Don’t fence me in
There is a lot of truth in the old saying: “There are two sides to every story”.
It’s something I learned very early on as a young, novice, schoolteacher. A fight in the playground, and “Sir” descends to break it up … “So, what’s all this about?”, “He started it!”, “No, he did!”, and so on. It usually turned out that the blame didn’t sit on the shoulders of just one of the parties, but should be split somehow between them … and, also, often shared with some of the onlookers who may not be just innocent bystanders.
As a result, therefore, I think that it might be useful making a small, simple amendment to this sage observation – adding the phrase: “at least”.
Your take on any particular situation all depends on how you look at it. For example, during the week I came across two blog entries about life at the Manas base, one saying that it “is AWESOME” and “the lap of luxury” whilst the other said it worse place he had ever served. As they both referred to some of the same features it made me wonder why there was such a disparity of opinion. Perhaps because one was simply in transit and the other was a marine comparing conditions between the two services … I won’t say which was the positive and which was the negative.
So, whenever I am faced with a potential conflict situation I always try, (although I don’t always succeed), to put myself, metaphorically, into the other person’s place so that I have a clearer understanding of exactly what the real issue is.
One of the (many) things I like about living in Bishkek is that my apartment is literally in the city center. It is so nice to be in the “center of things”.
Back in London I lived in one of the suburbs on the North city … about as far North as you could get and still have a London address and telephone number. It was about eight miles into the city center, which meant about an hour’s travel in each direction: a 20-25 minute walk to the tube station, and then 30-40 minutes down on the underground. Driving the car was often slower… and much more frustrating! Sometimes I thought about how nice it would be to live in the very heart of the city.
In fact there aren’t that many people who actually live in the center of London, although, (as usual), it all depends how you define the city centre. There is no official or commonly accepted definition of what constitutes Central London – I’ve come across about six different definitions – with population estimates varying from about 300,000 to one and a half million. If we talk about the actual City of London, (the historic city, itself, which is often called “the square mile” – or simply “the City”), the population was only just over 7000 in 2001, according to the Census data – Wikipedia gives an estimate for the population in 2009 at 11,500.
Mind you, geographically, Bishkek is smaller than London – about twelve times smaller in terms of area. If I want to go anywhere, for example, then it’s almost certainly in easy reach. A short walk, or a quick taxi ride. Of course, sometimes I have to go to places on the outskirts of the city, but that’s not very often.
There are times, however, when living in the center of Bishkek doesn’t seem so attractive. Many of the city’s residents don’t want to live in the centre even though there are a lot of conveniences in doing so. Many prefer to move out to the microrayons, the suburbs, especially the ones nearer the mountains to the South, where the air is thought to be so much fresher.
Two occasions when the drawbacks certainly seemed to outweigh the advantages were March 24th, 2005 and April 7th, 2010, the dates our two recent revolutions when mobs roamed the streets looting and damaging any building associated with the corrupt “Royal Families” of the incumbent Presidential regime.
In 2004 we awoke the following morning to find debris strewn all over the yard outside our building. It was amazing to see what there was. In particular the number of shoes just thrown away – all single shoes, not a pair was to be found. In 2010, however, the situation was slightly different because we and our neighbours had installed what is now becoming a increasingly common feature central Bishkek – a fence.
For some time there had been discussions about the number of strangers who wandered into the yard and used it for all sorts of purposes. Some just sat and chatted; others sat and drank; some were looking for a short cut to somewhere; occasionally a drunk or homeless person would sleep in the yard – and not just at nighttime; and occasionally some were looking for a secluded spot for some purpose – not exactly nefarious, but unpleasant all the same; but some very definitely had ulterior motives. In March last year, for example, we suffered an attempted robbery. Three masked men simply walked into the office early one morning and held my cleaner and myself at knife point. (I’ve written about that elsewhere, see the postcard: An attempted robbery).
Please don’t misunderstand me, … don’t get me wrong … these events spanned over fifteen years and it’s the same in any big city and I saw similar things in Britain.
However, it was a question of concern and the general feeling amongst our neighbours was that it would be good to do something to limit access to the yard. Someone suggested putting up a fence. Apparently there used to be a fence around our building, but it was demolished when the building next door was constructed. Eventually, last year it was all agreed and decided, we would erect a fence.
As is so typical here, however, it took ages for anything to be done – over six months – but eventually some workmen arrived and things started to happen. And then they stopped again. Started again. Stopped again. Started again. Finally, a year after the attempted robbery, it was done.
That was just six weeks before this year’s revolution. On the night of April 7th, the crowds just walked on by. No-one tried to climb over the fence or knock it down. In the morning the yard was clean and empty – apart from the vehicles which had been brought in for safe keeping.
I said that fences were becoming an “increasingly common feature” in Central Bishkek. That’s a bit unfair as there have always been fences and walls. It just so happens, however, that as I walked down the street the other day, I noticed another new fence … and another … and … well, I’m sure you get the picture …
So, there are two sides to every story. The words of the old song “Don’t Fence Me In” concentrated on how a a barrier can inhibit someone, but on the other hand it is usually intended to keep someone out.
Bishkek