We are in Qazaqstan for ten weeks, and we spent ten days of those ten weeks driving around Uzbekistan! On this blog there are many posts about our time in Uzbekistan from many different students, so I encourage you to check them out and read more about our time there.
Nearly all of our transportation across Uzbekistan was by bus, and by the end of the trip we had spent many hours aboard our beloved coach buses. One of our longest excursions was the roughly 3-hour drive (and then 3 hours back) to where the Aral Sea used to exist. The entire ride was quite bumpy and difficult on our carsick friends, but we got there in the end!
For those of you who might not know what the Aral Sea is, aka me before this trip, the Aral Sea was the 4th largest inland sea or lake in the world. However, due to the Soviet Union diverting all the water away from the sea to irrigate cotton, the sea has almost completely dried up. It is a massive ecological disaster, and the issues stemming from it have been devastating for the region.
Later in the trip traveling from Khiva to Bukhara, we also got to see part of the Amu Darya which is one of the rivers which was diverted to irrigate the cotton. It used to lead into the Aral Sea, but now it just trickles off into the desert. So many communities rely on this river for water, but the Aral Sea is not one of them anymore. As we stood gazing over the Amu Darya, we could, in theory, see into Turkmenistan that’s how close we were to the border, and our phones even connected to the cell towers!
The interesting thing is that our excursion to the Aral Sea was relatively early in the trip, but we continued to hear about it as we visited other places in Uzbekistan because its loss is now a part of the history and culture of the country. Before the sea dried up, there was lots of fishing and an economy centered around that. Now it’s all gone. In the town we visited, Muynak, there’s a small museum with some history of the region, and we were able to watch old footage of when the sea had a thriving fishing economy. Now all that is left is sand, salt, and toxic chemicals which were left from the evaporation of the water. They had to plant new shrubs there to try to prevent the sand from blowing and creating dust storms, but the air is still toxic to the many who live in the region. I’m obviously simplifying the situation for brevity, but I highly recommend looking into the disaster more because it is devastating.
I think what strikes me the most about this whole situation is the continued reliance on cotton within the economy. Even though growing cotton is what got them in this situation in the first place, the people living in Uzbekistan still continue to grow cotton hoping to make money for their family, especially now that there is no fishing industry. The Soviet Union collapsed, but since these people have no alternative, they must continue growing cotton to survive, which makes it even less likely that the sea could ever return. It’s frustrating that there does not seem to be an alternative for these people because governments do not prioritize the health of our planet.
We see evidence of climate change everyday from the wildfires on the west coast recently to the polar vortex in the Midwest 4 years ago and all the other incremental changes in the plant. Temperatures are rising, glaciers are melting, but the process has been gradual. There are still people who deny that global warming exists, and it has been so difficult to get legislators to try to do something about it. But you cannot ignore the disappearance of an entire inland sea. The Aral Sea is rock-solid proof of humans’ impact on the world, and not in a good way. We put so much work into destroying the world, why can’t we put that much effort into saving it?
