Friday, May 10, 2013
Our hotel in Khiva is wonderfully located in the heart of the 2,500 year old walled city. Late yesterday we walked all around the pedestrian only city, by ourselves for a change, capturing images in the late afternoon sunlight. This morning we woke up to a cold overcast day with the hint of rain in the air so we were especially glad we had taken advantage of yesterday’s light.
Our Khiva guide, 25 year old Makhmud, started us off at a wall sized map of the Silk Road and a huge bronze statue of a 10th century mathematician named Al Khorezmiy who lived in Khiva and gave us the concepts, “algorithm” and “algebra”. He also wrote many books about mathematics. As we reentered Ichan Kala, the inner city, through the west gate, Makhmud told us the population of the walled town is 3000 including his family. Unlike other Silk Road cities, Khiva has been occupied throughout its history and is therefore in much better shape. Without prompting he told us people his age and younger are all glad to be independent. The average age in Uzbekistan is 24 and non of them remember what Soviet life was like a mere 22 years ago. Makhmud showed us the main highlights of the city, beginning with a 130 student madrassa that has been converted into a hotel near the west gate. Just passed the madrassa hotel, is the base of a huge mineret. It would have been the largest in the world if the Khan who ordered its construction in 1855 had lived long enough for it to be finished. Even at only 50 feet in height, its dimensions are very impressive and it is covered in turquoise majolica tiles.
We visited the old palace, which is now a museum of the Khorezm Region, of which Khiva is a part. We saw hand made silk paper money from the 16th century made with block prints in Arabic and old Persian. We saw pictures of various Khans including the longest reigning Khan, Muhammid Rakhimkhan (1864-1910), who built schools, lowered taxes and wrote poetry. His secretary happened to be the great, great, great great grandfather of our guide, which explains how our guide’s family came to have a house in the center of town. We explored the harem where the Khan’s 4 wives and their servants lived, outdoor reception rooms with overhanging porticos for shade on hot summer days and platforms for royal yurts that were warm on cold winter days, the secretary’s office where Makhmud’s ancestor worked and a storeroom containing the last Khan’s carriage, a gift from the Tsar. I found the majolica tile work in the harem to be especially intricate and lovely. As palaces go, it was very interesting, especially with the family stories Makhmud was able to add.
We visited a carpet workshop that employs 33 women who are paid for their time rather than their product. The business is sponsored by UNESCO and Operation Mercy. We followed our noses to an outdoor oven where bread was just being peeled off the clay oven walls. It was so good we stood there and ate a bunch along with other tourists.
Then we visited a most attractive mosque, called Juma or Friday Mosque. It was a huge hall with a couple hundred hand carved elm columns supporting a hand painted wooden ceiling. To keep it from being very dark there were two square openings over square gardens. The columns were placed in such a way that worshipers could see the imam from anywhere in the space. Although the mosque has been restored many times, there are still several original 10th century columns.
The old town boasts several complete and appealing minarets, all of which we photographed several times from different vistas in town. The tallest, 49 meters, and newest, 1910, had a multi purpose use. Besides the call to prayer, it was a light beacon for people trying to find their way at night in the desert and a look out to watch for enemies.
Lastly we visited a mausoleum to a 14th century wrestler, Makhmud Pahlavan, who somehow became a holy man. An imam sits inside the carpeted entry room and recites prayers from the Koran to people who come to pray for the holy man’s help. We saw several come in while we were there, pay a small amount, receive a reading, eat a tiny piece of bread and back away.
All along the stone pedestrian streets are vendors peddling trinkets and small wares. There was not the hustle and throng of Bukhara. The whole inner city was exceptionally clean, quiet and relaxed. It was a pleasure to wander around and not get hustled to buy anything. We enjoyed lunch upstairs overlooking part of town from Makhmud’s parents‘ restaurant and were waited on by his sister. That evening we ate in another restaurant that served delicious minced meat filled dumplings. They looked like tortellini and tasted better to me. We watched the last of the vendors pack up as darkness fell and then headed to bed ourselves.
Adventures with Julia 