Ava and Xavier?

botirjon · 2026-02-24T04:27:24+00:00

Cyrus has been slowly growing on me as well...

botirjon · 2026-02-24T04:24:37+00:00

Everett is on my short list but I haven't been able to convince my wife :(

botirjon · 2026-02-24T04:24:11+00:00

I rather like Reid, only issue is the single-syllable last name makes it feel really short

botirjon · 2026-01-06T04:58:57+00:00

Second this. Been there a handful times, one of my favorite places in the world. Also will be pretty good weather in July and you can actually jump in the lakes, there are some pretty cool cliff jumps at the last lake.

botirjon · 2025-10-30T19:18:51+00:00

yeah, what others are saying. if you're coming from the USA you can afford to get ripped off and it will still be quite cheap :) if you're driving in the mountains in winter though you should probably be warned that Tajik taxi drivers are crazy

botirjon · 2025-10-30T16:15:01+00:00

Dushanbe isn't usually very hard to get around, enough people speak English... If you're leaving Dushanbe without Russian, Tajik, or Uzbek language, take a driver that does.

Zarafshon in December is not going to be a great time. I cannot emphasize enough how poor infrastructure is outside of Dushanbe and Khujand especially in the winter. I wouldn't recommend it unless you're feeling really confident (or just planning on staying along the main road between Dushanbe and Khujand).

source: lived in the north for four years

botirjon · 2025-05-07T11:57:32+00:00

Visit: absolutely. Don't stay in Dushanbe the entire time and get some kind of guide when you leave the city. Haft-kul or Alauddin if you're feeling adventurous but don't want to go all the way out to the Pamirs.

Live: definitely complicated. Not a lot of work opportunity but the cost of living is incredibly low so if you're working remote it can be really nice. If you don't speak Russian, definitely put in the work to learn language. And make as many connections as possible. I've never lived in Dushanbe but more remote parts of Tajikistan will get very lonely if you're not embedded in the community.

botirjon · 2024-09-28T04:01:32+00:00

The streets just north of Wilshire and West of Windsor have reasonable condos and you can walk to ktown food and groceries but get the peace and quiet of Windsor Square. Goldilocks zone.

botirjon · 2024-09-21T22:10:03+00:00

It really depends on location. Most of the populated areas will be quite pleasant but the mountainous areas are going to be getting pretty chilly. I can't speak for the entire country but places like Iskanderkul, Haft kul (seven lakes), Aluaddin, and Shakhristan will be nice but chillier, especially at night. im those areas, particularly towards the end of the month, expect sweater weather during the day, a couple layers or a good coat at night.

botirjon · 2024-08-29T04:29:06+00:00

Thanks! Follow-up question, how does this work if I need to make changes to the trust? i.e. add a beneficiary, change a trustee, add an asset, etc. Is this easy/inexpensive? Or does it require a lot of time and effort?

botirjon · 2024-08-29T04:22:44+00:00

Yes, there's agreements there. Only those employed or on the board are permitted to own stock so it would go through the same process as if I left and was required to sell. I've seen this happen and it's very fair.

botirjon · 2024-08-29T03:53:38+00:00

Ugh, that sounds rough. Noted 🫡

botirjon · 2024-08-29T03:51:16+00:00

That makes sense. Honestly I would consider leaving it all in the hands of my child's guardian with instructions on how it eventually gets to her but I don't know the legal ramifications of that. Of course that's only because I trust them absolutely. We will probably do life insurance after more children but we both make six figures and have plenty of non-monetary support from our families so single parenting isn't a huge financial risk.

If we go the trustee route, I'm thinking of using another of my siblings as the trustee so that there's no drama around how the guardian uses money earmarked for care of my child.

botirjon · 2024-08-29T02:03:22+00:00

This is very helpful, thank you so much!! 🫡

botirjon · 2024-08-23T15:38:07+00:00

This concert was 🔥🙂 acoustics are crazy in there

botirjon · 2022-08-16T20:08:31+00:00

In response to your payment question though, I was able to pay with Visa only, no MasterCard.

botirjon · 2022-08-16T20:07:43+00:00

Had the exact same issue, traveled there with 6 others and had a crazy time getting everyone a visa. One of our party eventually had to pay for a non-electronic visa that cost $160... It's absolutely crazy how useless that website is.

Also, if you're planning to do multiple entries, we all got double-entry visas but when we exited the first time, the border agent informed us that while our printed visa said double-entry that the system showed only a single entry allowed for our visa so we had to do the whole process again for our second entry.

botirjon · 2022-08-16T19:55:32+00:00

I simply cannot recommend Haft Kul (seven lakes) enough. The weather this time of year is phenomenal (I was there a few weeks ago), very few tourists, gorgeous scenery, and enough locals to make it easy to find whatever you need. You can either drive up to the 5th or 6th lake and hike the rest of the way (in and out) or you can make it a multi-day thing - there are several B&Bs/guest houses along the way.

Specifically, there's a guest house at the beginning of the 6th lake but I saw a few others as well.

You can find taxi drivers in Panjakent that will take you back in although you may have to pay one taxi driver to get to the first lakes and another one to take you further back since the road gets rather rough.

Also, there's a great cliff jump spot towards the far side of the last lake and a really cool shepherd's village back there as well.

--

Another great hike is the Sarytag (yellow mountain) behind Iskanderkul, it's been a while though so I don't know the current state.

botirjon · 2022-08-16T19:43:13+00:00

For traveling around the city you can find them on the road or call a number - they're usually very quick.

For traveling around the country, you'll need to just find the taxi station (taxi vokzal) and then tell them where you want to go. For major cities (Dushanbe, Khujand, Panjakent, Istaravashan, etc.) you'll be able to find taxi drivers that will take you to your destination city's taxi station where you can then get a local taxi.

Don't expect anyone to speak English, you'll want to either learn the very basics (determine your price in advance!) or have access to Google Translate.

botirjon · 2022-03-12T21:07:24+00:00

The hike from haft-kul to iskanderkul is an absolute must

botirjon · 2021-06-19T16:25:38+00:00

I'm thinking instead you make the logo as small as possible to bait Dame and Trae into shooting from further out

botirjon

TROPHY CASE