Osh Bazaar – getting lost in a maze of shops

With its crowded streets and wide array of goods, Osh Bazaar is one of Bishkek’s most popular attractions.  Here you can find an incredible number of spices, dried fruits, nuts, fruits and vegetables, and even an entire aisle of Kurt (a local dried/salted milk snack).  The bazaar doesn’t only include food though; you can get lost in the maze of household goods, Chinese knock off clothing (ranging from bad fakes to identical copies with the original tags), and military gear.

While many people find this place unappealing, I visited twice and found it fascinating.  The salespeople are quite friendly, and many spoke some English. However, when I started speaking in Kazakh/Kyrgyz, they were always so surprised that someone from the US knew any of the language and wanted to chat even more.  Even crazier when compared to other markets around the world, when I pulled out my camera to take pictures, many vendors asked for their portrait to be taken with their products!  Walking through one aisle of the shoe section I had almost the entire row ask for pictures and then we chatted for almost twenty minutes.  In the fruits section, a woman explained to me in English all of the different products and let me sample them all since I had never tried them before.  Of course many people were friendly for tourists, but even those people who I told I was just looking around the bazaar were very talkative and nice.

One of the biggest things I read online before going was that there were many “police officers” (both fake and real) who would try to steal things from you if you followed them when asked for your passport.  During both visits (which were quite long), I never saw anything like this nor had anyone I met during my week stay.  While it’s definitely wise to be aware of the scams, they are not as common as they are made out to be in travel guides and online.  This place is a must see for anyone visiting Bishkek!