The weirdest place we have ever been.

Seeing we had been delayed by so much we drove straight from the port to the capital of Turkmenistan, Ashgabat. This was a 12hour drive through the arid countryside passing the occasional small town, made up of simple homes no bigger than what we would have as a garage in Australia. We arrived in the capital city at about 9:30pm and we were astonished at what we saw. Great huge white buildings dripping with gold and surrounded by fountains, all lit up like Las Vegas. It was insane.   

We stayed in a hotel here and the next day (again very very hot being somewhere in the 40’s) we went exploring. What we found was something like I can only compare to a film set or maybe like the movie the Truman show, where every thing is made out to be real but its all a facade. The streets had no people. There was no small mini markets or corner stores. There were no service stations or just normal stuff. Guards protected the large marble white monstrosities and we were not allowed to photograph any of them. We went to the largest shopping mall where we had lunch, used the internet and had a game of 10 pin bowling. We spent most of the day here because this soulless city had nothing else to do. The amusement park which uprooted 100’s of families to be built is rarely open. Some of the group tried to get in to a small museum and was asked to leave for no apparent reason, it is very strange.

Turkmenistan is said to be the worlds 2nd most secretive country after North Korea. The lonely planet warned of hotel rooms and public places being bugged.Internet access is few and far between and is said to be monitored by the government. None of the hotels had internet and when we used it at the shopping centre they took ID from us. Face book and news websites were blocked. None of us had mobile phone reception either.

There are only 660 000 people that live in this city, a city that is constantly building huge hotels yet their seems to be no people staying in them. There are pictures of the president everywhere and apparently they keep pulling down monuments and buildings so often that the lonely planet which was a 2010 edition warned people that maps and information in their book could be completely irrelevant and a lot of it was. Even when we found a bazaar with people selling fruit and food we were told not to take photos by the locals and store owners.

Ashgabat is weird!

We then travelled into the dessert where we camped one night and the next day on our way to the border saw some ruins of a town that Genghis Khan had destroyed once upon a time. The best thing about this is that we stopped in a small town not far from the border where we had lunch. This town was wonderful, we went to the local bazaar and we were obviously a novelty to them all. We ate the best food and had great service in a simple cafe. The local store owners smiled and waved at us. I had store owners running after me to ask to have there photo taken. When I showed them the digital image on the camera screen it was such a novelty to them. It was such a great experience and we all found that we had found the real Turkmenistan, with real people and real friendliness. 

I can safely say that I will never ever go back to Turkmenistan in my life, but I am very glad I have been there. One of those places that makes you appreciate your home country.