Bishkek

Why Bishkek for 3 weeks? It was in between travels, the hostel was home from home with hot water, showers, flushing toilets with seats, a washing machine, a microwave and wifi (sometimes).  I was nearly classed as staff as the receptionists didn't speak English. Also arranged some sight seeing tours for some of the "new" hostellers and collected some maps to leave at reception.  The manager did speak English but only appeared to sort out repairs (a light exploded in the toilet; the toilet ceased to flush and was wobbly). At the end of my extended stay Anya, the oldest receptionist, cooked me a farewell meal of potato and onions and special doughnut like twists rolled in icing sugar (a form of borsok)and  requested I visit her should I ever return to Kyrgyzstan but maybe I'd need to learn Kyrgzys first.

Thanks to a link from home, at church I was introduced to a lady who oversees a centre for the homeless so with time to spare there was a mountain of clothes to sort and dishes to be done once the soup had been served.  This was a new experience for me and it was great to work alongside the Kyrgyzs folk on the team and humbling to see them working so compassionately with the homeless.

Bishkek is set out in rectangular grids so along with the backdrop of  mountains, when not shrouded by clouds, and clutching a map (2nd one nearly in shreds) navigation was fairly straightforward. 
Many of the buildings in the centre are large and block like along with tall flats (got to live on the 5th floor on my return thanks to a contact) and some interesting architectural structures in between with wide tree lined streets to provide shade in the heat of the summer.  There are also many statues, some larger than life, and parks filled with trees and, at this time of year, brightly coloured flowers, especially roses which along with the lime trees provided sweet aromas. People often sat on the grass under the shade of the trees in preference to the sun soaked benches.  The main square was memorable with its dancing fountains; 2 guards, who changed over a few times a day, under the national flag and a large national museum.  Here vendors sold balloons; bags of puff candy and ice cream or would offer to take photos for a fee. At night the square became even more alive with cyclists, roller bladers and remote control cars.

Pavements are rough with dips, bumps and open manholes (some homeless live down these) making a torch a neccessity at night. Isn't that right, Andrew! There are some road crossings but sometimes you have to "brave it" and hope that the traffic will stop although driving did seem slightly saner than in Mongolia.

In the summer, not surprisingly, more women wear dresses and skirts than in Scotland although with being the capital "anything goes".  The girls and younger women are very thin considering the fatty food they consume but then they become rounder as they grow older.  Often "babouskas" seem to look after the children but maybe because the schools are on holiday from June to September.

The minibuses (mursrudkas) are the main form of transport if you don't mind rubbing noses with others who are squashed in the aisles but there are also buses and trolley buses and taxis (sometimes shared).  The train service seemed to be limited to one short route to Lake Issukul.  The markets are fascinating and in some areas narrow like the Moroccan souks.  One huge market is like "container city" built entirely from ship containers (but how did they get here in a land locked country?) and with no obvious landmarks I ended up getting lost and taking a taxi back as I couldn't even find the buses.

Had an enjoyable hour of classical music (200 com) in the Philharmonia where a German guest celloist played exquistly.  Also attended a free 60th anniversary concert for the local radio station in the Opera House featuring some Kyrgyzs' poetry, songs and dances.  Andrew and 3 friends performing a popular Kyrgyzs' song but he was still prepared to act as my guide on our travels despite his stardom.

With fluctuating electricity and wifi connections I could often be found at  "Expresso", an internet cafe with real coffee (hard to find ) and ate my way round various Kyrgzys' cuisine. Apart from Bozo (a fermented wheat drink) and small sour cheese balls I enjoyed everything else.  Food and meal prices seemed cheap for us but it seems that most Kyrgzys folk struggle to make ends meet.

Eventually I left "home" and started to explore the countryside...

Ulaan Bataar

Still catching up on my blog from Mongolia and this time it's from Ulaan Bataar which has expanded immensely since my friends visited 11 years ago.

My friend Fiona's accommodation was beside a new fun park with it's roller coaster and wheel acting as good landmarks when walking to and from the centre marked by a towering glass building. From the park Big Ben chimed on the hour which was rather strange.

The city has tightly packed areas of tin roofed houses and gers leading into a more modern and spacious centre with many tall buildings and tree lined streets.  Throughout the city are tall cooling towers for the centralised heating and electricity unless house have their own boilers and generators. With the large mining industry there were many factories producing related equipment/machines. It was surprising to see high mountains and trees surrounding this industrial city.

Fiona whisked us around various squares, statues and buildings in between finalising the 12 day trip to the countryside and finding ATMs which would spit out money using my cards.  We did use some taxis and my friend's driver who took us up to the local monastery with its many prayer wheels, huge Budha, 2 large feet and intricate art work.  We also visited the Black Box a very modern and versitile theatre and centre for producing commercials.

A couple of times we met up with an IWAM group, international women who support various projects in UB. At one meeting we met a Mongolian Mum with her healthy Mongolian toddler  who'd undergone a major op funded by the group and also heard about funding for wheelchairs in Mongolia.

Can you believe we attended 2 Scottish country dancing classes run by an English man in a Scottish pub?  I managed to hold my own with him for Strip The Willow not quite getting him on the floor but then frustrated him by getting sequences of other dances muddled up as soon as the fast music started. Maybe I should have attended the after school club run at South Lodge.

One day we got wind of the driver's daughters' graduation ceremony which turned out to be an amazingly colourful talent show with confident younsters singing solos, dancing and reciting poetry.

We visited an enormous statue of Ghengis Khan on horseback an hour away from UB.  Here we had fun dressing up Mongolian style and an indoor lift took us to the top of the horse's head from where we got stunning views of the green mountains and valleys around. The nearest ger camps to UB were in that area (one with a dinosaur playground had been a favourite when Fiona's family were younger) where we enjoyed some Mongolian flat pasties and a noodle dish in a chalet style restaurant and later visited large rocks in the shape of a turtle. We also had the experience of holding eagles and vultures for photos but as the vulture was heavier than expected my photos were not very flattering.

One evening we had an Indian cookery demonstration and were able to sample the products along with other Indian food brought along by a local restaurant owner who also introduced us to some of  his Indian friends who were interesting to chat to.

Just before leaving we fitted in a Mongolian show at a small theatre featuring music, songs, dances and a contortionist who ended up with her whole body in the air supported by her teeth/mouth gripped round the top of a stand.  It was hard to watch and at times difficult to work out which side of her body was on view.  My performance at yoga hasn't reached that stage and guess it never will.
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Our last meal was in a Mongolian restaurant-a hot pot meal consiting of a selection of meats and veg which we cooked in boiling soup over a small burner.  We had one or two scarey moments when the flames got out of control but it was a fun way of eating and very tasty too although we declined the tripe and penis. Back at the apartment Dylan's (Catriona's boyfriend) famous lemon meringue pie was our tangy dessert.

And so we flew out of UB with my head full of so many new sights and experiences and although the cabin was rather warm I did manage to stay awake and gaze out at the scenes below which became more impressive as we flew over numerous mountain ranges in our approach to Kyrgyzstan.  Next stop Bishkek...

More On Mongolia

Finally got the time, computer and wifi access and electricity to update my blog and now hopefully can write impressions rather than a blow by blow account or diary.

Mongolia is massive and so after scootie Scotland it was amazing to be driving through vast landscapes free of people and houses not even gers (Nomad's round tents) for what seemed like 100s of kms.  Across this steppe land mountains sometimes soared in the distance and, in the Gobi, towering sand dunes.  Covering around 30,000 kms meant seeing a comparatively small area of Mongolia but it was filled with a variety of landscapes and everywhere there was a trail of vodka bottles, shredded tyres and some horses' lower legs and hooves.  Often driving was on sand, gravel, over rocks, along river beds, across rivers and up and down mountain tracks over terrains where we would normally just be hiking at home. In the countryside we spotted 1 signpost (Why didn't I take a picture?)and so the driver used a compass, his knowledge of the area and nomad nav (local form of sat nav) which gave more opportunities to check out nomad life.  Occasionally there were tarred roads but that could mean dodging the potholes and oncoming vehicles who were playing the same game. Once while the driver drove over boulders in the mountains we'd a half hour walk to catch him up in freezing conditions. Maybe Scottish roads are not so bad after all.  Our driver, Baggie, performed a "good Samaratin" act one day when another van had a burst tyre for the 6th time and he helped to change it.  However soon that tyre also burst and Baggie gave then his spare tyre and collected it from the next garage.  It appeared that the other van's tyres were not suitable for such rough terrain.

Travelling before the start of the tourist season allowed us to stay in family gers (often families have spare gers for visitors or for cooking but not for cooking the visitors!) rather than in ger camps which gave more of an insight into family life.  Some gers have a satellite dish and solar panel but all have a motorbike, van and/or horse and cook on their stove in a huge wok in the centre of the ger.  Fuel is generally dried dung (smells like peat and was stored in mounds) and also wood in the few forested areas.  Families sit/sleep on beds round the walls of the ger or on mats on the floor although 1 family was sleeping in their van.  The men wear a cap or hat and dressing gown type garment maybe because they spent a lot of time sleeping.

On arrival at a ger visitors are shown to the left and offered food from a dish on arrival. This is when we tried curds (rather chewy), cheese and cream/yoghurt and also their milky tea with salt.  When there's a shrine in the ger you sleep with your feet away from it ( Buddhist/ Shaman). Water is collected from wells and stored in plastic canisters or large barrels. We had fun pumping water into our canister at one well and filling it from a bucket at another well but had many disappointed customers (100s of goats and sheep) at another well when the bucket was full of holes but it was a good photo opportunity. Inside a ger there are often barrels of animal fat, milk churns (animals are milked in the summer), boxes of dung, a sink, some cupboards/drawers, cooking utensils and sometimes a TV or radio. The walls are made of latticed wood and often clad with felt covered with colourful material/rugs. Toilets are within walking distance of the ger and range from a cabin with a long drop toilet to a 3 sided structure at chest height (toilet with a view) and "natural" toilets. Expectations of these "facilities" changed along the way and with travelling in the windy season the 3 sided toilet quickly rose in our estimation in preference to the "natural" one. (Oops, forgot to pack a trowel!)  Carrying toilet paper/tissues became essential with access to a shower once on the 12 day trip and so did wipes altho' we were occasionally near a river...sometimes frozen.  However sometimes the sand was blowing so hard that it acted as an exfoliator and when recently finding that I'd bought some exfoliating cream by mistake thinking it was face cream my skin has been given a treat.  I came to the conclusion that I wash too much in Scotland and will aim to have less showers on my return.

At the gers it was mainly couples sometimes with a young child and sometimes the grandparent/s, as the older children would be in town during the week for school. Most pupils seemed to have very smart uniforms  and graduating from school was cause for celebration with gifts and prizes and a concert. Families have at least 1 dog and an assortment of sheep, goats, horses and in some areas, camels.  A 3 day old goat shared our accommodation in 1 ger and various goats and dogs tried to visit us at other times.  Nyamka, our cook was very skilled at cooking on the ger stove and on a camping gas stove (We were sleeping in tents a few times - challenging with my snoring and when the river beside us froze overnight but fine when the temp rose to 25 degrees.) The meals contained more vegetables and less fat than expected usually served with mutton or different types of salami and tinned fish along with rice, noodles or pasta.  Breakfasts were interesting and varied: hot fruit salad using a mixture of fresh and dried fruit; pancakes; eggs; bread and jam; hot and cold cereal; salad (reminding me of  Karen's wide selection of  breakfasts) and making my cereal breakfast at home seem boring...another challenge for me to be more creative with breakfasts for visitors.

During the trip we were eased into riding bactrian camels (2 humps) by meeting the shorter ones first and then the taller ones in Gobi but each time the wobbliest moments were when the camel stood up and sat down as it bends/stretches 2 legs at a time.  The camels were from light brown in colour to almost black and some looked rather scruffy as they were shedding their coats. Near the ger in the Gobi there were lots of baby camels(calves?) crying for their mothers to give them milk. Whilst in the Gobi we scrambled up the highest sand dune (300m) with difficulty but had fun running back down bare footed.  We saw a few sandy coloured lizards sunbathing in this area before they darted off and in other places had fun spotting marmots, pikkas (small mice), ground squirrels and hamster like creatures popping up from or sprinting for cover in their holes. One day we had a chilly horse trek over the mountains to a frozen lake.  Mongolian horsemen stand in the stirrups to ride their horses but it was ok for us to remain seated.  The nomads are very hospitable and so the guide's family fed us lunch in their ger nearby and gave us the use of their summer ger near our camping site so were able to escape the Siberian wind that night. Our travels took us through a few National Parks, one being where they are trying to reintroduce the cream coloured Takhi horses and the other where they'd found dinosaur eggs and fossilised wood. We watched the sunset over a mini Grand Canyon (Red Rocks) as we clambered over them. We travelled through a few gorges with little room to spare and were camped in one when motorbikes and vans roared through and then another tourist van arrived and set up camp round the corner- not quite the M1 but busy enough for us after not seeing vehicles for many kms. Eagles too liked this area.  Old nests were evident and often the eagles circled above the cliffs. In another gorge we saw peregrine falcons trying to catch their prey and we disturbed some wild goats and elk en route. With no trees or high vegetation for kms a few boxes on tall posts had been positioned for nests and 1 housed 3 chicks, possibly eagles or vultures.  We also visited a few monasteries which had some colourful art and Buddhist sites where it was sad to see so many people with false hopes in rocks, statues and rituals.


The towns we passed through varied in size and consisted of small houses and gers surrounded by fences made of wood, bashed out metal barrels and bricks, a selection of shops, a school and some other large, official looking buildings. Shops didn't have windows to advertise their goods so apart from the Mongolian script it was hard to work out the types apart from opening the door and gingerly checking inside.  Some of the towns have large (black) markets where we saw household goods including flat packed gers, clothing and various food products with understandably a limited selection of fruit and veg and fish. In the butcher's shop was a huge lump of fat which was a camel's hump and also camel, horse and goat meat but none of these featured on our menus.

Around the outskirts of the towns black kites circled over the piles of strewn rubbish. Eagles were often sitting at the roadsides on the open steppe land but didn't hang around to be photographed.
Flowers were beginning to emerge after the severe winter: carpets of miniature blue and a few yellow irises; low lying yellow vetches; shrubs like yellow broom; small alpine flowers like gentians and spikey grasses in the sandy areas. In the desert mirages of lakes and rivers were often evident caused by reflections from black stones or salt deposits. However in other areas we did see a few rivers and lakes with cranes, golden ducks and black and white ducks with red markings before the cattle stampeded into the lake for a drink.

And so 3 happy, tired and smelly campers arrived back in UB where Fiona acted as the perfect hostess nursing us back to civilisation and preparing us for our onward flights.