In August of 2019, writer Jay Owens traveled to the remote deserts of

Northwestern Uzbekistan to a city called Moinac. She was there to research one of the largest catastrophes in environmental history,

the drying up of an enormous body of water called the Aral Sea.

But what Jay actually found when she arrived was trippier than anything she could have imagined.

I walk up to a stage set on the edge of a desert.

The music starts playing really good techno,

really good sound system.

Well, the technically musicians from Berlin, from Japan, people who have played at Birkheim

were coming to this tiny tumblebeat town in Western of Pakistan.

There in the middle of the desert was a music festival. on. draw attention to this environmental catastrophe that had happened here.

At one time the Aral Sea had been the size of Ireland, but over the last few decades

it had entirely disappeared. And now this music festival was

bumping right there where the sea used to be.

You have World Coastcastejes playing astonishing, fantastic music, absolutely transformative into the open air,

right at the end of the road on a cliff overlooking what was

once the aerial sea but is now empty sand and the sound just rings out for

miles and miles into the desert

night as lasers trace the sky.

Absolutely sublime.

I'm Dylan Thuris and this is Atlas Obscura,

a celebration of the world's strange, incredible, and wondrous places.

Today, we're going to Moinac.

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