Uzbek Quotes

Banning paper and plastic and making shoppers carry their groceries home in their mouths like dogs is just the thing to make a little tin humanist in the Obama West Wing think he's admiral of the Uzbek Navy. ~ P. J. O'Rourke

Persian, Dilorom told me, had only one word for crying, whereas Old Uzbek had one hundred. Old Uzbek had words for wanting to cry and not being able to, for being caused to sob by something, for loudly crying like thunder in the clouds, for crying in gasps, for weeping inwardly or secretly, for crying ceaselessly in a high voice, for crying in hiccups, and for crying while uttering the sound 'hay hay. ~ Elif Batuman

At the first such gathering, I politely sat with them for half an hour, drank some vodka, and even recited a toast about how great it was that Gulya had such great friends. This proved to be a tactical error, since afterward Gulya wanted me to drink vodka and recite toasts with them every night, which was not compatible with my program of study of the great Uzbek language. ~ Elif Batuman

Not that he [Uzbek] rejected Mendel's proposals or rebelled against his decisions; but he exercised a subtle, passive abrasion against every active thrust: like dust in a watch, Mendel thought to himself. He's got dust in him, even though he is young. It's stupid to say the young are strong. You understand many things better at thirty than at twenty and you can also bear them better. ~ Primo Levi

I pray God that whoever will lead our country may be, in his heart, as much Pashtun as Tajik, as much Uzbek as Hazara. That his wife may counsel and assist him; that he may choose advisors of great character and wisdom. That books may replace weapons, that education may teach us to respect one another, that our hospitals may be worthy of their mission, and that our culture may be reborn from the ruins of our pillaged museums. That the camps of famished refugees may disappear from our borders, and that the bread the hungry eat be kneaded by their own hands.

I will do more than pray, because when the last talib has put away his black turban and I can be a free woman in a free Afghanistan, I will take up my life there once more and do my duty as a citizen, as a woman, and, I hope, as a mother. ~ Latifa

Shah Ismail had fallen victim to the rarely used, great Uzbek anti-Shiite potato and sturgeon curse, which required quantities of potatoes and caviar which were not easy to amass, and a unity of purpose among the Sunni witches which was likewise difficult to achieve. ~ Salman Rushdie

I am a former sabre fencer and fenced as part of the Uzbek republic team. ~ Alisher Usmanov

The pistol had been one hell of a find, because it hadn't quite been what she'd thought it was at first blush. Not simply the S&W Mk 39, but rather a modified version of the same, the Mk 22 Mod 0, also called the "hush puppy". It was Vietnam-era, not the most reliable gun in the world, but wonderfully silent, not only equipped with a silencer to eliminate the sound of gunfire, but also with a slide lock, to keep the actual mechanical operation of the gun quiet as well. She'd test-fired the gun at the market before purchasing, and been stunned that it still worked. The Uzbek vendor had offered to sell it to her cheap.
"It's too quiet," he'd explained. "No one wants it."
Chace shut her eyes, half smiling at the memory. ~ Greg Rucka