Postcard from Bishkek

When it mes to learning Kyrgyz, I have an interesting little problem.  Because I don’t take proper lessons and only dip n and out of exercises every now and again, my knowledge of Kyrgyz vocabulary and grammar is very haphazard. As a result, I am not really surprised when I come across a word that […]

  When I first moved to London, (yes, London – not Kyrgyzstan), I took a week of my holiday before starting work to explore the city.  Although I had visited London before, it was only on specific trips to attend a conference or visit a theater, or something like that.  So, I bought a travel […]

A few years ago I was talking to someone about literature, (books, poems and plays), and whereas I was being asked about Shakespeare and who was my favourite author … I also got asked if I had ever read anything by Alexander Sergeyevich.  I was confused and had admit my ignorance – “Who?”, I asked. […]

Language is not static but changes with usage over the period of time with new words being coined, whilst other are “borrowed” from foreign languages.  Some words are replaced or simply dropped from common usage and others are transformed and given new meanings.  Thanks particularly to the internet, we are going through a period of […]

There’s a lot of controversy here at the moment about proposed changes to the law about the State Language which would require that all government documents appear only in Kyrgyz and that all civil servants to pass a Kyrgyz-language exam and impose fines for those who slip into Russian in official meetings. I confess to […]

In 1982, the Daily Telegraph launched the first of a new type of competition – the Mini Saga. They invited their readers to submit a short story – very short, in fact; just 50 words … exactly 50 words, although another 15 words could be used as a title, although very people made use of […]

The other day someone posted a photograph on Facebook and I immediately moved my mouse pointer over the “Like” button.  It’s not the first time I had seen this particular picture but it summed up my own feelings and experience so, so well. Doctors are supposed to have handwriting which is virtually indecipherable … well, […]

The word “Hello” is a salutation, or greeting, in English and comes in many different forms: Hallo, Hello, Hullo, Hollo and, apparently, even Hillo.  It seems to be “borrowed” word, taken from Old German, (but there also seems to be a connection with French). The word has been adopted almost universally in different languages all […]

I wouldn’t blame anyone for asking “Poly-what????”. I came across this word as a result of a discussion with one of our staff about his learning English.  As it happens, I think that he speaks English quite well but he disagrees with me on this, and in the end I suggested that what he really […]

We all make mistakes … and I admit to several in my postcards. When some eagle eyed person spots a mistake and writes to tell me, I don’t edit the postcard, but add the fact in the comments section below.  Usually the mistake is just a typographical error, I have hit the wrong key and my […]