Dioramas And Dead Things At The Andijan Museum Of History And Culture

What's a museum in Uzbekistan without a swashbuckling diorama or a parade of taxidermy? A boring museum. Hooray, Andijan's museum is definitely not boring.

Fly like an eagle. Or hawk. Or falcon. Or brown bird. Let's be safe with identifying it as some sort of brown bird.

Starting at the beginning, the Stone Age Man. Check out the mystery animal, monster, thingy that's about to emerge and attack. Rabid wombat? Moving forward in time, a depiction of a Silk Road era walled city. Love how the 2D painting does most of the 3D lifting.

More fun with 2D vs 3D. An Uzbek uprising in 1916. Basically, a mural with some columns and one and a half carts as foreground props.

Bird, perched on a massive stick jutting out of a mountain. Rats. Squeeze too hard and the stuffing pops out. And you might lose your talon. Ouch to everyone.

Shake that tail feather. With a little bush support.

The Andijan Museum Of History And Culture

Or Museum of Local Lore. The repository has several names. It's a typical museum for a small town in Uzbekistan, filled with old and recent history, handicrafts, maybe some paintings, a treasured plate. Time to take a tour.

Impressive outside. Enter now!

Before heading in, be sure to check out the elaborate, raised stone mural on the facade. Uzbek heritage in Soviet, Brutalist style. Inside, re-creating a painter's little studio.

Typical gallery room, filled with artifacts. Nice collection of wood cradles.

More old stuff. A classic, old chapan robe, in ikat style. A grave matter.

More paintings. Camels and fields of cotton, always good, local tropes.

Pottery From Rishtan, Uzbekistan

One of the craft specialties in Uzbekistan is pottery with intricate designs and the place to go for the best pieces is the town of Rishtan in the Fergana Valley. Several shops carry on a centuries old tradition of pottery design.

One of the best places to go is the Alisher Nazirov studio. Narzirov is a master ceramist and teacher of the traditional craft. His designs are recognized as its own school, style.

The Nazirov shop and studio. Catnip.

Excellent plates, all unique in style yet part of a traditional whole. Pick color.

Portrait of a man (not Nazirov) and his kiln. Hot stuff.

Traditional methods, a manual wheel. Monoculture, pieces waiting to be painted.

Rishtan has a handful of shops, schools devoted to pottery craft. No reason to be shy or humble about promoting the local work, plop a giant vase in a main roundabout. Boom!

Fun Taxidermy At Khudayar Khan Palace

Many attractions in Uzbekistan have been restored and then left with the quandary of what to put in all the lovely, empty rooms. Some fancy furniture, maybe textiles? Frequently, stuffed animals fill the void. Taxidermy rocks!

The Khudayar Khan Palace in Kokand devotes a little space to some dead creatures. The combination of old, stuffed animals against what looks like extreme blow ups of low-res photographs makes for a bit of a surreal impression.

Display cabinets with additional creatures that didn't make the cut into a case.

Hello eyeless...what? Deranged duck.

Owl, perhaps waiting on a tootsie pop.

Fierce pheasant. Another fuzzy animal. A mini bear with a shag overcoat? Fashionable wolf?

Back in the marsh, this duck did a bit of an over-bleach. Oh, the vanity.

The Palace of Khudáyár Khán in Kokand, Uzbekistan

Khudáyár Khán Palace was built in the 1870s by, well, Khudáyár Khán. You build it, you name it. Tsarist Russia showed up, eventually drove the Khan from his humble home and then the mean Bolsheviks destroyed most of the palace. No taste. Post-independent Uzbekistan has carried out a couple of restorations and today glimpses of old grandeur can be seen, as well as a couple of museums.

Good front on a grey day. A giant platform in the plaza is frequently present for shows, exhibitions.

Babushka and inner courtyard. Colorful column.

Throne room, fancy.

In case one takes the restoration for granted, there's a nice "before" section on display. All cleaned up! When few artifacts remain, you display what you have. Carts and a door.

In the museum for local tools, materials. On display, a funky, curved, semi diorama horse portrait thing. Inventive.

Bukharan Jews Synagogue In Kokand

A bit of a confusing title for the synagogue as Bukhara is nowhere near the city of Kokand, which is in Eastern Uzbekistan, in the Fergana Valley. The synagogue was built in 1904, presumably for Jews from Bukhara who wandered over to Kokand. New location, give props to home city heritage.

Humble exterior, probably a nice, garden oasis on a sunny, summer day.

Humble interior. Through the main entrance, first a relaxing, eating area with, yes, a humble kitchen.

The main temple area, bimah in the center.

View of the ark where torahs, prayer scrolls, are kept. The sign seems to be a list of exalted rabbis. Or Important Men. Prayer books of various vintages.

Prep station. Purify your hands, slap on a yarmulke and get ready for God. Key to unlock your faith.

Wandering The Fergana Valley

Road trips are fun. Especially if there are cool things to see. Which is the point of road trips.

Holy Brutalist, Socialist Monument! Right outside the city of Fergana (which, duh, is in the Fergana Valley of Uzbekistan) sits this impressive salute to the Great Patriotic War, otherwise known as World War II. Soviet built, full of their iconic themes of communism and military might.

Soldiers in sync under the former USSR flag. The identifying marks of the flag have been chipped away. Progress. 1941, a big year! A beleaguered yet proud citizenry gathered together. Big anvil for strength.

Moving on to the city of Kokand, visiting the famous Juma mosque and madrasa complex. Central minaret.

The highlight is the extensive portico with hand-carved, wood columns, some original ones on display. Nice capitals. Looking up, wood ceilings of the portico full of colorful designs.

You Are Now Entering An Important City. Back to Fergana, the big gate over the highway lets you know something special is ahead.

Seeing History At The Fergana Museum Of Local Lore

Small town museums in Uzbekistan are the best. No fancy, digital, laser, interactive gee-whiz displays. Just good old Soviet-era dioramas and displays about hard work, animals, the glory of building a strong nation.

Exterior of the Local Lore museum. "Should we go in and get our minds blown?"

The museum has a handful of dioramas, a mix of animal, human, and natural. Cute animals in profile, poking their big noses from the side of the frame look cool.

Drippy. It's nice to see that anything can be made into a diorama. Can't visit the Chil-Ustun caves in nearby Kyrgyzstan? Local Lore brings the caves to you!

Working with your hands never goes out of style, from stone age man to Silk Road man.

Cotton is king in the Fergana Valley. If you forget what the crop looks like or where your whole family works, the museum is there to remind you.