Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan

During the mid to late 1990’s my father was living in Magadan, Siberia. On business trips, he toured Central Asia and spent a fair amount of time in Bishkek on business. His experience was as you might expect soon after the fall of the Soviet Union. He had major issues with the quality of accommodations and the food. His group ate a “meat burger” for dinner every night that they were here.

Things have certainly changed. The city is relatively small but quite comfortable and cosmopolitan. Japanese, Chinese and regional restaurants abound. Our hotel is comfortable with working air conditioning, a shower with hot water and the first half decent internet since we left home. I don’t know if it is because the city has a bit of a more familiar European feel or the weather is absolutely perfect but the whole group seems to be loving this place!

After our early (early, early, early) morning flight and rigorous luggage checks getting out of Uzbekistan, we breezed through Kyrgyzstan customs with ease. Once again, the customs agents had smiles on their faces….for us seasoned travelers that is quite an odd and wonderful thing.

We had lunch on an outdoor patio. The native cuisine was cooked perfectly using what appeared to be classic European (French) techniques.

Driving around we noticed an abundance of cars with both left and right sided steering wheels. Apparently, most cars are second hand and come from numerous countries including the UK and North America.

The tour of Bishkek started with a tour of the usual Soviet infrastructure. We visited a museum that was hosting a once a year sale of traditional felt carpets hand made by women in the surrounding countryside and had a few interesting personal encounters.

While crossing through an area that was hosting a business conference, we came across a gifted Russian musician playing a balalaika. I have never heard anyone who could actually play one before and it was completely captivating. Like some kind of reverse Pied Piper, the haunting array of sounds stopped several of us dead in our tracks and we didn’t leave until he was finished. I will upload the video that I took in the hope that it will provide a taste of the actual experience. [I searched for him online. His name is Alexei Arkhipovsky.)

On our way to the concert hall we met up with a persistent young man who was fascinated by our cameras. He kept trading his small digital Kodak camera while playing with ours. While initially suspicious, his persistence and gentle nature made the group relax. It seemed that he was destined to become a photographer and was trying out (and even helping us with our) higher quality cameras. He joked around about trading cameras and getting tickets to tomorrow night’s ballet with us. It stopped being cute when he followed people onto the bus. After refusing to leave at the insistence of our tour guide, several members of the group escorted him off the bus. I don’t know what he was up to but I am glad that it ended well.