Taking A Look Around Dushanbe, Part Two

Horses, guns and paintings, Dushanbe has it all. Time to look at it.

White plus black equals black and white. Interesting. Sure.

Mini amusement. Small pleasures. Apartment construction with lifestyle dream on the front fence. Somehow, skiing and a nice parking garage are big selling points. Might have to tweak the focus group.

Golden parking spot.

Intimidating. Detail of a sculpture at Sadriddin Aini square. Splicing power.

Art for sale in a pedestrian street underpass. "Whadya looking for? Flowers? A horse? Some fruit? How about an old mill or some guns?"

Monumental Victory In Dushanbe

The Soviets left all sorts of monuments to the Great Patriotic War, aka, WWII, all over Central Asia. The glory of military victory is good propaganda.

Dushanbe has an understated memorial, appropriately titled, Victory Monument.

Two simple steles with nice, brutalist, socialist, blocky frieze figures around the bottoms. Down goes the Nazi flag, up with flowers of peace.

The placement of the Victory Monument turned out to be a traffic choked plaza and the Dushanbe powers decided to duplicate the monument in, well, Victory Park. Bigger! Cleaner! Room for a tank!

With May Day approaching, time for an annual spit and polish. Photos of the dead. The images are near Victory Monument, part of a grand staircase that leads up to an eternal flame and plaza for memorial reflection.

The eternal flame, fresh laid flowers and a plaque that proclaims no one is forgotten.