The very best day came yesterday ...
June 04, 2018 | 09:27 |427
After waking up in the morning, I soon felt something was wrong. Not as usual. Something has changed. "Built-in" body "sensors" that control the already almost automatic mode of life, suddenly signaled: the surrounding airspace had a transformation, there are no habitual factors. A few minutes later I realized what was the matter: it was extremely quiet. The morning silence stretched like a soft rippling plaid, melted like a souffle in the mouth and brought an amazing mood. Oh yes! Today Ashgabat has a day without motor transport. But I could not even imagine how noticeably this could affect the sound background. Every day thousands of cars, rushing through the streets of the city, create a "gray" noise, which covers the city with a thick veil. We are used to this noise and do not notice it. It is the main soundtrack of a modern metropolis. And suddenly it was turned off. On the occasion of World Bike Day, which we ourselves came up with to help make everyone's life a little easier and remind us why we live it.Eziz OVEZOV
For a while it even seemed that the city was still. But it lived its former life, only somehow brisker, or more cheerful and more positive, thanks to the energy of childhood and youth, pouring into the streets of the city together with the heights of all colors.
Here I must say that, wishing to co-ordinate, since everyone on this day was moved to bicycles, I set off on foot. Therefore I had the opportunity to observe what is happening on the streets of the city, empty of private cars, sadly frozen in parking lots and in the yards.
Even taxis, yellow and white-green cars in drafts, which, as public transport, were allowed to move around the city that day, drove very slowly and, as if apologizing, modestly crowded to the roadside, giving way to the numerous cyclists who, with great pleasure, "cut" on the avenues.
But the passenger buses, on the contrary, challenged their advantage on the roads - on this day they shuttled with such a high intensity that the taxi could only be used by people who are very late for the airport.
On their posts there were also regulators - in a formal uniform, all the same on a holiday. Today, they regulated the movement of cyclists - after all, no one abolished the traffic rules, and signs of a traffic light are mandatory for compliance by all who go to the "big road".
And on the "small" roads - the district streets of Ashgabat - the children were completely in control. Here, high-speed races were organized on bikes, skates and roller skates. Restless mothers settled themselves as juries on the roadside, and the dads strove to take away the means of transportation from the offsprings, in order to drive themselves along the free streets, as in a carefree childhood.
The weather turned out to be perfect that day. Neither hot nor cold - comfortable in a sports jacket and sleeveless undershirt. I experienced great pleasure walking around the city, enjoying its silence, greenery, freedom and joy of the youth who occupied the road space of the capital with their bicycles.
It is very pleasant to note that many parents used the "Day without motor vehicles" to give their children the first lessons of riding a bicycle along the roadway. A great moment: a minimum of traffic and maximum attention of the guards, who are ready to talk about how not to expose themselves to danger while driving on motorways.
The whole day passed in this wonderful aura from a mixture of "no-traffic" enveloping silence, boyish mischief on the heights and the aspiration of adults to return to childhood, sitting on a two-wheeled iron horse. And when, at the end of all this, I felt the same "gray" noise, I wanted to sing "The very best day came yesterday ..."
