Jun 18 2010

RT @EurasiaNet: “Otunbayeva pu…

Category: TweetsChrisM @ 7:11 pm

RT @EurasiaNet: “Otunbayeva puts southern #Kyrgyzstan death toll at 2000 http://bit.ly/ar7umF #freekg via The AP”

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Jun 15 2010

Osh Eye Witness Account

Category: In The MediaChrisM @ 2:03 pm

For those interested in the current problems in South Kyrgyzstan, the following quote was written by an NGO worker in Osh. If you want to read more about the area, the revolutions and don’t find your favourite newspaper is giving you enough, I’d recommend reading through Registan, New Eurasia and EurasiaNet.

For my friends and family back in the West, I want to make it clear this is in a different country, Kazakhstan is absolutely fine. Wherever you see “I” in the quoted text, please remember this is someone else’s account.

First hand experience in Southern Kyrgyzstan

Before I explain anything, let me just say that I am completely safe. I and the other NGO volunteers (except for 3 village volunteers in Osh who will be moved tomorrow but are safe right now) have been moved to the American military base outside of the Kyrgyz capitol of Bishkek. I totally and completely safe right now, and I will definitely never be returning to Osh.

I don’t know if you have been following the news. Mostly just NPR and Al Jazeera have reported, but they know very little as the conflict is so bad no one can get in.

I just had the most terrifying experience of my life. I’m going to let you know so you can get a small picture of what it is like where I live. And I am only letting you know because I am now out of the conflict.

It was Friday at 1am and I was awoken by a phone call from another friend in the NGO who lives in my neighbourhood in Osh. He was wondering if I heard any strange noises on the streets. I didn’t at that point, but I got up and looked out my balcony (it must be noted that I am the only volunteer in Osh who lives on the main street with my windows facing it as well, so they wanted me to look for them. I am on the 2nd floor). What I saw was horrifying. I looked to my right and saw a fire burning in the street about a block away and men screaming loudly around it. I thought they were just screaming to put out the fire. I waited a bit and noticed the fire growing and growing. It cast a red glow across the whole street I lived on. I then turned to the left and saw a hundred or more local men walking down towards my building carrying axes and shotguns. They were yelling cheers and shooting into the air. They began to set fire to more buildings around me, while breaking the glass and doors of the stores on the first floor of my building and the buildings around me. I was scared and had no idea what to do so I called our safety officer at the NGO and she had no idea what was going on (I woke her up). More and more men gathered in the red glow of the burning buildings around me (at least 300 by now), and they began to throw rocks at buildings. I was walking towards the bathroom to seek cover (as this is the only room in my apartment that doesn’t have a window facing the street), and a large rock smashed through my window and flew right by my head. I was lucky to have missed it as it was a fist sized stone. I spent the rest of the night hiding in my bathroom, staying on the phone with the NGO, and sneaking peeks to see if my building was on fire. Luckily just as my building was going to get caught by the flames, the fire department came, dispersed the crowd and put out the fire (which I am surprised they put out so much because we don’t have fire hydrants here).

I can’t even properly describe the terror I felt. I have never felt so trapped in my life. I didn’t know what to do if my building caught on fire because if I ran outside I would have surely been killed. I am so grateful that the fire stopped when it did. It was also incredibly terrifying because this incident was about 2 hours long. I spent the rest of the night packing my emergency bag and trying to rest in the bathtub, but I was unsuccessful as I was so nervous about men climbing onto my balcony or my apartment being set ablaze. I can’t get the image out of my head of all those mens and guns shadows destroying my neighbourhood.

I spent the whole time praying for dawn because I thought it would get better with light. Well, it didn’t. 5 o’clock hit and Kyrgyz men came with crowbars and started smashing up the stores right across the street from my building. This continued until a crowd of Uzbek men came and chased them away with rocks. Yes, if you didn’t know, this whole conflict is about the ethnic tension between the Uzbeks and Kyrgyz, possibly started by a third party for political reasons.

Hundreds of Uzbeks gathered again on my street, but soon scattered into the distant neighbourhoods because of police. I was then called by the NGO and told to move about a block away to another volunteer’s house, where many of us would gather to be safe. I did so, and it was relatively safe. 6 of us spent the rest of that first day trying to rest, conserve our energy (I didn’t get to eat for 2 days because the gas and electricity were shut off and no stores were open), and hope for the best. We just heard distant fighting and shots the rest of that day and then that night military tanks were roaming the city firing into crowds to disperse them.

The next day (Saturday), we all woke up and got the 4 other NGO volunteers in the city to join us (thats 10 now). We were told by the NGO that we were leaving to the airport to catch a flight to the capital, but the roads were blocked and shooting was heavy on the way. We then had to wait for a new plan. In the mean time, some local Kyrgyz threw a bottle and rock into our window and smashed it. We had to create an emergency plan because we heard that molotov cocktails were being thrown into windows, so we needed to do fire prevention. We positioned the bed and cushions against all the windows, hoping that a molotov would bounce off back into the street. Luckily this was never tested. We spent the rest of the afternoon in complete silence (all phones were off except for mine to conserve our batteries. I kept mine on for communication with the NGO), and getting many different changing plans from the NGO.

Finally, at about 6pm we were picked up by 5 kyrgyz men (trusted and hired by the NGO) who had masks on and guns. They were to escort us to a bus that would take us to helicopter. We left with them, but the bus got lost so we were exposed on the main street for 20 minutes. It was so eery as all the streets were empty, except for when random cars would drive by with dozens of men and guns in them. One of the cars was stopped on the way by a group of Kyrgyz who pointed their guns at the volunteers in it and screamed, “If any of you are Uzbeks we will kill you all.” Luckily our drivers were Kyrgyz and we were somewhat “safer” because we were in Kyrgyz territory. They went away and we spent the next 20 minutes trying to get the bus to come to us while watching troops of Kyrgyz driving past us with guns. We were so scared of being shot at this point. Luckily, we got to the bus that was controlled by the Kyrgyzstan border control, who was to take us to a helicopter in the city. We got in and after driving a certain way we were blocked by a crowd of hundreds and hundreds of Kyrgyz men who were demanding the guns from the military tank escorting us. The military refused and started firing guns into the air. We all ducked down, but I saw that more gunshots were being fired around us by the local kyrgyz and then rocks and sticks were being smashed against our car windows. We were in this position for about 5 minutes and we were all in control, but I truly felt for the first time in my life that I could have died at that moment. So many men screaming, so many shots in my direction, so much anger. I just could truly see myself not surviving that moment. Again, i can’t describe how that danger feels. It is beyond numbing.

Luckily the tank eventually decided to plow through the crowd and we followed. We made it to the heli base and were lifted to the Osh airport where we got a charter flight to Bishkek. We are now safe at the base while our homes and friends burn in the fires of ethnic conflict.

While we feel grateful to be alive and gone, I personally feel guilty because I am so privileged to have the ability to be lifted out of the danger like that while my local friends and coworkers hide for their lives. It is a horrible feeling to have left them to die. Hundreds are dead already, thousands are injured. 150,000 Uzbeks have fled to the Uzbek border; women are handing their babies off to Uzbekistan soldiers at the border so that at least they survive.

Whats worse is that the Uzbeks are not only blamed for this whole thing (as the ethic and hated minority), but they are being targeted not only by Kyrgyz, but also the military. We hear from our Uzbek friends that police are openly killing defenceless Uzbeks on the street. Entire Uzbek neighbourhoods are destroyed in Osh. I will never forget the last image I had, flying away in a heli over the city, seeing entire blocks of houses scorched to the ground, with smoke and fire covering the whole city. It will haunt me forever.

Whats worse is that the Kyrgyz government is only providing humanitarian assistance to the Kyrgyz, and leaving the Uzbek out. Please urge your congressperson to push the american government to urge the Kyrgyz government to provide equal aid to all ethnicities. PLEASE. These are my friends and neighbors that are being murdered. Just take a few minutes and call/email. It is an emergency situation, no time to lose. Please leave my name out of your message though.

Email me if you have questions. I have good internet at the base. The rest of the country is completely stable as Uzbeks are mainly just in the south, so don’t worry about me being in the north now.

I love you all and I am think I will be home in America soon.

I have not been able to verify the accuracy of this account, and others have noted that conclusions drawn about the police and military forces in Osh and surrounding areas (although repeated by different people) could be inaccurate, as uniforms can be stolen, and identification of allegiances/membership of official forces could be difficult to ascertain in the heat of a battle.

If any Americans do want to contact their congressman/woman, I believe these three sites – 1, 2 and 3 should be able to provide you with details.

If you a UK citizen, and want to contact your MP, asking them to ensure the British government sends a message that humanitarian aid needs to be given out regardless of ethnicity, then click here.

[edit]
Update to include information on the best contact methods and URL assignment, by KZBlog in the comments section below

All American senators also have websites at LASTNAME.senate.gov. So if you know your Senator’s name, you can go there. House members are at LASTNAME.house.gov. Or go harass Obama at whitehouse.gov. Letters and phone calls do tend to carry more weight than emails and Tweets, so I’ve heard.

(Just in case you don’t scroll any further)

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Jul 01 2009

Anna’s Walk In Astana Park

Category: Anna's Videos,PersonalChrisM @ 11:54 am

Just a few days (1st July) before Astana Day (also apparently referred to as Capital Day?) Anna, Ira and I all went for a walk through Astana Park, which is just across the road from us. You can see in the background the ‘castle walls’ (OK, no idea what they were supposed to be exactly, but with a brick type effect, and ‘ramparts’ on top, you get the idea. This is the area that stalls selling local products were based. (OK, I say local, but a lot of the people seemed to be from Uzbekistan or Kyrgyzstan). More info on the Astana Day celebrations in a later post.

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Dec 22 2007

Arrrrgh, No Time…

Category: In The Media,PersonalChrisM @ 12:46 am

Scratch the original plans, here are the links I mentioned, not enough time left after having got everything ready for our trip to actually create proper posts. Now the DVD burner is fubared, and I wanted to burn another 3 discs of MP3s for driving to. Hey ho.

Kyrgyzstan elections not fair either – see this article and this one for more details. For those not familiar with the country, no that isn’t where we live (we’re in KAZAKHstan), however international monitors similarly do not think that the elections were free, fair and transparent there either…

Discounting apparently rife in stores – BBC article – Actually I’d call it pretty piss poor ‘professional’ journalism. They trot out the same rubbish each year, closely followed by an article in January saying how shoppers actually spent a lot more than expected. I especially loved the headline – attention grabbing, discounts sound significant, then followed in the main body of the text that this year’s reductions average at 36% off, not 35% ! Yep, 1% difference…

Wives Tales or Valid Medical Info? – Article here. If you don’t drink 8 glasses of water per day, you will use less than 10% of your brain, meaning you won’t be able to read in the dark, turkey will make you drowsy and your hair will continue to grow after death, no matter whether you shaved it or not. Or something like that 🙂 I have heard before that the ban on mobile phone usage within hospitals is rubbish, espcially when you consider the power of the transmitters they need to use for their own internal walkie-talkies etc.

Eco-friendly consoles requested – BBC article – I know that some PC component manufacturers are already trying, but apparently the big three gaming giants (Sony, Nintendo & Microsoft) are being pressured to lower the amount of toxic chemicals used to produce their consoles, amongst other things.

Take care when you google – info here – My thanks to Irina for noticing this report, and also on the shoddy workmanship of the journalist once again. The article reads in parts as though they did no investigation, and simply read from Google’s press release, with contradictions in places. Anyway, bad people had been setting up sites to try and hack unprotected PCs, and were trying to drive traffic by optimizing for popular keywords.

Dynamic advert placement within PDF files – article – the title says it all here…

Info on Amazon’s ‘Kindle” – here and here – Amazon’s e-book reader, an attempt by another company to crack the market. Once again, the aims have been praised, the actual product is not so popular in some circles.

Terry Pratchett has Alzheimers – check here – A long time favourite author of mine, Mr Pratchett has revealed he has the condition, though is doing OK so far. Whilst I selfishly hope he will be able to continue to write such well crafter novels, I do hope that if/when the time comes that the balance between personal well being and writing output tips the wrong way, his fans will let him retire with grace.

One for Alex – here – Poorly kangaroo goes for a swim, and gets snapped up by a shark! (As you may have guessed, based in Australia)

W00t – BBC article – Like ‘all your base are belong to us ‘ from a few years back, but certainly a lot snappier, w00t appears to have started its life in the gaming world, and is used as an exclamation, normally positive.

Not an article, but Wikileaks may interest you. Has a small section for Kazakhstan. Not going to discuss that sort of thing right now, no time.

Excuse me whilst I don’t cry – boo-hoo – with any luck the BNP will eventually go the same way as the old National Front did. I just hope any splinter groups don’t survive, and aren’t too radical whilst they are around. Don’t have much time for racist, lying, Lowest Common Denominator politics and politicians, as you may have guessed.

Misbehaving pupils shocked into towing the line – article here – I can never imagine Mr Owen having given this sort of punishment in his lessons…

Right thats it, I’m off to bed, and won’t be posting for a couple of days probably. Hope all who read this do so in good health…

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Sep 10 2007

Happy Birthday Tom…

Category: FriendsChrisM @ 12:58 pm

Today Tom, of LifeOf2Me fame has his birthday. I don’t know how old he will be, so lets be nice, and assume 32? I hope today brings you the company of many friends, and that they all remind you what a great person you are to have around.
For newer readers to this blog, Tom spent some time in Astana this and last year, before moving back to America, and then taking some Afghan kids to Kyrgyzstan on a summer camp, with Walton.
I hope we manage to meet up again some time soon, in any case, don’t work too hard, and keep on being your brilliant self 🙂

Happy Birthday Tom

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Aug 23 2007

My Very Own Restaurant

Category: Eating Out,Friends,PersonalChrisM @ 12:56 pm

OK, not quite, but the name of the place we went to last night is not a million miles from my surname…

?????????? Restaurant Astana Kazakhstan 2007

?????????? which (very) roughly equates to Meramhana, which is pretty damn close to Merriman 🙂
Anyway, we met up with Walton and Assel, who we had not seen since he went away to Kyrgyzstan with Tom to help teach some Afghan teenagers.

Assel ?????????? Restaurant Astana Kazakhstan 2007 Walton ?????????? Restaurant Astana Kazakhstan 2007

The last time we tried to go to this restaurant, the whole place was closed to the public, as there were some government big wigs in attendance at someone important’s birthday. That probably should have given us a small clue as to the price range, but we ploughed on regardless… Whilst we waited outside for Walton to arrive, I took a quick shot of the patio seating, though this now being the end of August, no Kazakhs were in view, as it is too cold to sit outside. Apparently.

Outside The ?????????? Restaurant Astana Kazakhstan 2007 Irina Outside The ?????????? Restaurant Astana Kazakhstan 2007

When we went in, the interior looked quite impressive, and the staff were actually pleasant to deal with; none of the oft-encountered ‘I am doing you a favour serving you’ sort of attitude. I had a nice fried cheese starter, and a pepper steak with chips. Sorry, that should have been a PEPPER steak with chips. (The amount of pepper corns I scraped off the meat would have lasted me a couple of years in a pepper grinder at home.) Walton and Ira had the same dish, though Irina has mushrooms as her garnish. Even Ira noted that the sauce on the meat was really quite hot. Half through the meal I literally had tears coming from my eyes, and this was after shaving the top, bottom and sides of the meat, to try and minimize the strength of the pepper sauce. I enjoyed it, but would not recommend it in a restaurant that was not air conditoned 😉

Pepper Steak With Extra Pepper Then A Bit More Pepper ?????????? Restaurant Astana Kazakhstan 2007

Please excuse the messy plate – I forgot to take a shot until about 1/2 through the meal. Whilst we ate, there was a live band playing downstairs, who were pretty talented, even if a little loud. The violinist had a stronger talent for playing her electric violin than singing, but their repertoire involved a wide selection of Russian and English songs, that did not exclusively involve female lead vocals, so overall, their input was most appreciated.

In House Band ?????????? Restaurant Astana Kazakhstan 2007

So, we finished off the meal with a nice dollop or two of ice cream, and said our goodbyes. It was really good to have the four of us back together again, and to hear (a little) about Walton’s time at the camp.

[EDIT]
Ooops, apparently ?????????? is actually the Kazakh word for restaurant… not the name of the establishment itself. That is now three words of Kazakh I know 🙂

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Aug 18 2007

Tom And Walton

Category: FriendsChrisM @ 9:55 pm

Have finished the summer camp for Afghani children over in Kyrgyzstan. To catch up with what has been going on, head on over to LifeOf2Me. We were hoping to catch up with Tom before he heads off to his next adventure, but at the very least we will be able to hear from Walton how things went over there, and if there were any stories that could not be published 🙂
Anyway, wherever you are right now Tom, hope life is going well, and has a little excitement in store still, and to Walton, WELCOME HOME, see you soon.

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Jul 20 2007

Tom Plus Afghans = Kyrgyzstan!

Category: Friends,PersonalChrisM @ 8:35 pm

I have been meaning to write a post on this subject for a while, but did not get around to it until now. Apologies Tom.
Anyway, as long term readers may recall Tom Toomey live here in Astana for a while, and we regularly met up to get drunk and eat too much have deep philosophical discussions whilst very drunk.
He returned to America earlier this year, and carried on blogging whilst there. It was good to be able to keep up to speed with his life. However, he recently went to Afghanistan (that most friendly of places to be if you are American!), for his regular annual trip to pick up some young men. And women. Perhaps I should clarify? Rather than any sort of romantic quest, he takes Afghan teenagers to Kyrgyzstan for a summer camp. Although British readers will probably only have come across the concept of summer camps through films and TV shows, I have been assured that this really does occur, and is not just some Hollywood invention ;).
So, if you would like to read Tom’s posts, head on over to The LifeOf2Me, and do make sure you read the older posts as well; whereas this blog tends to be random thoughts from the top of my head, his is seriously well written, if not deadly serious subject matter 🙂

PS He is a friend, not a business associate, so this post is not sponsored in any way, I would just really like any readers of mine who have not yet come across his blog to do check it out. Just don’t forget to come back here as well. I’m cool with polygamy 🙂

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Jun 08 2007

The Dragon Fart T-Shirt Has Arrived

Category: Friends,Personal,PicturesChrisM @ 1:34 am

TCat Designs Dragon Fart

As modelled by Pete.
For anyone who hasn’t yet visited, go and check out Tom’s online shop NOW. You will find a whole range of original t-shirts and other items, all designed by Tom.

TCat Designs is run by Tom Toomey, of The Life of 2ME blog. He is now back in America, having lived here in Astana for a short while. He and Walton are hopefully going to be in Kyrgyzstan this summer, running a camp for children from Afghanistan.

Nope, this isn’t sponsored, Tom is a friend, and no money was exchanged for this post.

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May 30 2007

Looking for news in the Stans?

Category: Kazakhstan,PersonalChrisM @ 2:34 am

Central Asia Now is a relatively new site dedicated to covering current affairs, well, in the Central Asian region.

Central Asia
In the above image, Central Asia is apparently shown as any country that on top the thick red line…

Central Asia now specifically covers Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
The site will aggregate news from the region, and once every couple of weeks will feature an original article on matters effecting those who live within Central Asia. Topics that will be covered include democracy, economics, human rights, energy, strategic issues, the military, governance and religious questions.

This post is not sponsored at all, just thought that as this is a Kazakhstan blog, readers might appreciate the heads up on the site…

the site’s address is http://www.centralasianow.org , but I’ve removed the live link for now, as the site is down.

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