Tashkent
Day Eight - Uzbekistan & Oman - 2025
A day tour in Uzbekistan’s capital to close out my four city journey across the country.
1. Museum of Applied Arts #1
The State Museum of Applied Arts in Tashkent contains over 4,000 exhibited items including embroidery, jewelry, and woodcarving.
Our bus left Khiva for the airport in the nearby city of Urgench very early in the morning. Rather than take the train or a bus back to Tashkent, our tour instead flew which I imagine saves six hours over the other options with transfers and security factored in. I found it odd that our hour-long flight was handled by a wide-body aircraft, but to be fair it was rather full.
Arriving back in Tashkent, we collected our very belated luggage and headed back to our pre-departure hotel downtown. The schedule for the day was pretty basic, consisting of an afternoon city tour. If you’ll recall, a significant portion of the group had been traveling for two weeks prior to my arrival in Tashkent; well, the day of my arrival was a free exploration day and I don’t think many members of that contingent had many stones left unturned in the city. Nonetheless, the vast majority of us headed to the Museum of Applied Arts, a short walk from our hotel.
2. Museum of Applied Arts #2
The museum is located in the former home of Russian diplomat Alexander Alexandrovich Polovstov and is richly decorated.
This museum has exhibits covering a variety of cultural topics; the exhibit which stood out most to me was on suzani, a Central Asian embroidered decorative textile. Our guide did a good job of covering all of these topics and I think if we had this introduction to Uzbekistan culture first it would have contextualized much of what we had seen in the proceeding few days. But I’ll save all that for the review….
Three more photographs from the Museum of Applied Arts follow.
3. Museum of Applied Arts #3
4. Museum of Applied Arts #4
5. Museum of Applied Arts #5
Want to see more of the real world?
Then follow us on Instagram!
Thanks for your support!
6. Independence Square #1
Independence Square in Tashkent is a large public space featuring multiple statues, archways, monuments, and fountains.
Out day guide then took us on the metro (underground / subway) to Independence Square, a nice albeit mostly barricaded-off public space in the city center. The weather was perfect and it made for a nice walk. We got a quick overview of Tashkent’s history, particularly during and around the times of the Soviet Union.
Oh, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention: the Kosmonavtlar Metro Station is a must-see for anyone with an interest in the Space Race or Soviet-era wall art as it features depictions of Soviet cosmonauts and a ceiling with lights meant to represent the stars. Very cool stuff!'
Four more photographs from Independence Square follow.
7. Independence Square #2
8. Monument of Independence
Originally a monument to Vladimir Lenin constructed in 1974, a statue of a mother and baby was added in 2005 and shortly thereafter known as the Monument of Independence.
9. Mustaqillik Fountain #1
10. Mustaqillik Fountain #2
11. Amir Temur Square
The center of this park in Tashkent has featured multiple statues: first, a statue to the former Governor-General of Russian Turkestan, Konstantin Petrovich von Kaufmann, followed by statues of Joseph Stalin and Karl Marx, before finally being replaced with Amir Temur in 1994.
Finally, we meandered our way to Amir Temur Square for one last expositive history lesson on Uzbekistan. We bid our tour guides farewell and made our way back to our hotel. Those in the group who still remained had an ad-hoc pseudo-farewell dinner at a nearby restaurant, and that was that. Relieved that my flight was not until the afternoon the following day, I tucked in for one last good night’s sleep in Uzbekistan.
So, what to make of Uzbekistan as a travel destination…. Do I recommend visiting? Yes, there is absolutely enough historical, cultural, and particularly architectural significance here to warrant a journey, so long as you accept the fact that 1) you are not going to see much in the way of natural scenery, 2) you’ll be spending your time most of your time in crowded, tourist-oriented cities, 3) you’ll spend quite a bit of time traveling between these cities, and 4) you’ll likely have to do quite a bit of homework in advance to get the most out of your experience, even with a knowledgeable guide. Also, I haven’t really brought this up much but it is worth noting the food is quite good!
All that said, there are some rough edges that definitely need polishing. At the risk of either rehashing my previous “staged authenticity” diatribe or spoiling my tour review, I’ll just say that my experience would have been vastly improved with significantly more informational signs and displays at historical sites, as well as genuine interactions with Uzbekistanis to truly appreciate their culture.
So, I will close by posing a question: will Uzbekistan realize before it’s too late that people may actually want to travel to their country to experience the real Uzbekistan? Only time will tell.
