Familiarity in Foreign Lands

Exactly one month after returning to the United States from Palestine, I found myself once again trekking across the globe.  My destination: Kyrgyzstan.  My purpose: to help prepare a new group of trainers deliver life skills training to Kyrgyz youth.

As I write this I’m at the Talisman Village Resort, which is located on the 10^th largest lake in the world by volume—Issyk-Kul.  Towering above in the near distance are the snowy peaks of the Tian Shan Mountains that separate China from Kyrgyzstan.  It’s a lovely place to conduct a training program and has the added benefit of being relatively isolated, which means the trainees can’t wander off on shopping tours in the middle of the day.

Talisman Village Cottages in the shadows of the Tian Shan Mountains

Issyk-Kul, the mountains, and an amusement park

I’m here with two co-workers.  The three of us arrived at the Bishkek airport in the pre-dawn hours Sunday morning after more than a dozen hours of air travel, and we promptly jumped in a car for the four-hour drive to Issyk-Kul.  The drive led us down dark snow covered highways and at times I worried that our sleepy driver was close to steering us off the road.  Alas, we safely arrived at Talisman Village Resort at 8am as the sun was finally starting to lighten the East sky.  Breakfast was to be served at 9am, which meant fighting the temptation to sleep in a chilly hotel room for what seemed like an eternity.  (Crawling into bed to find warmth was not an option as I knew that sleep would quickly overcome me and I would miss breakfast, so I sat shivering on the sofa through the 60 minutes of purgatory.)

Luckily, breakfast was worth staying awake for but as soon as I returned to the room I could not resist slipping under the covers of the bed for much needed warmth…and sleep.  I dragged myself from sleep and the warm comfort of the bed for lunch at 1pm but returned directly to warmth and slumber for the remainder of the afternoon.

Thankfully, I came prepared with layers of insulation, so dealing with chilly temperatures —inside and out—has been manageable this week.  But there are more interesting things than the chilly conditions to report, namely:

Nightlife in the Village:

As mentioned above, the Talisman Village Resort is relatively isolated, so the thirty of us are all basically stuck here for the week.  Fortunately, that’s not stopping us from enjoying an active nightlife scene.  Apparently, on the first day of the four-day training the training participants divided themselves into four groups based on their cities of origin.  Each city was assigned a night for which they were responsible to provide post-dinner entertainment meaning that each night we have been graced with unabashed performances and amusement.  The entertainment has ranged from sweet and sappy to poignant to downright bizarre and borderline inappropriate.  Among the activities:

• Skits based on Russian and Kyrgyz folklore
• An elaborate multi-act play following the life of a character called ‘Red Socks’ who overcame a difficult childhood with the help of life skills training to become a well-adjusted, successful adult
• (It’s no small coincidence that our purpose this week is to prepare the group as life skills trainers)
• A dance competition—my partner and I got third place
• An apple eating contest involving teams of two that tried to eat a dangling apple without using their hands
• Poetry recital
• Fortune telling
• And, of course, drinking shots of vodka

Unimpossible dancing

"Red Socks" after life skills training

It takes a village to harvest a turnip.

As I write this, we have one final night of entertainment ahead, and I’m equally scared and curious to find out what’s in store. 

Jet Lag:

After spending most of my first day here sleeping, I haven’t had much success in dreamland.  I wasn’t overly disappointed or surprised to wake up around 4am my first few days here, but my last two mornings have started at 2am.  Each morning I emerge from sleep with the initial impression that I’ve had a long rest and that my 5:30am alarm will soon urge me out of bed.  Each morning I’ve been surprised to find myself 3 ½ hours ahead of schedule.  Fortunately or not, I’m easily able to put the ‘extra’ time to use—mostly to make final preparations for the training day ahead, but also to catch up on other work tasks, to complete a thorough series of stretches, and to blog.

I thought I was hallucinating these swans due to jet lag.

Still Amazed by the Obvious:

During my unimpossible life, I’ve been very fortunate to travel extensively and meet people with vastly different backgrounds, living in diverse climates, cultures, and societies.  Through these experiences, I’ve learned that many people around the world share common characteristics: they are kind, generous, thoughtful, helpful, and fun.  So I really shouldn’t be too amazed that I’ve met so many Kyrgyz this week that also share these characteristics.  But I am.  And I’m very grateful for the hospitality and humor.

Two months ago I had no clue that I would visit Kyrgyzstan.  But it turned out to be just what I needed—a nice pre-holiday reminder that there are good people filling this planet and thus there is hope for our otherwise troubled world.

On the beach at Issyk-Kul lake, the future is bright.