Postcard from Bishkek

For a long time I have said that Kyrgyzstan has something of interest for just about everyone – unless their passion is for volcanoes or zoos.  As it happens, there is one zoo, NABU in Karakol – it’s actually an animal reserve and sanctuary.  We don’t however, have any volcanoes.

Apparently, for some time it was thought that the Tien Shan mountains were created by volcanic, but the travels of Semyenov in the nineteenth century showed that this was not true.

As it happens, today marks the anniversary of one of the most famous volcanic eruptions in history … that of Mount Vesuvius, just off the Bay of Naples in Southern Italy, which smothered the cities of Pompeii, Herculaneum, Oplontis and Stabiae in ash in the space of just six hours …

… or does it? The cities were sufficiently close to Rome that it was home to many villas owned by influential Roman personalities … the Emperor Titus visited Pompeii to give orders for the relief of the displaced population … those, that is, that had survived … either because they had been evacuated in time – or they simply weren’t there at the crucial time. Everyone who was caught in the Pompeii or Herculaneum was engulfed and their petrified bodies give a haunting snapshot of a terrifying moment in time.

For many centuries the sites were known but left untouched – and only really attracted renewed interest about 250 years ago.  Since then there has been a tremendous amount of research … and we’ve discovered something very odd.

The Roman historian, Pliny the Younger, gives us an account of the event;one of the most iconic disasters to strike in recorded history.  His account was written some twenty five years after the events … and several copies appear to exist – and this has led to a strange contradiction.  For several centuries the date of the eruption was assumed to have been on August 24th, AD79, based on an interpretation of one of those copies.

However, the archaeologists tell us that it almost certainly happened a couple of months later – possibly on 24th October or 23rd November.

It seems that the clothes people were wearing; the plants, fruits, seeds and so forth, all reflect these cooler autumn times rather than the summer heat; new wine had already been sealed in casks … and coins were found that would only have been minted in September.

So … it seems that we need to rethink and reinterpret our understanding of these historic events.

 

We may not have any volcanoes but we certainly see some interesting eruptions from time to time.

It’s actually been quiet quiet here this week – no big demonstrations or protest meetings – despite the fact that there has been some movement on many of the “controversial” topics that led to flare ups in the recent past.

The Kumtor situation, for example, seems to be reaching its climax with discussions between the government and the company .  Apparently the government have spent something like 56 million som, (that’s over a million dollars), on technical reports and so on … but there has, by all accounts, been some agreement to create a new company – a Joint Venture to manage the mine in which the Kyrgyz side will have a greater say in how things are done.  Although this should help to pacify some of the mine’s critics, it seems to me that whatever agreement they reach will almost certainly won’t be enough for the “die hard” core that want to “punish” the Canadians for whatever arrangements they may have had with the previous regimes and, personally, I can’t help wondering if it is simply delaying yet another round of protests – where the target of attention won’t necessarily be the “Canadians” but the Kyrgyz government themselves.

One of the main criticisms of the operations at Kumtor is the environmental effect that they are having – especially on the glaciers.  This was a theme taken up by the famous author cum diplomat, Chinghiz Aitmatov in some of his later works and has been taken up by several groups since then.  Certainly, it seems, the disposal of rock waste on the Davydov glacier appears to have had an effect, and there are measures underway to get it all removed.  Although this may well not help the situation, and perhaps even exacerbate it, the problem of Kyrgyzstan’s disappearing glaciers is almost certainly a problem of general global warming.  The Prime Minister has pointed out at a conference on water resources in Dushanbe that Kyrgyzstan is at risk of being without glaciers by the end of the century if the melting continues unchecked … with all the implications that this might have on the delicate ecosystems of the mountain regions: soil erosion, mudslides, floods, and so forth.  Indeed, we’ve seen some devastating unseasonable mud flows recently and the Ministry of Emergency Situations has been hard pressed trying to cope with them.

The effect on the wildlife is also getting attention – partly because Bishkek is going to host a major international forum on the Snow Leopard – which is expected to attract a number of international celebrities.  In preparation for this, it has been announced that Kyrgyzstan is going to participate in a special trans-boundary, (i.e. international), reserve for the protection of these endangered animals.

Part of the news coverage has included a fair amount of photo reports of the 138 animals or so, representing some 34 different species, in Kyrgyzstan’s only zoo – run with the assistance of the a German environmental charity, NABU.  The zoo costs about five million soms a year to run, and the entrance fees raise about a million som for the work of the fund in helping to protect endangered species such as the Snow Leopard in a special reserve in the Issyk Kul oblast.  Although many of the animals in the collection are indigenous, some, like the Llamas and Japanese Macaques are not local.

Also coming under the spotlight have been Kyrgyzstan’s Forests – which now cover under 5% of the country.  Much of the existing forest has been lost over the years due to a shortage of timber for both construction and heating and although there are attempts to increase the number of trees planted, apparently it’s an uphill struggle.

One particular piece of forest which attracted a fair amount of attention is a plot of land in the Naryn province which was planted by German prisoners of war during the Second World War.  It seems that in an act of defiance they arrange to plant the trees in the shape of a swastika.  I have heard stories about this phenomena for years – ever since we opened our guesthouse up in the city, but I have never seen it myself.  Indeed, I was beginning to doubt the story and think of it as apocryphal along with several other skeptics … but last week photos appeared in the press and on the internet … and apparently a lot of interest has been shown in the story in Germany.  The photographs are not exactly convincing … the swastika is not constructed with the sort of precision of the elaborate crop circles that often appear in the West or that owners of BMW vehicles might have come to expect – but, … and there is something there and, if it was indeed planted by POW’s then they wouldn’t have been given a completely free hand.

Then there has been the “final” blow in the case of the politicians who climbed over the fence of the White House, (parliament building), last October.  Having been accused and convicted of attempting to seize power, and then having the convictions quashed by the appeal court only to have them reconfirmed in the Supreme Court, the Electoral Commission have now taken away their mandates as deputies as convicted criminals cannot serve as parliamentarians.  Their colleagues in the Ata Jurt party have selected a new leadership and new deputies will be appointed from the party list to take their places.

Fortunately, at the moment, most of the colourful displays that we are seeing are festivals: pop music, crafts, KVN (a sort of game where students have to present acts some of which are rehearsed whilst others are improvisations), displays concentrating on human rights for the disabled or other minority groups, a festival of marketing and advertising, fruit and berries, honey, and so on.

More are planned as well … for next month’s celebration of the 135th anniversary of Bishkek.  Although there is archaeological evidence of human settlement here that goes back to the bronze age, in the modern period there was a fort established here by Kokand as one of a string of over 30 fortresses to protect trade along what remained of the Great Silk Road.  Around the fort a small settlement grew up and when the Kyrgyz appealed to the Russian garrison in Verney, (modern day Almaty), the settlement continued and in 1878 the town was granted a charter, eventually was made the administrative center after floods devastated the original choice of Tokmok.

As well as festivals, competitions, concerts and shows, which will take place throughout the whole month, on the day itself, (27th September), one of the city center streets will be closed to traffic and become a “pedestrian paradise” where there are planned to be “carnivals”, street performances, for the day.  The day will end with a firework display and shows at various sites throughout the city by local performers.

Strictly speaking the Dehn Goroda, (City Day), when such celebrations would normally take place, is supposed to be in April but in recent years it has been held over until after the summer.  There is now a move among the city’s councilors  to have the day officially transferred.

I have to say that here in Bishkek they do this sort of thing quite well and I am quite looking forward to it … if I am not going to be in Naryn that weekend.

The most impressive thing about the festivities, however, is that they have announced the plans for the event a month in advance … a whole month!  Bearing in mind that we usually get hear about such things with a few days notice – and sometimes only after the event has happened – that is progress indeed!   I just hope it’s not a one-off.

Bishkek is going to be quite a busy place in September … as well as the international forum on the Snow Leopard and month long (belated) celebrations for the city’s 135th birthday, we are also due to host the summit for the Shanghai Cooperation Organization.  The most senior guests, Presidents and so forth, (including the newly elected President of Iran), will be accommodated in the Ala Archa Presidential Residence complex to the south of the city.  Their entourages, however, will be staying in hotels throughout the city – virtually every bed in the city was booked by the authorities a couple of months ago.  (I say virtually all because when they asked us to reserve the whole hotel for the event – I said something along the lines of “No-can-do”.  OK – I wasn’t that rude but I did point out that we already had existing bookings for those dates and so couldn’t turn the whole hotel over to them … not without breaking our contract with the existing guests.  This isn’t the first time this has happened, but this time they seem to have taken the point and were relatively happy when I said that we can allocate them some twenty rooms.)  Since then, we’ve had several more requests and, unfortunately, had to turn them all away.

 

So far this year, it’s been reported, some 16000 criminal offences have been registered by the police.  Unfortunately, the reports didn’t really give any further details, such as  the type of offences, so it is difficult to put this headline figure into context – but it did say that the number was down by about 4% on last year and that something like 70% were solved.

Because those statistics cover the first seven months of the year, they presumably don’t cover the recent outbreak of robberies at some of the resorts up on Lake Issyk Kul … or the fact that the police have caught some youths who were apparently responsible for them.

Some of these statistics – such as the detection rate – seem pretty impressive … but, of course, they are open to question … just as they are in Britain, (where, apparently, police rush to arrest someone caught shoplifting – because it represents an easy conviction which boosts their performance statistics, but are rather relaxed when it comes to housebreaking cases where a good clear up rate is much harder to achieve … or, at least, that’s what their critics say).

I am not sure whether the discover of a pipeline across the Chui River, (which attracted a certain amount of attention in the Western media), counts towards the “detection rate”. The River marks the border between Kyrgyzstan and neighbouring Kazakhstan, that was apparently used to smuggle alcohol across the border avoiding customs duties. As far as I am aware, the authorities have the pipeline in custody – but not the smugglers.  What struck me as particularly odd is that alcohol – especially vodka – is basically very cheap here – even with customs duties applied – so why go to all the trouble to lay a pipeline and pump the stuff across the border?

Talking of the borders … there no news about either the dispute with Kazakhstan about the water in the canal which was blocked by Kyrgyz wanting to renounce the treaty which ceded a tract of land to them, nor about the case where two Uzbek borer guards were shot by their Kyrgyz counterparts, (who claim that the Uzbeks had strayed across the border and resisted entreaties to return home by drawing their weapons).  There has been more encouraging news about the Tajik border – even though it was announced that something like 4000 kilometers is disputed between the two sides.  The Prime Minister on his visit to Dushanbe held talks with the Tajik authorities and it looks as if demarcation talks may soon get under way in a positive spirit and, hopefully, this will help to defuse the situation surrounding the enclaves and among the two local populations.

 

One day I got back from a meeting and sat down at my computer and started to scan the news sites on the internet to see what breaking news there was and I got a bit of a shock … the Deputy Minister in charge of tourism in the republic has been replaced.  What struck me as particularly sad is that he hasn’t been able to see a season all the way through.  It reminded me of a school teacher who left half way through the term and his classes being left to cope as best they could in the lead up up to their examinations.  He’d only been in post about ten months and couldn’t help but recall Sir Humphrey Appleby’s comment to Bernard Woolley  in an episode of Yes Minister about the average life expectancy of a minister of the crown being … “ten months”.

Oh well, the new guy is young and dynamic and has already begun a discussion group on Facebook … but we’ll have to wait and see if this really helps him and what he is able to do.

 

Perhaps the strangest report of the week  concerned the reluctance, (refusal), of the Commission on Religious Affairs to recognize Tengriism as a religion?  Tengriism was the traditional belief of the nomadic Kyrgyz before Islam arrived and includes elements of Shamanism, Toteism, Ancestor Worship and other aspects of belief systems based on Nature and man’s relationship with the environment.   The Commission argues, however, that it is not a religion, and is socially dangerous as it could be divisive.  The society that sought to register as a religion has now appealed to the courts but the case has been adjourned … indefinitely.

I wonder what the Tengriists feel about volcanoes.

 

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Postcard from Bishkek: the weekly postcard that I send out as an email also gets posted on the website ianbek.kg each week – and there are other postcards which don’t get sent out.  This week, for example, there has been the following postcards:

Tags: Expat, In_the_News, Life_in_Kyrgyzstan, Weekly_Postcards