I know I have succeeded in my mission here …

22 Responses to I know I have succeeded in my mission here …

1. peteb says:

   January 19, 2005 at 5:10 pm

   An inordinate number of people? You mean more than the number who Google for “those guys”?
2. red says:

   January 19, 2005 at 5:14 pm

   I can’t tell you how many people get to me from Googling about Central Asia. Way more than “those guys” – because, I think, less people out there are babbling on about the Kara Kum Desert or the Aral Sea disappearing – so most usually I am on the first page of searches. I am # 3 for “satellite photos of Aral Sea disappearing” – or something like that. You would think nobody would Google that … but a TON do.

   And there I am. A nobody. Not a geologist or an environmentalist or an activist or a scientist … just a chick who is pissed off that the Aral Sea is pretty much gone and wrote a post about it. Just a chick who loves the history of that whole area. A nobody, basically. Very weird.

   I got a FURIOUS letter from a representative with the tourist board of Tashkent because I said I thought the buildings were ugly. I haven’t even been there!!! It was only from photos that I made me judgment!

   But that just goes to show you … nobody in any major metropolitan city would give a crap if some anonymous chick named Sheila said “the buildings are ugly” – but in Tashkent? When that “anonymous chick” is on the first damn page of Google searches? And they’re trying to draw tourists to their city?

   I wrote her a letter of apology and told her I had never been to Tashkent, I am sure it was lovely.

   I don’t babble on about the Kara Kum as much as I used to.

   More’s the pity.
3. peteb says:

   January 19, 2005 at 5:35 pm

   An honest opinion is a boon for everyone except Tourist Boards, Sheila.. always.

   Now, of course, those Googling “Kara Kum Desert” have another link to look at.. just got to tempt them into telling us ‘What information are they looking for? and Why? – or is that just me? – and that ‘FURIOUS letter’ sounds intriguing BTW.
4. red says:

   January 19, 2005 at 5:41 pm

   But still … If some random person writes on their blog: “New York City subways STINK” – is the NYC tourist board EVER going to even HEAR about it? If you Google “New York”, you are going to get a quazillion pages. But if only 10 people throughout the world have ever even heard of Tashkent … and are thinking of going … and come across my rambling post on the first page of Google searches about how ugly the Soviet architecture is … it could make way more of a dent in the tourism business than, say, someone complaining on their blog about how dirty the streets in New York are.

   Tashkent is off the beaten track. It’s nowheresville (I’d still love to go). What one person says matters WAY more. I knew that Central Asia, and that whole old silk-road area, was once one of the most important places on the planet … and then when sea routes were opened up, it fell out of importance, and fell out of history.

   I never really GOT that until I got the furious letter from the tourist board.

   Oh, and I ramble on and on about the silk road and the Kara Kum and the oases and the Soviets planting cotton (hence: the drying up of the Aral Sea) … so they’re pretty good links, I have to say. I get letters from people all the time about them. Weird.
5. red says:

   January 19, 2005 at 5:45 pm

   Oh yeah, and tourist-board chick was FURIOUS at me. There were many MANY exclamation points involved. !!!!!!! She gave me a list of everything beautiful there was in Tashkent. I told her I really wanted to come there someday and I would be sure to look it all up.

   I meant it, too!

   But what I was criticizing was the god-awful SOVIET architecture which pretty much ruins the look of a place. Huge, intimidating, poured cement block buildings, wide wide alienating streets, blech.

   I stand by that judgment. Still want to see the place though.
6. peteb says:

   January 19, 2005 at 6:01 pm

   You’re right about the comparisons on the number of hits.. But I don’t buy the argument put forward by the Tashkent Tourist Board about putting people off.

   Look at this way.. if someone’s thinking of going to Tashkent, are they really going to be put off by anyone saying that the Soviet architecture is ugly? If they don’t know already, they’ll soon be reading about that particular phase of the area’s history.

   It’s not as if you were dissing Tashkent, the area, the history or the people -and how many of the letters are complaints about those comments on the Soviet architecture?

   The Tourist Board should be grateful – considering the posts on the silk-road, the disappearance of the Aral Sea, the observatories and the rest of the history.. IMHO.
7. peteb says:

   January 19, 2005 at 6:04 pm

   Of course, it may just be that the Tourist Board is populated with the remnants of the Soviet apparatchiks…
8. Dave E. says:

   January 19, 2005 at 6:15 pm

   Red-I had a girlfriend who worked at the same company I did but she was in the travel division. You wouldn’t believe the lengths that the hotels and tourist boards went to try to get her to come visit, free of course, so she’d book group travel to their locations. You should have told that woman that if her government would pay for the trip, food, lodging etc. that you would be happy to do a “site visit” and write it up on your website as publicity for the Tashkent tourist industry. Probably nothing but hey, worth a shot.
9. Big Dan says:

   January 19, 2005 at 7:37 pm

   Googling “Kara Kum Desert” is exactly how I found you in the first place, Sheila. Unfortunately, at the time, I simply was badly misspelling an old porn flick I was looking for.
10. Alex says:

    January 20, 2005 at 3:38 am

    Sheila

    There’s a party happening in your brain that I want to get invited to.
11. Lisa says:

    January 20, 2005 at 9:01 am

    Hahahahahahahaha, Dan! We must share the same brain, because when I first read Kara Kum Desert, I thought, “When did Sheila do a post about PORN? And how did I miss it?”
12. red says:

    January 20, 2005 at 10:03 am

    peteb:

    I still say, though, that my one measly complaint was FAR more visible than a complaint about, say, Paris or Berlin would be.
13. red says:

    January 20, 2005 at 10:10 am

    Dave E.:

    I know. I think I missed the opportunity with that woman, sadly. It’s my dream in life to get my ass to that area of the world, but I would definitely need to be sponsored by some organization or another.
14. peteb says:

    January 20, 2005 at 10:49 am

    I completely agree with your point on the visibility of your minor complaint, Sheila.. which is not something you have any control over.. but I’m still concerned at an apparat-chick working at a Tourist Board – any Tourist Board – sending out a FURIOUS letter to someone expressing an honest (and, in this case, correct) opinion in a blog.
15. red says:

    January 20, 2005 at 10:52 am

    She said I looked at her city with “racist Western eyes”. But … I just said, pretty much: “Jeez, the Soviets were sucky at architecture, weren’t they? They ruin everything they touched.” That was the statement. Maybe she was Russian, there are still many Russians in Tashkent, so that would make sense. Because I lambasted the messiness, sloppiness, and ugliness of WHATEVER the Soviets built.
16. peteb says:

    January 20, 2005 at 10:57 am

    That’s not a FURIOUS letter, Sheila, that’s just plain offensive in itself.. and SHE was complaining that YOU might have put some people off visiting?!!

    Is there a Uzbekistan diplomatic office in the US? I’d be sending them a copy of the letter from the Tourist Board.. with a subtle hint that you’d really like to visit…
17. red says:

    January 20, 2005 at 11:15 am

    yeah, I can just imagine some unsuspecting person visiting Tashkent, stopping by the tourist board, and being harangued by some Soviet witch not to look at the ugliness with “racist Western eyes”.

    Welcome to Uzbekistan, you racist Westerners!

    Er … thanks??
18. peteb says:

    January 20, 2005 at 11:24 am

    I thought I’d seen a relevant reference when hunting down info on Ulugh.. according to this report on the BBC website from 2000 – “The current Uzbek leadership has eradicated most of the traces of the former Soviet Union’s domination”… most, but not all, apparently.

    BTW… Consulate General of Uzbekistan *ahem*
19. Dave J says:

    January 20, 2005 at 12:53 pm

    From the NY consulate, I followed the link to the embassy, which is apparently at 1746 Mass. Ave, NW: right along Embassy Row somewhere. I’m trying to place exactly where that is to see if I can actually picture the specific building in my mind without using MapQuest. By the number, it’s pretty far downtown, closer to Dupont Circle than to, say, the VP’s residence at the Naval Observatory, near where I knew a bunch of the central Asian embassies were clustered.
20. Dave J says:

    January 20, 2005 at 12:54 pm

    Oh, and I’m jealous of Big Dan having made what seemed to me the obvious comment first. ;-)
21. Big Dan says:

    January 20, 2005 at 6:10 pm

    Dave J,

    I’m starting some serious treatment this week. I gotta get my shots in while I can!
22. Phil says:

    January 22, 2005 at 10:22 pm

    FYI I googled “ineluctable mordality…”

    yes, yes ,yes.

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