A secular nation. (Uzbekistan).

We arrived in Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan, in the wee hours of the morning. The first thing that I noticed during our bus ride from the airport to our hotel was the unusual number of tall trees, as if we were going through a forest.

The other thing that got my attention was the unusual number of young people on the dark streets or alleys.

I asked Oleg Khamdamov, our tour guide, why there were so many people out and he replied that in his country the streets are safe at any time.

That was just for starters.

From the moment that our NCEW group set foot on the Central Asia nation until we left a week later, Uzbekistan gave us a surprise after surprise, mostly pleasant. Everywhere the Uzbeks we met were friendly and hospitable. Many took pride in sharing their rich history and cultural heritage with us.

However, one of the most interesting things about Uzbekistan was seeing the contrast between this predominantly Muslim nation and Saudi Arabia and Egypt. Uzbekistan is the nation that we got to see the most. In Saudi Arabia we spent a little over three days and visited only Riyadh and Jeddah. In Egypt, we spent four days and stayed in Cairo the whole time.

But in Uzbekistan, we stayed an entire week and made daylong bus trips to Bukhara and Samarkand where we stayed two days and one day respectively.

In a matter of days we went from the rigid way of life in Saudi Arabia, where women wear a black cloak (the abaya) to Egypt, a country with a more liberal dress code, and then to Uzbekistan. In the latter young women wearing jeans or miniskirts with sleeveless blouses, often baring their belly buttons, are seen almost everywhere.

That was the most obvious difference among all three Islamic countries we visited.

But there are many other profound differences. They are important in explaining to American and Canadian readers and radio listeners (one of our fellow travelers is from Canada and another is radio talk show host) what Islam is about.

For example, in Saudi Arabia the holy Qur'an is the Constitution and in Egypt, Islam plays a major role in the government. But in Uzbekistan, the government is secular.

If anything, the nation of 25 million people, which is slightly larger than California, still operates much like in the days when it was part of the Soviet Union.

Although Uzbek is the national language, Russian is spoken everywhere, the government is highly centralized, corruption remains a problem, there's no freedom of the press, and human rights violations are worse than ever. According to the U.S. State Department, the government targets mainly suspected Islamic extremists. About 6,500 people are currently in prison, although no more than 200 are truly religious extremists. Also, hundreds of prisoners are believed to have died, mainly after being tortured.

In addition, there are tensions with neighboring countries, and the economy is weak. Because of high inflation, a weak currency and partly because of tradition, Uzbekistan has a cash or barter economy. Credit cards are almost unheard of, and the U.S. dollar is hardly accepted anywhere. To complicate matters, basic infrastructure such as highways and railroads is deficient. Plus, the nation and its neighbors are landlocked. That makes it difficult, not to mention costly, to import the goods Uzbeks need and to export their products.

Attracting badly needed foreign investment is not easy, given those conditions and the fact that the illegal drug trade in Central and South Asia threatens the nation's security.

Then there's Afghanistan, just south of the Uzbek border. Although the two nations seem to have little in common, the fact that they share a narrow boundary -- and are predominantly Islamic -- make some Uzbeks uneasy.

"This is a secular government and people want it that way, especially after seeing what happened in Afghanistan under the Taliban," said Khamadavov. "They cannot see themselves, especially the young women, living in a country where religious extremists dictate an antiquated way of life, like wearing the burka and not being able to drink, smoke, or listen to music."

That explains, according to deputy foreign minister Sadik Safaed, why Uzbeks welcome the presence of American troops in their country.

Overall, we were enlightened that with Islam, the practice of religion varies as widely as in Christianity. We might have learned that if we had read about these countries. But seeing it firsthand was better, especially in the aftermath of September 11 when there's a great need to understand what Islam and its faithful are about.

NCEW member Enrique Rangel is an editorial writer for the San Antonio Express-News. E-mail him at [e-mail]