Author: Laura Kelly

And What Is The Hands of Asses?

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Now that I am in Bishkek, Facebook has decided to pepper my news stream with ads for things from Central Asia and Russia. As most of it is in Russian, I have to click onto the translate button that nests at the bottom of the post. This is what came my way today. I think of myself as savvy, worldly, clever. But with this translated passage, I am flummoxed.

Is that it? But it is his hemorrhoids. For the sake of luxury two and three pairs of panties turns on the washing machine. Delicate wash, you see!

And what is the hands of asses? Hand wash you can not?

When you have learned to drain water to the end? When you have learned to put a new toilet paper?

Cover when you learn to let down?! -It’s as loud.

The Sure Signs of Spring

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It’s not the official holiday of Nooruz or the vernal equinox that signals spring. It is little girls wearing sunglasses as they are dragged behind their mothers on the city sidewalks. It is the first ice cream stand. It is the clusters of bicycles built for two at the edge of Ala-Too Square. It is short sleeves and sandals. It is cafes that have dusted off their outdoor furniture and the people who sat in them today relishing the return to life outside. It is the folding tables that have sprouted with big containers of jarma (a yeasty wheat drink) and maxim (a corn and wheat drink with a zest and a zing to it). It is birdsong and full park benches.

It is glorious. And it is welcomed.

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storytellersRahela, Hajar, Benazir and Jungi—four students from my Effective Storytelling class. We meet twice a week. All are new to journalism’s architecture, vocabulary and particularities. This is the second photo I took during last Friday’s class. In the first, the four of them sat stone faced and looked at the camera as if they were being held on charges. I chided them, wiggled around in an impromptu hula, and this is the result. I also plied them with chocolates and sugar-laden fizzy drinks.

The Flower Seller

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flower seller

The weather forecast says abundant sunshine. Snow melt has made puddle jumping the urban sport. People walk with open coats.

And I spied my first sidewalk flower seller. She was near the intersection of Manas and Kievskaya, which is where I live. As I approached her, our eyes met, and I crossed sidewalk traffic to look at her offerings. Her flowers were bundled with torn strips of T-shirt, and she had named each of them. The purple and yellow flower bunch beside her head is the Ramon. It is Spanish, she said. The one below her chin is the Carmen. But they are not just flowers, she said, they are soul. All of this in Russian, and all of it I understood (or believe I’ve understood, which may be the same proposition). I asked her about each flower bunch just to keep standing there and being in that moment, and she said lots of things I didn’t get. I kept smiling at her and looking at her and listening to a tumble of words in the late afternoon light with long shadows and promises of spring and all that comes after that. I fell in love with her and went wiggly with gratitude for this chance to be here and for this maybe of being understood and for all that comes after that.

I bought the Ramon. It is in a simple vase on a pile of journalism books beside my TV.

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IMG_7797As I stepped over the snow melt and crossed Ala-Too Square this morning on my way to the university, I saw this fleet of about 15 ambulances parked in neat rows. A cluster of men gathered about; some polished the vehicles, and others chatted as more ambulances arrived.

IMG_7806ambulance detail

“What is it?” I asked. One man told me they were new machines, and the drivers had gathered to have their photo taken. I thought I should take their photo as well. As evidenced here, the ambulance drivers were a formidable group who were clearly impervious to my charms.

ambulance drivers

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NEWS

Arm Wrestling Competition

On the evening of Defenders of the Fatherland Day, within the walls of AUCA, the Office of Student Affairs and the Student Senate sponsored the annual Arm Wrestling Competition. This year’s event was different because women and staff also took part in the contests. Wrestlers were divided into two categories: Heavyweight and the under-75 kg. Arm Wrestling heavyweight world champion Artur Shmoilov and Arm Wrestling Kyrgyz Federation member Vladimir Fotin refereed the bouts.

Every competitor displayed strength and dignity, but some were just a little bit better.

 Women:

Winner – Takutdinova Diana

Second place – Isaeva Meerim

Third place – Beksultanova Sezim

Men – Under-75 Kg Weight Class:

Winner – Otonbaev Sultan

Second place – Abduhalilov Nurali

Third place – Emilyev Adilet

 Men – Heavyweight Class:

Winner – Dzhusupbekov Kalys

Second place – Kendzhahunov Dovran

Third place – Mamadrizohunov Akobir

All winners were presented with medals, certificates and valuable prizes by the Public Relations Office and the Student Senate.

We want to congratulate all men on Defenders of the Fatherland Day and all winners on their victories!

 P.S. Fortunately no one was hurt during the competition.

~ from the AUCA website

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I was asked the other night yet again why I have come to Kyrgyzstan. I stumbled through an answer. And then yesterday I watched a TED talk by Wade Davis, whose credentials call him an Explorer-in-Residence at the National Geographic Society. In his talk about the importance of a vast variety of cultures around the world Davis said: “All these people show us there are other ways of being, other ways of thinking, other ways of orienting yourself on the earth, and this is an idea, if you think about it, that can only fill you with hope.”

That is why I’ve come to Kyrgyzstan: To be filled with hope.