Continuously Sent Back To The Dark Ages

Guess what? Yep, you are so damn right. My apartment faced the undesired third time. This time I even had to bear some financial burden as well as discovered an interesting fact. In other words, I had one more opportunity to learn that folks here and presumably everywhere else treat you depending on your position and background. Luckily, I had the problem solved real quick and was assured of no fourth and fifth times for the days to come. Hope this is true.

Kicked Back to the Dark Ages

Karakol, 23 May 2009 - These days I am compelled to believe that I am not the only one to complain about electricity issues, though my case, described below, might differ from the rest. To my knowledge, an electricity distribution company is supposed to notify all of its clients of their debt, ideally in a written form, prior to cutting them off electricity.

However, a couple of days ago I had no clue who my apartment was off power because even upon my telephone call the local electricity distribution company assured me of its neutrality. Then I asked their specialist to check the electric wires of my apartment, referring to them as a potential source of the problem. Following our telephone conversation, I waited for him for two days until I found out that, in fact, my apartment had been cut off power. I felt so disappointed in the company and particularly its specialist, who was supposed to come and fix the problem. Moreover, I was requested to pay a fine of about 170 soms for not sinking the debt in time.

As you know, unless one is not notified of its debt in any form, the above described company has no right to send one back to the dark ages. Indeed, this is the second time that the local electricity distribution company is eagerly depriving me of the merits of our age, electricity, without a prior notification in any form. Luckily, my apartment abandoned the dark ages as well as I paid no fine for re-connection, as they, finally, admitted their fault. However, I am repeating that this is not the first time. Hopefully, no third time will take place.

Hey Santa Moroz, are you here?

How about skiiing?

Long time ago tourism was proclaimed as one of the strategic sectors of Kyrgyz economy. In fact, there were times, when Kyrgyzstan was even informally named as the Switzerland of Central Asia, meaning that it has enormous capacities for tourism development. Despite the numerous drawbacks hindering the development of tourism in the country, one’s heart gets filled with joy to actually find out a number of positive developments in this respect.

In particular, the ski base in Karakol, Issyk-Kul province is well known as one of the most popular tourist destination sites in the country. Indeed there are a number of factors that constitute the positive reputation of the ski base in Kyrgyzstan, of which I became double assured during my recent visit with a couple of foreign friends of mine.

On 7 January 2008 early in the morning, we departed for the ski base, which was already replete with tourists from Kazakhstan, particularly Russia and other countries. The ski rent at the base itself was 700 soms per day, whereas one could rent them for only 300-500 soms in Karakol. Also, a ticket costs 700 soms per person. As I had expected, a bowl of soup solely costs about 300 soms, while one could drink a coup of tea with a slice of lemon for 25 soms. Nonetheless, one could witness a continuous line of people standing for various snacks and drinks.

Anyways, the ski lift of French origin, which took us to the top of the mountain of about 3000 meters above sea level, as I later found out, was installed last year. Its significance for the ski base leaves no single doubt. Thus, the higher it took me to the top, the more I felt proud of the unforgettable beauty of the surrounding gigantic snow-peaked mountain ranges.

Once on top, however, it required lots of efforts and patience, before I finally began to master skiing to a certain extent. As a matter of fact, I felt somewhat embarrassed to find out that even small kids were skiing so well as if they were purely running down a hill. I even lost the track of number of times I fell, but shortly I began to take more enjoyment from skiing as I was already making some progress. By the way, quite experienced skiers were skiing from much higher and way steeper mountain slopes.

Toward the end of the day, the pleasure I took from skiing outweighed all of my bruises and pain from frequent falls in the beginning. And the only thought that occupied my mind at that time was “I definitely should come back here as soon as possible”. Hopefully, my forthcoming visits to the ski base will bring many more impressions that might prove the first ones either right or wrong. Time will tell...

Weird celebration of 2009 New Year…

Happy New Year! This is, so to speak, the only time of the year, when each and every one of us robotically attempts to make some sense of the year passing by and looks at the coming one with eyes filled with new hopes and wishes. And, what a relief for us, when, in retrospect, we dare to say that the year slipping away was not spent in vain. For this reason, it deems important for us to better set priorities for the year ahead and give it our right arm to carry out, at least, most of our good plans. Also, I am sure that each of us has something interesting to share with the rest from the last year. In fact, I have something to tell you…

The thing is I had quite a weird celebration of this New Year. Indeed it was my first time to “celebrate” this New Year in the remotest northeastern town of Karakol. Guess what? All alone. It is not to say that I am so passionate about New Year celebration, but rather the way I experienced it for the past two days has impressed me way more.

As a matter of fact, a couple of days prior to the 31 December 2008 by some weird mistake my head was occupied with a thought that this Tuesday was the last day of the month, but not Wednesday - the actual day. These days I did not really mingle with other folks here and mostly stayed at home. Therefore, it becomes clear why I mixed up the dates. Frankly speaking, I even thought that my cell phone and even watch went wrong inadvertently. Besides, it can also be partially explained by the fact that I did not attach much meaning to this New Year’s celebration.

As a result, on 30 December I finally went out in the evening, went to a local store and bought up a load of junk food and soft drinks. That night even the store was so replete with customers that it sort of double assured me that it was the 31 December. To make the matters even much worse, my apartment was cut off power that night. Thus, by the light of my candle I had my “New Year dinner” and went outside close to midnight to see the fireworks. Guess what? To my surprise, I saw neither the sky bursting with fireworks, nor neighbors shouting out New Year toasts. So I thought to myself that it might be the way the New Year eve looks like in Karakol mistakenly and went home to sleep.

The next morning I woke up in a cold room still with no electric power, when I finally figured out that it is, in fact, the last day of the year. However, that day I was in a weird state of feelings because most of my New Year joy and feelings have I “spent” the day before. Nevertheless, I witnessed the sky filled with colored lights and air with the laughter of kids, of sincere childish New Year joy.

Anyways, now I dare to say that for the first time in my life I had two New Year days - the days of confusion, surprise and mixed feelings. Also, I have electric power back to my apartment. After all, all is well that ends well and may the year coming in be the year of peace and prosperity for all of us. I would be more than interested in hearing your stories of New Year celebration and not only…