The Mountains Up Close: Song-Köl and Tash Rabat

What you may see looking out the car window in Kyrgyzstan.
Photo credit: Robert Henschel

       Finding mountains in Kyrgyzstan isn't too hard, seeing as they cover 80 to 90 percent of the country. But seeing them up close can be a little bit more difficult, since, as an infrastructural risk analysis succinctly states, "road communication between the north and south of Kyrgyzstan is unreliable"; that means the "highway" is a pothole-ridden gravel road, the likes of which would barely be tolerated in Canada in any context at all. But the scenery was beautiful, although that adjective might not be quite adequate; Kyrgyzstan has everything from green fields to lush hills to red mountains and green mountains and grey mountains to tan ones to snowy peaks. There are big blue lakes or deep green ones; wide rivers, small fast ones; thick forests, sparse ones... Central Kyrgyzstan is breathtakingly beautiful. But when a friend of mine mentioned going back to Naryn (in southern/central Kyrgyzstan) I automatically shifted in my seat; the road, or rather its bumps, twists, and turns are still too firmly ingrained in my muscles.

A vista of Song-Köl lake, as seen from our yurt.
Photo credit: Robert Henschel

       The first night of the trip we stayed in a yurt next to Song-Köl, one of Kyrgyzstan's larger mountain lakes. The food was amazing: for supper we had baked trout, a local specialty, with potatoes and the tomato-and-cucumber salad mentioned in previous posts, served along with, as all meals are, bread. Somewhat unusual, however, was the excellent sour-cherry, black currant or apricot jam served alongside; that seems to be more common in southern Kyrgyzstan than in the north. The yurt was equipped with a ton of very thick blankets, necessary since it gets to be quite chilly at night (at an altitude of more than 3000m). We rented a horse for an hour, but it was small, old and seemed to be on the edge of death; it wouldn't move unless you hit it with a stick, and we really didn't want to do that too much. We also took a two-hour hike up into the mountains; the air was clear and fresh, but quite thin: a relatively short walk through hilly country winded us.

Mountains in four colours: grey, green, red, tan.
Photo credit: Robert Henschel

       The second day, we drove further south, towards Naryn. The roads didn't improve, but the scenery, if possible, did. Approaching Naryn, you could see mountains of 4 different colours, all standing together! Grey, green, red, and tan. The city itself felt very rural: dusty one-storey houses and small shacks selling a virtually identical mix of drinks, candy bars, and baked goods. Also, in stark contrast to Kyrgyzstan's north, the only people not ethnically Kyrgyz that I recall seeing were two obviously foreign cyclists. These cyclists are a fairly common sight, pedalling up steep mountains or avoiding children and dogs on the village roads. And cows. Everyone avoids cows, because they simply don't care what you do. Sure, they'll show an intense yet detached curiosity and, one assumes, amusement, especially coming across some tourist brushing his teeth by the lake in the morning, but they won't move for a car on the highway. Horses and sheep and goats and bicyclists will move if you honk, and dogs and pedestrians without being told, but cows will just peer at you with an idle sort of curiosity. While you're bearing down on them at 140 km/h. ("What, you expect me to moove?"...) I've developed quite an admiration for cows - in Russian, корова (karova), in Kyrgyz, уй (uy - think of what your German grandma might exclaim upon tripping over a rock or, should she happen to live in Edmonton, upon slipping on the ice in March). Kuh in German, for anyone interested, and vaca in Spanish. In (Russian-language) conversation class one day we had to discuss our favourite animals. The instructor was quite dumbfounded to have someone bring cows into the discussion, but after a number of my semi-intelligible explanations she had to agree that cows are pretty cool.

This road had 35 switchbacks!
Photo credit: Robert Henschel

       The second night's camp was also in yurts, but this time next to Tash-Rabat, the historically fascinating Caravanserai. As with all things long-ago, no-one quite agrees on its origins, but consensus seems to be that it was constructed sometime in the 8th to 10th centuries, originally as a monastery, perhaps Buddhist. Everyone agrees, however, that in the 15th century it became a caravanserai, an important link along the silk road due to the offered shelter from mountain storms and, in addition, most likely playing a significant role in the smuggling trade to China. A local guide claimed that the underground passageways leading out from the Caravanserai had not been explored, since neither flame nor flashlight will stay lit once underground; he speculated that they lead all the way (40+ kilometres) to China. On the other hand, he firmly believed that there were 500km of deserted land in central Kyrgyzstan due to yeti; I heard estimates of 800m to 3km for the Caravanserai's tunnels elsewhere. Perhaps the monks did use the 700 years they had before Islam took over to dig the 40km to China.
       In any case, the drive was beautiful, and the experience worth it. If there weren't so many other interesting places to go to, I wouldn't hesitate to make this trip again.
 

Tash-Rabat, the monastery/caravanserai/smugglers' haven.
Also rumoured to house ghosts.
Photo credit: Robert Henschel

A lush green field and a fast mountain
creek next to Tash-Rabat. And a cow.
Photo credit: Robert Henschel

Issyk-Kul

       Issyk-Kul or Ysyk-Köl (Russian: Иссык-Куль, Kyrgyz: Ысык-Көл) is the world's second-largest alpine lake, and an amazingly biodiverse area. What makes it additionally special is that, despite its high altitude, it never freezes over. The past week, I was there for about a day and a half, which is all I could spare from my lessons. The drive there was an experience in itself, and the landscape all along beautiful in a variety of different ways.

A giant flag of Kyrgyzstan on the
hillside, visible from far away.
Photo credit: Bente Lea Omdal

       Kyrgyzstan looks on the map to be comprised almost entirely of mountains, but population-wise most of the country lives in the two valleys: Chuy Valley, where Bishkek is located, and Osh in the Fergana Valley. The drive from Manas Airport to Bishkek, entirely within the Chuy Valley, actually reminded me of a slightly greener Barrhead-Edmonton drive, but as soon as you enter the mountains, the scenery changes dramatically. The mountains to the east of Bishkek, in the direction of Issyk-Kyl, are mostly craggy and largely arid, but every so often, in the vicinity of a mountain stream, the mountains become lush and green. Against the backdrop of the big, snow-covered Tian-Shan mountains in the distance, it makes a spectacular sight.

       An interesting custom that has developed is to write things out on the mountain-side with big white rocks, so that the message is visible from far away, particularly the highways. A variation on that was an absolutely huge rendition of the Kyrgyz flag, so big as to be recognizable almost from the horizon. Some enterprising businessmen had elsewhere written out their website or brand name as advertisements in this way; it seemed like a bit of a shame.

Sunset over Issyk-Kul.
Photo credit: Bente Lea Omdal

Looking inland from the lake.
Photo credit: Bente Lea Omdal

       The lake itself was, as far as lakes and sunsets go, breathtaking. What appealed to me far more, for whatever reason, was the craggy, desert-like landscape between the blue of the lake and green and grey mountains further south, towards central Kyrgyzstan. I could cheerfully have spent all day out there, and in fact more or less did. I ended up getting quite a sunburn, but learned a number of new Russian words associated with sunburn and lotion and healing and pain. All in all then, quite a successful trip.

       Our sleeping quarters were sparse, in a dusty, ugly, building with crookedly-run brick walls. The rooms were sparse and each contained exactly one bed and a hatstand or coat rack. The kitchenette was crowded with a fridge, cupboards, a sink, and a table; the bathroom was maybe five feet by seven, the shower not separated from the toilet at all, so you had to be really careful not to soak anything but yourself - we felt like we were in a palace! It's incredible how adjustable concepts like comfort, luxury, and the normal are: clean and cool rooms, hot water, a thick, colourful, possibly Turkish carpet in front of the second story floor-to-ceiling windows... we were pretty excited. We spent the evening sitting on this carpet, talking and snacking; it was nice, but it must get boring to do so night after night. No wonder alcoholism is such a problem in rural areas across Eastern Europe, Russia and Central Asia. 

The house from a distance.
It didn't look quite this good in real life.
Photo credit: Bente Lea Omdal

       For lunch one day the cook living next door, a most likely very nice lady whom we couldn't get to know since she spoke no Russian at all (and my Kyrgyz amounted to all of counting from 1 to 10), made us an enormous pot of plov, a rice-based dish with meat, some vegetables, salt, cumin, and the requisite animal fat and olive oil. The serving bowl must have had a diameter of a foot and a half, and was almost overflowing on the sides. Between the three of us, eating this for lunch and supper, we must not have finished even half, but it was delicious, and she served it with the customary cucumber and tomato salad with vinegar dressing. Plov, by the way, is fiercely claimed by the Uzbek as their invention, while the Kyrgyz viewpoint will generally range from agreement to  "sure it's Uzbek, but theirs tastes weird" to "what Uzbek?" (the Uzbek have few friends in the region). Outside of the Central Asian countries in question, however, plov is generally considered to have Persian origins. 

      Although there wasn't much to do at Issyk-Kul yet, summer and therefore activities apparently beginning in July (although it was 42 degrees out today), we all in all had a great time just relaxing and taking in the nature. Issyk-Kul is definitely worth the visit.  

Kyrgyzstan through the State Historical Museum

The State Historical Museum as seen from the front. Its
Soviet roots as the Lenin Museum are quite obvious.
Photo credit: Bente Lea Omdal

       This museum in many ways exemplifies the whole of Kyrgyzstan. The first floor consists primarily of souvenir shops, an emphatic nod to Kyrgyzstan's burgeoning capitalism. There is actually a lot of foreign investment in Kyrgyzstan and, at least for small businesses, Kyrgyzstan has one of the world's more favourable climates for starting a business. There are scores of Turkish chains and especially shopping centres funded by Turkish businessmen, for example the VEFA mall mentioned in previous posts. I got a haircut in the VEFA Centre´s Istanbul Salon; the hairdresser spoke Russian with me but Turkish with his wife, who worked at the reception. The whole procedure was somewhat different as well: rather than letting you lean back to wash your hair, you bend over forwards over the sink as they vigorously scrub your head. Nothing by way of a relaxing scalp massage here. At the end of the haircut, I was a little bit surprised as the lighter came out; I hadn't thought they would be allowed to smoke while on the job. As it turns out, he wasn't going to smoke: rather, he used the lighter to burn off the little hairs around and on the ears, the back of the neck, and around a little bit to the front. It was a very interesting experience, and not necessarily in a bad way; just different. Back to the souvenir shops themselves, they aren't really much different from souvenir shops anywhere else: they sell the same sort of souvenirs (hats, slippers, carpets, little wooden figures) you might get at the market, only that they are half or a third of the price at the market. This floor is also supposed to display state gifts of some sort, but that area was cordoned off and no-one really seemed to know what was going on; also typical of Kyrgyzstan and Central Asia in general.

A tribute to the almighty name of Lenin.
Photo credit: Bente Lea Omdal

       The second floor is a reminder of the country's Soviet history, commemorating various "great" and "democratic socialist" wars; it is also a shrine of sorts to Lenin, seeing as the museum used to be, in Socialist times, named the Lenin Museum. The first glimpse of this floor is of a number ceiling tiles, writing out Lenin´s name in perhaps 20 different alphabets. Did they really expect a Thai to come and read Lenin's name written out in Thai? Even for Soviet standards, that seems a little bit over the top. There are also a number of statues depicting actions of Communist heroes, scenes from revolutions and wars, and simply ideal citizens, like a tableau of shapely, short-haired women in work dress carrying the harvest in. Apart from these very Russian-centric remainders of the Soviet era, the exhibits are much more Kyrgyz-oriented, although the requisite pages from Lenin's journal or some such thing are still present. Everything is described in Kyrgyz, and most things in Russian, but many displays need no explanation: guns and swords, coats and hats, baby clothes and instruments, and many photographs, documents, and newspaper articles commemorating the Soviet era. One of the most interesting things to me was the list of all 73 Kyrgyz Soviet War Heroes. Most had Russian names and surnames, but the patronymics, derived from the father's name, were often obviously Kyrgyz. I wonder how many of these heroes believed in what they were dying for, and what the grandparents felt when the invaders, their oppressors, hailed their fallen grandchildren as heroes for the cause forced upon them.

One of the museum's most gripping murals.
Photo credit: Bente Lea Omdal

     
       The third floor is an exhibit of Kyrgyz history from prehistoric times to the modern era. The first thing to be seen on this floor is a life-size yurt flanked by traditionally-outfitted horses and riders. Then the exhibits start, ranging from prehistory to the twentieth century. The exhibits on this floor include artefacts of various sorts, most notably traditional carpets and clothing, the designs of which closely resemble something you might find in a museum of Native American history, but the extensive Soviet-era ceiling murals, both on this and the previous floor, really steal the show. One of the most impressive features a number of presumably American men in long robes and skull masks carrying an upside-down Pershing missile as crowds of solemn citizens and protesters look on, some with English-language, some with Russian signs. Another mural seems to depict Manas, Kyrgyzstan's legendary hero, riding to save the day to the backdrop of a crumbling mosque; this painting has a strangely surreal effect, probably due to various things being a little off: a musician, squatting on the ground, seems to float several inches above it; a pillar of the arch mimics the Möbius strip effect; the hero's horse has a pinkish tint; some characters' feet seem impossibly tangled. Equally interesting, but far more mysterious, is a mural of a huge wedding feast. Surrounding the bride and groom in traditional Kyrgyz wedding dress, all sorts of people can be seen sitting together eating: a young, possibly Kyrgyz, couple cozied up; beside them, a sharply-dressed man clasping an Osama-Bin-Laden-lookalike's hand; at the centre some more traditional Kyrgyz people; on the far right sits someone with mid-back-length dreadlocks; front and centre, musicians playing traditional Kyrgyz instruments entertain the guests. The table is set exclusively with fruit and bread, but in the corner a basket of chicken seems to be on its way. Exactly what this mural is supposed to mean isn't quite clear, but perhaps it's simply there to be enjoyed. And enjoyed it was; the State Museum is definitely worth a visit.

The wonderfully strange wedding. The dreadlocked man is unfortunately
just outside the camera view.
Photo credit: Bente Lea Omdal

Manas entering triumphantly on his pink horse.
Photo credit: Bente Lea Omdal

Protesters demanding peace as
 the eerie procession passes by.
Photo credit: Bente Lea Omdal