Comment by jakub_g | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jakub_g | Hacker News Reader

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Semi-related: I've been to Uzbekistan before pandemic with friends. It was very fun. Country is modernizing fast but has some remnants of the old era, which make a fun mix. Very nice people; at the same time, the controls on rail stations are airport-like, with x-raying people and the baggage, triple checking the tickets etc (but it seems mostly pro-forma).

What was surprising is that they have very modern high-speed trains, and super new train stations (most of them built just a few years ago). The country is huge but very well connected by train (and air; we first flew to the far west, and then came back east by train and visited a few cities along the road).

For one of the trains we bought regular tickets, but the ticket inspector friendly insisted on us to get an upgrade to the "lux" class :) (probably the regular class was busy), which was a good decision; the upgrade was absurdly cheap, and worth it (4-people compartments, very spacious and comfortable) due to the length of travel (several hours).

Another fun story: in another train we've been in an "open space" w/o compartments; it had TVs on the room which first played Michael Jackson concert, and the some TV series :)

> What was surprising is that they have very modern high-speed trains, and super new train stations (most of them built just a few years ago).

Is this from the country being fairly rich and having money to invest, or is this part of China's massive infrastructure project?

Several of the Stan’s such as Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are quite wealthy due to a high amount of natural resources such as oil and coal. Kazakhstan’s main city capital Astana is incredible. It looks like a small Shanghai or Dubai and it’s all largely because of their wealth from oil.

The country opened up a few years ago once the long-term president died and was replaced by a more progressive one. There was a moderate amount of western investment since - modernizing rail, telecom infra etc.

Also as mentioned by another commenter: Uzbekistan is more wealthy than other countries of the region; it's a major exported of things like gas, cotton, silk.

> Uzbekistan is more wealthy than other countries of the region;

Absolutely not. Uzbekistan was the Central Asian version of North Korea.

The poverty was universal, and extreme.

And yes, a change from a braindead Kim Il Sung wannabe who boiled people alive to a plain idiot plutocrat could be considered a "change" to be welcomed.

Kazakhstan is by far the wealthiest Central Asian nation.

I didn't say it's more wealthy than KZ. I was comparing to Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan. (Not an expert but it seems to me UZ is well ahead those)

> x-raying people

mmWave or X-ray?

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