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7. 19 July to 1 August 2011 - Beautiful Kyrgyzstan
Kyrgyzstan has just over 90% of its territory above 1500 metres and water plummets constantly from its glaciers into a myriad of crystal clear streams. A third of the country is permanently under snow, and it has 1.923 lakes. How can it be anything but stunningly beautiful?
All of this makes it easy to ignore much of the chaos and disorder of the cities and towns where half-finished or abandoned dwellings and old Soviet-style apartments are everywhere, footpaths and roads are crumbling, rubbish disposal is challenging, and screaming mini-buses are the major form of public transport.
There are many minority groups throughout Kyrgyzstan, but the ethnic Kyrgyz are in the majority following the continuing exodus of Russians, Ukrainians and Germans since Independence in 1991. We met some delightful local people - like the young girl in Kyzyl-Oi, a tiny village on the way to Lake Song-Kul, She was part of the Community Based Tourism which is developing in Kyrgyzstan, and when we pulled up having noticed the CBT sign on an old timber building, she appeared at our window, speaking brilliant English and desperately eager to help us in some way. She squeezed into the front of our car and gave directions to a shaded area on one of those crystal clear streams just on the edge of the village. She returned later with advice on the best road to take to the lake.
Song-Kul is an alpine lake at an altitude of just over 3000 metres, surrounded by snowy peaks. We camped there for four nights, totally entranced by the nomadic herders and shepherds who graze their stock on the carpet of green grass around the lake and surrounding hills in summer. In the winter months they return to the villages.
They are such skilled stockmen and magnificent riders, even the young kids galloping freely are fantastic to watch. Over the few days we observed how they all manage their herds of sheep, goats, horses and cattle. The horses seem to be yarded in the evenings to enable the mares to be milked, though on the way up we did see a woman with her bucket milking a mare grazing on the hillside. The horses are released later in the evenings, and then a young boy often seems to have the job of galloping out the next morning to bring them in for milking again. The sheep and goats are yarded each evening, and the cattle seem to graze freely most of the time.
The families live in yurts, traditional nomadic housing, in these summer months on Song-Kul. Several thick layers of felt cover a portable concertina framework, to which poplar poles are tied and bent to stretch up to a circular frame of wooden batons around the smoke hole at the top - this section called a 'tunduk' is represented on the national flag. The inside of the yurts are decorated with brightly coloured traditionally-made felt shyrdaks on the walls, and felt carpets on the floor.
During our stay at Song-Kul, we were visited quite frequently by young boys riding past on horseback. They would stop and say hello, and we'd carry out a very basic Russian conversation about how beautiful the lake was, or how beautiful Kyrgyzstan was, or showing them where Australia was on the map, or about their dog, or which yurt was theirs. Once a couple of boys on horseback rode round and round our camp, looking at everything and laughing at this or that, while we looked on, laughing as well. Another boy came up when we were listening to the BBC news on the short-wave radio, and when he heard the noise inside he said "TV?" (one of those universal words!). We explained that it was a radio. I asked him did he have TV, and he nodded and said enthusiastically "and DVD!"
On the last evening, an old man tottered over to our camp with a long branch as a walking stick, wearing the traditional Ak Kalpak hat which men wear with pride in Kyrgyzstan. These hats are usually made from four panels of white felt with traditional patterns stitched into them. They are practical, keeping the head warm in winter and providing protection from the heat in summer. We had our usual basic conversation with him, but whenever I was forced to say "Ya ni panimayo" - I don't understand - he would reply with "Yi-yi-yi-yi-yi!" followed by laughing from us all. Just on dusk he shook our hands and tottered off again.
The following morning, just as we were packed up and about to leave Song-Kul, another man wearing his Kalpak wandered over with presumably his grandson, and we had yet another fragmented conversation, followed by much shaking of hands and waving as they walked away.
Issyk-Kul is another mountain lake and the second largest in the world. Its mineral content gives the salty lake its curative properties and its beautiful blue colour, but also makes it unsuitable for drinking. In places it is over 700m deep, and there is apparently evidence of a submerged ancient city in its depths. We had some beautiful campsites on its southern shore, with snow-peaks visible in every direction, and met a delightful couple from Israel who were staying in one of the yurts and backpacking in Central Asia and China. A Belgian couple were also staying there and she was studying a four month course of Russian in Bishkek. We swam in the lake and enjoyed the summer atmosphere of locals with their umbrellas on the beaches, and swimming with bright coloured floaties of all shapes and sizes, which we'd seen for sale at roadside stalls.
'Koumys' (fermented mare's milk and so very sour!) is a traditional Kyrgyz drink which we tasted during a traditional Kyrgyz meal of mutton and potatoes inside a traditional yurt near one of our campsite on Issyk-Kul. We also often saw koumys being sold in plastic bottles in roadside stalls, along with 'koorit", little hard balls of cheese, smoked fish hanging from racks and many many buckets of apricots from the trees growing wild along the roadside and in every garden.
It seems the Kyrgyz are deeply proud of the traditional Kyrgyz way of life, and are once again living many of these traditions, some of which disappeared with 150 years of Russian occupation. There is a revival of the Kyrgyz horse, which is small but sturdy and suited to the harsh conditions, and was vital to nomadic life in pre-Russian times. Nothing was revered more than skill with horses, and equestrian games were a feature of every festival or celebration. These games are often a feature of important occasions today, and we were lucky enough to see these horse skills in action in Karakol, on the eastern corner of Issyk-Kul. This particular day was more for tourists, but we still thoroughly enjoyed the spectacle, and learnt a great deal about the Kyrgyz culture, and certainly saw horse sports vastly different from pony club or polocrosse at home, yet similarly highly competitive.
We chatted to two local Karakol girls who were both acting as translators for particular tourists attending the horse games. They had studied English at the university in Karakol, and one was on her very first job as a translator. Both were keen to chat, and to find out how much we were enjoying the day, and where we had been in Kyrgyzstan and whether we liked their country. It seems that as well as speaking the native Kyrgyz language, children still need to speak Russian to be able to attend university, and English is also now taught in schools.
We have met a number of cyclists travelling through Kyrgyzstan - Austrian, German, Belgian and Danish, and on the mountain climb on the way to Song-Kul we chatted to a wonderful Swiss couple, Philipp and Corina, who have been cycling for 11 months through South-East Asia, China and Central Asia. We met them again at the lake, and while we were having coffee together, they told us that the carpet of flowers across the grass down to the lake was edelweiss, growing wild, yet rare and protected in Switzerland. A Belgian couple who rode up to our camp at Song-Kul were staying in a yurt for a few days and were out on a horse trek. And an Austrian couple overlanding in a converted Land Rover were camped in Karakol with us and also went to the horse games up in the hills above Karakol.
And now we are heading back to Bishkek, the capital of Kyrgyzstan, to meet up with our travelling companions to start on the road south towards China!
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