Did I Say Things Couldn’t Get Anymore Bizarre??

Well I’m pretty sure I said last time that things couldn’t get any more bizarre – well they have…

Last weekend I was in Bishkek the capital of Kyrgyzstan, a drab ex-Soviet city without an ounce of charm. It is full of broken down apartment blocks that have not seen a lick of maintenance for 30 years and the buildings have absolutely no architectural merit and with the odd grotesque left over soviet memorial to the worker in strategic locations.  By the way people are all pretty well dressed with almost a 100% western influence.

It started off as an ordinary trip, sleep, office, meetings, then evening comes and one of my colleagues says we’re being picked up by one of our contractors to be taken to dinner. Ever the optimist, I had great expectations of some local culinary delights, just maybe some delightful experience of local ethnic food other than mutton/lamb?

Dinner was ordinary at best but then it was followed by a visit to the baths/sauna – apparently a great Krgyis tradition where the men bond. I’m not keen on sauna’s, there were little rotund men not very well covered but OK into the sauna I went it was 65 degrees C … don’t know if that’s hot for a sauna but it was to me. Exiting the sauna we are introduced to Igor the Russian a bit of a paunchy roman gladiator type he was our “master of ceremonies” for the evening, there was a sort of evil glint of madness in his eye … and I soon found out why. It was then into the cold plunge pool and then into a rather dingy side room for the mandatory series of vodka toasts. Fortunately I had a glass of coke next to me so 90% of the vodka got ditched into the coke.  Then the mad Russian Igor turns up looking for a "volunteer", I thought well let’s get it over with. So it was back into the sauna where I’m told to wear a towel and one of their funny white hats, Igor then appears with 2 fan shapes made of bunches of oak leaves and I have to lie down and be patted with these things, then it was back into the cold plunge pool! I have no understanding of its significance whatsoever. To cut a long story short everyone had to go through this ritual not once but twice with more vodka to dodge in between.

Since that little miss-adventure at the baths ( of which I have absolutely no desire to repeat) I have returned to site at Kazaman which has included a couple of trips up top. One earlier in the week saw my first experience of snow for about 20 years. Cold and a complete white out but cool to see snek (snow).

 The next trip (yesterday) was to sort out access issues, and what a tragic day it was. We left at 7.00am for a 2hour drive and then a 6 hour walk across the top of the mountains. One of my biggest fears is that someone goes over the edge into a 200-600m freefall down the mountain, well half way up the mountain I look down and there is what remains of a bulldozer that has done such a freefall. I’m going oh please don’t let there be anyone in it; Misha my driver, raced down the slope to return 10min later to say the driver was dead. Nothing for us to do, the dozer belonged to a contractor working for another company who arrived shortly after… but still a complete tragedy. It seems that he had been working on night shift and may have almost successfully ridden the thing upright to the bottom but then rolled it 3 or 4 times crushing the cabin.

 After that there was little to do other than continue with our trip. Basically we are trying to sort out access to another tenement area, so this involved a 6 hour hike across ridges and mountain tops to meet up with another party from our drilling camp 12 hours drive away but only 5km across the valley. A stunning clear day, snow all aroun and a blistering cold wind at times but an absolutely awesome hike. Looking like Kenny out of South Park except for a green instead of orange jacket, I made sure I had two young fit offsiders with me in case something gave way and I couldn’t get back. We were at 10,000 ft and just in the snow, in the photos you can see mountains covered with snow probably heading to 6000m/20,000 feet and beyond.

There are these guys riding the silk route.. it must be torture.

Late afternoon - return from Bishek.

Just to show I'm not making it up.

The military outfit is popular - this is a geologist, nicknamed Stormy seeing he is wearing the Desert Storm outfit.

The unfortunate bulldozer.

A dusting of icing sugar.

My walking compatriots.

Mountains maybe 75-100Km away...

Entertainment Kyrgis style - she sat through every cycle.

At last I think the first time I’m up to date ….. we are supposed to be having a wedding at our guest house tonight wonder what that will bring? Apparently the Kyrgis are noted for their “abduction” weddings i.e. basically a guy has been eyeing off some girl he fancies organises an abduction and she is then forced to marry him – this is illegal and they are trying to stamp it out.  I think this one is “normal” I did ask big momma though it was only booked in 3 days ago so who knows? Once again enjoy the photos. 

Crazy day – Helicopter, Vodka and fat, fat Lamb…

Thanks for the feedback on the blog it seems like it’s getting the thumbs up and that the general consensus is that this is a real “boys own” adventure! On that note yesterday has to be one of the most bizarre days I have experienced here, in fact in my past 6 months of wanderings.

To set the scene we have a small mining lease on the top of this 3600m high mountain, and there is some sort of I don’t know like warlord, chieftan, business guy who walks around with 2 bodyguards who was instrumental in bringing this project to our attention. There is only a small amount of coal here but significant enough to supply a hungry domestic market for heating in their long cold winters. So this was the official opening of the “mine”.  The grand entrance by this guy was made on this massive 50 year old ex-Soviet chopper, complete with our investors, this was followed up by a trail of officials who drove up from the low country.

The celebrations were in the earthmoving contractors tent. The centre of attention was this massive pot of boiled lamb – to me absolutely disgusting and oozing with fat, but in Kyrgyzstan the more fat the better, a dish to be dreams. There were a series of speeches led off by the Kyrgy dude and then our people, then our representatives in Kyrgy and government officials, after each speech there was a round of vodka or cognac which had to be sculled.  All the time the Kyrgy dude had his boys buzzing around taking photos/videos for the “international mass media”.  In the meantime the lamb was divided up with certain parts being given in priority, our MD was lucky enough to get the head!!  Me, I just got these ribs with a 1” layer of fat on it.  I did a deal with my colleague that if he ate my lamb I’d drink his vodka.. at the time seemed the lesser of two evils.

The origins of the Kyrgy people is very much from the invasion of the Mongols many centuries ago.  You will have seen in the photos that majority of people have this Asian/mongolian appearance (in fact my Phillipino offsider is often taken for Kyrgy). Most of the “western” influence is from the Soviet association of some 80 odd years ending in the mid 90’s. The European lot are louder, brasher, more up-front and the asian/mongolian looking are more reserved, polite and softly spoken. I guess considering its location people have come from all directions, though there doesn’t seem to be much middle eastern influence (other than the country being largely muslim!). Many of them have this romantic attachment to the mountains, you ask them why they came to work for us and they will say to get back in the mountains.

Being part of the old soviet republic has obviously had a major effect on the place, Russian is the dominant language though most educated people are bilingual with Kyrgyis and Russian with the traditional Kyrgis language being related more to Turkish. Although mainly muslim there seems to be a very low key approach to it and little sign of the bhirka type dress for women, the nearest thing is a head scarf. People can be quite stand offish which is probably my not understanding the greeting protocols, you can pass a shepherd in the middle of nowhere and he will barely acknowledge you. I don’t know what they think when I wave it is probably a very overt and offensive greeting – but I do it anyway.

Some of the characters… Tair is a larger than life “go do it man”. Big and fat he seems the friendly bear but I’d hate to get on the wrong side of him. He is the ex-KGB senior officer, knows the police, well connected into government. I am taking over 100% for several weeks and he will be my right hand man.  This will be an interesting management experience as he has strong opinions on how things should be, I need to orchestrate some wins for him otherwise he is going to hate being directed by me. He works and works and works, it is hard to get him to take a day off. Or to stop him driving at 2am.

My driver and translator is Misha a 21yo, you’d think he’d be the reckless kid but he is a great driver, very measured, if I had to choose between them all he’s the one I’d have driving me in the mountains. He is blond and blue eyed and a definite European, amazing maturity for a 21 yo having worked as a tourist guide for 5 years. As an aside there is an interesting theory about seat belts and the mountains, they tend to not wear them as the idea is if you go over the edge you at least have a chance of jumping or being thrown clear, I subscribe to that as there is no chance one would survive the ride to the bottom it would be a mangled mess.

Anyway I’m off to Bishkek for the WE a very grey ex-Soviet city with no charm what so ever. I think this is enough – attached another set of photos so you don’t have to read the words.

Being a Refugee… and Jaws from James Bond??

Being a Refugee… and Jaws from James Bond??

I was wondering how long it was going to be before I had enough content but it has rolled around fairly quickly. I’m sitting in my refugee tent with the drone of a generator as the temperature rapidly drops probably to about 4-6 degrees. It has been a beautiful day, first time the sky has been something like clear. For the past 4 days I have been working on top of a 2700m sort of plateau.

Hard to know where to start. Firstly this is about a 10 hours drive from our base camp and although it is only a few (15 km) south of our northern tenement, yes you guessed it, you have to drive round a mountain range to get there and then do a 2hr climb into the hills… nuts! For the google earth fanatics we had go through Jlalabad which sits on the border with Uzbekistan. Apparently there was some sort of attempted revolution down there a couple of years ago and travelling through the  city there are half built empty houses everywhere where the Uzbeki type people left following the failure of the revolutions.

The 10 hour drive was fascinating actually saw open fertile farming land (rather than mountains) and bitumen roads. The whole country is committed to agriculture mainly grazing but also things like sunflowers, and where else to process them but on the main (bitumen) road; in doing this they take over half the road, firstly drying the heads, then beating them with sticks to release the seeds then spreading out the seed (say a 30mx5m area) to dry and then they are swept up into piles for bagging – all on the road. You see very little mechanised farming, there are probably some ploughs but often you see hay being cut with a scythe, tractors you do see look about 50 years old (probably left over from Soviet times).

The mountains are used for summer pasture for sheep, goats and cattle. They have grazed the be-jeezus out of the place but summer is coming to an end and they are already heading down to the lower slopes. The vegetation up here has been devastated by hundreds of years of grazing, the hillsides almost have a mosaic of tracks with almost no trees at higher altitude other than a sort of conifer tree that grows about 9” off the ground. This morning we were at the highest peak which must be close to 3000m and expecting to be alone, here was a shepherd asleep on the ground next to his broken down former soviet car.

We are doing some diamond drilling on the mountain, so there is a 24 hour a day operation. The camp is run by the drillers.  They are tremendous hosts and always wanting to shake the hand of the visiting international expert which is how I’m introduced. Food is surprisingly good, yesterday’s delicacy was dumplings stuffed with meat and onions – awesome, I have offered to swap their cook for our “big momma”.

Communications are terrible, there is one spot on the mountain where you can get mobile phone coverage, it’s about a 30min walk if there are no cars available, yesterday it worked fine today nothing so I spent about 40min climbing to the top to see if it improved but without success. Again, in the middle of nowhere and on the side of the mountain, out pops a shepherd trying to do the same.

Things I hate about Kyrgyzstan 1) flies, down at our base camp there always seem to be a swarm in the kitchen which I try not to look at 2) mutton, mutton, mutton 3) toilet paper which is like sandpaper and I must confess I’m starting to dislike tomatoes 4) Nothing works as it should, doors always jamb, electrical fittings pull out of the wall, toilets leak, the hot water trickles but the tap gets so hot you almost burn your hand switching it off etc…  5) I hate my bed/s, particularly the one up here in the drillers camp,  firstly I have been issued with a USA military sleeping bag which is bulky and almost suffocating if you zip it up so I’ have taken to sleeping on an uncovered foam mattress with the sleeping bag unzipped like a doona being careful to keep the edges tucked in as there is a bit of a mice plague (put earplugs in so I didn’t have to listen to their scratching).  When I get back to base I’ll probably love my 1m wide plank. 6) Cheap Chinese knock offs, you get Nescafe, Colgate etc.. often Chinese imitations that taste crap.

The Krgis are a delightful people, as I said very hospitable, polite and welcoming. So far I have managed to avoid vodka and fermented horse milk, I know what the former will do but the later apparently will go straight through you so you need to be near a loo if you drink it, it is considered a bit of a health tonic.. I also spent a day with a Kyrgy geologist, built like a mountain goat and with a headful of stainless steel teeth (yes stainless steel though gold is the most popular style). I could crack him walking up hill but downhill, as your toenails try to dig into the mountain side, no chance! At one point I had to just sit down, count to 10 to calm my nerves and just let him go. I have also been invited bear and wolf hunting which of course I declined but said I’d pay them to take me so I could take photos, the only problem is this involves getting on a horse… hmmm.

Next weeks challenge is avoiding a trip in a Soviet helicopter, we have some hot shot investors coming to visit – there is a spare seat that has been offered but I might just decline.. would love to do it but a 50 year old chopper maintained in Kyrgyzstan???

Soviet style living - external brown "cladding" is rotting insulation.

School is a serious business - all black and white uniforms.

Bridge of sorts.

They start young - not unusual to see a 5yo with whip in hand on a donkey controlling a heard of cows.

Our worker left (male) ex-Afghan war veteran (soviet side) right.

 Jaws!!! Sorry photo got screwed loading.

Me with Jaws and earth moving contractor.

Enjoy the photos  - been difficult to choose so many more I could have put up there.

KGB Mountains & Old Audis Never Die They Just go to Kyrgystan

After 3 weeks of holiday I’m now in the middle of Krgyzstan, one of the Central Asian states that broke off when the USSR or Soviet Republic imploded in the mid 90’s, if you’re a Google nut the location is Kazarman or Aral.

If Tanzania felt like an adventure well this is totally off the planet! Yesterday I spent the day in a car, on a single width track usually looking 6-800m down into a valley heading for the snow at 3,500m – no room for error, a slow and painful death would be certain. My driver is an ex-KGB Colonel – a really, really nice guy and a great driver. You are surrounded by mountains wherever you go in this country but driving is torturous. In a straight line we are probably only 180km from the capital Bishkek but it’s nearly a 10 hour drive as you have to go around some major mountain ranges.

I think I’m in shock but in a good way, as this place is so totally and completely different. The country is quite arid and being land locked the climate is quite extreme and temperatures vary between 40 degrees in summer to minus, YES minus, 25 degrees in winter; this later end I am quite worried about! Before I left Bishkek I was taken out to buy thermals, down jackets etc.

As much as it’s a democratic country, there is widespread corruption but it seems to be nowhere near as bad as Tanzania. In size the country is about that of the UK but the population is only 5.5million (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyrgyzstan) many of them living a peasant existence. The country seems to have struggled to maintain the infrastructure built and left by the Soviets, this seems to comprise mainly grey concrete buildings and broken bitumen, I don’t think I have seen any building of architectural merit old or new.  And I think I have travelled on the worst bitumen road ever, it was appalling like riding a bucking cow! In contrast to all this it has the most amazing landscapes with a country that has had massive recent geological activity (mountain building) and which has been wonderfully sculpted by what must have been equally massive glacial activity.

I’m with a totally new Australian company called Celsius Coal, the project is to prove up a coking coal deposit, previously identified by the old USSR/Soviet regime somewhere between 1940 and 1970, it is used in steel making. The small problem is that the coal is located in the mountains but having its neighbour being China is a huge plus and of course the project has the potential to bring much needed $’s to the country should it get through the hands of the Government to the people. 

Our host is Big Momma. She runs an ex-Soviet guest house on top of a rise overlooking Kazarman, we almost have exclusive use of it. From the front door you have a 270 degree view of mountains and the valley below. It’s functional and almost comfortable, there is a pool and sauna, neither of which work. I have finally got my own room which is OK. Big Momma does all the cooking but she seems a little arbitrary as to whether she wants to do it or not, some day’s the meal will be lavish and others something simple. Food comprises mutton, mutton, more mutton and potatoes but being summer tomatoes, a sort of hybrid cucumber/zucchini, water melon and apples are abundant. Much of the farming comprises sheep grazing so that means flies, flies, flies.  It just doesn’t pay to look in the kitchen!!

Milk doesn’t seem to exist but there are some really nice breads, the local beer is good. So I’m eating well, I got the guys to tell her I don’t eat much meat and since then have had a good variety of vegetable alternatives. There are chickens wandering the yard so you have to be careful where you place your feet, chicken was requested the other day for dinner and no sooner was the request made than there were 2 less chickens in the flock… (or is that for sheep?)

 The staff is great, as I mentioned my driver is an ex-KGB agent, a huge bloke who walks around a lot of the time without his shirt speaking broken English with a heavy Russian accent (the native tongue). Communicating is hard as you need a translator for everything but I seem to be getting by, I have picked up names now I have to try to get a few words. All staff seem to be very hard working and thoughtful but the administration is far from helpful and inflexible, if one thing sends me home screaming this will.

There doesn’t seem to be much public transport which is a bit of a blessing as it keeps the buses off the mountain roads.  But in the country 9 out of 10 cars are old audi’s, they are everywhere, hundreds of them. This is where Europe and even the US sends it’s old cars. The city seems to be a bit different a lot of old Merc’s, BMW’s and Toyota’s. I’ve been told I can have my own car so jokingly suggested it should be a BMW X5 and they said fine!

Don’t know if this has been interesting or not, over the next few days I’m heading to our farthest exploration site. Our closest one is about 45km away and takes 3 hrs to get to, the next one is about 10km away but on the other side of the mountain range so it is basically a 3 day round trip to get round to the other side of the mountain and up, sounds crazy but true!

Enjoy the photos.. Oh yes the company is buying me a mountain bike so I can explore the local region even further, I must admit I’m tempted to try to ride the hill up to our highest tenement, possible I could beat the 4WD?? 

LIFE IN THE BIG CITY…

Things are coming to an end for me here as I fly out tomorrow evening; it has been sad to leave as the Tanzanians are good people to work with.  They are so appreciative of any effort you put into helping them understand their job. They are thoroughly pleasant people, I have not had a cross word in the whole time I have been here, in fact it’s almost been a holiday. They have all asked for my private email address and phone number and one of the students working for us sent me a text today saying “Thank you very much Sir. I appreciate everything I’ve learnt from you. To be honest I’m gonna miss you so much.  I promise to work hard sir. May God rain his blesses down on every plan of yours”. Charming guy but also looking for a job.

  

Leaving site was quite upsetting, everyone was very sad to see me go (more likely concerned about the return of Stalin!)  but they are a very likeable people and have fun when they work. I drove back to Dar which is probably close to 1400Km a long haul over 1.5 days. The country on one front absolutely fascinating but in others can be an absolute dump, one of the worst sections is about 300km with interval where eucalypt forest have been planted which has devastated the landscape.

 For the return trip I used my authority and got our driver to take us to Mikumi a small game reserve and with a western hotel called TanSwiss.  We got in late, close to 9, and the kitchen was closing at 10.  I asked for chicken tikka, “would sir like it with ricey or chipsy?” despite 90,000 serves of rice over the previous 3 weeks I said rice, only for her to come back and say they had run out and would I like mashed potatoes to which I said yes please. Still tasted good but the chicken was like rubber bullets.  As you can see by the pics Mikumi Park did not disappoint. All we did was drive along the main road (which is traversed by a thundering, fume belching truck every 2min) to see the most amazing wildlife.

I had a taste of life in the big city the day before I left. Firstly dropping one of our technicians to his home in an outer suburb of Dar; then dinner with middle Tanzania in an up market shopping mall that could have come straight out of the “burbs” of Adelaide and including the wife of one of our employees called Hapiness, and; a discussion with a german intern doctor that told an horrific story of government repression; followed by a visit to the “Q” bar, a place where expats hang out and where prostitutes pick up “mzungu”, desperate old white men to be sugar daddies.

Well the horrendous story was that from the german intern who is in Dar for 6 weeks. Apparently shortly after arrival the doctors went on strike, after a week the leader of the strike disappeared to be discovered near death with his finger nails and2 teeth pulled out and badly beaten.  The doctors had to “fight” to get the fellow released from the Police so they could take care of him.  After the doctors did return to work the Government still said they were on strike as propaganda.  The intern said whilst working there three case note piles at the start of the day, public patients, private patients and fast track patients, the last group were those that paid to jump the queue.

The dinner was with one of our geologists and his wife, “Happiness”, was a lacklustre meal, a lot of talk about work but the cat had got Happiness’s tongue as she did not say a word.

The last one was to the “Q” bar described above. I was told it was where the beautiful black girls hung out trying to find white sugar daddies.   It was a Monday night so it was very quiet but clearly there were a few girls there, I ran into the german intern again and he said if I stood alone it would take only 10min to be approached. Well they circled me, and nudged me and it was probably close to 20min before one spoke to me  - good English, doing language studies just back from Moscow and Blearuse, she must be catering for white Russian fantasise.  I was then approached by another one and said that I was  Australian and she said she had a friend Stewie …., I said oh I know him, which brought on this fear from her that I would tell him and that he would beat her if he found out she was out. Hmmmm. I exited shortly after.

On my last day I went to the Dar Es Salaam fish market and the Kariakoo market where I was told to leave all valuables behind.  An uneventful visit but fascinating  - have a look at the photos.  I’m now signing off for 3 weeks until I take up my new posting in Kyrgyzstan. Hope you have enjoyed this little expose of life in Tanzania.