Jul 17, 2024
The Kyrgyz Republic
And some have independence thrust upon them
With apologies for the misuse of Malvolio’s self-deluding quotation, it is a comparison I could not resist. After one month in the country on our second visit in five Covid interrupted years, the Kyrgyz Republic – or Kyrgyzstan - is still Russian-like "a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma" to quote Churchill (I will try not to sprinkle this blog with too much grandiloquent quotations).
Here are some interesting highlights:
- A Muslim ‘light’ secular independent country whose capital houses a Russian Orthodox church; a Roman Catholic Church; a Buddhist Temple; a Lutheran church; a synagogue and, as one might imagine, many mosques;
- A population of 7 million people with 118 different ethnicities including Dungan and Uyghur Muslims; Tatars; Russians (a recently increasing population, especially among young men of military age); Uzbeks; Tajiks; Kazakhs; Azeris; and Turks in a melting pot forcefully created by Stalin;
- A hospitality industry where most restaurants do not serve alcohol while citizens enjoy their vodka at various times of the day;
- Towering apartment blocks and Soviet era constructions which suffer from the lack of funds to provide regular maintenance;
- A functioning democracy in which, with perhaps two exceptions, the incumbent secures positions for his family and clan to ensure maximum benefit;
- People who have seen their lives upturned by the events of the last 33 years, still tilling the land by hand in some places and yet inherently hospitable;
- A nation caught between the pincers of Russia and China whose generosity cannot be spurned, while Turkey built its newest grand mosque, a simulacrum of Istanbul’s Blue mosque; and
- 91% of the country above 1,500 metres and wherever one looks mountains, quite often snow-capped, that leap at you like so many upended greybeards.
Confused? So are we still; but one thing is clear, not only from our own impressions, but from the comments of the Kudus who joined us for two weeks:
“the very best of the ‘Stans’”
“incredibly beautiful”
“brilliant”
“stunning”
“fascinating and impressive”
… this country is worth the time and the awe.
On the very first day of our Kyrgyzstan walking tour , Kudus travelled through the scenic valleys of the upper reaches where Kyrgyz people erect their yurts and train their children in riding and native skills. To see people building these unique habitations was just one of the joys of this journey to our own yurts in the sky, built by one man as a personal crusade using local materials and labour. Spring water piped from 4,000 metres gave refreshment to the flight weary guests who soon learnt to enjoy the local food and somewhat ‘interesting’ wine.
Two days of gentle walks, accompanied by expert botanists, accessed flower strewn mountain paths and picnic sites gazing over valleys to those snow-crested peaks. Next, we visited the ancient site of a Sogdian city with carved stone stelae before settling into a guest house with outside terraces and hearty dinners. A familiarisation stroll through the village prepared Kudus for a good night’s sleep before a walk to a vista where we looked out past the Kyrgyz ranges onto the mountains of Kazakhstan.
The road past Issyk-Kul takes us past resort complexes with the architectural style of a Blackpool funfair, while the 180 kilometre length of this expanse of water, the second largest mountain lake after Titicaca, reflects, in varied tones, the high alpine sun. An open air museum scattered with petroglyphs from millennia past provides a welcome stop as we make our way to Karakol, the Kyrgyz Republic’s fourth largest city and a developing ‘hip’ town with many restaurants and interesting 19th century Russian houses, identified by their blue shutters and carved gables. Our home for the next three nights provides an oasis of calm and floristry together with great food and a surprisingly pleasing wine selection.
Our visit to a museum honouring the explorer, spy and naturalist Nikolai Przhevalsky presents that modern dichotomy between admiration for a person’s achievements and disdain for their public statements. The mood changes as we take two chair lifts to just a smidgeon below 10,000 ft. (3040 metres) and gaze over verdant valleys to peaks soaring beyond 5,000 metres in the Tien Shan (“Celestial Mountains”) range. A stroll down prepares Kudus for an excellent Korean themed lunch in a laid back café before visits to a Russian Orthodox Cathedral, built entirely of wood on a previous brick foundation, with not a nail in sight and a Dungan mosque where a welcoming custodian presents Tereza with a rose.
Over our two weeks’ tour we were entertained and fed in homes where the residents were Dungan or Uyghur, the first group being Chinese speaking Muslims, the second identified by their use of a Turkic language. On two occasions, our hosts told us the stories of the arrival of their families in the Kyrgyz Republic and held Kudus spellbound by these histories. The food matched the hospitality and we were allowed to bring wine into their residences. The sight of your scribe rattling bottles round the local supermarket in preparation for these evenings did raise some Islamic eyebrows – not the first time I have been viewed as the Antichrist or the Muslim equivalent thereof.
A riverside walk with our ornithologist, a resident of the Jewish Autonomous Region of Russia, preceded a drive to our next three night residence, a modern four star hotel with an adjacent wedding hall and restaurant. On our journey, we dropped in for lunch at a felt-making workshop where hours of work have been saved by the use of a cannibalised car engine from the Russian equivalent of the Fiat 124.
Naryn’s location provides access to truly wonderful walks in valleys along and occasionally in the river and up hills to view in situ petroglyphs, while the town itself contains a modern decorated mosque where the imam allowed us to view the basement gallery of photographs and an art gallery in which we were treated to a personal tour of its exhibits by a very enthusiastic curator.
Evening dinners were again surprisingly tasty and varied, accompanied by wines – and the occasional G & T - sourced in another ‘booze run’ to the local shops. Naryn is a site for the University of Central Asia, funded in part by the Aga Khan. Its history as a Russian frontier base and its decline since independence is contrasted with a well set out, if poorly maintained, central square and the advent of coffee shops and a up market lunchtime café where we exchanged photographs with a group of local doctors in town for a reunion.
Bishkek is our last stop and we enjoyed two days of sight-seeing during which we toured the city, still being built and rebuilt, where a massive statue of Lenin points to the mountains and Marx and Engels, neither of whom visited the city, discuss communism at the foot of an alley featuring the martyrs of Stalin’s 1938 purge. The nation’s heroine stands above us as we hear about her 19th Century leadership of the Kyrgyz people of the South of the country and her decision to make peace with the Russians during their participation in the ‘Great Game’.
In their search for a home grown hero, the Kyrgyz people have adopted the 9th century Arthurian figure of Manas, a composite of various warriors whose tale is told in the longest epic poem in number of lines (over 500,000) by revered manaschi to whom statues are dedicated throughout the land. The story of his attempt to combine the forty tribes of the Kyrgyz land – represented by the forty rays of the national flag – takes 11 days to relate and is showcased in a museum adjacent to a vast fortress allegedly dedicated to Manas’ uncle and wisest counsellor: yet another site we explored with no other visitors.
At the end of this sojourn, Kudus were enthusiastic in their praise of the Kyrgyz Republic. Yes, it is awkward and at times, frustrating. The ‘facilities’ may be still evolving; the roads could do with more asphalt and the service in hotels and restaurants is variable, but the people are welcoming and sanguine; the mountains are magnificent and the land invites further exploration.
To return to my headline, in March 1991 the Kyrgyz people voted 88.7% to remain within a Russian Federation but were rebuffed by Boris Yeltsin with the famous phrase “take as much freedom as you want”. Their ‘freedom’ may still be a work in progress but the Kyrgyz Republic continues to hold elections and perhaps, more importantly, hold their presidents to account.
Our travel through the Kyrgyz Republic was enlivened and immensely augmented by our excellent guide, Olga, and two helpful and inexhaustible drivers, Alexei and Rustan.
Tereza and I look forward to showing Kudus this country that is fast becoming our favourite.
Join us for our next departure - 23rd June - 6th July 2025