Some thoughts on Kyrgyzstan and a silly anecdote.

Krgyzstan is a true Kaputnik-State. Which means that it works, despite the fact that absolutely nothing is meant to function. You get the idea immediately within the first 5 minutes in the country: Grammatical errors in the official airport signs, no means of renting cars, an absence of busses and the likliness that your flight will be delayed, because a cow decided to nap on the runway. Just like they do on every other road.

Can you spot the mistake?

Maybe the latter is exaggerated. It is, however, very surprising that 30 years after declaring its independence and controling vast mineral ressources, Kyrgyzstan would still not be able to run a few buslines – or marshrutka (vans) throughout some part of the most central regions. The only train line that does exists, apparently runs only once every week!

Even this thing is able to conquer the mountain. Why not a bloody bus?

Every official state worker seems to be corruptible. Take a random street cop for example: instead of writing a fine for speeding for 500 som (around 5€), he gladly and woolfishly accepts 200 som that go straight into his own pockets. The higher the rank, the higher the bribes get.

Unsurprisingly, this treacherous nature that is so visibly displayed by the important people of Kyrgyzstan, is imitated by its other inhabitants. I have the impression that almost each and every (male) citizen will try to cheat you of your money. Deals that are agreed on, can easily be altered to the locals wishes, desires and, of course, to the tourists/travelers growing frustration.

At one point… something snaps within the tourists troubled, oxygen-deprived and most oftenly over-heated brain. And then the haggling starts. When in Rome, do as the Romans do. Bargain for every cent/som as if your life depended on it. Do not trust any of the prices.

It so happened that, while staying in Osh for a few days, me and one of the 4 Israelian guys staying in the same hostel, went to buy some Coke. The prices on the markets were close to 60 som for 1.5 Liters (for warm and filthy Coke), whereas the one we found in a real shop was tagged at the dastard price of 80 som. So we haggled.

“80 som? That’s prosta outrageous! Never in my life have we found anything this inhumane and despicable. Have you seen the prices on the market, have you? This is already only barely acceptable, but 80… 80 som? I need this money to feed my poor, gray donkey a little bit of grass that he so deserves on his old days. He’s already limbing on his two hind legs, but he wants to go back to his mountain village to see his donkey wife and donkey children before the inevitable happens, yalla.”

We managed to push the prices by 5 som. Not great, not terrible. But when trying to pay, we ran into some serious issues: we did not have enough coins. We were going through our combined wallets and pockets and found only about 70 or so som. That, plus about 10.000 more, but only in big bills and we had already entered a stage of stingy deception that there was was no turning back. In the end, we got it our way and, though embarrassing as it was, we achieved a little discount.

On that day we truly understood some of the Kyrgyz mentality. All thanks to a completely rotten government.

The Isrealian desert rat that can eat an infinite amount of pasta.

The mashed mess the convolutions of my brain have come up with

Well, certainly I’ve arrived here in this amazing and intriguing Kyrgyzstan only a short while ago and I what might have seen is (hopefully) less than the outer layer of all the curiosities this country has to offer. Yet it would appear that all of this is already more than enough for my brain to handle, so that it needs to try and find a way to sort and stock this input somewhere. Is it possible that I find it harder to cope with the amount of input than a few years ago? Or is it just that Kyrgyzstan is so much more difficult to understand as an outsider? However exhausting living in Berlin or in Luxembourg may have been (mostly it had been really relaxing), nothing could have prepared me for the first week here. Really not at all. Because all these manifold impressions need to be processed here and now. This process needs to take place in this jeep that’s speeding over horribly dusty roads. You see, I am far from being in a calm place where I can think and meditate. It has to happen now.

I close my eyes and a million different impressions appear before my inner eye. As if on an epic dose of LSD my mind dislodges chronologically well ordered information into a caleidoscopesque fashion. Colours become more intensive, lights flicker and randomly vary in brightness, while the shapes of buildings, landscapes and peoples’ faces come into a renewed existence – however personal and fictional they have become by now. My imagination begins to kick in and melts the very essence of existence.

Imagine this shape at night time contrasting the starry, starry night sky

A massive and dark mountain range draws nearer at an almost incredible speed. Though it approaches, its shape remains unchanged, no further details become distinguishable on the huge silhouette. Only the overhead sky changes in colour: from an intensive, cloudless light blue that you might find on a warm, midday summer day over the vast expanses of the ocean, to the dark blue colour of an infinitely beautiful sapphire starry night. The stars shine brighter with every passing second and takes on the well-known and familiar structure of our Milky Way. They dance around in the hot evening heat, but as I lean forward to regard them from a little closer, the dance becomes distinguishable as the regular up and down of reflections on the Ysyk-Kul lake. I take a deep breath as I watch the wavy surface of this mountain lake and smell its salty water.

The taste then instantly translates into pictures of the black salt mine deep within the dry mountain ranges of the Naryn region. Let’s follow this guided tour through the former mine for a while – it definitely is a little absurd, but no reason for alarm. What was once an extremely lucrative mine (its salt was equally as worthy as gold) has now been transformed into a most extravagant sanatorium. As if played at 2x the normal speed, we move through the шахты, the mine shafts, and explore its interiors. What a calm and quite place without even the most remote life form, as none can flourish in this deadly, salty atmosphere; completely devoid of water.

The tour comes to an end and I leave behind the magnificient, though industrial, carvings on the walls. The exit fills the empty air with warmth and dust. The blinding light falls into my eyes and I blink involuntarily.

Upon opening them again, the salt has disappeared and in his stead I find a loud and busy bazar/market. I stop short. A sheer, never-ending flood of Kyrgyz people flow by. Some are old, others young. Few have money, most work hard to earn a days living. In their eyes I can see stress and calm. Together they have lived a million years; years of stability, perspective, wealth, development and aspirations. However, most of this combined life span was spent in a chaotic mess. The crowd comes to a standstill. Their faces remain visible. Their eyes speak of million stories, yet their mouth stay shut. Their accounts are not audible. Low tunes of a melchanolic guitar play the music of loss… dust in the wind. The sunlight fades, its last sunrays illuminate the contrast in their tanned faces while a nasty, dirty smell fills the air. As if in a dustbowl, my tongue is covered in a sand-like substance.

The processing comes to an abrupt halt. I open my eyes for real. Only thick clouds of dust remain that have been unearthed by cars going over the weathered roads. I look out of the open window and above streches a great starry firmament. They will lead us safely to our next destination. We will soon arrive in our longed-for post-Soviet and former uranium mine of Min-Kush.

Soon we will have arrived. The car jerks heavily as it hits another hole in the road and I dive deep into a deep slumber.

Good night, beloved celestial companions! I shall welcome you into my dreams and have you shine over all the mysterious and magical places that still await me.

The Art of Acting

Let’s not overthink this. Yes, best be not to think too much. Because if you started thinking, this pretty immediately made you consider and possibly reconsider choices that may or may not have been taken hastily. But acted we did.

Let’s not overthink this choice to visit the far lands of Kyrgyzstan. Even though it was not the first choice, as the Russian bureaucratic system made us act involuntarily and probably too fast for our own good. In fact, the effort required to first of all collect all the documents for obtaining a Russian visa is tremendous. After struggling to gather all the papers for over 2 or 3 months, Ludwig and I collectively decided to abandon our initial idea and travel instead to the mountainous, post-Soviet state of Kyrgyzstan.

Our momentary travel route

It was in the early days of 2021 when the idea of photographing Sovietic моногорода arose (monogorods, Russian #bezeichnung# for a industrial towns that are entirely centered on one single source of revenue. They are most mining or other industrial cities. Norilsk, the Nothern-most industrial city, whose industry is focussed primarily on mineral mining and processing may be cited as a lovely example – also it is responsible for emitting 2% of the global CO2 emissions). Further, we were planning on diving deep into the local community and gather information on people by sticking to the ethnographic research method called participant observation. The so collected data should later form the basis, on which he wants to write his Bachelor thesis. A route had already been layed out, focussing primarily on the Ural mountain range and things appeared pretty jolly.

Our initial plan have undergone minor changes

However, due to the before-mentionned inconveniences concerning Russian bureaucracy we short-handedly changed our plans. Our new aim was Kyrgyzstan.

Why Kyrgyzstan? What do we know about the country? Not too much. Only the little information we found in various academic articles on ethnic composition (e.g. of the 70.000 Coreans deported by Stalin to Central Asia only a minute fraction did move back to Corea after the collapse od the USSR) and environmental problems. Very little did we find on Soviet influence in the region and possible Slavonic communities in the country… which is very unfortune, as Ludwig’s BA should have a clear connection with Slavonic studies.

Time will eventually show, if this travel will have any scientific value at all or if we’re only going to spend a month-long, well-deserved and long overdue summer holiday in one of the most magnificient post-Soviet states. Because sun, heat and a mighty mountain range we crave!

But let us not hesitate one more second. Let us rather dive straight into the adventure ahead and act. Do. Feel and experience. And, of course, share it with an evergrowing crowd of people.

Ludwig on his first day on Kyrgyzstan

MADE? Eh, dat is ja voll ecklig!

Thank you all for reading these lines. We will do our best to keep the following articles as interesting to the reader’s eyes as we can.

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