It is nine in the morning on my last day in Dushanbe. I have been here just 14 days and in eighteen hours I will start the journey back to Ireland. I had originally hoped to take the train from Dushanbe to Moscow and document the trip that many of these labor migrants take. Unfortunately the process for securing all the correct visas (you travel across four international borders) takes nearly three weeks to complete. I do not have the time or the money right now to wait three weeks in Dushanbe while the visas are arranged. Perhaps in the spring I will try and make that part of the story happen.

Tajikistan is a beautiful country. Its terrain and climate remind me very much of California, particularly the Bay Area. It is a mostly mountainous terrain with one large valley in the Southwest part of the country which is where Dushanbe is located. The city itself is a fairly new creation having been build by the Soviets only 70 years ago. There was once a small village and market located here. In fact the name Dushanbe simply means “Monday” in Tajik as this was the site of the “Monday market”.
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