, as Nazokat began a slanging match with Toychi the dyer, with whom she either flirted or sparred.

I spent more time with the weaving ustas and, as we worked
together, Ulugbibi liked to complain about her mother-in-law, who kept a tight rein on her. Ulugbibi herself was a striking woman and had been quite a head-turner in her youth – promptly married off to keep her out of trouble. She lived with her husband, his mother and her two sisters-in-law who had never married and enjoyed picking on her. Ulugbibi longed to move out, but her husband struggled
to find work and they couldn’t afford their own place. I asked her if she loved her husband, which she considered a strange question and one to which she hadn’t given much thought. Safargul the usta was in a similar predicament as the main breadwinner in their house. Her husband, according to Madrim, was a good-for-nothing. Safargul was careful to keep her earnings away from him, knowing how quickly
they could be turned into a wild bout of drinking or frittered away on ‘bad girls’.

* * *

Although women were undoubtedly second-class citizens in Khiva, their lot had improved dramatically. In fact, the impact of Communism on women’s rights all over Central Asia was nothing short of revolutionary. Previously they had been veiled, largely house-bound and the property of their husbands
– who could divorce them by merely repeating ‘I divorce thee’ three times. Suddenly they were presented with a bewildering level of status. Under Soviet law, women could divorce their husbands and gain employment, and were provided with unlimited access to birth control and abortion.

As the Bolsheviks gained control over Turkestan (later carved up into the current –stans) in the early 1920s,
they called on women to emancipate themselves, to throw off the veil and discard domestic servitude for equal rights as factory workers.

Gustav Krist, an Austrian POW interned in Turkestan during the First World War, escaped to Persia but returned in the mid-1920s to witness the transformation taking place under the Communist regime. Previously veiled women now wore Soviet skirts and jackets.
He met a young proletariat leader of one village who had, a few years previously, been an illiterate slave, third wife to a rice merchant. Now she was the most powerful person in the village, learning how to read and to speak Russian.

Schools of ballet were set up to better the toiling masses, and Uzbek girls, previously scolded for exposing too much wrist, now paraded on stage in tights
and tutus. Liberated bare-faced Uzbek women braved the old city in Tashkent, going from house to house and preaching emancipation. The first batch had their throats promptly slit and their successors were provided with revolvers. Mass veil-burnings were conducted in public squares, the air acrid with the smell of burning horse-hair. The scratchy black horse-hair veil was worn under the
paranja
–
a long cape with extended ornamental sleeves, sewn together at the wrist like handcuffs to symbolise that this wearer was the property of her husband. The veil could be flicked back, exposing the face and allowing free conversation with other women, then flipped over again if men passed by. They were stifling in summer, made breathing difficult, and with regular use left scabs on the nose and
chin where the rough horse-hair continually rubbed. The overall effect was best described by a Swiss traveller to Central Asia in the 1930s, Ella Maillart, who referred to passing women veiled in this way as walking upright coffins.

In order to liberate women, not only from the veil but from motherhood, huge crèches were set up in the factories. Neat rows of beshiks were rocked by nurses,
their contents tightly swaddled inside. Most Uzbek babies spent the first year of their life strapped tightly into one of these cradles, which flattened the back of their skull. They proved essential in traditional families, in which women produced large numbers of children and were unable to watch over them all at once. Dummies dipped in sugar and opium kept babies happy and quiet, their mothers
lifting a breast over the rocking wooden structure to feed.

The beshiks
were designed to keep mess to a minimum, each floored with a mattress with a hole strategically positioned halfway down to collect piped urine.
Strings of cloves and chilli peppers adorned each beshik, bread and a knife were placed under the mattress, and triangular amulets stuffed with Koranic verses hung from the wooden
rocking handle that ran the length of the cradle. These were all
achik
,
and kept the evil eye at bay. European cradles were introduced in the Soviet factories but met with stiff opposition from the workers and were soon replaced with beshiks
.
These were, after all, a practical way of caring for large numbers of infants, and the time-honoured tradition of dipping dummies in sugar and opium also
proved popular with Soviet nurses, quietening the unhappiest of squalls.

Another Soviet concession regarded the use of
isfan.
This dried yellow plant – the equivalent of garlic in medieval Europe – was said to cleanse the air of evil spirits, particularly those causing disease. Anyone taking to their bed with flu needed nothing more than a thorough smoking – a pan of acrid isfan smoke wafted
around them. The Soviets, attempting to ban such superstitious nonsense, soon realised the futility of this and instead secularised the practice. Soviet doctors declared that isfan rid the air of microbes. Even today, each time there’s a flu epidemic, school nurses wander the classrooms in their white coats and surgical masks, smoking each child with a belching pan of isfan.

* * *

Despite gains for women made under Communism, traditional values remained strong, as I witnessed during my seven years in Uzbekistan. In the Khorezm oasis women had a particularly hard time, as brides were sold for a hefty bride-price – the groom’s family then expecting value for money.

Grooms were expected to provide a chest full of new dresses, a set of corpuches and heavy gold-hooped earrings.
Most families, struggling to make ends meet, could hardly afford this or the huge quantities of food and vodka consumed by hundreds of wedding guests.

Weddings took an entire day, beginning with a tour of the Ichan Kala’s holy sites for the bridal couple and their friends. A madrassah converted into a wonderfully kitsch confection of plasterwork, zodiac signs, stained-glass windows of bride
and groom, and even a stork with a baby-sized parcel in its beak, made for the ‘house of happiness’ where a register was signed and the couple were legally married.

The wedding party, enjoying the absence of older relatives, then raced in their cars to one of the war memorials where they would lay flowers in a nod to Soviet tradition – the cars festooned with ribbons and balloons and LOVE
written in English on the back window. The groom’s car sported a large tiger or teddy-bear strapped to the front, while the bride’s had a plastic doll attached to its bonnet, the driver speeding to make her skirts fly up.

The groom retired to a friend’s house with his mates for a feast, while the bride returned home to begin her farewells. Old grandmothers sang ‘
Kelin
, don’t cry’ as the
young girl wept, knowing that she was no longer a member of this household. She was torn from her parents and driven to the groom’s house, her parents remaining alone and taking no further part in the celebrations, for they had just lost their daughter. The young girl, shrouded in a blanket, had to bow low before each of her in-laws. She was beginning her new life as a
kelin
– meaning literally
‘come in’ – and taking her place at the bottom of the family food-chain.

The kelin’s female relatives took her to the bedroom she would share with her new husband and covered her in a silk blanket, standing guard outside the door. The groom, returning with his mates, had to fight his way into the room, offering gifts on the way, before picking up the bride and throwing her onto the bed.
His robe, hat, shoes and belt were removed and everyone watched as he joined her in bed – grannies laying charms around and under it as a baby boy was passed through the sheets in hope of a first-born son.