I'm sorry you were ill. Doesn't sound too ordinary to me. Sounds nasty. Hard to be sick when you are traveling.
The pictures. Oh wow. Places on a map for me, but now real. The baths contrasted with the modern buildings. Startling. What a walk through history. I am far more fascinated with that than with the modern prosperity. I believe you know that writing books that don't sell was a recent hobby of mine. One focused on the Four Masters of Yuan (traditional Chinese artists who tried to survive after the Mongols took over). In that book I dealt briefly with Genghis Khan's conquests, the Silk Road, Marco Polo and the spread of plague. All of these took me through the area you discuss in your blog. But of course, the area was abstract before I saw your pictures :)
I couldn't stop to read last night, but did so at my leisure today.
Great cat pictures :)))
You will like the next set of posts. I went to Kazakhstan also visited Turkistan, its related to Timurlane, host one of the best preserved timurid monuments:) very close to Taskent and Samarkand
I was looking at the map closely last night after I went to bed. You were right there, next to Iran. Was that not dangerous, flying around? Started reading about Baku and oil in Azerbaijan. First modern mechanically drilled oil well, pre-dating US. Wow. Everything I didn't know about oil :)
Also, the cats. Apparently it's a Muslim tradition, to treat cats well. There is a legend that Muhammad once cut off the sleeve of his robe so he wouldn't disturb his sleeping cat. The cat had fallen asleep on the robe.
Your blog was a fascinating introduction to a part of the world I never thought about very much.
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On a different note: I voted early.
We are leading 3 points but don't cook the chicken yet. We typically underestimate Republicans numbers by 4.1 points, so unless we are leading by 5 points in the poll we are not safe. And we are NOT leading in 5 points...
I'm going Monday with my daughter and granddaughter. We want to make her (my granddaughter's) first vote symbolic: three generations of women voting together. I have a mail in ballot that I'm dropping off just to be there.
As for Texas. I hope, but don't expect. It is a very odd year and you have a truly despicable candidate in Paxton. Maybe that will make the difference???
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