Samarkand
Uzbekistan
May 27, 2009

Dear Family and Friends,

The Antica Bed & Breakfast in Samarkand was an excellent spot to make new friends. I met Alice, traveling alone around the world; Stephen from the mountains of Austria; Nick, a milkman from Liverpool; Sean and Marissa from the Ivy League (both speak fluent Russian); Matt, an American diplomat posted in Latvia; a group of documentary film-makers from Iran; and Peter from Holland.

I met Antoine and Julia with their two very young sons, Athur, 4 and Balthazar, 2 on an adventure through Central Asia.

Everyone is good company over buffet breakfast and multi-course traditional dinner as we exchange our travel stories, suggestions, and political points of view.

(Some of us meet again and again as we travel the same route from city to city.)

And of course, there’s Aziza, our charming and helpful host and her Tajik family and staff.