The belt of hills on which the eastern suburbs of Dushanbe sprawl obscure the view of the Pamir Mountains, the northern ranges of which I can admire only now, when leaving the city, from the airplane window.
The plane first heads north, revealing a high mountain range with snow-capped pyramid-shaped peaks stretching as far as the eye can see. From here to Tibet runs the ‘Roof of the World’, with Tian Shan directly ahead – words I last marvelled at in the geography lessons at high school, when, in the shadow of midday sun, behind dark velvet curtains, we were shown photographs of these regions, which one rarely hears about in the West today, photographs taken deep in the Soviet era and shown with an overhead projector, because at that time, in the late 1990s, many of the new learning materials had not yet reached the rural schools in Estonia.
The man in the seat next to me, who was chatting enthusiastically with two Korean girls on the airport bus a few minutes ago, says he works for an NGO that supplies Tajik mountain villages with drinking water. He informs me that 97% of the territory of Tajikistan is covered by mountains, and access to drinking water is difficult in many areas. I point to a water bottle with the logo featuring the mountains in the pocket of the front seat.
We are now flying southwest. A mountain range – lower, and probably not because we are flying higher – runs in parallel with the plane to the north until it breaks off. Although the map doesn’t show state borders, I know that we have left Tajikistan.
I am excited because Samarkand and Bukhara, the great cultural centres of the Silk Road, are on our way. The husky voice of Aşık Veysel Satıroğlu echoes high above the wilderness. Atatürk has died. In the lament, he is the heir of Alexander the Great, the powerful inheritor of Samarkand and Bukhara. I don’t want to spoil the sound of these beautiful names, so I decide to not read anything about these cities in the foreseeable future. A glimpse from the plane, a memory, is enough.
Spring 2014