124 Chapter Four
Turkestan as an interpreter and intermediary.^11 In his account of Turkestan
under Russian rule, the American diplomat and writer Eugene Schuyler de -
scribed Said Bay’s “peculiar” position in Turkestan after the conquest. Rus-
sian officials believed that he had “vast influence” over the local population, and
they relied on him as a trusted intermediary. His own people, however, detested
him for meddling.^12 The tsar rewarded Said Bay for his support and loyalty by
conferring on him the status of “hereditary honorable citizen,” which brought
special legal privileges, including exemptions from taxes and military con-
scription.^13 Saidazimbaev inherited this title and status from his father, along
with a small fortune and political connections. He worked in family businesses
and dabbled in local politics in Tashkent before exploring new opportunities
beyond Turkestan.^14
Saidazimbaev was not the only person to approach the government in this
period with a proposal for organizing the hajj, but he was the most ambitious.^15
He proposed to streamline Russia’s hajj traffic through the single port of
Odessa, using exclusively Russian railroads and steamships. He would build a
string of multipurpose facilities for hajj pilgrims along the rail routes between
Tashkent and Odessa, sell single, “direct” tickets to hajj pilgrims in rail stations
across the empire, and provide multilingual guides to help pilgrims navigate
Russian-speaking regions, all at cut rates. Facilities would offer lodging and
other services free of charge. They were to be erected in both Muslim and
non-Muslim regions, more or less along the new Tashkent-Orenburg-Odessa
rail route, which had opened in 1906. He proposed facilities in, among other
places, Samara, Penza, Kharkov, and Odessa, and a “reliable person” to head
each outpost.^16
Globally the mass hajj traffic in the early twentieth century was dominated by
poor Muslims, most of them traveling long distances for the first time in their
lives, and Russia was no exception.^17 Russia’s pilgrims were by and large “unso-
phisticated,” Saidazimbaev argued, and easy targets for predatory brokers and
“guides” who preyed on them along their routes, especially in Russia’s Black Sea
ports, where pilgrims’ needs were greatest. His focus on Odessa was timely: the
opening of the new Tashkent-Orenburg-Odessa line had suddenly connected
the port city directly to Central Asia, turning Odessa overnight into a major
hub of Russia’s hajj traffic. Odessa had no infrastructure to support the hajj traf-
fic; many pilgrims ended up sleeping on the streets, and the police were besieged
with reports of crime. Here, as elsewhere along pilgrims’ routes, Saidazimbaev’s
proposed his facilities as a way to “rescue” pilgrims from dishonest people, pro-
vide for their various needs, and solve problems of disorder and crime.