Like Khiva, Buchara is also a living museum. The most obvious landmark of Buchara is the Kalon minaret in the old city centre. It rises over several mosques and medressas (schools where the Q'uran is teached).

The local children are not impressed by the importance of these buildings: in the evening they use the deserted square to play soccer.

In the early days, there used to be over 200 pools in Buchara, which were connected through a extensive network of canals. The water wasn't very clean and caused many epidemics. When the Russians took over, they drained most of the pools. The Lyabi-Hauz is still there, and nowadays this is by far the best place in town have tea, eat some kebab and watch the locals.

Getting out of the maze is more difficult. The locals who see you wandering through the streets will point you right the way you came from ... back to the Char Minar.

The other party looked (just a bit) more normal. In the Jewish quarter of Buchara we encountered this group of three musicians. They were followed by a large group of overweight women, 'dancing' through the streets while carrying pillows with presents on top of it.

To the left a water tower, and down the Zindan or prison. So, Leon and Mirjam can both say they did think about work.

One word of warning: do not visit the Ark of Buchara; it will cost you a lot of sums and there isn't much to see except lots of souvenir shops. Definitely a tourist trap.

Some things we saw when walking through Buchara: decorative scissors and construction workers having a break. The big bottle between these guys contains tea, and (although it looks that way) not some kind of paint remover.