Anniversary of June 2010

June 5, 2013

We are approaching the three year anniversary of the June 2010 riots and ethnic cleansing in Osh andJalalabad – or as Altynbek put it, “the war between the Kyrgyz and the Uzbeks.” I watched a TV “special” (all in Kyrgyz) on the events from three years ago. While I couldn’t understand most of what was said (as I speak very, very little Kyrgyz), the special showed a lot of archival footage from the events, most of which I hadn’t seen before. The special also inspired Altynbek to tell me in his broken Russian that “Все Узбек – хитрый” (‘All Uzbeks are sly/crafty/untrustworthy’). I asked him why he thought that. His answer was “I don’t know, but it’s true. They all are.” I really didn’t know what to say to that.

For the past few days there have been protests in Jalalabad (which closed the main through-road between Bishkek and Osh, causing massive traffic jams and delays in and around Jalalabad). As far as I could tell from the Kyrgyz language news, the protests were somehow connected to the June 2010 events, although unlike the events of three years ago, these protests were peaceful, and the road has since re-opened.

Curious to find out more, I emailed C, whom we had met in Jalalabad. I told her of Altynbek’s comments, and asked for her take on the events in Jalalabad. This was her reply:

I absolutely love your host-parents' take on current events in J-Bad. To be honest, most of my friends here have similar opinions- when I ask them about it, they mostly just disdainfully explain that it's politics, nothing unusual, typical meetings. Nobody really seems interested in it, and the city itself is calm, even if they had closed the road to Osh for a couple days. I don't think it's related to the anniversary of the 2010 events, though, or even to the "xitrie Uzbeks." I met with the [pro-democracy organization] in Bishkek this week, and they talked a great deal about the five vying political parties. Apparently, one politician suggested overthrowing the governor (they have a video of this, even). He's been arrested, and now there are just general protests/gatherings related to all this. Or there were- I think everything has pretty much passed for now. Never a dull moment in the south!

In which B gets robbed and we go to Osh

May 21, 2013 
We decided to wear our new Chinglish t-shirts.

Initially we’d planned to taxi out to a nearby village in order to go horseback riding, but we awoke to yet another dreary, drizzly day – not at all the kind of day you want to spend on a horse. Instead we decided to take a taxi over to Osh, as it was only an hour and a half away and perhaps might have clearer weather. While walking down Toktogul Street, we heard someone call out from a balcony as we passed, “Hello! Where are you from?” in a very American accent. It turned out that we had been walking past the Jalalabad office of a US government funded group, and the young woman who was calling out to us (C) was one of their employees.

We chatted with C for a little bit, and learned that even though on the surface things in Jalalabad seem really calm and everyone seems to get along, there’s a lot of tension right underneath the surface. We exchanged contact info, then C headed back to work and we headed off to catch a taxi.

In order to reach the taxi touts at the far end of the bazaar, we had to walk through a crowd of people. B got jostled (or as he put it, “violated”) by a group of tracksuit wearing youth, and found himself pick-pocketed and out 2300 som ($40ish). Justifiably, this put him in rather a foul mood for the rest of the day. I would however, like to point out that it could have been a lot worse. He had initially put his wallet with all of his money in his pocket. I had admonished him against taking so much with him on a day trip to Osh, so he ended up leaving his wallet and most of his cash in the homestay. You’re welcome. Hah!

What has it got in its pocketses?

We negotiated a decent price for a taxi, but again we didn’t have great luck with our driver. While he wasn’t a horrible driver by any means (especially not when compared to our nightmare ride to Bazar Korgon), for some unknown reason he stopped the car in a small village about half an hour outside of Osh, hopped out, and said he’d be right back. And then was gone for half an hour. Then, when we got to Osh, he tried to pressure us into agreeing to hire him to drive us back to Jalalabad when we were ready to go. Um, no. For one thing, we had no idea what time we’d be leaving the city. For another, he’d delayed us by a half an hour for no clear reason. C’mon, dude!

Osh was depressing. Granted, it was a dreary, overcast day, but the Osh I remember from 2008 was a vibrant,active place. Back in 2008, the Jayma Bazaar was a jam-packed and bustling place, filled with lively sellers who traded pleasant banter with everyone who passed, local and tourist alike. The bazaar was torched during the events ofJune 2010 (which affected Osh as well as Jalalabad), and it has obviously not fully recovered. While there were plenty of traders around the periphery, they seemed to go about their business rather solemnly. The central part of the bazaar was nearly a ghost town. Much of it was empty, and some places still showed scorch marks. Remembering the active bazaar of 2008 made walking through the silent center of the Jayma Bazaar an eerie experience. And the building with the big sign reading Миру-Мир (peace on earth) was completely gone.

We headed for the park for the purpose of finding the old Aeroflot Yak-40 – cum – movie theater – cum tourist attraction to photograph. While it hasn’t operated as a movie theater for some time, back in 2008 the thing was decently maintained, and you could pay a few soms to go inside and have your photo taken. Now it is merely a derelict shell filled with filth. Next to it, however, was a ferris wheel – which of course B and I rode. None of us had any interest in climbing Suleiman-too, so we wandered through the park for a bit (accidentally ending up in the local lovers’ lane), and then we decided to head back to Jalalabad.

B in the ferris wheel with Suleiman-too in the background

At the bus station we negotiated a good price for the return trip and hopped into the driver’s van. When the cars parked behind him didn’t promptly move out of the way, the driver hopped out. I suspect he planned to round up the drivers of said cars, berate them, and get them to move out of his way. However, he forgot to set the parking brake and left the van in neutral, meaning that when he hopped out, the van started rolling. He scrambled to get back in, but was unsuccessful, and we rolled smack into the car behind us (albeit at a very slow speed). The accident was so slow-moving that it surely couldn’t have caused much (if any) damage to either vehicle. But nonetheless, both drivers got into a huge argument, and pretty soon nearly every taxi driver in the vicinity had chimed in. Our departure was delayed by a good 20-25 minutes. Sigh.

Just outside of Osh, our car was stopped by a traffic cop. Our driver blatantly paid a 60som ($1.10ish) bribe (this involved an ostentatious hug and handshake, during which the money surreptitiously changed hands), and then we were on our way “home” to Jalalabad.

We returned to Jalalabad around 5pm, made plans to meet up with C for dinner around 8pm, and then called Hayat (as he was far more reliable than the local CBT coordinator) to arrange transport for the following day. Dinner with C was lovely (except for the part where a rather inebriated local woman forced me to dance with her).

B ordered a salad called ёжик, which means hedgehog. And it looked like a hedgehog.

We also learned that the Kyrgyz word for mud is баткак. For those of you who don’t read Cyrillic, that’s essentially pronounced butt cock. This will never, ever get old.

Jalalabad

May 20, 2013

In the morning we left Arslanbob and rode (in a car arranged by Hayat at CBT) to Jalalabad, where we arrived at around 1pm. We had our driver drop us at the Jalalabad CBT office. Unfortunately, while the Jalalabad CBT folks were very nice, they weren’t quite as on the ball as Hayat. We explained to the coordinator that several of us were ill and that we were in need of a western-style, sit-down toilet. Normally we have no problem with squatters, but when you’re having digestive issues, there are only so many days of squatting you can really handle. Unfortunately, the coordinator was very insistent that we 'stay at a place just down the block, insisting that it had a “very clean porcelain toilet.” We went and took a look. Sadly, it had a very clean porcelain squat toilet. As we’d come to Jalalabad specifically for the opportunity to sit and shit, we had to explain yet again what we wanted. At that point the homestay’s owner brought out a wooden chair from which the seat had been removed and placed it atop the squatter. I’m pretty sure we all visibly shuddered at this point. I really hope we did not offend the homestay’s owner, but as a sit-down toilet was the reason for our presence in Jalalabad, we had to remain firm. Unfortunately, the only place that had a sit-down toilet that the CBT coordinator could arrange would not be ready until 5pm as the owner was at work. We decided to leave our things at the CBT office, and spent the afternoon exploring Jalalabad.

One of the first things we saw was a statue of Lenin sitting down. There still are statues of Lenin pretty much everywhere you out in Kyrgyzstan (and throughout much of the former Soviet Union for that matter), but in nearly all of them he is striding forward into the great Soviet future. Seated Lenin is apparently quite a rarity. We eat an Uzbek interpretation of gulash in a café near the main square, and then spent a good chunk of time exploring the bazaar, where we all bought absurd, tacky, Chinglish shirts as well as Kyrgyzstan tourist t-shirts. We then made our way to the local park which contained yet another rickety ferris wheel, which we of course rode. We then spent some time banging away at frustratingly slow Jalalabad internet… at which point our homestay was ready. As in Naryn fiveyears ago, we had an entire Soviet era apartment to ourselves. And yes, it had a lovely sit-down toilet.

Lenin, sitting
Central Jalalabad
Newyork Newyork with the British flag, and Everyone Needs a Nemesis
Jalalabad's ferris wheel
B

Jalalabad is an interesting place. Located in the “conservative” south and one of the major locations of inter-ethnic fighting and attempts at ethnic cleansing back in June 2010 (many neighborhoods were torched, thousands of ethnic Uzbeks fled across the border into Uzbekistan, and somewhere between 400 and 800 people were killed). As such, we had expected to feel some sort of tension in the community, but we didn’t at all. Granted, we were only in Jalalabad for two nights total, but on the surface everything seemed normal – tolerant, even… to a point.

One of the few visible remains of the destruction of 2010 was located near the entrance to the park. Apparently it used to be an Uzbek restaurant, and it was torched in the riots and has yet to be rebuilt.

We saw a couple of fully veiled women, a few in hijabs, many women in typical Central Asian headscarves (more similar to a bandana than a hijab) and many women without any head coverings at all. (In contrast, N and I had been the only women in Arslanbob without headscarves.) Women’s fashion in Jalalabad seems to range from full covering, to traditional Uzbek, to fashions from Turkey (ie, stylish, curvy Muslim attire), to fashions from Russia (ie, short skirts and high heels), to lots of ridiculous Chinglish t-shirts (such as the ones we purchased).For the most part, men seem to wear the ubiquitous three-stripe Adidas tracksuit (frequently combined with absurd Chinglish t-shirts). We’ve also seen many men wearing kalpaks (the traditional male Kyrgyz hat) as well as quite a few men wearing the traditional Uzbek hat. We also saw a surprising number of ethnic Russians and a few ethnic Tajiks (in addition to the ethnic Kyrgyz and Uzbek majorities).

In many ways, Jalalabad seemed like a surprisingly cosmopolitan city. However, despite the cosmopolitan mix of styles and ethnicities, there was definitely more pro-Kyrgyz propaganda in Jalalabad than we saw anywhere else. There were tunduks (the national symbol) everywhere, as well as various signs in Kyrgyz, exhorting the glory of Kyrgyzstan. Nearly every car seemed to have a Kyrgyz flag on it or in it (but visible) somewhere. While there were certainly more people in Bishkek wearing Kyrgyzstan t-shirts and jackets than there had been back in 2008, it was nothing like in Jalalabad. Tons of people wore Kyrgyzstan shirts and jackets (and this was the only place where we were able to find – and buy – Kyrgyzstan shirts with the country’s name written in Cyrillic, as in made for locals, not for tourists).

At the end of our day we went out for pizza at a lovely little pizzeria on Toktogul Street, not far from CBT. Sadly, they didn’t have any pizza. Nonetheless, we really enjoyed our dining experience as the staff (both Uzbek and Russian) were quite pleasant, and the food (traditional Russian fare) was quite tasty.