Rich tapestry ... a workshop of women embroidering textiles in Tashkent.Credit:AFP
On a trip along the old Silk Road,Sandra Hall admires intricate carpets and embroidery,and the revival of a nation's traditions.
In the courtyard,Mr Akhbar is cooking plov,Uzbekistan's national dish. A form of pilaf with mutton and vegetables,it can be as stodgy as it sounds but Akhbar,we're promised,is a plov expert.
While we wait to find out,we join his wife,Mastura,in their house in the old Jewish quarter of Bukhara. Once one of the key cities of the Silk Road,it's now a UNESCO World Heritage site,and the house,built in the 19th century for a merchant and his family,retains much of the original design. The walls of the living room are lined with fluted panels and niches displaying the household's collection of ceramic pots and dishes. But we're here to see its textiles.
Akhbar started the first antique shop in Bukhara after Uzbekistan gained its independence from Russia in 1991. Now Mastura opens a door at the end of the room and begins taking out bolts of fabric,unfurling them as she goes. First come the silk ikats,some of them antique. Then she moves to the suzani,the embroidered pieces that,according to tradition,are essential to every Uzbek bride's dowry. If a bride can't make them all herself,her female relatives pitch in,producing wall hangings,cushion covers,bedspreads and tablecloths.
To take antique pieces out of the country requires a government certificate but the modern embroideries are just as beautiful. And because of the resurgence of nationalism since independence,these handcrafts are being enthusiastically revived,helped by UNESCO seed money and government incentives in the form of tax breaks for artisans and subsidised rental space in former caravanserai.
The silk threads are coloured by natural dyes and certain motifs recur. Pomegranates are an emblem of fertility,apple blossoms mean happiness and chillies are said to be protect against the evil eye. By the time the plov is served - as promised,a great improvement on anything we've sampled so far - most of us are happily nursing a parcel or more. And it's not as if we've been extravagant. In Uzbekistan,the Australian dollar goes a long way.
The next morning,on the streets of Bukhara,workmen are hammering paving stones into place with plastic bottles filled with sand. On our way into the city,we'd been looking forward to sitting over a coffee in the city square,a great local meeting place,and browsing in the shops and stalls on its edge. Now the square is a construction zone. Dust is thick in the air and the nearby shops have taken in their displays of carpets,suzani,pottery and leatherwork.
Preparations are under way for an international festival taking place in three days'time. The organiser is the president's daughter,Gulnara Karimova,a glamorous and highly controversial figure whose diverse business interests are said to have earned her a fortune. It's hard to know where to start in describing her ubiquitous role in Uzbekistan's political and commercial life. As well as making a pop video with Julio Iglesias,she has set up a fashion label,designed a jewellery line for the Swiss company Chopard and served as Uzbekistan's ambassador to Spain and permanent representative to the UN in Geneva,where she lives. Let's just say that whatever Gulnara wants,Gulnara gets.
On our third morning in Bukhara,we step out to find that the men with the plastic bottles have achieved the seemingly impossible. The square is paved,the dust is settling and the shopkeepers,who have had to contribute to the cost of the work,look almost happy.