Right balls to this I’m off. I had originally planned on sticking it out in Tashkent until after New Year, then popping off down to Tajikistan to attempt to hitchhike the Pamir Highway. I mentioned that place to you before. You know; avalanches, earthquakes, drug runners, altitude sickness, wolves, sub-zero temperatures and the Taliban? Well I’d been advised against it, and the fact that I was simply feeling miserable enough being ill, having shocking wifi and meeting TEFL wankers, 15 days visa free in the more developed country of Kazakhstan sounded very appealing. That and the border was half an hour away, and Christ knows what I would have done in Dushanbe using dial-up.
Shymkent was a lazy 130 km up the road, with most of that being on the Kazak side. This afforded me a late start and taking a marshrutka to the border, which was so close a hitch would have made me look much more of a cheap bastard than usual. Granted it’s understandable over long distances, but trying to cadge a free ride when the ride is 20p is taking the piss. Rammed in a rattling soviet transport with large women on shopping trips and screaming kids, I’m doing my best to entertain one inquisitive child who wants to play my guitar, while simultaneously trying not to fall into the enormous bosoms that surround. A stern military type with a flat face utterly devoid of humour barks arrival at my stop, and I hand a disintegrating paper note up the chain of passengers to pay the driver, before taking several passengers with me as I clatter out into the cold.
My heart sinks as I approach the border and realise it’s just as chaotic as the autobus. It’s a foot crossing only, and there’s a throng of people shouting, screaming, pushing and pulling. A large percentage of people are carrying checkered tarpaulin bags, like the ones you get in Ikea, laden with goods. I battle through a number of aggressive taxi drivers, and for the love of god I can’t understand why they would think I wanted a taxi when I’m leaving the country. I eventually force my way to the front of the queue and thrust my passport into the hands of a helmeted guard brandishing a Kalashnikov.
In Uzbekistan customs I run into a little bit of a problem. Upon entering the country I had to declare how much money I was bringing in, and on exiting how much was going out. However I was supposed to have kept the stamped sheet from the border back with Turkmenistan. This I don’t have for some reason and I’m soliciting the wrath of some thirty Uzbeks as I hold up the line. Eventually I’m escorted to see an officer through a side door.
He speaks enough English to ask a number of questions while I play the dumb tourist card. I honestly don’t know what’s happened to that bit of paper, but at the rate these guards are just stamping them and throwing them onto a pile, I don’t really understand the need for it. I’m always wary that declarations of how much cash you have on you at borders are purely a way for the guards to see how much of a “bribe” they could rob you of. I’ve stretched the truth a few times.
Luckily this guy seems to be in a good mood and he just tells me to fill out a new form, and I’m on my merry way out of the country. With most of the foot traffic local (in fact I’m clearly the only one out of hundreds of people not from either side of the border) I do feel a little sorry for the raw deal you get from standing behind me at passport control. This is especially if I’ve somehow manged to wedge myself between a family, as everyone else goes through leaving some poor waif stranded behind while I’m getting the third degree. Hat off, glasses off, look at the camera, look back at the customs official and have him stare unromantically into your very soul, working out if you’re indeed the owner of this passport or wanted by Interpol. I’ve thought about giving them a little wink but it might not be the best idea. Then they leaf through the book for an age examining each stamp and visa in turn, more out of curiosity than bureaucratic necessity. Finally, devastatingly, moronically, they will bring their little inked rubber power-trip down on a fucking blank page.
Then I lose my shit.
Obviously not in front of the guard, but more a little way off to the left, out of the way of creating any serious international incident. And obviously not that loud for the exact same reason. But nonetheless I turn the air blue with profanities as this imbecile with a cap and badge has just voided a blank potential visa page. With visas taking up a whole page, I now only have four left, with maybe two or three pages sporting only one stamp each. The wasted space beggars belief! I’m incensed! They’ve got one fucking job! ONE JOB! Well they’ve probably got to stop drug trafficking and people smuggling too but that’s not your average day is it? PUT A STAMP IN A SPACE ON A PAGE WITH OTHER STAMPS! DON’T STAMP A BLANK PAGE!
“BASTARD!”
“I DON’T FUCKING BELIEVE THIS?!”
“HOW CAN YOU BE SO FUCKING DENSE?!”
“YOU MOTHERFU…”
These are phrases I may of may not have uttered in my toned down PG-13 fit of angry border rage. Folk are rightly watching me like I’m a psychotic weirdo. Perhaps my outburst is somewhat superfluous, but basically because of such stupidity I can’t reach India unless I get a new passport.
Ahhhh. And there’s the rub. I’m going to have to fork out a stack of cash and sit somewhere close to an embassy while the UK government takes its own sweet time to rip me off and send me a new book. I was going to have to get one anyway but that’s not the point.
There’s no come back for this. There’s no retribution. Nothing you can do but scream bloody murder to let off steam and walk away. You can’t complain. You can’t yell at the idiot behind the glass because you’ll be in the back of a van in minutes with a cosh bump on your head. But stamping in the wrong place on a passport can cost the holder a lot of time and money, and when that’s pretty much all you do all day, you surely need to understand this.
To add insult to injury an older guard chances his arm inquiring if I’m carrying dollars and if he can have any of them. My unflinchingly irate demeanor is enough to tell him he can fuck right off.
I’m heavily fleeced in a money exchange a few feet from the door, mainly because of my inability to count. I panic, and so by the time I’m holding my sign out to hitch I’m in a stinking mood with light pockets. An aging, ragged faced Kazak with his wife swing in ahead with their BMW, then angrily skid away kicking mud and snow in my face when I inquired if the ride was for free. I thought I was going to leave all the crap experience behind in Tashkent. But then, just when I’m feeling excessively sorry for myself (first world problems), I catch a break.
A window lowers and in Russian I think the driver explains he can take me to the highway. He wants no payment, and drops me far from the border traffic in a great spot near a gas station. I’ve been there less than a minute, barely putting out my sign, when I’m picked up by Victor. Victor can take me all the way to my hostel door. Things are looking up.
Me and Victor. Happy he was looking at the road
Victor speaks little English, but somehow the ride rarely falls silent. He’s a police detective in Taraz, he loves Game of Thrones, and follows Real Madrid. He’s very interested in meeting other people from other countries, and it’s clear he is passionate about popular culture from around the world. Occasionally his English extends to only enthusiastically bellowing the famous catchphrases and lines.
“THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE! DA?!”
“FREEEEEDOOOOOOMMMM!”
“JON SNOW ISN’T DEAD DA?”
Although I was pissed he didn’t like Star Wars.
For a couple of hours we drive through ice and snow, but the weather is bright and Victor’s enthusiasm is lifting my spirits. The sun is a glorious gold in a pale blue sky as he goes out of his way to locate and drop me at my hostel door. Shaking his hand warmly we part, and in two rides, six hours and 130 km I’m in Shymkent, Kazakhstan. I finally find a working ATM, fast wifi, good exchange rate and new marker pens to make my hitch signs; all in one place not five minutes from my bed. You’d be surprised how happy the small things can make you when you’ve been starved of them. Isn’t it wonderful when things just work?
Hitchhike to India leg 51: Tashkent to Shymkent
Right balls to this I’m off. I had originally planned on sticking it out in Tashkent until after New Year, then popping off down to Tajikistan to attempt to hitchhike the Pamir Highway. I mentioned that place to you before. You know; avalanches, earthquakes, drug runners, altitude sickness, wolves, sub-zero temperatures and the Taliban? Well I’d been advised against it, and the fact that I was simply feeling miserable enough being ill, having shocking wifi and meeting TEFL wankers, 15 days visa free in the more developed country of Kazakhstan sounded very appealing. That and the border was half an hour away, and Christ knows what I would have done in Dushanbe using dial-up.
Shymkent was a lazy 130 km up the road, with most of that being on the Kazak side. This afforded me a late start and taking a marshrutka to the border, which was so close a hitch would have made me look much more of a cheap bastard than usual. Granted it’s understandable over long distances, but trying to cadge a free ride when the ride is 20p is taking the piss. Rammed in a rattling soviet transport with large women on shopping trips and screaming kids, I’m doing my best to entertain one inquisitive child who wants to play my guitar, while simultaneously trying not to fall into the enormous bosoms that surround. A stern military type with a flat face utterly devoid of humour barks arrival at my stop, and I hand a disintegrating paper note up the chain of passengers to pay the driver, before taking several passengers with me as I clatter out into the cold.
My heart sinks as I approach the border and realise it’s just as chaotic as the autobus. It’s a foot crossing only, and there’s a throng of people shouting, screaming, pushing and pulling. A large percentage of people are carrying checkered tarpaulin bags, like the ones you get in Ikea, laden with goods. I battle through a number of aggressive taxi drivers, and for the love of god I can’t understand why they would think I wanted a taxi when I’m leaving the country. I eventually force my way to the front of the queue and thrust my passport into the hands of a helmeted guard brandishing a Kalashnikov.
In Uzbekistan customs I run into a little bit of a problem. Upon entering the country I had to declare how much money I was bringing in, and on exiting how much was going out. However I was supposed to have kept the stamped sheet from the border back with Turkmenistan. This I don’t have for some reason and I’m soliciting the wrath of some thirty Uzbeks as I hold up the line. Eventually I’m escorted to see an officer through a side door.
He speaks enough English to ask a number of questions while I play the dumb tourist card. I honestly don’t know what’s happened to that bit of paper, but at the rate these guards are just stamping them and throwing them onto a pile, I don’t really understand the need for it. I’m always wary that declarations of how much cash you have on you at borders are purely a way for the guards to see how much of a “bribe” they could rob you of. I’ve stretched the truth a few times.
Luckily this guy seems to be in a good mood and he just tells me to fill out a new form, and I’m on my merry way out of the country. With most of the foot traffic local (in fact I’m clearly the only one out of hundreds of people not from either side of the border) I do feel a little sorry for the raw deal you get from standing behind me at passport control. This is especially if I’ve somehow manged to wedge myself between a family, as everyone else goes through leaving some poor waif stranded behind while I’m getting the third degree. Hat off, glasses off, look at the camera, look back at the customs official and have him stare unromantically into your very soul, working out if you’re indeed the owner of this passport or wanted by Interpol. I’ve thought about giving them a little wink but it might not be the best idea. Then they leaf through the book for an age examining each stamp and visa in turn, more out of curiosity than bureaucratic necessity. Finally, devastatingly, moronically, they will bring their little inked rubber power-trip down on a fucking blank page.
Then I lose my shit.
Obviously not in front of the guard, but more a little way off to the left, out of the way of creating any serious international incident. And obviously not that loud for the exact same reason. But nonetheless I turn the air blue with profanities as this imbecile with a cap and badge has just voided a blank potential visa page. With visas taking up a whole page, I now only have four left, with maybe two or three pages sporting only one stamp each. The wasted space beggars belief! I’m incensed! They’ve got one fucking job! ONE JOB! Well they’ve probably got to stop drug trafficking and people smuggling too but that’s not your average day is it? PUT A STAMP IN A SPACE ON A PAGE WITH OTHER STAMPS! DON’T STAMP A BLANK PAGE!
“BASTARD!”
“I DON’T FUCKING BELIEVE THIS?!”
“HOW CAN YOU BE SO FUCKING DENSE?!”
“YOU MOTHERFU…”
These are phrases I may of may not have uttered in my toned down PG-13 fit of angry border rage. Folk are rightly watching me like I’m a psychotic weirdo. Perhaps my outburst is somewhat superfluous, but basically because of such stupidity I can’t reach India unless I get a new passport.
Ahhhh. And there’s the rub. I’m going to have to fork out a stack of cash and sit somewhere close to an embassy while the UK government takes its own sweet time to rip me off and send me a new book. I was going to have to get one anyway but that’s not the point.
There’s no come back for this. There’s no retribution. Nothing you can do but scream bloody murder to let off steam and walk away. You can’t complain. You can’t yell at the idiot behind the glass because you’ll be in the back of a van in minutes with a cosh bump on your head. But stamping in the wrong place on a passport can cost the holder a lot of time and money, and when that’s pretty much all you do all day, you surely need to understand this.
To add insult to injury an older guard chances his arm inquiring if I’m carrying dollars and if he can have any of them. My unflinchingly irate demeanor is enough to tell him he can fuck right off.
I’m heavily fleeced in a money exchange a few feet from the door, mainly because of my inability to count. I panic, and so by the time I’m holding my sign out to hitch I’m in a stinking mood with light pockets. An aging, ragged faced Kazak with his wife swing in ahead with their BMW, then angrily skid away kicking mud and snow in my face when I inquired if the ride was for free. I thought I was going to leave all the crap experience behind in Tashkent. But then, just when I’m feeling excessively sorry for myself (first world problems), I catch a break.
A window lowers and in Russian I think the driver explains he can take me to the highway. He wants no payment, and drops me far from the border traffic in a great spot near a gas station. I’ve been there less than a minute, barely putting out my sign, when I’m picked up by Victor. Victor can take me all the way to my hostel door. Things are looking up.
Me and Victor. Happy he was looking at the road
Victor speaks little English, but somehow the ride rarely falls silent. He’s a police detective in Taraz, he loves Game of Thrones, and follows Real Madrid. He’s very interested in meeting other people from other countries, and it’s clear he is passionate about popular culture from around the world. Occasionally his English extends to only enthusiastically bellowing the famous catchphrases and lines.
“THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE! DA?!”
“FREEEEEDOOOOOOMMMM!”
“JON SNOW ISN’T DEAD DA?”
Although I was pissed he didn’t like Star Wars.
For a couple of hours we drive through ice and snow, but the weather is bright and Victor’s enthusiasm is lifting my spirits. The sun is a glorious gold in a pale blue sky as he goes out of his way to locate and drop me at my hostel door. Shaking his hand warmly we part, and in two rides, six hours and 130 km I’m in Shymkent, Kazakhstan. I finally find a working ATM, fast wifi, good exchange rate and new marker pens to make my hitch signs; all in one place not five minutes from my bed. You’d be surprised how happy the small things can make you when you’ve been starved of them. Isn’t it wonderful when things just work?