Two books you should read, and one you shouldn't

Silk Road to Ruin by Ted Rall was recommended to me (I think...) by Amanda, and was recently shipped to me by my mother. Rall covers much of the same ground covered by Colin Thubron (whose books I reviewed here), but his style of writing couldn’t be more different. While I hate the phrases highbrow and lowbrow, I’ve got to admit they’re the best choices for comparing the authors’ different takes on presenting Central Asia. Thubron is definitely highbrow, while Rall totally writes for the masses. His writing is highly entertaining, and Ruin contains several formats: prose, photography and graphic novel. It certainly provides an accurate sense of life in Central Asia as seen by a tourist, and it’s most definitely not your typical tourism. I definitely recommend this book to anyone interested in what life is like over here. However, I feel I should take Rall’s editor to task. Not only were there two factual errors that I caught (the Russian Revolution was in 1917, not 1918, and it's called a balbal, not a bubble), but there were numerous typographical errors. Additionally, while I enjoyed most of Rall’s adventures and misadventures in Central Asia, his tale of bribing airport officials to kick passengers (who had already bought tickets) off the last airplane out of Osh to make room for his tour group to escape the military clashes with Uzbekistan which were happening in 2000 didn’t sit well with me at all. Nonetheless, I still class this book as a recommended read.

I often go to Fatboy’s in central Bishkek for the purpose of snagging books from their “library” – most of the books there aren’t exactly literary, but as I’m a big fan of escapist mysteries, I can usually stock up. The other week, however, I found a particularly good find: Sputnik Caledonia by Andrew Crumey. This is a totally bizarre work of modern fiction, a la Pynchon, written in a non-linear style from several different points of view, with a bit of a dystopian alternate reality thrown in. It’s set in Scotland, although it features cosmonauts and black holes, nuclear waste and secret government installations, and it was thoroughly engrossing and weird as hell. Definitely give it a read.

It’s really hard to find decent books on religion. When I was in Korea, I really wanted to learn more about Buddhism. I purchased a book called Buddhism for Beginners (which I reviewed here), which really should have been called “Buddhism for those who have been practicing for a short while already and know a good bit about the religion but want more info.” Sigh. I decided to try to learn more about Islam, so I purchased Islam: Religion, History and Civilization by Seyyed Hossein Nasr, as it received numerous excellent ratings and reviews on Amazon.com, but I just couldn’t get past the first chapter. Not only is the text filled with unexplained religious terminology, but it’s written in a thoroughly obtuse style. I mean, it’s full of sentences like, “Unity cannot manifest itself without entering into the world of multiplicity, yet this manifestation is the means whereby humanity is led from multiplicity to Unity.” Huh? Anybody have any recommendations for readable books on Islam?

Free Kittens in Georgia!

One of my mom's coworkers fround a mother cat and five kittens. Unfortunately, she can't keep them all. Anyone in Georgia (or north Florida) interested in one of these adorable furballs? Please let me know!

Dammit, dammit, dammit.

What the US Embassy had was my old, expired Florida drivers license, which must've been in my wallet, too. Shit.

Awesomeness times two!

I got more things published in Everywhere Magazine! (Yet another reason you cats should subscribe to it.) They published some photos and my story from my trip to the DMZ in 2004, and a picture of Joanna from our 2006 trip on the Trans-Siberian. Small images are below :-) And in equally FANTASTIC news, someone found my drivers license and turned it in to the US Embassy!! :-)

A terrible week.

Sorry for the lack of posts of late. I was struck down with either food poisoning or stomach flu, which had me confined to the bed/bathroom for a full three days, and I am just now getting back on my feet again. And in the midst of all this, I received an email from my mom saying that another one of her cats had died: Isis, one of my favorites, whom we rescued from a parking lot in Florida six years ago.

Issyk-Kul, Tuz-Kul and Barskoon

(I've only posted a few of my photos from this trip below; to see the full set CLICK HERE)

Last weekend I went out of town, which accounts for the lack of recent blog-posts around here. My boss took me, Katy, Ben and Joe as well as Florence and Kat (who are studying Russian at the school) to the southern shore of Lake Issyk Kul for the weekend. We left on Friday night, and drove the the small village of Kara-Koo (pronounced Kara-Koh), where we had stayed back in February. In case you don't remember, Kara-Koo is where my boss's husband is from, and where his brothers and mother still live, and we stayed at their house. We arrived late in the evening, and after our hosts plied us with tea and fried breads smothered in jam, we went to sleep.

The next morning, after a hearty Kyrgyz breakfast, we set off for the village of Barskoon (pronounced Bars-kone), which is located about two hours east of Kara-Koo. Barskoon is unfortunately known for its close proximity to the Kumtor gold mine, which in 1998 spilled two tons of cyanide into the Barskoon river, killing hundreds, injuring thousands and causing the worst pollution event in Lake Issyk Kul's history. (You can read more about that here.) The Barskoon waterfall is located halfway up the side of a mountain on the left side of the road, roughly midway between the village of Barskoon and the Kumtor gold mine.

At the side of the road at the spot where the waterfall first comes into view is a bust of Yuri Gagarin. Legend has it that as he was being rocketed into space on the first ever manned spaceflight, Gagarin looked out of his space capsule and saw this waterfall. Apparently he was so impressed by what he saw, that after returning to earth, he came to see it on vacation. As such there are two monuments to Gagarin at this site. One is fairly new and in good condition. The other, erected by the Soviets, has been thoroughly defaced over the years.

(You can see the waterfall to the left of Gagarin's neck...)

From here we began our hike up into the mountains. That waterfall might not look all that far up there, but let me tell you, getting there was strenuous work. There are three main cataracts to this waterfall, and our first goal was (obviously) the lowest one. While the trek to the lowest falls is fairly steep, it isn't that great of a distance and it was certainly well worth the view.

Back to front: Kat, Florence, Joe, Katy, Ben, me

After the first cataract, the climb got considerably steeper, and our pace grew considerably slower. Florence didn't make it the whole way to the top, and Ben, Kat and I seriously considered wimping out. However, Joe and Katy forged ahead and soon came back to tell us that we had collapsed a mere five minutes from the view of the second cataract. So, we dragged our exhausted selves further along the trail to a pleasant view at the base of the second falls. We didn't try for the third.

The view was spectacular, although it was difficult to get a decent photo without falling into the river. Plus the sun was directly behind the falls at that point. Sigh...

After basking in the cool spray of the falls for a while, we began our trek back down the mountain, which was much easier than the trek up! We soon arrived back at the base of the mountain, where our boss and her family had prepared a wonderful picnic for us, with tons of delicious shashlik and homemade bread. Heaven!

After lunch, we began our drive back to Kara-Koo. Along the way we stopped twice: once to check out this bizarre thing under construction at the side of the road. Apparently it's supposed to be a gigantic tourist resort which allegedly will hold 7000 people and is themed after the legendary Kyrgyz hero Manas (wikipedia). Currently all that's there is a very long wall painted with curious murals and topped with bizarre statues. If you peer through the cracks in the unfinished wall, you will see that there's nothing on the other side. We also stopped to swim a little bit in the famed Issyk Kul itself. Issyk Kul means "hot lake" in Kyrgyz, but that water was frigid. As a native Floridian, I didn't spend much time in there.

A giant mural to a manaschi, or Manas story teller, at that bizarre place on the side of the road.

Our swimming spot on the southern shore of Issyk Kul. Also, there was a smudge on my lense, dammit.

That evening we returned to Kara-Koo for an evening of scruptious food and singing (as in February), and we went to bed fairly early.

My boss and her in-laws

The next morning, we went first to visit a local family known in the Kara-Koo viscinity for making yurts and othter traditional handicrafts. The quality of these items was really incredible, and I would love to buy a yurt (the smallest size, a 4 person yurt, costs $1000), but not only do I not have an extra grand lying around, but I suspect a yurt would simply grow moldy in the humidity of south Georgia!

Afterwards, we we drove about an hour to Tuz-Kul (which means salt lake in Kyrgyz). The lake, while not as salty as the Dead Sea was still very salty, and we were incredibly bouyant and left thoroughly encrusted in salt.

Tuz-Kul

Despite allegedly being a "dead" lake on account of the salt, we discovered that Tuz-Kul was teeming with these things, which we christened Primordial Fish Things. Any idea what they could be?

Look! We're floating!

After leaving Tuz-Kul we headed back to the nearby shore of Issyk Kul in order to wash off the salt. However, while the comparatively small Tuz Kul had been relatively warm, Issyk Kul was frigid, and I simply couldn't bring myself to get in. I did take photos though.

This was Joe's reaction to the water. Seriously, would you get in after seeing that?

While the northern shore of Issyk Kul is filled with tourists this time of year, the southern shore is un-developed and tourist-free.
Please CLICK HERE to see the full set of photos from my trip!

Introducing Heelix

(I know it's an odd name, but that's what I've chosen, and it seems to fit her.)

This furball of unbearable cuteness needs a name. Suggestions?

This was the last thing I needed...

...but I couldn't just leave it frantically running down the sidewalk mewing pathetically.

Rock, thefts and racism

I didn’t write much about the rock festival that Katy and I went to last Saturday, as I was more concerned about my stolen wallet. (I’m still rather concerned about the loss of the drivers license, as according to the GA DMV website, you need to know your license number in order to replace it, and I don’t.) Anyway, as I mentioned in the post about the wallet, the sound quality at the rock festival was definitely sub-par. Even groups which we had heard before, which we knew normally sounded good (such as our friends in the band Cadillac), sounded terrible at this event. As such, I won’t bother wasting my time uploading any videos. I will, however, post some shots of Cadillac performing:

While at the festival, we ran into Lyuba, a girl of 17 who is one of Katy’s former students. I told her how I’d just had my wallet stolen, and her reaction was, “But you’re OK, right?” She then gestured to a vertical scar bisecting her lower lip and told me the following story:

One night as she was walking home, she was surrounded by a group of Kyrgyz men. (I should probably mention that Lyuba is ethnically Russian and doesn’t speak any Kyrgyz.) They began shouting at her in Kyrgyz, then one of them pulled out a knife. At this point she gave them her wallet, saying (in Russian) “Take my money, but please don’t hurt me.” They took her money, then one of them punched her in the face, splitting open her lip and knocking her to the ground. They kicked her repeatedly as she lay on the ground. Later, Lyuba was told by several ethnic Kyrgyz to whom she related this tale that “her people” often attack/injure/kill Kyrgyz people in Russia, so she probably deserved it.

The thing is, there definitely are racially motivated attacks against non ethnic-Russians in Russia, but that hardly justifies retribution against 17 year old girls in Kyrgyzstan! Additionally, I find it fascinating that both in Russia and here in Kyrgyzstan, my students have insisted that racism is a problem endemic to America (I was told just last night that in America all whites hate all blacks and vice versa!) and that there is no racism in either Russia or Kyrgyzstan...

On a lighter note, I bought a new wallet: