Traveling around Uzbekistan

I’ve been to Jizzakh three times now, and I still can’t quite pin down what makes it stick in my memory the way it does. The region sits wedged

I landed in Tashkent with exactly three Uzbek phrases memorized—hello, thank you, and something that was supposed to mean ‘bathroom’

I used to think walking through ancient cities was about ticking boxes—see the mosque, photograph the minaret, move on. Then I spent three days getting

The rockface looked ordinary until I got close enough to see the scratches weren’t random. Sarmish Gorge sits in Uzbekistan’

The Silk Road Marathon, held annually in Bukhara, is the kind of race that makes you question whether you’ve trained enough for both the distance

I’ve walked through a lot of public squares in my time, but Independence Square in Tashkent—Mustaqillik Maydoni, if you’re keeping score—still

I never thought I’d spend a Tuesday morning watching a seventy-something craftsman argue with clay. But here’s the thing about traditional

I used to think wedding music was just background noise until I attended a three-day Uzbek wedding in Samarkand. The ceremonial songs—called “

I’ve walked Broadway Street in Tashkent maybe a dozen times, and each visit feels like stumbling into a slightly different version of the same fever dream.

I used to think medieval science was all dusty scrolls and vague astrology charts until I stumbled across the Khorezm Ma’mun Academy.