by Sam Tranum
70. Allworth, Central Asia, pp. 284-289. Whitman, “Turkestan Cotton.”
71. Curtis, Glenn. (1996). Turkmenistan: A Country Study. Washington: GPO for the Library of Congress. Retrieved on July 25, 2007 from http:// countrystudies.us/turkmenistan/
72. U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child (June 2, 2006). “UN Committee on the Rights of the Child: Concluding Observations, Turkmenistan.” CRC/C/TKM/CO/1. Retrieved June 27, 2007 from www.unhcr.org/cgi-bin/texis/vtx/refworld/rwmain?docid=45377ee50.
73. US Department of State (2004). “Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, 2003: Turkmenistan.” Retrieved on July 1, 2007 from http:// www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2003/27870.htm.
74. Agence France Presse. (Nov. 5, 2003). “Turkmen Traffic Cops Round Up Drivers to Gather Cotton Harvest: Report.”
75. Gelb, Michael, “An Early Soviet Ethnic Deportation: The Far-Eastern Koreans.” Russian Review, 1995. Vol. 54, pp. 389-412. Kho, Songmoo (1987). Koreans in Soviet Central Asia. Helsinki: Finnish Oriental Society.
76. Gelb, “The Far-Eastern Koreans,” p. 401.
77 . US Commission on International Religious Freedom (2004). “Countries of Particular Concern: Turkmenistan.” Retrieved on July 2, 2007, from http://www.uscirf.gov/countries/countriesconcerns/Countries/ Turkmenistan.html.
78. Conolly, Arthur (2001). Journey to the North of India Overland from England Through Russia, Persia and Afghanistan. New Delhi and Madras: Asian Educational Services, p. 76.
79. LeStrange, Lands of the Eastern Caliphate, pp. 379. Though the remains of Dekhistan now sit in the middle of the desert, the Caspian coast is actually not that far away. It’s possible that either the sea’s level was higher in Hawqal’s time, so that it extended further inland than it does today, or that Dekhistan was once a sprawling region that stretched all the way to the coast.
80. Kharin, Vegetation Degradation, pp. 40-41.
81. Edgar, Tribal Nation, p. 213.
82. Ibid, p. 206.
83. Ibid, p. 209.
84. Olcott, Martha Brill. “The Basmachi or Freemen’s Revolt in Turkestan 1918-1924.” Soviet Studies, 1981. Vol. 33, No. 3, p. 353.
85. Edgar, Tribal Nation, p. 212.
86. Lerman, Zvi and Karen Brooks (2001). Turkmenistan: An Assessment of Leasehold-Based Farm Restructuring. Washington DC: World Bank, pp. xi-xii. Pomfret, Richard. “Turkmenistan: From Communism to Nationalism by Gradual Economic Reform.” MOCT-MOST, 2001. Vol.11, p. 170.
87. For men, life expectancy at birth in Turkmenistan is 65. For women, it’s 72. CIA, World Factbook – Turkmenistan, retrieved on July 17, 2007 from https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos / tx.html.
88. Masson, V.M. (1992). “The Decline of Bronze Age Civilization and Movements of the Tribes,” in History of Civilizations of Central Asia Volume I: The Dawn of Civilization: Earliest Times to 700 B.C., A.H. Dani and V.M. Masson (eds.). UNESCO Publishing: Paris, pp 342.
89. Marri, Mir Khuda Bakhsh. (1997). Searchlight on Baloches and Balochistan. Lahore: Ferozsons, Ltd, pp. 17-21. By 1997, there were some 40,000 –50,000 living in the area.
90. Hopkirk, The Great Game, pp. 425-429.
91. De Laesso, F. 1885. “The Caves and Ruins at Penjdeh.” Proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society and Monthly Record of Geography, New Monthly Series, Vol. 7, No. 9 (Sep. 1885), p. 584.
92. Hopkirk, The Great Game, p. 429.
93. US Foreign Agricultural Service. (2004). “Crop Production in the Cotton Region of the Former Soviet Union.” Retrieved on July 25, 2007 from http://www.fas.usda.gov/remote/soviet/country_page / fsuasia_text.htm.
94. Aldiss, Songs from the Steppes, p. 5.
95. This hotel was home to a handful of American “gas-and-go” guys, who serviced the American military aircraft that regularly stopped off to refuel at the Ashgabat airport on the way from Europe to Afghanistan. This operation has been in place since the US invaded Afghanistan after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. See Balancing Military Assistance with Human Rights in Central Asia, a hearing in front of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on June 27, 2002.
96. United Press International. (March 1, 2004). “Men Get Makeovers in Turkmenistan.” Niyazov justified his decree by claiming that, “excess hair gives outsiders the ‘wrong impression’ of the country and is ‘unhygienic.’”
97. Hannan, Tim and Sarah O’Hara. (1998). “Managing Turkmenistan’s Karakum Canal: Problems and Prospects.” Post-Soviet Geography and Economics, Vol. 39, No. 4, p. 227.
98. Ibid,” p. 227.
99. Allworth, Central Asia, p. 117.
100. Hannan, “Managing Turkmenistan’s Karakum Canal,” p. 231.
101. Brice, Environmental History, p. 348.
102. Finn, Peter. (July 10, 2007). “Aral Sea’s Return Revives Withered Villages.” Washington Post.
103. Hannan, “Managing Turkmenistan’s Karakum Canal,” pp. 230-231.
104. Ibid, pp. 230-231.
105. Ibid, p. 232.
106. USSR Academy of Sciences. (1977). The Remaking of Nature under Socialism: Desert Development in the V.I. Lenin Karakum Canal Zone. Moscow: USSR Academy of Sciences.
107. Kerimi, Nina. “Opium Use in Turkmenistan: A Historical Perspective.” Addiction, 2000. Vol. 95, No. 9, pp. 1319-1333.
108. Allworth, Central Asia, p. 274.
109. A half-pencil-sized cellophane tube of nas costs only a few cents and can be found at most bazaars. Recipes vary, but they can include tobacco leaves, lime (purportedly from chicken shit), vegetable oil, pomegranate rind, and saksaul ashes. When I tried it, it wasn’t much fun – it made me dizzy and a little queasy. Niyazov banned it in 2004, claiming it caused cancer and tuberculosis. Still, the sidewalks in most Turkmen cities were stained with green splotches, where men had spit their nas goop.
110. Associated Press. (August 23, 2005). “Turkmen President Bans Lip Synching Performances.”
Table of Contents
Daily Life in Turkmenbashy’s Golden Age:
Part I: From Palm Beach to Central Asia
Chapter 1: The Pit of Fire
Chapter 2: From Palm Beach to Central Asia
Chapter 3: Welcome to the Gulag
Chapter 4: Life in the Gulag
Chapter 5: Marching for One Man
Chapter 6: A Massacre, a Plague of Locusts, and an Earthquake
Chapter 7: Permission Required
Chapter 8: Without Permission
Chapter 9: The Road to Tejen
Part II: Corruption, Absurdity, and Paranoia
Chapter 10: A New Year
Chapter 11: In the Golden Age, There Are No Cold Schools
Chapter 12: The Internet Center
Chapter 13: Doubt
Chapter 14: Merv
Chapter 15: A Wave of Revolutions
Chapter 16: A Small Success
Chapter 17: This Is Not a Camp
Chapter 18: Robbed
Chapter 19: My Three-Part Plan
Chapter 20: Picking Cotton
Chapter 21: Korean Salads
Chapter 22: Isolated and Smothered
Chapter 23: It All Comes Crashing Down
Chapter 24: Accused of Kidnapping
Part III: I Find an Oasis
Chapter 25: Nurana
Chapter 26: Working in the Vineyard
Chapter 27: Conversations With a KGB Agent
Chapter 28: A City Inside a Mountain
Chapter 29: Reminders
Chapter 30: Boating the Karakum
Chapter 31: Mugged
Chapter 32: Going Home
Notes
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