5 ootamatut fakti Usbekistani kohta. Kogenud reisija muljed

Heir to the Persian and Timurid empires, ancient Sogdiana and the Bukhara Kaganate, Uzbekistan has preserved the best of its ancestors. But also added a lot of modern and relevant. What this mix turned out to be – in the selection of unexpected facts about Uzbekistan.

Pro-Visioni president, Vinogradov.story kogukonna autor

Prepared entertaining facts about the country of sun, pilaf and bright colors.

Uzbekistan has a “relative” of Ivan the Fool

If Tashkent is the business and political center of the country, its heart beats in the triangle of Samarkand – Bukhara – Khiva. Each of these cities is unique and deserves the most enthusiastic reviews. In Samarkand they will sound on Registan Square, in Khiva they will echo in the walls of medieval Ichan-Kala, and in Bukhara they will probably be drowned out by laughter at the monument to Khoja Nasreddin, who in the East is considered a “relative” of Ivan the Fool or Baron Munchausen.

Comfortable red trains run between the cities, and international airports have been built on the way out, so there are no problems with planning a route.

Monument to Khoja Nasreddin

Discoveries that influenced the development of world science

The greatest discoveries that influenced the development of science and enlightenment all over the world were made on the territory of modern Uzbekistan. The Khiva scientist Al-Khwarizmi should be thanked for establishing algebra as an independent discipline, and the physician and philosopher Avicenna should be thanked for his Canon of Medicine, an encyclopedic work that reinterpreted ancient “therapy” in terms of the achievements of medieval Arab medicine.

Home of the detailed map of the starry sky

The “honor board” of academic luminaries of Uzbekistan would be incomplete without Ulugbek, mathematician, astronomer and astrologer, who founded one of the two most important observatories of the Middle Ages in the vicinity of Samarkand and gave the world a detailed catalog of the starry sky – “Gurgan zizhd”.

According to the memories of contemporaries, “in geometry Ulugbek was like Euclid, and in astronomy – Ptolemy”, he founded a madrasah, which simultaneously trained more than 100 students.

At the same time scientific works in Ulugbek’s bibliography neighbor with works on astrology and esotericism, to which people turn even now, five centuries after their creation, in search of answers to exciting questions.

Every region has its own recipe for pilaf

If I were asked to play association game and describe Uzbekistan with one succinct word, I would suggest plov. Plov is a national treasure of the country, a source of pride and ironic gastronomic disputes between regions.

In each of them plov is cooked differently: in Samarkand version meat, carrots, rice are laid in layers and steamed, in Tashkent version – fried, and in Fergana one uses only a special kind of rice – Devzir.

When traveling around the country, I recommend not to restrain yourself and try them all. However, not only to try: you can make an agreement with Uzbeks and take a direct part in its preparation. The experience is amazing and very useful. By the way, pilaf is cooked early in the morning, at dawn, so that by lunchtime it was cooked and acquired a rich taste and aroma. But plov is not eaten for dinner, preferring lagman, manty or samsa.

Uzbek prints are an inspiration for famous fashion houses

I would venture to suggest that the rather restrained nature of Central Asia once inspired the inhabitants of Uzbekistan to create a distinctive and incredibly bright layer of visual culture – ornaments, patterns and prints. Traditional techniques of dyeing and ornamentation of fabrics with alternation of saturated accents from opposite parts of the color spectrum create a characteristic “showcase” of Uzbekistan, and together with it – the mood of the whole country.

The trail of the Great Silk Road in patterns of bakhmal, adras and satin stretches through the centuries and inspires couture designers not only in Uzbekistan, but also around the world. In 2020, for example, Armani presented a collection with Uzbek motifs.

Earlier we wrote about two more interesting countries that will surprise travelers. We suggest to get acquainted with Kazakhstan and Armenia closer. Read these articles and be inspired.