If you a regular visitor to ianbek, then you are probably aware that, as a former Maths teacher, I am fascinated with numbers and that,as a former teacher of statistics, I have a “love-hate” relationship with their “use and abuse”.
As a result you will probably understand my feelings towards “Blue Monday”. Knowing how almost every “special” or “commemorative” day is marked here, I am a bit surprised that no-one has picked on this particular one yet … but maybe they will. I hope not.
“Blue Monday” is the designation given to either the third Monday in January, (or, alternatively, to the Monday of the last full week in the month – that is, today!), as the “unhappiest day of the year”. More…
Every now and again, I come across a reference to Kyrgyzstan in the news which takes me aback. It happened again earlier this week in a news report from the Marion County Record – a provincial newspaper from Kansas, USA.
The reference was in a short article about the singer John Denver and his local connections, (local to Marion County, that is).
As far as I could see, however, there was little connection with either K: Kansas or Kyrgyzstan. More…
Some people ask me how I find the time to write these weekly postcards, and others ask where I get my inspiration. The answer to both questions is quite simple and, I suppose, go back to my days and training as a teacher.
It is a matter of habit, instilled in me over seventeen years in the classroom, to spend some time reviewing the events that had taken place during the day before it came to a close. Lesson reports had to be written up, not that anyone apart from me was ever likely to look at them, and it was useful to briefly mull over some of the incidents that had occurred and consider what had gone well, and what could have gone better … if only spotted the warning signs beforehand … if only I had done this or that … instead of handling the situation as I had … More…
When I first came here I often ran into problems over names. Back in the UK, for example, as a school teacher, I would have “hit the roof” if one of my pupils had dared to call me Ian. The correct form of address is “Sir” or “Mr. Claytor”. The use of the given name is restricted to friends, relatives or superiors, say a line manager. Here, on the other hand, the correct and respectful form of address is to use the imya followed by the ochestvo, the given name followed by the patronymic. So, Vladimir Putin would be addressed as Vladimir Vladimirovich, and no-one would be surprised, there is nothing disrespectful in this.
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For the the second time in less than a week, my feet felt frozen and I thought my toes were about to drop off as a result of the cold. More…
Tuesday lunchtime and we closed the office to go to a special Birthday lunch. I have said before that Birthdays are a big deal here in Kyrgyzstan. This one was especially important as it was a 30th Birthday – a landmark, a round figure. More…
I came across an interesting dilemma last week concerning our site www.links.kg.
The idea behind the site is to provide links to webpages which concern travel to Kyrgyzstan, in particular to travellers’ tales, where they give accounts of their visits to Kyrgyzstan and their impressions of the country and what it has to offer. We made a policy decision in the early stage not to link to sites that “sell” something. As a result we are happy to include book reviews, but not links to sites like Amazon which sell the books. Let’s face it, if someone likes the review and wants to buy the book, it is easy enough for them to find the relevant Amazon page.
Likewise we decided not to include links to tour company sites. To be fair, we do have pages about Celestial Mountains in the “About Us” section and this includes banners and links to our growing family of websites, and there are links in the main section to the various “information service” sites that we operate, (such as www.sounds.kg about traditional Kyrgyz music), but not to the sites that “sell” tours or our tour services or which promote our hotels. More…
Yet another international survey has been released – this time by Freedom House.
Their annual survey, “Freedom in the World” showed some progress for Kyrgyzstan, which managed to buck the general global trend which, according to Freedom House, indicates a “fall” in the level for the fifth year running. This five year trend is a record in the 38 year history of the survey.
The list of results does not rank countries as such but allocates them to different groups: Free, Partly Free and Not Free. A Free country is defined as one where there is broad scope for open political competition, a climate of respect for civil liberties, significant independent civic life, and independent media. Partly Free countries are characterized by some restrictions on political rights and civil liberties, often in a context of corruption, weak rule of law, ethnic strife, or civil war. A Not Free country is one where basic political rights are absent, and basic civil liberties are widely and systematically denied.
Of the 194 countries surveyed, (plus 2 related territories and 12 disputed territories), 25 showed significant declines in freedom whereas only 11, (including Kyrgyzstan), showed “noteworthy” signs of improvment. There were five countries where the situation worsened to the extent that their status was downgraded, (Djibouti, Ethiopia, Mexico, Nagorno-Karabak – technically classified as a “Disputed Territory” – and the Ukraine), and two countries that improved their status this year: Guinea and Kyrgyzstan, which both moved from the Not Free to the Partly Free category.
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I was watching the news on the TV the other day when an item caught my attention. It was about yet another anniversary … they are very hot on anniversaries here in Kyrgyzstan.
This time it was marking the anniversary of the adoption of the State seal, or Gerp as it is known here, as a symbol of the Kyrgyz Republic. It was officially adopted on 14th January 1994.
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This week we seem to have had the usual run of news stories. Follow up accounts about the events in Osh in June, with one report blaming Uzbek nationalists, who oppose Karimov’s regime there, for provoking incidents which led to the eruption of violence; about the “terrorist gang”, (who are now being referred to as simply a “criminal gang”), that were apprehended in last week’s police operation; about how some of the plotters behind the recent explosion in Bishkek had received training in Afghanistan and Tajikistan. More…
