Paris, Friday 27 September, 22.00 hrs. Uzbekistan Airways flight HY252 to Taskent departs on time. The new Airbus 310 is painted in the national colours of Uzbekistan but looks a little bit naked inside: no decoration at all. When you're flying with an Asian airline to Asia you expect to enter into a typical atmosphere once inside the plain. The same goes for the uniform from the hostesses: over-aged Soviet style. Why not buy some nice tissues in Bukhara or Khiva and have typical and original dresses? We get a drink after taking off and later a good supper is served. But it seems that the staff forgot to serve drinks with the food.

7.30 A.M., Tashkent international airport. In the arrival hall, everybody has to fill in a customs form in double, only, nobody told us about that. Why not distribute this form on the plain, with some explanations? The bureaucratic situation at the airport reminds me the situation in Vietnamese airports, about 15 years ago. There's still a lot of work to do over here. My driver and traveling companion from Uzbektourism are waiting outside. Up to hotel Uzbekistan. A huge, renovated hotel with only one wing in operation. Not an unusual situation, because following the 11th September crisis, most of the hotels run on 30 to 40% occupancy rate. I have a free weekend in Tashkent. Time enough to discover the city, walk around, stroll through an amazingly number of nice parks, sightseeing for monuments and fountains. And Saturday evening along Saligokh Street, commonly called "Broadway", the place to go to watch Uzbek people enjoying themselves and the place to get a cold beer.

On Sunday, I attend a performance at the Navoi Theatre and Opera House. The repertoire is vast and performances change daily and on this very Sunday I get to see ''Le Corsaire" by the French romantic composer Adam, performed by the Bolshoi Ballet Group.

In the evening, I continue my artistic escapade with a visit to the art-cafe Caravan (with good food and nice music) and the Blues Bar (also known as Taxi Blues).

After two days of official and commercial meetings, we're leaving for Samarkand on Wednesday morning. The good road will take us there in 4 hours. About 17 km of this road are passing trough Kazakh territory. It seems that everybody makes a slop here to have a drink and to buy a bottle of the best local vodka (cheaper than in Uzbekistan).

Samarkand is giving me everything that I expected: the great monuments and culture of the Silk Road. 1 especially appreciate the majestic Registan, the intimate Shah-1-Zindah and the colorful main bazaar. The Afrosiab Palace Hotel is a nice place and in the evening there's time enough for a chat in the Rendez Vous bar, with (again) some good vodka. Before this, I had a sumptuous dinner with the hotel manager and several local officials. Further on to Bukhara today. It takes us about 5 hours to arrive at our hotel, the Bukhara Palace, a splendid building with nice, spacious rooms and professionally managed by the German Ralf Poth. If Samarkand means majesty, Bukhara means beauty. I like this town, where you can walk around for days, finding always new and interesting places and hidden beauties. With countless medressa's and places to stay a while for refreshments or just to look around, like the Liyabi-Hauz pool and square or the Taqi-Sarrafon and Taqi-Zargaron trading domes. Not-forgetting the impressive Minaret Kalyan! Tourists should stay at least three nights in Bukhara to enjoy the beauty, arts and handicrafts in this town. And also to attend the Fashion and Folk show with dinner under the stars at the Nodir Devan Begi Medressa.

The road to Urgench and Khiva is long, bad and dusty, because we're crossing the Kyzylkum desert. For a few km, the road leads trough Turkmenistan. An occasion to experience the bureaucracy at the border control (some of the police and customs officers even keep my passport upside down because they can't read any of the European languages on it.) This short trip also takes us trough an open-air museum of industrial archaeology and environmental pollution. It will take decennia to clean this area! We're crossing the famous Amudarya River, slowly dying, because the Turkmen as well as the Uzbeks are stealing its water for irrigation and other purposes. This is also the main reason why the Aral Lake is dying. To take tourists to and from Khiva, it's absolutely necessary that a new bridge over the Amudarya River is constructed at the town of Beruni, in order to avoid the journey to Turkmenistan.

Urgench is just a forgotten town in the middle of nowhere. But the completely renovated Khorezm Palace hotel is a very nice place to stay despite it being almost empty. After the majesty of Samarkand and the beauty of Bukhara, Khiva means poetry. An ensemble of medressas, mosques and mausoleums are inviting to walk around for hours and hours.

It's Sunday when I'm flying back from Urgench to Tashkent. A good flight but a funny ticket: the price on the ticket is mentioned in USD (75) and in UZS (63965), at an exchange rate of 820,06 Sum for one dollar. But this is not the fare the ticketing office asks me to pay: 74.000 UZS. Because nobody speaks English at the airport, there's nobody to explain this strange calculation.,p I spend my last night in Tashkent, an occasion to say farewell to Broadway. Early Monday morning, I catch my flight to Frankfurt. This time the plain is a Boeing 757-200. Good food and a lot of drinks this time, although is early in the morning.

Uzbekistan... first impressions... Nice hotels, nice people but above all the wonders of the Silk Road. Beyond a doubt the country has a lot to offer but still has a long way to go to develop further its tourism. With better roads, trained hotel staff and management. With better access to and infrastructure in remote areas for trekking and activities in nature, such as the Fan Mountains. A more professional management in tourism marketing and promotion could help a lot in this field.