We are in the Panjshanbe Bazaar. Panjshanbe means “Thursday” at they used to just trade at this market on Thursdays. Now they trade here every day. This market is near the center of Khujand and was very crowded. It had locals, tourists, and people shopping from the neighboring villages. It was a huge place and divided into grocery and non-food items. Non-food items included clothing, electronic devices, and household items.

The building itself was also impressive, especially since it was built by the Russians in 1964. It looks a bit like Stalin gone off the rails. It has a pink neoclassical façade, statues of field workers, a large dome and all sorts of attached areas with shops, tents, and trucks loaded with melons. Again, I’ll try and pick out some lesser seen photos rather than just the fruit and vegetables, though they looked wonderful.

You can see a portion of the façade with the grand entranceway in the first photo. There was a large religious and memorial complex across the open square that we visited before we walked across to the market.

The main market was crowded and we had limited time so we wandered out the back of the main building to see if we could find more interesting or unusual items. In the second photo, you can see that it was still crowded out back.

I included the third photo because I don’t remember seeing peanuts and cotton (behind the woman) for sale in any of the other markets.

We learned that the way back section was considered the “wholesale” area, so we went there. The fourth photo was back there. It also included great big piles of onions and potatoes and the like that weren’t bagged, just piled. At one point, a guy tried to speak to Vicky and myself but we couldn’t understand him. Finally he asked in broken English, “Where are you from”? We said California and he shouted “Arnold Schwarzenegger” over and over in a big booming voice. Everyone laughed.

The last photo is inside the covered building. It was melon season and melons were everywhere. They were in booths, in trucks, stacked up, spread out and it seemed that most people were buying melons.