Crossing

Steppes, borders, years

I was out the classroom door the moment the clock struck 9:45 that Friday, shouting “have a good weekend, guys!” over my shoulder. I had a bus to catch. In the end, I was over an hour early to said bus, which will surprise no one who knows me. But that gave me plenty of time to buy a bottle of water and a samsa to add to my supply of travel snacks (blini from the cafeteria, cucumber, bag of peanuts) for the journey to Bishkek¹.

The bus, a noon Friday bus in mid-September, was maybe half full, so I had the row of two all to myself and sat in the window, watching first the Almaty suburbs (the massive Baraholka bazaar, which stretched for blocks, countless auto repair shops, new apartments jutting into the sky) and then the endless hills roll by.

In contrast to my earlier trips between Almaty and Bishkek, it took only 3.5 hours to get from Almaty’s Sairan bus station to a city bus in Kyrgyzstan. The border guard on the Kazakhstan side was a little skeptical.

Him: “Do you speak Russian?” (in English)
Me: “A little” (in Russian)
Him: “Where are you going?” (in English, apparently unimpressed by my “чуть чуть”)
Me: Bishkek
Him: Why?
Me: Tourism
Him: You’re going to Bishkek?
Me: Yes
Him: For tourism??
Me: Yes
Him: Bishkek?? For tourism??
Me: Yes
Him: Hmmmm

Then he stamped my passport and sent me on my way. I crossed that little no-man’s land, which during my first ever daylight crossing I could see actually went over quite a lovely river, and was asked zero questions on the Kyrgyzstan side. 5 minutes later I had shaken 15 som, leftover from two years ago, out of my wallet and was on a city bus to southern Bishkek, on my way to meet George.

That’s why I was going to Bishkek, by the way—to see George. Longtime readers may remember George. We were on the same Bishkek program, and he’s spent quite a bit more time there since.

It took almost as long to fight through Bishkek traffic as it had to reach the border. Not much had changed in the nearly two years since I’d been there, although I do think traffic was worse, and the bus more crowded. Bishkek recently got rid of its marshrutkas, the packed vans with no pre-determined stops that I’d grown to love. The overflow was now shuffled over to the buses, and I wound up getting off 3 stops early, practically squeezed out the door.

I finally found George in a Navat, a Central-Asian themed restaurant². We caught up (for about 3 hours), discovered that fast-food favorite Wok Lagman had discontinued their vegan lagman (sob) and went to the grocery store before heading back to our former Russian professor’s apartment. Shoutout to Olga for letting us stay.

In the morning, we decided to take the new, semi-mythical #1 bus to Ala Archa National Park. We stood outside in the blazing sun for almost 20 minutes and decided to give it 5 more before calling it a day. At minute 4, the bus arrived. And every single person waiting at our stop piled on. At the next stop, a hopeful group of backpackers approached the bus and slunk away before the doors even opened. There was literally not one inch of space.

The bus ride took about 40 minutes, certainly the most beautiful 40 minutes I’ve ever spent on a city bus, as it wound out of the city and out into the villages, with views of the mountains and fields. We took a shuttle up to the entrance, did a quick hike at Ala Archa, where we heard much more English and other foreign languages than I remembered hearing there previously. I also felt that there were fewer squirrels, though they were just as friendly,. In the distance, some of the trees had been cleared from the mountain. They were building a cable car, and the beginnings of yurts.

After our walk, we took another shuttle back down, where we waited again for the vaunted #1 bus. It arrived, was promptly swarmed, and then abandoned again as the driver informed us that it was, in fact, his lunch break. 30 minutes later, we were on our way back to the city.

Ala-Archa never disappoints

I had tea (meaning lunch) with my host family, who were mostly unchanged, if taller. We played some Roblox games, of course. Then George and I met again at Biscuit, the cafe where we spent most of our time and money in Bishkek the first time around. It was strange to walk from my host family’s apartment to Biscuit, a walk I’d done a hundred times—forever ago. The hair salon is now a dentist office. The bread guy is still there, but the billiards club is just a restaurant these days. The buildings that were half-built are still half-built, or maybe these are new ones and the old ones have just blended into the skyline.

We grabbed a couple of things for Olga’s borscht at the grocery store next to Biscuit and headed home. Olga’s house was a Russian zone, which was nice practice after spending most of the last few weeks in the English bubble of my university. The borscht was delicious, and she’d bought an enormous watermelon to hack into pieces.

Early Sunday morning, George and I headed for the new, significantly less cool-looking-and-conveniently-located-than-before Bishkek bus station. The bus was nearly half tourists, and they explained in detail, in both Russian and English, how to meet up with the other bus after crossing the border. They even had a little laminated card with pictures—a far cry from the time George and I were abandoned in at the Kazakhstan/Uzbekistan crossing. Overall, the tourist infrastructure felt much more developed this time around.

The Bishkek-Almaty view

By 3pm we were back in Almaty, where I wrapped up my lesson plans for Monday. The short trip home was made even shorter by the fact that Almaty switched time zones several months ago and is now an hour behind Bishkek, despite being significantly further east. One of the unintended consequences of nation-building. George stayed for a week before heading off to Karakol (and then grad school, yay George!), but not before starring as a guest speaker for my class, who were remarkably engaged.³

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Other than that little jaunt, I’ve been sticking pretty close to home, with the occasional wander up to the Green Bazaar for a giant bag of Korean marinated mushroom salad or over to a fancy cafe near the textiles district, or to a bar that serves a borscht-flavored liqueur with a pickle on top.

Absolutely massive building of craft supply stores

We’ve also been attending various events and festivals around Almaty. Two art museum openings, a gallery opening I stumbled into accidentally, a book fair, a concert of traditional Kazakh music, a French film festival, the list goes on.

Almaty’s new art museum. For you Shorewoodians out there: that’s a Plensa!

In fact, Almaty celebrated its birthday a couple of weeks ago at Alma Fest—a huge festival in a park with literally thousands of tons of apples for sale, friendship pavilions from various countries, plov and lagman, honey stands, multiple hot air balloons, and, of course, a giant apple.

scenes from Alma Fest

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We’ve also crossed another kind of border. For Rosh Hashana, I located a Chabad branch in a basement 10 minutes from my apartment—thanks to the directions given in a previous Princeton in Asia fellow’s 2023 Wisconsin Jewish Chronicle article. It was…not my favorite mechitza setup, but I did get to hear the shofar. By the time dinner rolled around I was the only woman in the building, so I just headed home. I did manage to pull off pretty decent honey-cake-style-muffins in our gas oven, and brought them in for my coworkers. There is also no shortage of great apples and honey in this city. Shana tovah u’metukah!

I also went to a Shabbat dinner at Almaty’s Moishe House, a space for communal Jewish living and young Jewish community. It was really fun, and another good test of my Russian. I’d say I understood 80% of what other people were saying, and managed about 6 words myself. I did tie for first in Shabbat trivia, winning a borderline antisemitic refrigerator magnet from their recent trip to Warsaw.

For Kol Nidre, I braved the hike uptown to the big shul, where I was promptly offered matchmaking services—politely declined. I spent Yom Kippur day mostly in bed, with a short jaunt out to sit on a bench along Almaty’s Terrenkur—a new walking path alongside the river.

I watched the sun set from the my spot on the riverbank, thinking how strange it felt to be so far from home for the holidays. I was more than 6,000 miles from both the synagogue I grew up in and the Jewish community I found in college. I wondered—not for the first time—how exactly I had ended up here⁴. What I was doing here. Where I might end my fast next Yom Kippur. Then I got up, a little dizzy, and went home.

1. Also plenty of time to sit around on the wrong side of the bus station, finding the correct bus only 3 minutes before it departed. Oops.

2. This was actually my second Navat trip in as many days, as the night before the fellows had dinner together at Navat Almaty—Lu was craving beshbarmak

3. A “my student is posting (positively) about me on Reddit” incident last week reminded me that my students do also have access to the internet and could theoretically read this blog but you gotta live your life. It would be good practice for them anyway.

4. Minored in Russian, studied in Bishkek, found this program, filled out a lengthy application, had an interview, filled out a form, had another interview, had I think maybe a third interview, submitted a resume and cover letter, attended an orientation, took a TEFL course, got on a plane, etc etc. Wanted to be here so badly. Really like it here. But, you know, philosophically speaking.