Christmas in Tajikistan, where there's no "Christmas"!

View from Debbie's apartment

Debbie in front of her school

Neal, Debbie and I explored Dushanbe, Tajikistan for a couple of weeks. Debbie's teaching at the QSI international school and has a super-nice apartment, right near the giant flagpole. The giant flagpole in the middle of town towers over the smoky layer of air so high that I could see it on landing!

Debbie and I had fun at the QSI New Years party with tons of food, entertainment, and dancing. Ded Moroz (Father Frost) and Snegurochka (Snow Maiden) led us all in rocking out. Women dance with lots of shoulder, head and hand movements, while men strut with toes tapping behind them. At 10 pm, they called last dance. What?

The 10 pm theme carried through to the New Year's Eve celebration at the Ismoili Somoni Statue. Lots of people were on the street at 9 pm when we started walking toward it, many going away from the statue. We got through security checks to the stage and music, and "had to" dance with these Tajik guys. Neal loves dancing, and Debbie and I did a little. We were surrounded by guys with phone cameras. Then at 10 pm, they counted down and set off the fireworks! The crowd was dispersed by police and the stage was torn down. We asked everyone who spoke English what was up with 10 pm? No one understood the idea of midnight New Year. There is apparently an unofficial curfew in Dushanbe.

Neal and one of many dancing fools

There will be NO getting out of control

We three visited the national and antiquities museums and saw the replica and original Buddhas Sleeping in Nirvana. Here's the 360 degree photo.

This version of the 360 degree picture is flattened and not able to be moved. See the top of Buddha's head on the right? Imagine the picture wraps around me. It's really huge! Neal is reading about it on the wall. "After Afghanistan’s Taliban destroyed the largest Buddhas in Central Asia, the newly unveiled Tajikistan Buddha, which dates back to the 5^th century AD, will be the largest ancient Buddha statue in Central Asia." (Circle of Ancient Iranian Studies)

The amusement park has a giant ferris wheel, but we were afraid to ride it. It was super cheap to enter There were just 3 other customers, who did ride it. Lots of people were working on planting or cleaning.

The Nutcracker ballet was unexpected. The grand staircase and entry was full of costumed characters; from cartoons to royalty. The pre-show was about a wolf, a 3-headed dragon, a dog, Ded Moroz and Snegurochka, with lots of interaction with kids in the audience. The ballet followed, and was good, but shortened.

Fort Hissar was a great Sunday trip. There were a zillion weddings happening! Brides wear white, and women wear their shiny, colorful dresses over matching pants, like in India. Cars are beribboned, friends are making music, and there are pedal cars and tanks for the kids to ride. The couples walk up an arch-covered walk, get married, then promenade all around the Fort. Jamal, our tour guide, was really interesting. He clearly loves history. This fortress has just recently (2014) been restored and is still a work in progress. It is thousands of years old.

Dushanbe has a Makerspace! It's sponsored by the US Embassy, and focuses primarily on kids. They have more enthusiasm than I've ever seen! We hope to do some Skype calls between there and our Bergen Makerspace. The 360 degree camera was a huge hit there. Here's the picture.

We all had a very relaxing visit. We binge-watched Netflix, cooked good food, and enjoyed each other's company.