Kyrgyzstan

Kyrgyzstan fun

This is a long post but be sure to check out the link with the photos at the end as there are tons of pictures and I am really happy with so many of the shots. Many of them are of the locals and they came out really well.

Where do I begin? It has been days of great experiences. Not spectacular sites or famous places, but just small successes and a feeling of accomplishment at the end of each day. Truly each night I think, wow what another incredible day, yeah. It is all about small successes for me here. The Stan’s are not your typical tourist destination and so far I am the only one I know of. So when I get a train to the correct place or bus from point A to point B and see what I set out to see it feels great. Everything is in Russian and I know yes, no, thank you, please and that is about it. So to be making it places with my Russian rail tickets and finding the correct platform or stop, all is good. I have been fortunate to stay at places that have had people who speak a little bit of English at them and I get them to write me notes, like I need a taxi to … Where is the bus to… I would like to buy a train ticket to… All expect the last hotel I was just at. They said they had an English speaking person, but I saw her when I arrived and not again over the next four days. No big deal though, I just walked and took the trolley car number 11 or 29 I knew they would come back to my hotel. 20 cents a ride and a taxi was only ever $4 at max.

Let’s start with the boarding crossing from Kazakhstan to Kyrgyzstan. I came from Turaz to Bishkek via Marshrutka a minibus/van. It holds 15 people and they take off for the destination when full. My luck has been that they have filled quickly and I haven’t had to wait long. It was an $8 ride and took five hours. At the boarder the immigration guy working asked me if I needed a VISA to cross, he didn’t know. Canadians don’t. Then when they went to stamp my passport another guy went through all the pages and then asked me if this page was ok. I said that was fine. There were four different points to get your passport checked at the different immigration stations and it was like they had never seen a foreign passport. I later found out that they probably haven’t it is not the common boarder crossing for foreigners and at the other one you can sometimes wait three hours to get up to the boarder crossing. This one was quick and easy. I walked across the boarder with my bags and the van soon followed and we were back on the road.   

The hotel in Bishkek was $20 a night and an old tired room. So tired it didn’t have a toilet seat on the toilet nor did any of the rooms. A western toilet with no toilet seat, I just don’t know if that means you squat or sit? Anyway for the price and other than that it was fine, more than fine it had a piping hot shower and good heat so it was excellent.

In Bishkek I was waiting for my Letter of Invitation to come from Uzbekistan via email and then once I had that I had to visit the Embassy in Bishkek to pick up and pay for my VISA. That went through quickly and my appointment with the Embassy went off without a hitch and I was in an out in less than five minutes after I paid my $75 and a VISA was in my passport.

I happened upon a travel agency in my walking of Bishkek and thought I would go in and ask about flights to Tajikistan and get some info on local travel. Well I have been having great luck with travel agents in The Stan’s and I made another friend. Another one where there was absolutely no pressure to buy and a case of people just wanting the best for you in their country. She was the first English speaking person I had talked to in days and she was lovely. She is from Bishkek and is married to an Australian. She invited me to join them for dinner the next evening and I did. We went to a great restaurant and had an excellent meal, wine and evening, they were so kind they even treated me. He is an engineer for a gold mining company that is trying to start up here and has been going through the bureaucracy for years. She went to school to be a Russian teacher, but doesn’t teach. Now get this colleagues a teacher in Kyrgyzstan makes $25 a MONTH, yes a month. The average income is $20 a month. Her friend takes on extra teaching duties such as being the lead for two grades, teaches two full time jobs, they must have staggered start times, shifts for school and is the VP and makes $200 a month.

The land between Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan was flat and the fields were plowed and there was literally tumble weed rolling down the road. Not much out there. Now I have just taken the Marshrutka to Karakol in the east of Kyrgyzstan, six hours $6. It was a beautiful drive around Lake Issyk Kul. It is the second highest alpine lake in the world after Lake Titicaca. An alpine lake is one that is above 1000m. The lake here doesn’t freeze and is surrounded by snow capped mountains. It was a picturesque drive passing through little villages where the locals ride horses, donkeys or are pulled in a wagon or sleigh by a horse or donkey. I wish I could have photographed it all, but they never turn out through a window.

On the ride to Karakol I was sitting beside a woman and her daughter in-law and one year old grandson. She spoke a bit of English and when we arrived in Karakol her son was picking them up and she offered that he would take me to my guest house. Remember I am in a little town, with at max two storey buildings and looks like it is set in the 1950’s. So he picks us up in an old Lada which runs out of gas as we pull into the gas station. Luckily he had a container with gas in the back and put some in and then carried on to the pump and put in $4, then were off. Then we stop to buy a bottle of anti-freeze, not vodka, which is prevalent here, anti-freeze for the vehicle, and then were off again. (Some people use vodka as it is cheaper.) Then we stop at the road side kiosk to pick up Pampers for the baby, which you buy individually, she picked up six and were off again. It blows me away. The woman asked me if I have Face book yet her son comes to pick us up with his gold teeth. It is as if they haven’t learned about proper dental hygiene, as lots of little kids have rotted teeth. But they have Face book.

This time we arrive at where I am staying and it is lovely, oh my, lovely. It is clean, modern, western standards, there is a toilet seat. A beautiful place I could stay here just for the accommodation let alone the scenery (surrounded by mountains.) It is a guesthouse attached to the owner’s house; it has a homey feel and great home cooked meals and I met a tourist! Well no not really he lives in Bishkek and is just here for a few days to relax and get away from the rat race of the city. Yann is from France originally but now owns a wine importing business, two wine bars and a French restaurant. He retired at 38 from the French Air Force, he was a fighter jet pilot and moved to Kyrgyzstan. He showed me some cool videos from missions he was on.

Yann and I ordered a taxi from our guest house to take us around to some of the surrounding villages so we could take some photos and see how they live. The taxi was $5 an hour and was an unmarked Mercedes sedan. I felt a little pretentious rocking up to these villages with no running water and outhouses in it. But we were well received. Yann can speak Russian so we were able to ask the cab driver to stop here and can we go here and he was able to ask the peoples permission to take their photo and make small talk with them. It was a fabulous day. Twice we came upon kids playing with old wooden sleds and I joined them for a toboggan. One group was playing with fire crackers and of course one got something in his eye, so I helped him out even though we don’t speak the same language and tried to flush out his eye with some snow. Survival of the fittest and natural selection Yann says as the elders just sat around and watched him suffer. He quickly recovered and was playing again.

The photos are great if I do say so myself, so be sure to have a look.

The region is known for its apples and you can get a kilogram for six cents. Yann made 3000 bottles of cider in another potential business adventure he is working on. He can make the cider have it bottled, corked and labeled for 12 cents a bottle. The locals are not interested in the business quite yet as they don’t think waiting for six months while it ferments is profitable when you can make vodka in a day and their staple is vodka. What you mean there are other alcoholic drinks?

I also spent a night in a Four Seasons Hotel on the shores of Lake Issyk Kul $50 a night. It was nice looking and amongst beautiful mountains and had a beach, pool, bowling alley, tennis courts etc the only one of its kind in the Region. But it wasn’t like a Western Four Seasons, even though they were going for that the toiletries were not well stocked and what was there was not full so no stocking up. But there was a toilet seat, a hot shower and I went in the pool and used the sauna. It was a weird feeling to be there after having just spent time in the villages with no running water and out houses. I was one of three guests at the resort that can accommodate over a thousand.  The other two guests were the Diplomat and Ambassador for Hungary in Central Asia and the Director of Foreign Affairs for Hungary. So that was an interesting evening. We had dinner together, went bowling, played pool and had drinks. Erno and Imre were their names, just a regular night, hanging with Hungarian officials, as you do.

It was a little odd to be in a bowling alley after having spent the previous day with kids riding sleighs older than me.

Then I arrive back to Bishkek to the hotel I was staying at to pick up my laundry. They had four days but it is Kyrgyzstan so it was still on the line and they gave it back to me frozen, lovely. I put it in my bag anyway I was trying a different place for the night. I went to a way better hotel and met some more lovely people. Steven and Asher were in town for the elections. They are from the UK and are Election Observers and consultants. They travel all over the world observing electoral processes. So they joined me for dinner as well as their very nice translator. We all went to Yann’s French Restaurant Ratatouille. He was just arriving when we were and was with an American guy Daniel who owns the Café in Karakol (six hours away) where we had went when we were there, so the six of us had an amazing meal. I had pumpkin cappuccino soup, duck breasts as my main and an incredible dessert of ice cream in pastry covered in hot fudge sauce. I could eat like that every day, it was amazing and wine too and all of this for…$20. Imagine. It would be at least a $100 meal back home.  

Click on this link for pictures from Kyrgyzstan