Walking around Dushanbe

On Tuesday I did a little sightseeing with one of my coworkers, Nasiba. We were walking along the street, when I saw this billboard.

I asked who "that guy" was, and Nasiba started laughing really hard! Apparently, "that guy" is the president. I had read on Wikipedia that the president's last name is Rahmon, so I said his name, wanting to give the impression that I wasn't totally ignorant. But that ended up being funny too, because I pronounced his name "Rah-mohn" instead of the more gutteral "Rach-mohn." Haha, oops. You can see that President "Rach-mohn" is pointing off in the distance, and the caption says something about building a new energy plant for the people of Tajikistan. It's funny to see such blatant propaganda, I wonder if Tajik people feel that the propaganda is obvious or silly.

While we were walking around, I noticed a lot of children selling things on the street. Dushanbe has a really big child labor problem, there are children everywhere selling things. While we were eating in an outdoor cafe, a boy of about 10 had a strainer with burning grass in it, and he was blowing the smoke from the grass around people. Nasiba told me this was to chase away bad things. I'm not actually sure what that means, since Nasiba's English fell through at that point, but my other coworker just told me the grass is pronounced "see-PAHND" and is supposed to be holy grass. I don't really know. It did smell nice, but I was very shocked to see so many children acting like adults. It is strange to see them so business-like, they don't smile and they talk gruffly with each other, like disgruntled old people. Most of the time they are silent though, even when they are begging you for money. It is very unnatural to see children so cold. I tried to take a picture of the boy with the grass, but it didn't turn out very well. He got mad at me for taking the picture, because child labor is illegal.

Anyway, Dushanbe is definitely not a bad city, that is just one bad thing I noticed. On a more lighthearted note, when I was walking around with Nasiba I forgot for a second that not everyone speaks English, and asked a random stranger to take our picture. But it turned out the girl I asked spoke English. Not only that, but she was American! And after talking a little, I found out she graduated from Emory, the same place I went to college! It was pretty weird. She is here documenting child labor for her dissertation. Here is the picture she took of us.

We also saw some nice sights around Dushanbe. The most prominent sight in Dushanbe is this statue of Ismail Somoni, who is considered the founder of the Tajik state. Everything in Dushanbe is huge, and this statue is no different. Here is Nasiba in front of the statue.

We also walked in a Rudaki Park, which is named after a famous poet from Tajikistan. When I saw the park from a distance, the arch reminded me of the St. Louis arch. Small world. :)


Also, I am supposed to mention one Josh Finkle in this post. We were just e-mailing in real time! We are on opposite sides of the globe, but this is what he said, "WHAT! You are totally on the other side of the world right now. that is
crazy.
BUT WE ARE BOTH AWAKE."