The story of the Aral Sea is a modern fable that contains a dire warning about our future. Less than 40 years ago this was a sea full of fish, the air was clear, the soil rich and the climate temperate. But today the Aral Sea is one of the most tragic environmental catastrophies of the last century. The Aral Sea is dying the death of a thousand irrigation canals, silently evaporating in the desert sun. The people call the dust blowing off the former seabed the dry tears of the Aral. The new Aralkum, the new desert, covers 38,000 square kilometres. This is the legacy of the will of distant leaders to turn Central Asia into the greatest cotton producing region in the world.