Steppe in Style: adventures in Eastern Europe and Central Asia
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Issyk-Kul out of season
One morning in October I slung some clothes into my rucksack and crept down the stairs outside into the courtyard, careful not to wake my neighbours to meet my Italian colleague, our local friend and his friend outside TSUM for a trip to Lake Issyk-Kul. Issyk-Kul is a high mountain lake up in the Tian-Shan…
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I tried to be a tourist in Kyrgyzstan and totally failed
Being a tourist in Kyrgyzstan is difficult. Things are done differently here. I spent days searching for a tourist office that might have some information about what to see and how to get there, before eventually giving up. Even the attractions listed in the guidebook are for the most part un-marked so I often found…
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How to visit Manas Village (it’s not easy)
One day I got an unscheduled morning off and decided to visit Manas Village, a newly built tribute to Kyrgyzstan’s national hero, the epic warrior Manas. That wasn’t the original plan. I was on my way to the Issyk-Kul Hotel in the outskirts of Bishkek where was expecting to attend a round table on drugs…
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Street names in Bishkek are full of significance
The street names in Bishkek are full of significance. After independence, a lot of the street names in Bishkek were changed. Lenin Square and Lenin Prospect became Ala-Too Square and Chui Prospect, after the Ala-Too mountains and Chui Valle. My street, the street once named after Felix Dzerzhinsky, head of Lenin’s secret police, was renamed…
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The terrifying morning I was woken by an earthquake
“Mo-lo-ko! Sme-ta-na!” This is the wakeup call I hear shortly before my alarm goes off every morning, the dairywoman doing the rounds in the cool early morning with metal pails of fresh milk and sour cream. The other part of the wakeup call and morning soundtrack is the “Khhhwk-pppht-sppppleugh!” of men walking along Erkindik Prospect,…
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Sexual tension in the mountains of Kyrgyzstan
Independence Day is a particularly big deal this year because it’s also (according to the government) the anniversary of “2,200 years of Kyrgyz statehood”. National anniversaries like this one are popular among Central Asia’s nation builders, trying to create a sense of unity and national identity among ethnically diverse populations. President Askar Akayev has already…
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My first press conference in Central Asia was all about poo
A few days after I started work I’m sent to my first press conference in Bishkek, all about waste water in Kyrgyzstan. The press conference is being given by John E. Johnson, a scientist from the US Environmental Protection Agency, who has just completed a study of Kyrgyzstan’s drinking water supplies. Johnson stands at the…
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Dordoi, Central Asia’s largest bazaar
Soviet Frunze has changed back into Bishkek, a stop on the Silk Road. The huge markets – Central Asia’s largest bazaar Dordoi, Osh Bazaar, Alamedin and the others – are flourishing, and the streets and underpasses of the entire city are turning into one great web of commercial activity. On my first day I saw…
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My first taste of Bishkek nightlife involves vodka, hitchhiking and a panzer tank chieftain
On Saturday I get my first taste of Bishkek nightlife. I hadn’t intended to. Constantly going through my head is the information from the “Dangers & Annoyances” section of the Lonely Planet: Bishkek smiles during the day but is neither safe nor well lit after dark. So I’d been intending to spend the evening writing…
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I witnessed Bishkek’s main Lenin statue being torn down
Quite by chance I got to see the removal of Bishkek’s main Lenin statue. Walking down Chui Prospect to Beta Stores one Saturday afternoon, I found lots of people loitering on Ala-Too Square. They had an air of expectancy; they were not simply sitting or standing under the shady cloisters to gain a respite from…
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Steppe in Style 