We woke up fairly early as we had around a hundred kilometres to cover till the Aydat yurt camp where we would be spending the night and a few visits on the way.
As I stood outside the hotel looking at the empty street (with just a couple of road sweepers) I recalled what I had read about Bukhara, the city we would be leaving behind ...
"It is the city of poetry and fairy tales where legends hover about the zigzagging streets and the flight of human genius dwells in the verticality of the minarets, whilst every stone in the lace of the stone masonry is covered with the dust of eternity."
I had grown attached to Bukhara maybe not as strongly as I did to Khiva, but having had more time "we" had certainly become used to each other's presence and I felt almost sure I'd be missing those streets
It was as if the local policeman responsible for the area the hotel was located at didn't want us to leave, as he blocked the road access and despite some verbal altercation between him and our guide he made it clear that the buses had not been allowed in and would therefore not be allowed out of the area.
The nine of us together with the French tourists of another bus held "prisoner" of this one man's decision talked about possible strategies to resolve the situation, which we felt very much depended on bribing until our bus driver under the direction of one of the hotel employees veered through the very narrow streets of the city hoping to make the way out ... but a few minutes afterwards we were back at the same starting point, that is, behind the street barrier.
As time went by we started getting worried, as well as tired of hanging around doing nothing. When we were beginning to doubt whether we would make it out of her Saudat showed up with a superior order that forced the policeman (who had obviously acted on impulse and under nobody's order) to have the barrier open for us all to drive through.
It is always interesting to get additional information on the artistic production of the country one is visiting, even if as far as pottery is concerned I have already been to several pottery centres in various countries where ceramics was an old craft as well. Yet, one should take into account the fact that the craftsmanship, the harmony, the colour sense and even the imagination differ from country to country.
In Gijduvan we were given the opportunity of visiting a big pottery centre owned by the Narshullaev family said to own the oldest secrets of pottery craft, this being one of the reasons as to why it is UNESCO protected.
After having seen the artistic pieces in display at the exhibition room we visited the various production rooms in order to get an idea of what sort of work is involved in preserving such an ancient Art using the ancient methods.
And finally watched the lady of the house carrying out some traditional embroidery.
(To be continued)
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