The standard refrain from anyone you ask is that 'Osh is older than Rome'. Legends credit all sorts of people with its founding, from King Solomon (Suleyman) to Alexander the Great. These days it's Kyrgyzstan's second-biggest city and the administrative centre of the huge, populous province that engulfs the Fergana valley on the Kyrgyzstan side.

It suffers a kind of demographic schizophrenia, being a major centre of Kyrgyzstan but with a strong (40%) Uzbek population more in tune with Uzbekistan and the rest of the Fergana valley.