East Germany on the Amu Darya

BUKHARA. I’m in Bukhara, Uzbekistan and staying at the Bukhara Palace which does not make a good first impression. A pile of concrete, it is conveniently located within easy walking distance of nothing. The service at the front desk is as charming as the architecture—a real taste of the total indifference which was the hallmark of Soviet service. The rooms look like they were decorated by the guy who failed to win the contract for Marriott’s Hot Shoppes cafeterias back in the 1970s.

Perhaps the saddest aspect of the Bukhara Palace is the fact that this building was constructed after the demise of the Soviet Union. Still, it has its moments. One former Peace Corps Volunteer told me that he and his girlfriend used to sneak in and ride the glass elevators up and down for evening entertainment. And yes, he admitted that this was before they had consumed any alcohol.

I’m in Bukhara to attend a conference on civil society in Uzbekistan which might as well be sponsored by the Ministry of Truth. The conference has every imprimatur of government approval from the police escort from the hotel to the conference site to the television cameras to the official reception on behalf of the local Hakim (i.e. regional governor). Apparently, I have been on Uzbek TV.

The word surreal only begins to hint at the strangeness of this conference. Most of the attendees appear to be graduates from the Castro school of public speaking in that they believe speaking longer is better though no one has Castro’s charisma. Frequently, I could not possibly have told you what had been said over the last five minutes—it reminded me of when I tried to watch television after being under anesthesia.

Local officials attending the conference were mostly predictable or incomprehensible, though one local attendee made a refreshingly candid assessment regarding self-censorship by the local media. However, the foreigners hailing from democratic countries were truly astonishing. One explained how it is well known that human rights had caused thousands of deaths over the course of history. Another said how she thought it was great that the president’s picture was in every classroom because this would help build national feeling.

The Turkish representative explained repeatedly at great length about his country’s grievances regarding EU rejection and the Cyprus question, though I was left perplexed about the exact relationship to the conference topic. Perhaps the subtext was that Uzbekistan should not bother adhering to democratic norms because it won’t get what it wants from the West anyway. At least someone was blaming Europe instead of America for a change, though America is not at all popular in Turkey either. My own talk went over well, primarily for its brevity.

The representative from Kazakhstan had a lot of passion and was a welcome breath of fresh air. He quite forthrightly said that “of course” everyone knows that the last Kazakh elections were fraudulent. Yet, he also pointed accurately to areas where his country had made progress in building civil society. Maybe I won’t be the only one who finds it hard to get another visa to Uzbekistan.

If this sounds like a somewhat amusing "through the looking glass" experience, it would have been if only lasted an hour but two full days were interminably tedious. It was very taxing to constantly think of ways to speak in favor of democracy but without criticizing the country so much that it would make it impossible for the Embassy to invite more speakers or the few remaining NGOs to operate here.

It sure gave me a glimmer of insight into living in a Communist or authoritarian nation and how deforming to the soul it must be to constantly engage in such self-editing throughout one’s life. However, I did at manage to set the record straight and explain that the U.S. does not execute "small children". I also spoke out against that the idea that journalists should be "responsible" and support the "national interest", pointing out that what is in the national interest can be hotly debated as the Iraq War demonstrates.

Our hosts were extremely kind and attentive. We had two sumptuous dinners held within the courtyards of old madrassahs. I guess membership does have its privileges. Of course, you have to play by the rules. When I tried to take a short break to rest my ears from the translation device and to get outside for a few minutes, I was effectively tracked down and politely asked to return to the conference.

However, I did get taken away in a police car by the end of stay—only because the tour bus for our windshield tour of Bukhara was full so they asked if I would mind riding with the police escort. The policeman kindly took me back to the hotel after the end of tour when the rest of my group headed for the airport to return to Tashkent. It really is the only way to travel--everybody yields to police cars here.