Holiday in Central Asia (5) a strange lake in Kazakhstan
September 6th, 2022 by Roger Darlington
It was an odd night in the Alban guesthouse and many of the group did not sleep so well because of the regular barking of local dogs, the early crowing of the village cocks, and some members taking nighttime showers. I pride myself on being able to sleep anywhere at anytime but a combination of jet-lag and animal noises had me awake for a while.
Today’s excursion (Day 4) was to a very particular location called Kaindy Lake. This is so remote that it could only be accessed by four-wheeled drive vehicles, so the group split into two Toyota 4WD land cruisers in which we swerved around ruts and rocks, splashed through streams, and ploughed up hills for a fun drive of 45 minutes.
Once out of the vehicles, things became even more challenging. The paths down to the lake are very steep and very gravelly and several of the group took a tumble. But what a sight: both at water level and from the hillside above.
Kaindy Lake was formed by nature after an earthquake in 1911 dislodged a huge block of mountain which blocked the river and created the lake in which earlier trees still make a ghostly appearance. Located around 2,000 metres above sea level, surrounded by huge spruce trees, and with the silver trucks of dead spruce risking above the water surface like the masts of sunken ships, this is truly a magical experience.
We were at Kiandy Lake for an hour and a half, following which we returned to our guesthouse for a quick lunch, before leaving Saty village to return to Almaty. It was a journey of almost four and a half hours, but we stopped briefly to view the Black Canyon and to have a comfort break.
Some of us wanted to take the opportunity to have a sleep or read a book, but our guide Svetlana appealed to us to ask her anything about Kazakhstan and our Scottish member requested information on the country’s experience of ice hockey. His other questions kept us going till Almaty where we are staying at the same place as previously: the luxurious Ritz-Carlton Hotel.
Dinner was also at a familiar location: “Navat” restaurant. This time we had salmon as the main course (the Kazaks do love their meat) and three members of staff put on a short dance show.
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Holiday in Central Asia (4): canyon & lake in Kazakhstan
September 5th, 2022 by Roger Darlington
After a day and a night in Almaty to rest and recover from our jet lag, on Day 3 we left the city for two days to visit some nature locations in the very south-east this huge country.
Our guide Svetlana never stopped talking while we were on the road and we learned so much about the country and the people. Her personal story is symbolic of post-Soviet Central Asia. Her mother’s family was Ukrainian kulak and banished to Sakhalin Island, while her father’s family was Don Cossack kulaks who were sent to Siberia. Thank you, comrade Stalin. They grew up in the Soviet Union before finding themselves in independent Kazakhstan. On our road journey, we passed close to China and Kyrgyzstan and went through a Uyghur village. It is a complicated region of the world.
Leaving our Almaty hotel at 7.30 am, we travelled around 200 km to arrive at our first destination just over 3 hours later (there was a comfort stop at a service station that served coffee). Our destination was the spectacular Charyn Canyon where we spent three and a half hours. The canyon consists of rocks varying in age from 23M to 60M years old. Today the canyon is 154 km in length with cliff sides of up to 300 metres high.
We walked the 1.3 metre trial along the top, walked all the way back, and then took the 2.3 metre trail on the floor of the canyon all the way to the rushing Charyn River, so we covered around 5 metres. The lower part of the canyon is known as the Valley of the Castles because of the striated and coloured cliff faces on either side. The weather was glorious with a temperature of around 40C made bearable by a breeze. But, in the summer, the temperature can hit 50C. Understandably we all took a open lorry back (thankfully with sears) from the river to the start of the trails and found some shelter for a picnic lunch.
Our next destination was a further 100 km and took almost another two hours on increasingly winding roads. This time our destination was the Kolsai Lakes. In fact, we only viewed the nearest and deepest (70 metres). We were higher now so the weather was milder and the views were simply beautiful. After a coffee, I took a walk half way round the large lake, during which I befriended a Kazak couple who wanted to video me (no problem) and discuss English football (a subject on which I am totally ignorant).
We are not returning to Almaty yet because we have another local sight to visit, so we spent the night in the very simple but clean Alban guesthouse in a tiny village called Saty. Ten of us the group plus driver & guide – shared two toilets and two showers. Here the WiFi was so slow it reminded me of the days of dial-up when we watched that blue bar edging barely perceptively to the right.
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Holiday in Central Asia (3): welcome to Kazakhstan
September 4th, 2022 by Roger Darlington
Kazakhstan is about the size of Western Europe and, as a single entity with defined borders, it was an invention of the Soviet regime in the 1920s. During the Cold War, the USSR decided that the republic was so empty and remote that they used it as the chief nuclear bomb testing ground. When the USSR collapsed, it was the last of the Soviet republics to declare independence.
Although Kazaks – who ethnically split from Uzbeks in the 15th century – form two-thirds of the population, it is a multi-ethnic country with a substantial Russian minority. The dominant language is still Russian, but the Kazak language is in the process of moving from the Cyrillic to the Latin alphabet.
Our first day in the country – Day 2 of the tour – was just a resting day to catch up on our jet lag. For those who wanted it, there was a free extra option of a demonstration of falconry which I attended. Then, in the evening, we had our first group meal – there are eight of us – round the corner from the hotel at a restaurant called “Navat” which served us a selection of local foods, all of which were tasty.
We will be back in Almaty in a couple of days for a proper look at the city.
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Holiday in Central Asia (2): getting there
September 4th, 2022 by Roger Darlington
I knew that this trip would be challenging but I didn’t expect the challenges to begin before we even reached the region. However, the evening before departure, we were notified that our UK Tour Manager had just gone down with covid so that we would be dependent solely on local guides.
On Day 1 of our 26-day trip, to reach the starting point of the tour, there were two Turkish Airline flights: one from London to Istanbul and then another from Istanbul to Almaty.
The first flight of just over 3 hours went smoothly. Once at Istanbul airport, the good news was that it is a super modern facility opened in 2019 – although free WiFi is only available for an hour after scanning one’s passport details. The bad news was that the onward flight was delayed by two hours turning a three-hour wait into a five-hour one. The second flight was just over 4.5 hours.
We were met at Almaty airport – a wholly inadequate facility – by our local guide, a Russian called Svetlana, and driven the short distance to the 30-storey Ritz-Carlton Hotel which is as good as any Western hotel. Indeed it was so modern that the rooms had sliding panels in the drawers with a fixed electronic pad that controlled the lights, the curtains, the air conditioning and probably all sorts of other things that I never discovered.
It was now 8 am local time. Since I had left home at 7 am and Kazakhstan is five hours ahead of UK time, the journey door to door had been 20 hours. After a quick breakfast, it was time for bed.
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Holiday in Central Asia (1): introduction
September 2nd, 2022 by Roger Darlington
Throughout my life, I have been fortunate to have had many opportunities to travel and I have visited a total of 80 countries all around the world. But this trip – organised by the travel company Voyages Jules Verne (VJV) – is different. It is not my furthest or my longest trip: that would be the one to Australia and New Zealand in 2013 when I was away for 31 days. But, given the location (Central Asia), the length (26 days) and my age (I am now 74), it is probably going to be the most challenging.
As the travel company puts it, the region is: “Perhaps amongst some of the world’s least visited and least well-known destinations, making this a true journey of discovery”. The briefing refers to “remote and, in part, unsophisticated destinations”, hotels that may be “simple and unpretentious”, occasional “water or electricity shortages”, food that “can be repetitive”, and “some long journeys, some on uneven roads with only limited opportunities for comfort breaks”. And, of course, you cannot drink the water anywhere.
We will be away 26 days and make 9 flights. We will stay in 18 hotels: 12 of them for one night only and 6 for all of two nights. Although VJV has been operating in the region for many years, this is the company’s first five-nation tour. Sounds like fun, huh?
We are going to visit five ‘stans’ (the word ‘stan’ means country): Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. The only one that I have visited before is Uzbekistan in 2006 so, by the end of this trip, the total number of countries that I have visited will be 84. Visas are not required for Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan or Uzbekistan but are necessary for Tajikistan (payment in advance of £50 to VJV) and Turkmenistan (payment at the border of $100).
All five of these ‘stans’ were previously members of the USSR but, with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, each became an independent state. All of them are overwhelmingly Sunni Muslim, economically underdeveloped, and politically illiberal. But, of course, each is different.
Kazakhstan is an enormous country, the ninth largest in the world and over 10 times the size of the UK. It is the largest landlocked country on earth and the world’s largest Muslim-majority country by land area. Yet it has a population of only 19M and therefore one of the lowest population densities in the world. Since 1997, the capital – which used to be Almaty – has been Astana which in 2019 was renamed Nur-Sultan. It is rich in oil, gas and mineral resources which makes it the most economically advanced of the ‘stans’. Officially it is a democracy but it has an authoritarian government with a poor human rights record.
Kyrgyzstan is a similar size to the UK but with a much smaller population of just 6M. The capital is Bishkek. The country is probably the most democratic in the region, following the Tulip Revolution of 2005 which overthrew Askar Akayev. it has a semi-presidential political system with a free news media and an active political opposition.
Tajikistan is smaller than the UK and has a much smaller population of about 10M. The capital is Dushanbe. Mountains cover more than 90% of the country which has minimal resources. Following a civil war from 1991-1997, it has had peaceful elections but the same president since 1994 and one party holding the vast majority of seats in the parliament. A major source of income is remittances from abroad.
Turkmenistan is twice the size of the UK but the population is a mere 6M, the lowest of the Central Asian republics. The capital is Ashgabat. Since independence, the country has been ruled by three repressive totalitarian regimes with poor human rights records. The country possesses the world’s fourth largest reserves of natural gas and substantial oil resources. It is the least-visited of the ‘stans’.
Uzbekistan is almost twice the size of the UK with a population 35M (about half that of the UK but almost as large as the other four ‘stans’ combined). it is one of only two double landlocked nations on earth (the other is tiny Liechtenstein). The capital is Tashkent. Following the death of the totalitarian leader Islam Karimov in 2016, the country has embarked on political reforms which have improved relations with neighbouring nations . The country is a major producer and exporter of cotton. It is the most-visited of the ‘stans’.
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A review of the 2017 film “The Killing Of A Sacred Deer”
August 29th, 2022 by Roger Darlington
This is a very odd film in so many respects.Above all, the storyline is so unusual: inspired by an ancient Greek tragedy (which is mentioned once very briefly), it is a psychological thriller in which lives are threatened and one is lost (the titular reference to an animal is a metaphor).
Although it is set in Cincinnati, the American family is played by an international cast: (a very hairy) Irish Colin Farrell as a surgeon and father, Australian Nicole Kidman as his wife. English Raffey Cassidy as his daughter and American Sunny Suljic as his son plus Irish Barry Keoghan in a stand-out role as the mysterious centre of the drama.
From the very opening, what we see is unsettling and unexplained and the narrative only moves very slowly in revealing meaning. Meanwhile our sense of unease is aggravated by the cinematography, with lots of tracking shots along corridors and wide-angle shots of characters in settings, and by the sound, with obscure classical music and frequent jarring noises.
The source of all this oddness is Greek director and co-writer Yorgos Lanthimos whose previous work was “The Lobster” and whose next work was “The Favourite”.
If you need conventional storytelling, this film is not for you. If you like something idiosyncratic and thought-provoking, this is recommended.
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A review of the 1995 film “La Haine”
August 24th, 2022 by Roger Darlington
A French-language film shot in black and white with the title “Hate” might not immediately appeal, but it won the Best Director prize at the Cannes Film Festival and it has become a major classic of recent French cinema. Written and directed by Mattieu Kassovitz, amazingly this was his screen debut and he was only 27 at the time. The work is so striking because the locations and the characters are so different from most French films and an array of cinematic devices is deployed to tell a hard-hitting story.Shot largely in the deprived Paris suburb of Chanteloup-les-Vignes, the 24 hour narrative revolves around three friends: a Jewish man Vinz (Vincent Cassel), a black boxer Hubert (Hubert Koundé) and a young Arab Saïd (Saïd Taghmaoui) – note how the names of the actors inform those of the characters. There is a lot of (rough) dialogue with plenty of anger and violence but cleverly Kassovitz weaves into the tale some funny characters and situations – a bit like Shakespeare in his tragedies. You will never forget the ending.
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A review of “The Long Game” by Rush Doshi (2021)
August 21st, 2022 by Roger Darlington
Important and informative though “The Long Game” is, it is not an easy read. There are 400 pages of small and dense text with a good deal of repetition and almost 1,500 notes. But Rush Doshi knows what he is writing about and what he is writing about is of huge geopolitical significance. Doshi is the founding director of the Brookings China Strategy Initiative and, since completing this book, he has become Director for China on President Biden’s National Security Council.The work is a review of the rise and rise of China over the past three decades and, in the words of the sub-title, “China’s Grand Strategy To Displace American Order”. A distinguishing feature of the book is its use of an original and digitised database of authoritative Chinese-language Communist Party (CCP) documents personally excavated by Doshi who is proficient in Mandarin.
The central thesis of “The Long Game” is that China has sequentially adopted three “strategies of displacement” of American power, each triggered by sharp discontinuities in global politics.
First, following Tiananmen Square, the Gulf War and the Soviet collapse, from 1989-2008 it sought to blunt America’s power in Asia – a process known as “hiding capabilities and biding time”.
Second, following the Global Financial Crisis, from 2009-2016 it endeavoured to build a regional hegemony in Asia – a position dubbed “actively accomplishing something”.
Third, following Brexit, the Trump presidency and the coronavirus pandemic, since 2017 it has attempted to expand its blunting and building efforts worldwide under the banner “great changes unseen in a century”.
In respect of each strategy, Doshi looks in detail at what the CCP documents say and what the country does under three headings – military, political and economic – and emphasises how these three elements are closely co-ordinated to further the grand strategy.
Doshi dismisses the regular suggestions that American is in fundamental decline but argues that the US needs to counter China’s grand strategy in an asymmetric fashion that does not attempt to compete “dollar-for-dollar, ship-for-ship, or loan-for loan”. Instead he presents – rather briefly and broadly – a series of (costly) recommendations for blunting Chinese order and building America order.
In the course of China’s 3,000 year history, the so-called “century of humiliation” (1839 to 1949) is seen as an aberration which can and and must be corrected with China’s return to a central position in world affairs. Doshi suggests that China’s economy will equal that of the US by 2028 and that the CCP intends to complete this process of “national rejuvenation” by the centennial of the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 2049.
Can this be achieved without armed conflict? Since Doshi wrote his book, Russia has invaded Ukraine and you can be sure that military strategists in Washington and Beijing are already assessing the lessons for any move by China to regain Taiwan.
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Would you fly with Ethiopian Airlines?
August 19th, 2022 by Roger Darlington
There is an amazing story that two pilots with Ethiopian Airlines fell asleep at 37,000ft (11,000m), missing an airport runway before waking to land the aircraft safely.
The news raises the question would you fly with this airline? Well, I did – six times in two weeks as you will see from this account of a holiday in Ethiopia.
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A review of the film “Donnie Brasco”
August 19th, 2022 by Roger Darlington
For some reason, it took me two and a half decades to catch up with this excellent movie from 1997. By then, Johnny Depp – who takes the titular role – had been through the increasing madness of the “Pirates Of The Caribbean” series and endured two highly-publicised court cases with former partner Amber Heard. This work is a reminder of just how fine an actor Depp was earlier in his career.Here he plays an FBI undercover agent who infiltrates the New York mob and works his way into the trust of increasingly senior mafiosi. The tension is like a taut piano string and the outbursts of violence like the crashing of a piano lid. A lot of attention is paid to style: the cars, the clothes, and above all the language. There’s a wonderful sequence in which the informer explains to some FBI colleagues the different meanings of the phrase “Forget about it”.
The powerful central performance of Depp is backed up by superb support roles, most notably Al Pacino, the mob middleman Lefty Ruggiero whom Brasco befriends and who vouches for him with the other gangsters with profound consequences for both of them. Michael Madsen is always good and it was interesting to see Anne Heche in the only significant female role (a few days before I saw the film she died as a result of a car accident).
Surprisingly for such a quintessentially American movie, the director was the British Mike Newell who had previously made “Four Weddings And A Funeral”, as different as you can imagine from a mafia movie.
The most astonishing aspect of “Donnie Brasco”, however, is that it is loosely based on a real story, an undercover operation by FBI agent Joseph Pistone between 1976 and 1981. At the conclusion of the film, we are told that his evidence led to over 200 indictments and over 100 convictions and that subsequently he has lived under an assumed name with a $500,000 open contract on his head.
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