Postcard from Bishkek

No, not yesterday evening … tonight is the Last Night … It’s nothing to do with the end of the world but the Last Night of the Proms – am right week season of Promenade Concerts of classical music, established in 1895 by the famous conductor and composer Sir Henry Wood.  The weren’t the first such Promenade concerts but they have now been held annually ever since … even during the two World Wars, (although some concerts had to be cancelled due to heavy air raids in 1940 and 1941,  sometimes with an additional Winter season interspersed as well.

Promenade concerts were originally outdoor concerts in London’s parks and gardens and members of the the audience were free to stroll around while the orchestra was playing … and although such concerts are still staged, the Proms are normally held indoors but there is an area where the Promenaders  stand rather than sit … but pay a much lower price for their ticket.

Most people’s image of the Proms are gathered from the Last Night – which normally takes place in the Royal Alberyt Hall in London and offers a selection of popular classics and culminates with British Patriotic music including, Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance March, (which contains the the tune for Land of Hope and Glory), Sir Henry Woods, Fantasia on British Sea Songs (which includes ab arrangement of Rule Britannia), and traditionally concludes with Hubert Parry’s Jerusalem … to which the audience sing along.

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 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBGPjndGS0A

The clip from youtube is of Jerusalem, performed at the Last Night of the Proms in 2006.  The song was based on a poem of Willam Blake’s, written in 1808, “And Did Those Feet In Ancient Time“.  It is based on a legend that Jesus travelled with his uncle, (Joseph of Arimethea – who appears in the gospel as the man commandeered by the Roman soldiers to help carry the cross to Golgotha), to what is now Glastonbury, in England.  In the Industrial Revolution with its smoke-filled factory towns of the Northern England, the image of Jesus returning and creating a heaven in England gave many a sense of hope.

The poem was set to music during the First World War, and has since become one of Britain’s most patriotic songs and has been adopted as the official English Rugby Union song … although the crowds on the terraces seem to like Negro Spiritual Swing Low Sweet Chariot just as much.  Jerusalem was also the “anthem” of the Women’s Institute – apparently sung at every meeting when my Grandmother was a member.

In fact, the concert season offers a very varied and although British composers feature prominently ion the programmes – Sir Henry Wood’s original idea was to try and use the concerts to “educate the public” and create a knowledge audience eager to hear Classical music.

I remember sitting an watching the Last night on our old Black and White TV back in the 1960’s … I can’t say that I was much of a fan for some of the other pieces … but Jerusalem has always had a particular place in my affections …

Here in Bishkek we don’t have anything like the Proms … in fact the concert season doesn’t season ends before the Summer heat arrives and recommences with the cooler evenings in the Autumn … indeed it’s already started with performances by a Chinese ballet company which was well received.

It’s easy to think of the troupe as an advance guard before their President arrives for the ShOS summit next week, (the Shanghai Cooperation Organization).  We are expecting a whole host of Presidents and other dignitaries … in fact it is going to be difficult to get around town as streets will be closed for the duration.  The dignitaries are going to be driven around in special armour plated vehicles, some of which have been donated by China but the Russians have ordered five from BMW at a cost of more than USD650,000 each.

There was some speculation that the ShOS summit might be cancellation as a result of the outbreak of plague up in Issyk Kul … but with only one confirmed case and the quarantine now lifted it hardly merits the furore that it aroused.  Some sportsmen, however, felt concerned enough to cancel their appearance in the Issyk Kul Games.  It seems that the diplomats are made of stronger stuff because they decided not to change their plans after all.

The new terminal at Manas airport, (with the inspiring name of Manas-2 …  I had hoped they might have been more imaginative than London Heathrow),  has been prepared for it’s first big occasion .. and does look quite impressive in the photo reports that have appeared.  One of the first visitors will be … the President of China.

In fact there are over 400 Chinese Joint Ventures operating in Kyrgyzstan and several large projects in the country being undertaken with Chinese participation including the reconstruction of the main Bishkek-Torugart and the Osh-Sary Tash-Irkeshtam roads, the Datka-Kemin and Datka-South power transmission lines, construction of an oil refinery in Kara Balta, the proposed new China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway as well as a whole host of smaller projects in mining, food processing, energy, engineering … and, apparently, tourism.  That last one surprised me a bit so I obviously need to do a bit of homework!

The refinery in Kara Balta is apparently ready, technically, to start work.  I am not sure how much crude oil they will process will come from Kyrgyzstan – we may not be a second Kuwait but it seems that in the first half of the year we produced som 46000 tons of oil.  That makes an interesting change from reporting about Gold.

For some reason, however, Chinese firms seem to attract a certain amount of controversy and one of the mining companies, however, as it has just has its license withdrawn for some reason.  It makes a change for the controversy to be about a company other than Kumtor, but the Canadian firm is still in the news with the result of the negotiations with the government due to be made public soon.

The “extortionists” who apparently asked the company for three million dollars are still in the news.  After being interrogated and released from custody, their arrest and detention until the end of September has been ordered.  There is still some conflicting opinion about wether this was an attempt at extortion, with a group of locals claiming theat were simply asking for help for the local community, not for money for themselves.   As it is, the local communities are watching to see what the negotiations will deliver – the citizens of At Bashi diustrict seem to want 10% of turnover as a development fund for their region and a group from Issyk Kul wants Kyrgyzstan to have 67% – it is hard to see, however, such figures being met.

Last week there was a Kurultai, (Assembly or meeting), of Kyrgyz “youth” held in Issyk Kul and they also had demands.  At the beginning of the week the security services, (the KGNB), released a video debriefing of one young man who claimed that the opposition had plans to cause further disruption – meetings, road blocks and even poisoning rivers.  In the video he named a number of prominent opposition politicians and severval have been called to the headquarters of the service to answer questions and write “obysnytelniye“, (explanations).  Most have denied any knowledge of the person concerned and the plans, and some have threatened legal action.

Protests continue, however … the latest ones outside the American Embassy to protest at the possible military intervention in Syria.  Interestingly, not long ago there was considerable alarm when it was discovered that some young people from Kyrgyzstan had been recruited to take part in the fighting there.  As usual, there is considerable concern over the prospects of conflict and a rise in Islamic militancy and extremism (and, oddly enough, p[ossible links with organized crime) … and for some time the focus was on Afghanistan and the possibility of trouble erupting after the American withdrawal in 2014, but maybe the focus is now shifting.

If trouble does come, then the elite troupe of Kyrgyz border guards – the Snow Leopards – will be in the forefront of dealing with it … and there was interesting press release form the OSCE, (Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe), that featured a military exercise which they have been assisting as part of the training for this special group.

 

I’ll finish this week with a number of titbits from around the news …

Roza Otunbaeva, the former President following the 2010 revolution, once said that energy was one of the wings of the Kyrgyz economy … and I am sure was thinking of hydroelectricity, but there is a growing interest in possibility of developing alternative, sustainable sources of energy, (solar and wind power in particular – but also geothermal).  The debate over this continues, however, with some experts claiming that such an approach cannot be effective whilst others claim that it can provide up to half of Kyrgyzstan’s energy needs.

Plans are going ahead for the construction of a new North-South highway to connect these two disparate regions of the country, separated as they are by high mountain ranges.   At the moment there is really only one road connecting them, the Bishkek Osh highway constructed in the 1960’s.  The plans for the new road include a tunnel which, at three and a half kilometers long, would be the fourth longest tunnel in CIS … beating the Too Ashu Tunnel through the Kyrgyz Krebet mountain range and connecting the Chui valley with the Suusamyr plain by over a kilometer.

The country’s schoolchildren made their way to school for the start of the academic year on Tuesday … a little later than usual.  The school tear usually starts on September 1st, but that was a Sunday and the Independence celebrations extended through to Monday, they got a few days of extended holiday.  Even when they get to school, however, they may yet find they have yet more free time as many schools are facing a critical shortage of teachers. This fact clashed somewhat uncomfortably with claims made by several politicians, including President Atambaev, about the importance of education and how an educated youth was the key to a strong state.

The World Economic Forum has ranked Kyrgyzstan as 121st (out of 148 countries and territories) in their regular survey on global competitiveness.  That doesn’t sound particularly impressive, and it is obviously hoped that joining the Customs Union might help to improve that situation … Armenia seems to think that there are advantages in doing so as they have signaled an interest in joining the economic block and turning their face away from Europe.

It was interesting to see that plans are progressing with the aim to create an on-line archive of Kyrgyz photographs and film.  Work on the project has been underway, apparently, since 2002 and something two thirds of the material has been catalogued already.

Perhaps more controversial, however, was the news that one of the deputies is proposing to abandon the moratorium on the death penalty, claiming that murders have increased since it was introduced “due to a sense of impunity among criminals”.

 

Well, it’s been another interesting and difficult week … I’m looking forward to a meal of plof at a new chaihana here in town this evening … and then coming home, putting my feet up and seeing if I can catch the second half of the Proms performance.

 

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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