Around the Silk and the Cotton Road.

It is always so inadequate to take a country and wrap it up in a couple of paragraphs. There’s the food. The language. The faces. The countryside. The horses. The steppes.

And you can’t help but glide over the surface. As a traveler you see what you are shown. The locals show you the best. The sheets are clean on the uncomfortable beds. You manage to negotiate the squat toilets, because you know when you leave you can go back to soft paper and sweet smelling soap. With the traveling I have been doing, there are always local guides. Professional maybe, but they are fearless in their dissection of the country in which they live. So it is with Kyrgyzstan. And to some extent it is with Uzbekistan. Our young guide Nasiba, is from a family who live in Bishkek. She has three sisters and a brother. Her mother is from the Talas region. The Talas women are known for their strength. You marry a Talas women so that she will organize your home. Naziba carries her mother’s strength. She is funny, unapologetic, passionate. In the Kyrgz culture, the youngest boy will stay and look after the parents. If there is only one boy then it falls to him. The girls normally follow a path where they marry by about the age of 26 and move in with the grooms parents where they will look after the household. Nasiba tells stories of her mother teaching her cooking or other skills and saying , “ this is for your future mother-in-law” or “ your future mother in law should thank me for this.” Nasiba eventually had the courage to say that maybe she didn’t want to get married. Seems her mother is fine with that. The boy has made a good marriage and already has given them twins as grandchildren, so Nasiba is off the hook. Because there is a whole tradition here of girls being stolen by men who need wives. I read a book before coming called “ Sovietstan.” In it there is a story of a young girl who went to her best friend’s engagement party and the fiancé asked her to walk outside with him when she was bundled into a car with three of his friends holding her down. She was driven out to the country, with the fiancé professing love for her and when she got to his house a feast was ready. Her own family and boyfriend had been alerted and were also there crying and begging her to return with them. It seems that when the grandmother approachs with a white shawl and covers the head of the abducted girl it means that the marriage has been agreed. This poor one was exhausted and fearful and gave in. This bride kidnapping is called Ala kachuu. And although they say it has died out as the culture has become more sophisticated it still exists. They report in 2021 one in three marriages rural marriages begin with an abduction.

The Soviet Union has it’s rubber boot all over these countries. There are many older people still sentimental about the Soviets. Health care, schooling were all free. But all of the industry and agriculture was in service to Russian growth. In Kyrgyzstan they built hydro electrical power plants. They dammed the main river and flooded valleys full of villages. In Uzbekistan. they forced all the small farmers to grow cotton instead of crops. The Aral Sea, once the third largest lake in the world, began shrinking in the 60’s after the rivers that fed it were diverted by Soviet irrigation projects..and all that cotton was Shipped out of the country back to the Soviet Union. That was the talk I heard, but what did I see? In Kyrgyzstan I maybe saw a handful of tourists. Lots of LADA’s these old Soviet cars that had been left behind.In Uzbekistan, There is a Chevrolet factory , and 90% of cars on the road are chevy’s. In both countrys I saw children coming from school. All neat and bright in white tops and black skirts or trousers. All the little girls have big ribbons or pom-poms in their hair. In Kyrgyzstan they people have strong Mongolian or Tibetan features. In Uzbekistan they are much lighter with features that seem to come from the other direction, Persia.

Kyrgyzstan is 90% Muslim, but most of them are not observant. Some head coverings mixed in with long black ponytails. There’s no pork on the menu, and the Imam will call from the minaret but it’s rare to see anyone heading to prayer. There are more headscarves in Uzbekistan particularly among the older women, but the younger hijab wearing girls are there too.

The table is always laden with bread. Butter. Dishes of homemade jam. Towers of sweets and pastries. It’s very important, it seems, for the table to be heaving with stuff to show welcome. Home cooked meals consist often of soup, a salad of tomatoes and cucumber, and potatoes cooked with meat. The countryside is full of cows, sheep, goats and horses. And they eat them all. Yes, even the horses. Inconceivable to think of those strong lean beauties being carved into steaks, but the herds of horses are bred for the purpose. Horse meat and horse milk are an intrinsic part of the food chain in Central Asia.

The markets are laden with pomegranates and persimmons. Root vegetables abound. And mountains of tomatoes. Spices, rice, buckwheat, teas. Wheel upon wheel of the fresh bread. Grapes. Figs. Walnuts and macademias. And everything you could want to do with milk on it’s way to butter.

And of course there are rugs and carpets. This is the world of weaving and felt making.

It seemed that everything was different. Doors. Cars. Faces. Clothes. Food. It was only in Bukhara and more markedly in Samarkand that tourists ( In which group, I know I belong) became evident. I found I was happier sitting in a park watching the locals go by, carrying or chasing their babies. I had a few words. Salaam, Rahmat…but after that it was a lot of smiling.

It’s different traveling to places untried. Time moves outside of the clock. So good to be allowed to dip in.

There are yurts and then there are yurts….

North east of Bishkek is the second largest Alpine lake in the world. Issuk Kul. It is right up against the border with Kazhakstan. Lightly saline and clear as glass. Many stories about it’s origins. A woman’s tears. A king with ears like an ass.

There is this lovely man called Ruslan Bayke. He builds yurts for a living. The village he lives in is known for building yurts. He is probably not very old; he is very handsome and weathered. His youngest child, a boy of seven, has just started school in the village.

His eldest boy has gone to Bulgaria to study hospitality. Strangely and maybe sadly you hear this a lot. A schoolteacher who turns to tourism to earn more money.Tourism in Kyrgyzstan means adding onto your house so that you have a room big enough for groups to eat breakfast and supper and rooms enough for people to sleep and hopefully a shower or two. They are very rudimentary. But these are the very early days of rural tourism in Kyrgyzstan. And it is mostly small companies that bring their people to this isolated places. There are no hotels, no restaurants in these mountain villages. Just locals who have the wherewithal to build on their land. To be clear there is no architectural style here. Breezeblocks, corrugated iron, cement and paint will do it. Patchworks of carpets, odd bits of wallpaper, plastic tablecloths and flowers. But more of that later. Back to yurts.

Yurt camp # one has only been open for a year. It has about 10 beautifully finished yurts laid out in a circle around a central wooden deck that has a massive fireplace.

There are wooden structures tucked inbetween the yurts that have western toilets and basins. There is a long building at the entrance which is warm and wooden with an endless supply of hot water and long tables for those meals. It has wi-fi. Shaky sometimes. But it is there. AND there are three modern showers with doors that close and water that is toasty. I wrote all this for comparison..but you may have guessed that. You can hear jackals at night braying around the outside perimeter. But the grey and white kitten still appears at the door every morning so I am assuming the green fence is holding it’s own.

The yurt itself is quite a joy to enter. You mustn’t kick the threshold and you have to duck your head when you enter. Both are a sign of respect. The inside struts and the wooden webbing around the base are both painted red. But it is the top, the round tunduk, which appears on the nations flag that is the glory point. The light seeps in and slides down the walls to the woven carpet and fabric covered metal box that stands at the back. Nights are quiet here. Stars are big. Skies are dark. I watch one night as people roast marshmallows. I hate marshmallows..here or there, roasted or not.

I learn how to make Borsok. this delicious bread, which i sadly discover is deep fried, meaning I won’t be trying it at home. I volunteer to have my head wrapped in metres and metres of white cotton to create an Elelcheck, the traditional head-dress of a Kyrgyzstan woman. I float around in a hot spring. It is all on the edge of authentic. A truly comfortable way of touching tradition whilst having clean hair. Two days later there is a drive up, up, up through the mountains.

All of Kyrgyzstan is above 900 metres, which is why the country is described as 90% mountainous. But this climb high and higher on rough unmade roads takes us to 3400 metres. Past miles and miles of golden slopes peppered with flocks of cows, sheep and horses.

An occasional shelter, many streams, no other cars, no other people. Finally we end up at Son Kul Lake. 3016 metres high, in the centre of the country. It is beautiful in it’s starkness. Not a tree. Not a shrub. Surrounded by mountains and with snow cover running at 200 days a year we are on the very edge of being able to visit here. the temperatures are dropping and the shepherds have taken their herds down to lower slopes. It is cold. Even at 3.30 in the afternoon. You know you are on a slide down to freezing. The yurts are in a semi circle facing the Lake. The beds are spread around the walls. There is a central fire which will not be lit till night falls. It is probably more authentic. There are no red ribs to follow up to the tunduk. There are no colorful shyrdak rugs to brighten the floors. These yurts will soon be disassembled for the winter. Welcome to a more nomadic life than you were hoping for. You find the 4 toilets that will serve these 28 yurts. You have been advised not to have a shower because you could get hypothermia. You decide the only thing to do is get under the bed covers and wait for the supper of sorts and the man who will light your fire.

He comes with a fire torch. He doesn’t say much. I’m sure he wants to go home and be done with all of this cosseting. He throws a bag of coal on and exits stage left. You go and get your “school dinner”. Where someone has also opened a bottle of vodka because they are Russian and know what cold nights can be like.You venture to clean your teeth and do the only thing left to you after your have marveled at the new pink moon and the Milky Way , you get into bed. In my case , because I am unable to go to bed in anything other than a white cotton nightie, I just topped it with a pair of camel hair socks, a long cardigan and a woolly hat. There was no reading, no playing of cards, it was just pull it all up and round as closely as you can and hope for the worst of times to be better than that. The night was long..the socks stayed on.. the hat didn’t. I did not need to get up and pee in the night. It was minus 4 degrees centigrade.

The following morning there was frost on the ground. I tried to clean my teeth but the water from the tap on my hands froze my fingers and the water from my bottle terrified my mouth. We drove away. I had survived. There is definitely triumph in survival and with every passing mile and every degree of warmth that the sun brought, I metaphorically lifted my arms above my head as if I had been the South Pole and back…. But that is for another time

Bishkek

Bishkek is the capital of Kyrgyzstan. It sits at the top close to the border with Kazakhstan. I land in the early hours of the morning and lay my head in a room of black sparkly curtains, glossy glass chandeliers and beds that are close friends with a plank of wood.

When my eyes finally open I go for a wander under grey skies past grey buildings. There’s a lot of cement in Bishkek. There are a lot of buildings that were built by the Soviets who only left in 1992. The story is that the soviet building might be ugly but it is solid and can stand up to most things including earthquakes, but, oh lord, they’re depressing. An endless medley of brutalism in concrete. 90% of Kyrgyzstan is Muslim. But it’s loose Muslim, if that makes any sense. There are no burkas. No veils. There are many girls with headscarves and some that are closer to hijabs. And most of the older ladies were scarves which cover their hair in what seems like practical move. But there are more of the young who just wear their hair swinging around their heads, gloriously long and dark. School has started and everyone is in white and black. Walking home with bags of books in gangs. There are cell phones I am sure, but they are in pockets rather than glued to hands. The traffic is fairly chaotic. Almost all of the cars are old. All of them are filthy, covered in dust. There is no organized parking so people just stop at an angle, don’t even check to see if they are obstructing anything and move on. There are small markets for staples and everyone seems to be carrying bread.

I learn that bread comes before most everything here. It is ALWAYS on the table. If it is offered you cannot refuse. You should not lay the sculptured side of the bread face down. So many possible insults before even taking a bite. The currency is som. Which translates into big numbers. When you pull out a 500 som note for a large bag of shopping, you shake yourself down when you discover it is just over 10 dollars. I brought a shelf of snacks from Trader Joe’s with me. Following a travel article I had read that said “ snacks’ were a pro tip. Do you know how heavy bags of almonds and trail mix are? I think that may not have been the smartest move. There have been 5 presidents since the soviets left. The only one who went willingly was a woman. There are a couple who have sought asylum in Belarus and Moscow. They have bumpy pavements and then a whole avenue of flower beds. There are roads that turn abruptly into building sites and there are large empty squares where the concrete buildings have now been faced with marble.

There is a national guard who stand outside the National Museum like mannequins. And do a Monty Python dance every hour in their petrol blue uniforms as they swap positions.

Lenin was in the centre of Victory Square, but now he has been moved to behind the Library.

There is a new statue now. Of Manas who is the hero of an ancient poem that tells the story of the people. And there is a flagpole flying the national red and yellow flag, which was changed by one of the now deposed presidents, because the spokes around the wheel were curved and he felt that changing them to points made it more manly.

There is a mall and an outdoor market. The mall is full of silly stuff and Nathan’s hotdogs. The market is full of saddles and shoes and then the inside halls have every thing you would to make out of milk. Every type of rice and spice. And vegetables piled high alongside cheese balls so tart they sucks the saliva from your mouth.

There was an opera house, but nothing was playing for a couple of weeks. There is an Art Museum but it closed a few months ago. There is a circus, but it is shut. Bit it is the city that the young people want. With the university and the coffee shops and their friends and the music and the possibility of a foreign future. But there is much more country in this country than city…

Airport Lounges

Airport lounges....A new thing for me really. I got a membership for a card that gets you into some of those lounges that aren’t attached to an airline. In Dubai on a layover. 7 hours down. Another 4 to go. Will be Landing in Bishkek at 4.40 am.

So I am in an Airport Lounge after a trying time at the ticket counter where a snotty guy told me a didn’t have a ticket for the second flight. “ My bag is on it.” I said. “ No it isn’t Madam. Not if you don’t have a ticket.” “ But I have a ticket.” “ No madam, all you have is a ticket for a baggage claim.” “ What do you suggest I do?” I asked. “ Who did you buy the ticket from?” he asked, as if I had got it free with a carton of orange juice. “ A travel agent.” I replied. He shrugged, as if that explained all and everything. I walked away to call my very efficient travel agent in London. I needed the code. My man was still sitting there with shiny hair and his pressed uniform. “ How do I call outside the country? “ I asked. He told me and then as an afterthought asked to see my boarding pass from the first flight. As I was looking for it an Indian man came up beside me yelling something about “ wanting his name and making a complaint.” The snotty guy then says, “ Don’t approach the lady. Why would you approach the lady?” Indian man is still yelling and I think the snotty man says something like “ she is better than you, she is a different level.” Indian man stomps off. Snotty man then becomes very helpful. To me. Angry Indian returns with a wife and son and member of the Emirates staff. They are all pointing at me and saying “ she is no better than him.” Snotty man ignores the Indian man and his family and the manager slides inbetween us to smooth it out. Snotty man then becomes obsequious towards me and claims to have saved the day because he was able to print me a boarding pass. He hands it over with a toothy smile. I say thank you rather unwillingly, and tell him, “ I am not on another level.” I don’t even really know what that means, but I know it’s wrong. He flicks his hand in the direction of the disappearing Indian family as if they could be removed like a fly on a hot day. “ You remind me of Uriah Heep.” I told him. He had no idea what I was talking about and I wasn’t sure why I chose that character. But it seemed appropriate. So I come to the Marhaba lounge and wash my face and have two bowls of carrot soup and a lot of water. And watch people eat plates and plates of square bits of cake. Cake is obviously big here. The temperature outside tonight is 33c/92f. So cake, heat and insulting behaviour. Dubai was never on my bucket list. It hasn’t moved one inch closer. I was sort of happy to get on the plane to Bishkek. On an airline called Fly Dubai.

Or Fly Away from Dubai. Or Fly Away from Uriah.

leaving yet again.

I just met a lady who was cleaning the bathrooms here at the airport. Sri Lanka tour over? She asked. Yes, I said. Going back to London. London. Ah. She said. Have you been there? I asked. But really, I knew the answer to that one. So I jumped in with India. Have you been to India? Nooo. Live Negumbo. She said. It is the city closest to the airport.

A lot of people have never left Sri Lanka. Most of the people I have met. The cultured and multi lingual guide on my tour, Lakshen, had only been to India because his girlfriend, now his wife went to university in Poona. The owner of the hotel I have just been staying in Bentota told me that it is very hard for anyone from Sri Lanka to get a visa anywhere outside of South East Asia. So Europe or America is a pipe dream for them.

I have three passports. I think it is legal. I always had a British one. I got an American one when I had been living over there for a number of years and felt that it was important to vote. I got an Irish one, based on my having been born in Dublin, last year. Because the sadness I felt over the Brexit Vote to leave Europe has not subsided. I don’t take it for granted. I remember the hard process to get my American passport and I had a lot going for me. And the present world is full of people risking everything on boats or through deserts to get to a land where they have no sure way of being able to stay. It is one of the great things about traveling the world is that the ground under you never stays stable. If you steer clear of the 5 star living, then the ground rules of the community you are visiting will show themselves quickly.

Most Sri Lankans are just so happy to smile and push their children forward to shake your hand and try out their school English.

I met a woman yesterday who got off her pink bike and after finding out where I was from wanted my address. Why? I said. Are you going to write to me? Then she started to say that she wanted to repair her house. I didn’t have much with me. What do mean? I asked. Money for a new roof? She smiled and tilted her head. I don’t know you, was my response. She didn’t seem fussed. I went on walking. She passed me on her pink bicycle and waved, saying Good bye. Smiling as she went. Odd really. Just trying it on I think. Charming in it’s own way.

Sri Lanka is really trying, with a new hard working primeminister, to take care of their own. There are no pensions and there probably will never be enough money in the depleted kitty to have any. The pay is low. The lovely lady who gave me a couple of Ayurvedic treatments works daily at a fancy shmancy hotel where she does at least 7 female customers a day and she is paid 18,000 rupees for the month. ( $61/ 48 pounds GBP)

The noble and wonderful Shiva who took us for Hikes in the mountains around Heptale used to work as a salesman in the textile industry. Before he came back to take care of his wife after she had gone into depression after losing a baby. His pay then was 3,600 rupees ($ 12.20 /10 pounds GBP) He has built his house out from a one room hut into a house with a separate kitchen and two bedrooms. So now with his salary of 600 rupees a day for the hiking ($ 2./ 1.61GBP) he told me with a quiet pride that now he was middle class.

There is an echo here of the dignity I found in the Cambodian people. Self contained. Honest. Proud. Trodden on, but intact. Gentle. Kind.

The children all go to school from 7.30 till 1.00. School is free for everyone. As are the unforms. Every child gets two every year. Here in Sri Lanka the uniforms are white , white white. Symbol of their optimism that every thing will work out somehow.