Uzbekistan Bonus

Hey Ya’ll!

Welcome back. Happy to have you here.

As I was perusing YouTube earlier this week, I came across a video creator that I have been following for a long time who provides all-encompassing videos on every country in the world. His series has been going on for some time and he works in alphabetical order, and GUESS WHAT! This week he highlighted Uzbekistan! So, we are going to take a short break from researching places to visit and things to do around the country, and instead watch and reflect on his video. Barbs from Geography Now is an enthusiastic geography wiz who engages his video audience throughout the entire nearly 40 minute video. What I really like about his country highlights are that he cover topics like: physical and political geography, social demographics, history, disputed territory, wildlife and notable people of the country. He also, if at all possible, brings in guest speakers from the country to speak on these subjects from their perspective as locals. The videos are very entertaining and filled with fun skits and banter-like dialogue. Something I learned through the Uzbekistan episode in particular are the UNESCO World Heritage Sites found in the cities of Samarkand, Bukhara and Khiva, with the latter two being places I had never even heard of! She highlights these sites and discusses their significance to the country, its history and its social demographics. Another interesting point made in the video I didn’t know about the country before are its economics. For example, I learned that there is one electronic company who has a monopoly in the country, making it difficult to buy things like Apple products.

As you can see, these types of resources can be beneficial on a deeper level to understanding a new country as a whole. With the local perspectives, it gives the researcher, like you and I, a better understanding of the destination. Please watch the video linked above and then I encourage you to explore more of his videos for other destinations you’re interested in! There’s always more to learn.

Happy research and chat with you next week!