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The Bicycle box

UZBEKISTAN

Mar
2004-09-14 15:10:54

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is finished.”, because there is probably not a known word for career-retirement. There’s more men coming over to join the conversation and the first man explains to the group that we are from The Netherlands. Now the questions are about the bicycles. One at a time the crowd squeezes the foam of our handlebars, swing the pedals, check the air pressure in the tires, oh and yes, a saddle with a whole in the middle is indeed strange, and finally they always find the bell. “Compass?”. “Yes, but today North is West and tomorrow it is called South”, the compass gets disturbed by the bike computer during cycling. The men laugh loudly and translate this to each other. One asks where the shift stick is, moving his arm as if he is in a car. Then, “Tourist?”. “No, business”, Raymond replies, stupid questions will get stupid answers. Another is now pointing at the map of Central Asia and Raymond names a few of the bigger cities and countries where we are going to. He stops at China because the men lose their attention, probably they have no idea where all of these places are. But then someone shouts “aaaaaahhh” if Raymond translates China into Kitay. One of the crowd is death and makes clear that Raymond will have a beard of a one meter when we arrive in China. I reply that I will dress him up when he reaches one meter.

Some women are now joining the group. According to the Uzbek tradition I have not yet shaken hands with anyone but have exchanged a lot of nods. “Mush, mush?” (married?), they ask me with their index fingers in each other. Then one moves her hand on belly height from left to right asking if we have children. The average Uzbek has children that reach my own length at our age so I guess we don’t need a Spa resort to look younger. “No” with the same move and a nod. The conversation between the men is still continuing about the bicycles and what they cost and last but not least they exchange salaries. Raymond suddenly earns ...