Bad Blogging Good Living

So I have been very truant. Very very truant.

Once I got back, things really started moving on two fronts. First, preparing for the trip to Alaska. Second, making money working construction. Neither seemed to be packed with thought provoking moments worthy of sharing. To sum it up, there are many many little logistical steps that go into arranging a long time far far away from many many little logistical steps. And making money is much more possible in the US than Kyrgyzstan. I made in 4 hours roofing what a doctor would make in a month at the ER, or a teacher in 2 months. I think that keeping that in the back of my mind helps me make sure that I use my power to consume wisely. That is to say, try to do less harm than perhaps average for this part of the world.

Then came camp. What is there to say about that place? It seems to me to be a place where amazing people, who are in many ways different, get together and work energetically and constructively at giving young people an experience to change their lives for the better. What more could I ask for in a job. This summer was blissfully productive on that front. For myself, my group, and camp at large from what I saw. I watched older staff provide great trips and great role modeling for younger staff. And I watched younger staff transform their joy and energy from being a camper (or going camping, if they had not been campers) into real selfless concientiousness of others. Watching peoples' hearts and minds awaken to a a more authentic and fundamental way of living, a parallel and connected but distinct reality, is awesome. As in full of awe. But nothing like awful.

And in the midst of all that was a trip. I needed to be reminded of the power and sublimity of the Arctic. My first time there perhaps I had too few places to compare and contrast it too. Then as I traveled more and more through different comfort zones I thought the Arctic, and the mountaineer experience, was somehow pretty much the same. I even let myself think at times that I was doing it, not because it would be the greatest opportunity for growth for me, but because I could provide the greatest comfort-expanding opportunity for others. Naivity wrapped in ego. The freedom of endless sunlight and the radiant joy of a simple life with young, playful and responsible people is sunshine after a dark winter, ice water on a hot day and rain after a drought.

I think in our own ways, each of us came back saying "oh yeah, that's how great life can be. I have to get me some of that for next year, forever. "

Except of course one does not get such a thing. One lives it every moment of every day with the decisions we make and people we surround ourselves with. And that's why its so great. It comes from inside. That's why it can be so hard to find too, because no one can make that happen for but myself.

Most recently, family was visited in Phoenix. It was great, just like I'd never left... about 4 years ago. except of course that everyone has grown and changed, especially the youngins. But that's why it seems so familiar. because despite all the changes the fundamental dynamic and goodness is the same. It's a good thing to come back to.

Coming back to the USA news cycle and the city has been good. Its a good challenge to have distractions that remind us of the need to get back to what's real... of course all of it is real but somehow it is not complete. It is some sort of unbalanced appendage to a more whole reality.

Seeing talk of politics, I think I will focus on remaining informed but undefined by it. Watching some people try to convince the universe that some particular party's platform embodies Truth and Justice and all things Good.

If only US domestic politics were more like Star Wars.

So now it's finding a place to live in Seattle. Four Widji connected folks will be grooving together out there. It's going to be a blast and a mellow blast at times, I hope.

My councilor had a kid. William Alouiscious Hansen. And time rolls on.

Minneapolis

I returned from Bishkek a week ago today. It's been good, great even. The feeling of not being one's self is starting to fade away as I spend evenings with friends and family. I am commited morally and financially to UW next semester for Central Asian Studies. I never realized how much stuff I have until I collected it all in one room for sorting. Gross.

So I think right now is very much about getting my feet back underneath me. Not to say that Kyrgyzstan was somehow some sort of a traumatic exerience that requires recovery but making up for all that lost time in terms of paying attention to (and receiving attention from) friends and family, dealing with stuff (literally all of the accumulated things with attendant memories), trying to get back in shape, and plan the excursion to Alaska are all sort of things that require time but don't really qualify me as busy or working. It is good to take a moment to prepare for the future in every nebulous and concrete way.

I certainly feel that Minneapolis is where I am from but it is not where I live. The anchorless feeling is liberating and daunting. But I will be moving out of my parent's place officially (no stuff in storage).

On the international events front, protests in Kyrgyzstan are going to result in some sort of lurch away from the status quo. It is unclear how that is going to end up though, it is fairly unimportant until some leader comes along with the will and the influence to govern well (and honestly).

Somalia is sliding back to chaos. The US was foolish to think that an Islamic movement can be decisively defeated on the battlefield. If the Islamists come to power again the US should recognize the government and offer aid. Then you can have leverage and less hate. As long as we posture like their ideology can only be dealt with by eradication, they will behave accordingly. Both China and Russia only changed significantly after detente, and the changes (including less hostility to the US) came only after internal upheaval.

The US would also do well to ease up on the rhetoric vis-a-vis Iran (recognize the regime, denounce regime change) and do more under the radar.

I sat next to what I consider to be a fundamentalist for the final leg of the journey home. He believed that the Bible was the supreme source of truth, thus the world is 6,000 years old and all the so-call scientists are out there just to keep the Word of Christ down. Ironically, he claimed to love science and said that science upheld his world-view. All of his "scientists" seemed to amount to one guy in Pensacola Florida with a talk show. I gave a couple of attempts to question his logic, but when he considers the Bible and the Pensacola Creationist to be legitimate sources of information and I do not, it was hard to have a discussion. The lack of a discussion did not prevent the preacher from Nebraska from doing what he knows how to do, preach.

All and all he seemed like a great guy. If only completely irrational belief systems had no effect on people's politics and we did not live in a democracy...

Thanks to everyone that wrote to me while I was abroad. It means more than I can say. I'll keep writing on this page, but probably less frequently for a while.

Kyrgyz Implosion

Ridiculously, I often hear about big changes in Kyrgyz politics from the AP or the New York Times. I suppose that people are basically just fed up with all the backroom scheming. I'll try to illustrate why.

The current super-president is Bakaev, from Osh. Most of the government is run by his buddies. People from the North don't like this. So the North and South tussle about who gets to control the government. Some people that feel they are not getting their fair shake at governance (or non-governance?) are planning to protest in April. Bakaev has reason to be afraid, such a protest put him into power two years ago and could just as easily put him out of power.

It the countdown to the protests everyone is jockeying to shore up their exposure to political risk. Seven Ministers (of 12 or so I think) tried to resign. First people thought that Bakaev was getting rid of them to co-opt opposition protest leaders. But then he failed to endorse the resignations. So now it looks like maybe the ministers were trying clear the wreckage of Bakaev's sinking ship.

But today the NYT's reported that he has announced a new prime minister, from the opposition. Does this mean that Kyrgyzstan will be really looking at reform and move away from brinksmanship politics? or does it mean that the wobbly super-president has negotiated another few months in office? No one is sure, most don't care.

How do demonstrations topple governments when the people are universally alienated and apathetic? My theory is that things get rolling by "bought" demonstrators, literally paid to make a fuss by one side or the other. Throw in underemployment, a lack of positive male avenues in life and the resulting anger at the world and you can get a Bishkek pillaged in minutes flat.

The real moral of the story is that no one really knows what is going on and what people's intentions are. People have become estranged from political dialogue because so far all that has been served up is very superficial stuff that is not properly challenged by the weak media. For example, polygamy has actually been thrown around the parliament here as a potential idea.

Some of the pro-polygamy arguments:
"I mean, we're Muslim so we are allowed to be polygamists, right?"

"One guy I know has four wives but he is just helping out widows and stays with his family. So polygamy can be sweet and touching and doesn't have to be scary."

A real dialogue about what it means to be Kyrgyz and Muslim and what being Muslim means for policy is pretty much non-existant. That estrangement from dialogue can be dangerous as it tends to lead to reinforcing cycles of revolutions, brinksmanship and instability rather than evolution, negotiation and flexible-continuity.

As time for me winds down, there have been a lot of good-byes. I was surprised to feel sad about giving my last English classes. It's always bitter-sweet.

Some of our young climbers made it to the finals of a climbing competition. They made second and fourth place. I am hoping that the format of the competition will reinforce the message I have been lamely trying to deliver: It is not if you get to the top that matters but how you get there. After all, once you finish one climb, the only thing left to do is start another and if you always take the easy route, that is all you will be capable of. Banal and cheesy, but that is often a good indication of more than a nugget of truth.

Swollen Eyes, Dancin' and Monkey Morality

I had to admire my host sisters. The dance club was 4/5 empty. They had imbibed not a drop of alcohol but they set out to dance and dance they did. I wish I could have admired them from afar. Three people, the base-intensive stylings of Mr. Timberlake, and a big old dance floor. If only the fog machine had been more proactive in creating a hazily anonymous ambiance.

One of my students had swelling under his right eye. It looked like an ingrown under-eyelash, or one of those lovely deep painful pimples. When I asked him what was up, he said that he must have looked at something unclean. I wasn't sure I understood. So he made some odd hand gestures and then settled on the example of a dog peeing.

I chuckled, my cultural sensitivity caught off guard by what seemed to me to be a quaint explanation. And that is why it is hard to have discussions about o-so-many topics with my students. Our underlying assumptions about reality are completely different.

Biological Origins of Morality this is an interesting article that overviews a discussion about the origins of morality. I think it is hard to defend a universal objective moral truth. What does it matter to the infinite cosmos if one human kills another? Do we pass judgment on single celled organisms for destroying one another? An insightful way to examine morality is to ask, why? The answer is usually that unregulated behavior leads to instability which is bad for the group (even though it may be advantageous to the individual in the short term). It does not make morality any less important though. We are what we are and there is more escaping that. Also, social bonds of friendsship or love are fairly easily explained rationtionally, but that does not mean they are any less significant. Considering why we think the way do however, can help us avoid tragic folly.

I am struggling with going to grad school. All and all it sounds like the experience will be similar to IPE at UPS. That is to say, flexible and drawing off of many disciplines. But by borrowing from so many disciplines, in someways it can lack discipline (structure). IPE did not give me any special technique that makes me employable. But it does give an excellent and adaptable approach to examining many problems. JSIS offers much of the same but more indepth and focused regionally.

Is it possible to specialize as a generalist in today's world?

So it seems that (and the language emphasis) plays to my personality. So far the IPE-type style has worked out pretty well for me. The lack of a defined alternative also tilts me toward school. And Seattle/the Cascades. Finally, I am reminded of a bit of mountaineering wisdom. Sometimes a decision and corresponding action is better than indecision and inaction. Sometimes (most often) you have make a decision based on incomplete information and only vague knowledge of what lies ahead. After all, it would not be a decision if the best option were obvious.

Finally, I am approaching 10 days left in Kyrgyzstan. Today is a national holiday and an excellent reminder of why I will be relieved to arrive home (with no regrets). (It Would Seem) Everyone in Kyrgyzstan has a family. Everyone has plans. Everyone in Kyrgyzstan has plans with their family.

I confess to being tired of being an observer.

But I know that my affinity for Abroad will continue to stretch me between some sense of "home" somewhere in the US and the sense of personal growth I get from moving out of my comfort zones. I would rather be a little dissatisfied now and then than comfortable and bored.

A Bump and a Bleet

With the spring weather and the prospect of returning home on the horizon, I have been trying to get out of Bishkek.

This weekend, the weather looked good and we decided to go climbing. there were six of us. A French couple biking from France to Nepal, Christine (French Alpine Fund volunteer and host to the couple), a British English teacher, Colin (American boyfriend to Christine and Alpine Fund volunteer) and myself met Saturday morning at a round about.

After a frustrating if predictable discussion about the merits of taxis vs. a mashrootka we found ourselves compelled to get into a van. By compelled I mean that all of that taxi drivers sort of started yelling and urging us to get into the car. The first thing I noticed was a bad smell coming from the car. The second thing I noticed was that there were 3 sheep in the back. The driver told us "just throw your stuff in the back." We gingerly put the packs on the sheep and squeezed into one row of seats.

There was no time be cranky about safety.

As we sped and bounced our way up into the mountain valley the sheep remained calm and collected. Then we swerved around a machine pulling up asphault. The back opened up.

Said I, "Excuse me, your door has opened"

"ehhhe, the door opened, yes?"

"Hey mate, I think this sheep is going to fall out," stated my British colleague.

"Yeah, it is open." I assumed that would be enough information.

We drove on.

"You might want to stop."

"This sheep is definitely going to go"

"Your sheep will fall out if you don't stop"

Unphased, our driver pressed onward.

"And there is goes," I looked behind and there was a sheep, legs tied and one of our backpacks on the road.

"Stop. Your sheep fell. Oi, stop." I urged to no avail. The driver remained unconvinced. Then all of us yelled at him at once and he finally stopped the van. I guess he really didn't want to stop. He only seemed to do it because it might shut us up.

They heaved the sheep in with a THUNK. and slammed the rear door several times as the sheep bleeted. Finally, the door remained shut. All of the bags were unloaded but somehow mine got missed. As the driver pulled away I yelled. Then I banged on the side of the van. Then I opened the door. Only when I had seated myself in the moving vehicle and asked him for the sixth time to stop did he finally yield. Here was a man who really didn't like to stop.

It is possible that his Russian (or mine) was really so bad that we were having a communication impasse. But "stop" is something that everyone has to learn to say to get around Bishkek and I have not met anyone yet with such bad Russian. I maintain that this was a man who really did not like to stop.

During the hike to the canyon we greeted an old man. He said "what nazis." I stopped and asked him what he was talking about.

"Oi, you're not Russian!" he said in Russian.

"No, I am American, he is british and those guys are French." I left Colin out because he was standing with the French folks.

"Oi, that's great. Nevermind."

The climbing was great. It rained at least half the night and my bivy passed it's second test. We had interesting conversations about traveling and how everyone seems to not appreciate the American government. The French couple leave for Kazakhstan tomorrow where they will not have to to through a friend of the Chinese consulate to pay a bribe for a Chinese visa.

Cranky About Safety

Spring weather feels like it is here to stay now in Kyrgyzstan. Day by day the weather has been warming. Today was t-shirt weather. The change in people’s moods is my favorite part. Everyone get very explicably happy.

I received good news on Wednesday. The Ellison School for Russian, Eastern European, and Central Asia Studies (REECAS) at the Jackson School of International Studies (JSIS) at the University of Washington (UW) invited me to join their musing, yammering lot. At first I was unconvinced. But I tried to look at the situation logically. If as an undergrad I pursued International Political Economy at the University of Puget Sound than studying something like Comparative Sociology at the Ellison School for Russian, Eastern European and Central Asian Studies at the Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington is surely the next step. Just compare the abbreviations: IPE at UPS and Csoc at REECAS at JSIS at UW. The swelling tide of multi-syllabic words (that can now compose multi-syllabic acronyms) clearly indicates that I am moving up in the world of social studies.

Do you ever go a long way for a concept that seemed funny but then it’s really not all that funny at the end? Yeah, me neither.

There was a almost-terrible almost-incident at the climbing wall yesterday. A man with his 2 year old kid wandered in (the wall is at a sort of indoor running track). While one friend and I were setting up, he decided to try once. He climbed probably four meters up. His sun stood directly underneath him and watched. I gave it the old open-palmed slap on the forehead in astonishment of the man’s irresponsibility (for himself but especially his son’s). He came back down with out incident. During the next 45 minutes three other climbers came, we climbed and the man and his son wandered around the facility and watched us in turns.

I was climbing at this point. The man came back to the wall. He started up a little bit, as curious people are apt to do. No one else spoke any Russian and did not think anything of it as passers by often try to boulder at the bottom of the while fairly frequently when they see us climbing. Then he climbed a little higher, say 2 meters off the ground. As the ground is concrete below the wall, this is the “I am not sure I would do that, but…” point. This wall was slightly more technical than the first one he tried. He promptly pushed right passed that height. At about 4 meters I noticed that him and came off the wall. Around that time he learned the blind climb dilemma. That is, it is almost universally easier and safer to go up something than to go down it. So then he got worried and climbed a little higher. Then he realized he was screwed.

He froze, he head about 20 feet above the ground. His son once again watching from directly underneath him until we moved him. There was nothing that we could do for him; once he is on the wall any attempt to help is only going to compromise his balance. He was very lucky that some Kyrgyz guys happened to be playing a native game (similar to marbles but with sheep bones). They came over and coaching him down. By the time he started to come down his legs and arms were shaking from exhaustion and/or fear. But he got down, clapped his hands and smiled sheepishly. “Ha, ha. That really got the heart going.” My head and heart will still turning with memories from the broken back last summer and the first steps for assessing and treating various dramatic injuries.

He made it down safely, I would say barely. I was pretty upset. I am very unimpressed with the machismo in South America, Russia and Kyrgyzstan. The reason we never chided him the first time is because one quickly learns that advice which could be conceived of as questioning one’s manly prowess and courage is poorly received. I had assumed that once demonstration of incompetence would suffice for the day. Never underestimate the things people are willing to do to entertain delusions of pride in nation, religion and gender identity.

The “it’s my life, I’ll do what I want” is hard to penetrate but really it’s a load of crap. It’s your life and you’ll deal with the consequence until it is a problem that you are unable to cope with and then it becomes the problem of professionals, your family and strangers. And when your kid is watching from a position where IF you screw up, he’ll break your fall (all 30 pounds of him), well then you are just an idiot. And the issue is that because the machismo argument seems to hold for single-independent men then it spills over into every part of society. No one wears seat belts and legitmate concerns about health or safety are dismissed as being whiny. And as a result more people end up dead and crippled by car accidents and work place accidents. While the individual may pay the brunt of the suffering, the family and society and a whole also ends up taking up the slack. It would be inhumane not to.

I was most sickened to watch bad decision-making being passed on between father and son without an apparent twinge of self-reproach.

As a visitor with a heavy tongue, I get used to largely playing the part of passive observer. In fact, I actively try not to project my values and ways of doing things onto the people and places I go. That is the point, to second guess the way things are ‘always done’ back home. This incident made me question how far that amnesty for cultural difference should go.

It is easy to see how cranky-‘bout-safety outdoors old-timers get that way. They are like that because enough misses and near misses eventually pierce the adolescent assumption of adventuresome invulnerability.

Next time, I will definitely say something the first time.

Karakol

Karakol means darkhand in Kyrgyz. Lonely Planet postulates that this is because the soil is fertile there and dark there. It is in the northeast corner of Kyrgyzstan.

A had a few quintessential solo traveling moments. The first was on the marshrootka out to Karakol. I read most of the way. There is not much else to do on 6 hour rides on bumpy roads. About 2/3 of the way there conversation must have petered-out among the young and restless in the van and I started catching words like "ihnastranitz," "chitat'" and "ni ponimayet" (foreigner, read, doesn't understand) followed by rounds of boyish giggling and expectant nervous silence. After a couple of awkward-glances complete with foolish but good-natured smile, I piped up. They were very nice. One of them invited me to his house, or his grand parents' house, rather, to sleep. I had expected the ride to be 4 instead of eight hours and it was dark and definitely not the tourist season. After he insisted that it would be great, I accepted.

His family was not really in to the surprise guest. They were very welcoming, however, as a matter of duty if not of pleasure. I tried to shrink. The next day I found a ride up to the mountains and got out of their hair. I gave them some tea and cookies. I had to do something but I thought trying to offer money would be inappropriate if not insulting as the son had invited me.

Skiing was great. First day of downhill in some 7 years or so for me I think. All of the lifts are T-bars or worse. There is no parallel in the states so I will explain. It is an iron tow rope and you get a rope with a hook on one end and a wooden-dealy on the other. You put the hook on the rope and hold on to the wooden thing and away you go. There was a third lift that was sort of like a T-bar but with just a little circle for your crotch to squeeze. 3 lifts, 3 designs. All of them kinda crappy.

I got to spend the day zipping along with a doctor, who became my line-waiting conversation buddy. He is a traumatologist (because he likes screwing bones and stapling tissues) and makes US$ 100/mo. So he has to teach as well. Pretty amazing. He lamented the corruption but it seems pretty inevitable when people make so little. People have to pay to get extra attention or special treatment, not to mention the bribes the doctors themselves pay in med school. I figured a traumatologist might buck the trend of not wearing seat belts. I was wrong. "Ha ha! Of course not! It's my business and no one else's." Yeah, I guess. Despite the illiberal Big Brotherism of it all sometimes it seems wise to have Big Brother make society change self-destructive attitudes. About half of the time I half left the city on bad weather days I have seen a bad accident. You can bet that no one (not even kids) were wearing seat belts. Having dealt with the consequences of that "it's my business" attitude last summer, I don't much sympathize.

The people I got a ride with were Russians from Kazakhstan. They didn't have much interest in me. They didn't even play the what do you do where do you work, what are your plans game. So I guess I win by default. They did ask, "Why do all you [American, Europeans] come here anyway?" I wasn't sure whether not to be amused or offended. There was subtext to the question but I am not sure which it was. A couple of the more likely possibilities are "Only Russians should be in Central Asia" and "Why would anyone visit somewhere backwards and poor when you could go to Breckenridge?" I was really baffled by the use of "all you" which was repeated when I asked what they meant. Anyway, I asked "why not?" it seemed like the safest play.

The finally classic moment was the drunken man on the bus. The bus added 2 more hours of pleasure but cost 1.50 less. I will spare all the inglorious details of the gripe session but he was very talkative and very drunk. Aside from insisting I visit (in 10-20 years if not this time) he was very excited that I might buy him some Colgate toothpaste his aching tooth. Alcoholism is dumb.

It is hard to know when to be patient and when to be firm with people of infirm mental constitution.

I have to say that all the experiences were very unplanned and undiluted, which is the way things go, for better and for worse, when you go it alone.

One of the funny mentality things people seem to have over here (I experienced it in Russia too) is concern and moderate dismay when you reveal that you are traveling alone. Dependence can be more acceptable than independence but people also think it is dangerous. The second count I find ironic because people will speed past giant truck on narrow two lane roads in sleet, going around a bend (to the left), with a mountain obscuring their view of oncoming traffic, on the crest of a hill but seem to think their streets are filled with drunken serial killers.

I am trying to figure out the future, as always. Do old people spend as much of the last 23 years of their life looking back as I have spent looking forward? It seems very silly and I try not to overdo it. How much stability and how much change and flexibility do I need to create the most happiness? I don't know but fortunately many of my friends are groping similar questions. I take great comfort in the insecurity of a group while individual insecurity is very trying.

There is the grad school possibility. But I am not sure where that leads exactly. And there is the need to balance the challenge by choice of wilderness trips and the introspective potential of independent (abroad?) living with the richness of drawing on long term intimate relations with family and friends.

I think that the freedom of action presented to young bourgeoisie Americans presents both a source of inspirational potential and a terrifying burden. The burden is a moral obligation to all those whose circumstances in life are dictated to them to make the most of the tremendous opportunities afforded us to affect the world for the better.

If privileged young people will not, who will?

So we must choose to challenge ourselves. Because it is our choice, it is our responsibility.

It is like Spiderman's Uncle Ben said, "with great power comes great responsibility."

Good Signs from Sketchy Sources

Recent reports from Turkmenistan indicate that the new President may be a BIG improvement on the old regime. It is so early that it is untested and it could all just be to generate hype. There are now internet cafes open to the public. The cost at $4/hour is prohibitively high for a country where most people officially make $100/month. I say officially because I noticed that in Kyrgyzstan lying to tax authority is standard fair and collecting bribes is also. That makes the official economy the tip of the iceberg. I would count on the same being true in Turkmenistan. That said, people are not by any means well off.

Also he has started to free up the education system and promised some tweaks in the rest of the outrageously eccentric policies of his predicessor. He even made a commission to support human rights and uphold the constitutionally promised rights of Turkmenistan. I won't hold my breath for any explosive revelations. But hopefully, the reforms will keep on rolling.

That info comes from local printed press that is not online. It sited the AP but it must already be archived because it is not on the AP news wire anymore.

And Bush went to LA ostensibly not to counter Chavez, but he is too loud and dissonant to be ignored. I think Chavez is not right fundamentally, but neither are the United States and his outlandish criticisms push the US towards more responsive and responsible policies. It is too bad that the congress is now split from the White House. The Democratic party with its skitzophrenic save-the-underdeveloped-world hippy lobby and its don't-deal-with-the-underdeveloped-world labor lobby does not make for good legislative trade partners.

I would like to see the trade deals we hashed out with Peru, Columbia and Panama signed. This may be naive, but I think it gives Latin America an incentive to cooperate and put leverage on the US in the long run. I think that it will hurt as much as it helps in the short term. But if a few countries can get together and say "you guys are consistently being jerks with these common provisions, we want it changed or we are all pulling out" that will get US attention, especially after our industries have gotten used to exports dependent upon the treaties.

NYT Bush in LA Article

Here is a Russian joke:

Two guys are standing next to each other on the street.

First guy says, "how's it going?"

"aw, you know same as always, always a little different" the second guy says, "First everything was bad, bad, bad. But then things suddenly took a turn for the worst. But again now things are just bad, bad, bad."

I'll say this for the joke. It's very Russian. When I get home, I am going to watch a funny movie. A clever, ironic, intelligent and funny movie. But as long as I am here I will grimace and soldier on. The funny thing about fitting in here is that the world seems bleak and you feel generally estranged. And yet somehow I take great comfort in that.

Some links to thoughts

"The Must Do List"

The list outlines some of the stuff that gets to me, all in convenient list form. I think America's patriotism-identity is founded on an assumption that we are basically good. History of course shows that that assumption is not always safe (just look into Guatemala or Cuba for starters if you have doubts). But the current tactics by our government are pretty much evil. Remember when we were the good guys because the Soviet Union was documentably evil and even if we were not perfect, at least we better than that? That was nice.

It is an opinion article and some of the potential of the article maybe gets hampered in partisanship. One can let the accusation speak for itself without saying (and I paraphrase) "Bush has shown himself untrustworth of exectutive power let along MORE executive power." But when one set of partisans starts looking like apologists for evil, I'll be an apologist for slipping into partisanship.


"Darwin's God"

This is a long article that explores evolutionary explanations for why people (most all people, most everywhere) believe in God or stuff with God-attributes.


Happy wishes for you all and with good dashes of hardship to make the happiness happier.

Solitude and Internationalism

The Boys and I on Defenders of the Nation Day (Man's Day)

I apologize for not writing much about Kyrgyzstan or Central Asia. Being in one place for a few months it sort of blurs together. Corruption sucks, but I will probably end up assisting to it if it means I can get one of my students into tech school and thus set for employment and hope outside of hauling boxes at the bazaar. Teaching English is rewarding but in a slow way. The weather has lingered between winter and spring for the last two weeks, precluding any interesting trips.

I did have a “play defense for US policy/role in the world” conversation today. It is hard to explain why one always seems to end up on the defense. I think it is just to try and explain what the non-malevolent motivations are behind malevolent looking policies and postures. It is a good exercise because it helps me see other perspectives both when assessing my (or US) behavior and when assessing others. Anyway, one critique that is a little flat on the surface is that the US’s actions are “illegitimate” or “illegal” because under Bush we have acted unilaterally to a large degree. It is a little flat because internationalism is not so well established that one can say there is a set or laws that one must abide. There may be standards or norms but countries go to war, use economic leverage and bargain for their own advantage all the time. The US just looks worse for a couple of reasons 1) we are bigger and thus more effective at these self-interested tactics. 2) Other people, like Americans, expect more morality from the US than from other countries. But the critique is fundamentally correct, if perhaps naïve.
But I think that in the long run it is in the US’ interest to establish and follow through on international constraints on state behavior and encourage proto-international governance. Why? Because the US is almost certain to have less influence proportionally in the future than it does now. Thus we can shape the system that will constrain the action of future powers.

I’ve been thinking a lot about solitude lately. I have sort of an odd relationship with solitude. On the one hand, solitude makes me feel lonely and a little down. Not despairing and (thus not depressed) because I have never experienced the feeling down as though it would be unending. But sometimes I know that I would be overwhelmingly glad to see an friend from pre-Kyrgyzstan. Due to that feeling, I think I have cultivated a premium on friendships. It looks, and is, downright corny on the instances I let out of the bag. I get greater joy now out of all my relationships from it.

The sadness and modest frustrations have become an opportunity for growth. I almost feel the growth from loneliness or minor regrets (a word too many or few in a conversation and other social faux-pas). Once the modest suffering is perceived as constructive and instructive, it becomes very bearable to the point of being pleasureable. One can then focus not on the suffering but on the cause of the suffering and thus on a way to avoid or reduce it in the future.

Little pains and sufferings are a necessary part of life. But by learning from it and not feeling ourselves to be the victims or irredeemably guilty of it, the joys and light moments should out shine the adversities. Solitude and the change of pace that setting into a far-away routine provides amplifies the suffering and forces us to deal with it head on rather than procrastinate. Being with friends is not a coping mechanism but not having the luxury forces one to see the sources of discontent more clearly and resolve them from the inside-out. In the states it often seems that time to ones’ self is fleeting. Letting it linger for a longer term feels almost like a kind of long term meditation in that something which at home is always changing and demanding our attention becomes suspended.

Something can be gleaned from that, I think, which otherwise may remain illusive. I don’t know what it is, but I would liken it to a wilderness experience, time abroad or a really intense talk with an old friend. Somehow, things get a little clearer. It may not always be fun at the time, but one would not trade it for anything because it immediately becomes a part of one’s very composition.

Gaspin'

Gasp.
Gasp at the interval of not writing.
Gasp for the opportunity to air it out.
Gasp surprised.
Gasp with pleasure.
Gasp yea, verily.

You know when you are really busy for a while. And all the sudden your not and you sort of have to rub your eyes and look around to take in the sudden change in reality mentality. This is like that.

As long as I am out of breath, stupefied and astonished, might as well roll with it. I am astonished with what I’ve done since being here. I am humbled by how much more could and should have been done. And I am familiarly overwhelmed by the crossroads of time. Dang there is a lot of stuff that brings you to where-when you are and so many place-times possible.

The question of the day for me: Is all this Central Asia stuff going to lead to a concretely related future or will it provide a perspective on a relatively disjointed life? Is there a difference? Ow, my headheartsoul aches so good. Is there happiness here long-time stylie or just lots of interest? Won’t know until I find out I suppose.

I’d take great comfort in knowing that a good friend was on a parallel road in the region. But maybe that would push me away. I worry that an aspect to it is proving my specialness to myself and others by dabbling in the Exotic.

I aint special.

That’s reassuring.

I like honesty because it is terrible and beautiful. I think that the most precious things are like that and that they are precious because they are honest, real, and often expressions of humanity. A sunrise is not terrible and war is not beautiful. But in the most human of things it seems they exist together, complimenting each other, undermining each other and providing that attracting repulsive confusion. Like first love unattainable. It consumes us but fills us with insight into the universe.

On auspicious occasions one can sometimes chose to decide if a reality is beautiful or terrible, funny or sad. It may be both but it usually inspires more so in one direction than the other. Our attitude is influence, if not determination, of truth.

Fittingly, there is a downside to seeing both sides of things. The Hamlet complex: Too much smarts for action. Maybe that’s how we can let the Allpowerful Allknowing Allgood off the hook for alllllll the terrible suffering in the world. But that hardly seems perfect. Damned.

The last couple weeks I have been trying to direct my mind towards stillness, openness and observation and away from the din of savage conciousness. The wellness and stillness will come for a lightning moment on the mashrootka or cooking or watching people while I walk somewhere. But I can’t get it to stick around or comeback. It seems to never strike twice.

Climbing has been big for me lately. I am learning how to build anchors and rappel and getting better but all the accomplices are Anglophones. The linguist purist nags at me to keep my distance and my eyes on the prize but I don’t know what the prize is.

Maybe if I win I get a Fulbright.

Accolades. It’s probably accolades. I fucking love accolades.


Alright. So I want to start thinking about how to apply the crazy implications of physics to other parts of reality, less quantifiable but very real parts. Maybe all it does is allow one an excuse for irrationality. But I like to think that it allows one to make sense of some of the paradoxes that define our little life-boat. It came up in a couple topics of conversation over the last week. I want to make a disclaimer that I only talked about this silly-serious stuff four times in the last few weeks. I am not Mr. Serious Pants 24/7.

The first area that it surface in was the trouble with being an ideological liberal. Is it possible to be accepting of all ideas? Even ideas that do not accept a plurality of views? I cleave toward the following objectionable presupposition, any acceptable idea must respect the right of other ideas to exist. It is a paradox. It is even hypocritical. But if the fundamental building blocks of the universe can exist in two places at once, so too can the basis of logic. I think it would be better to leave it to a moral intellectual obligation to question the basis of a totalitarian ideology because persecuting it legally usually just gives it martyr status.

I hang out with my director and her sister here at the end of the day. I practice my Russian, have a glimmer of a social life and they are great. Her sister studies international relations in grad school now, so it was only a matter of time before the US’s role in the world came up. Being from the US, I rushed blindly to defend it. That’s is not exactly true, but it is funny how when you are a US citizen abroad you feel the need to point out the upsides to contrast all the negative impressions of the US. But even though no half-hearted student of history or current affairs could agree with everything the US has done, influenced, not done I think it is good to try and see both sides of the issue. It also reminds me to remember to see things from the other perspective. If you look at things from a Russian or Iranian perspective, they don’t seem crazy at all. Rather, we do.

Right so the US is sort of like particle physics and relativity. Here it is if you measure it one way. There it is if you measure it another. They are both necessarily interconnected but it is hard to see how one actor could have two such divergent behaviors. Look at corruption. On the one hand, Big Players, especially the US because it is the biggest and playing-est, tilt the field in their favor. Or more importantly, they tilt it against smaller poorer developing countries. That’s not fair. It is bad. Its like the Yankees without a salary cap. Everyone (should) hate the Yankees, right? The US engages in corruption and other underhanded, often violent, manipulations of other governments. If you don’t believe me pick up a book about Latin America since the Monroe Doctrine. I mean if you are willing to believe that the Russians, French and Chinese do it, why wouldn’t the US? Just because they are American. That’s not very capitalist-competitive. If the US is one thing, it is capitalist-competitive. No likes a bully. So from that perspective it seems like reform should come from the top-down and that the rich and powerful have a greater moral obligation to play fair.

But then here in Kyrgyzstan I see very little evidence day-to-day that the IMF is the root of all ills. Rather I see people bribe a police officer rather than pay an extra sixty cents. Every form of administration and justice seems to be on auction. I get Western-righteous. The WTO, the World Bank, the IMF and US-based MNCs are a sideshow. Coca-Cola’s got nothing on the illicit market here. People accept corruption as a fact of life. They use it when they can and then grumble about it when they don’t/can’t. The buck always stops at the next tier up. Everybody is a victim just trying to get by in a mean world. And because everyone believes it, it is true.

In such moments of Western-righteousness I say nuts to the Washington Consensus, find a way to make sure you can’t by a MD degree for US $500, reform things so that a 13 year old kid can’t buy his grade for math and pause a moment to consider what you justice system is going to look like when at least 70% of the students at Law School pay bribes. That’s just education.

But both the international hypocrisy and the local hypocrisy are true and should be addressed simultaneously. Neither is an excuse for the other. In physics quantum craziness explains some stuff. Relativity explains other phenomena. We understand both and true and neither as the final truth for all situations. So it is in the world of International Political Economy. The global and the local are mysteriously related, perhaps too complexly for us to ever grasp fully. But to help resolve these problems most successfully we need to work from both sides, Local and Global.

The Calm: Before, After and/or During the Storm

Life has a feeling of steady busy-ness and an unspectacular contentment about it for the time being. It is strange to realize that I will be out of Kyrgyzstan in only six short weeks. Right now, things feel very unremarkable. But there may be a couple reasons for that. I am already eagerly wading into planning my mountaineer trip for the summer (destination, unknown but remote; duration, between 30-45 days on trail). And after all the excitement and strain of setting into to Kyrgyzstan having a relatively comfy routine is quite unremarkable. This will definitely be a good time to store up thoughts and energy before the whirlwind that is spring and summer in the states.

Teaching at a snails paces adds to the mental molasses. The kids at Osh Bazaar mean well but it took us an hour and a half to review "this/that is" and learn posessive adjectives (my, your, his...). These things all translate directly into Kyrgyz so the tough going is a little odd to me. I keep telling myself that it will be more fun once we get a vocab base.

And languages... Kyrgyz is really funny right now because I can finally string some thoughts together. It always suprises me when my teacher understands. Unfortunately the magic is gone as soon as a walk out the door. I feel like a baby that needs my teacher to translate my gibberish into real Kyrgyz. The Russian is a little better but I also have more luck with those that know me well than new aquaintances.

A funny exception was at the funny bar a friend and I go to after playing football (soccer) on Fridays. The place is great because it was decorated by a schitzofrenic. One room is hunter themed, the next is mountaineering themed (and has a tacky fountain next to an even tackier fake fireplace). The piece-de-resistance of the joint is a room with a cieling tilework of toilet paper rolls. The walls have pictures of windows. One window looks out to the sea, the next onto the Sarangetti and the last onto a forest. A Russian fellow had just "broken up" with his girlfriend of five years. I up it in quotes because it often means they are in a fight. He was out on the town with his brother, the greco-roman wrestling champion of Central Asia. After a long conversation about how the heartbroken gentleman had just gotten back from a week in London ("After 3 days I had taken all the pictures, seen everything and was homesick") my thin friend challenged his brother (wrestling champion) to arm wrestling. Having had luck with usual alcoholics and scruffy kids that strike up conversations and arm wrestles in bars in the past, my friend's self-respect was utterly shattered. After graciously but firmly refusing to go "meet up with special prostitutes" I went home. But, now that we are best friends for life, I get 20% off at a local retail clothing store.

Consciousness and Determinism

I picked up “the universe in a single atom” by the Dalai Lama this weekend. Thanks to the Dad and Jane for mailing me books out here! I always get a lot from reading the Lama; his thoughts are nuanced but holistic and profound as well as humble. The book is an attempt to discuss the implications of science for spirituality, critiquing at times, but most often calling for acceptation, adaptation and reconciliation on the part religious schools. I hope that I have distorted his ideas in this entry.

I found one particular point of his regarding consciousness to be particularly cogent to me (he used the word ‘cogent,’ so I decided I can too). He noted that in Buddhist philosophy the “mind,” encompassing perceptive, rational and emotive consciousness, is “luminous and knowing.” Luminous refers to the ability to interpret and reflect and knowing meaning perceiving. The implication is described by a metaphor,

“As the primary feature of light is to illuminate, so consciousness is said to illuminated its objects. Just as in light there is no categorical distinction between the illumination and that which illuminates, so in consciousness there is no real difference between the process of knowing or cognition and that which knows or cognizes. In consciousness, as in light, there is a quality of illumination” (125).

The Lama goes on to assert that most Tibetan and Indian schools cannot reduce mental world to “a subset of the physical.” This is somewhat at odds with neurobiology, which has been pushing scientific understanding toward a more deterministic understanding of consciousness such that our biological and genetic predispositions combined with sensory inputs determine our feelings, responses and actions and by extension, our consciousness.

I think that the Lama’s analogy is revealing. Like the inseperability between space and time introduced by relativity consciousness and reality may indeed be inter-dependent. I believe The Lama errors however when he associates inter-dependence to indistinguishability and thus with no determinism. By introducing this credible issue of indistinguishability, The Dalai Lama casts doubt on the material basis of consciousness. Or at a minimum he suggests that consciousness is a two-way street such that both brain chemistry affects our conscious state and that our conscious state may affect our brain chemistry. I perhaps agree with the conclusion but I would alter the argument.

But to consider Buddhisms analogy of the objects and illumination, is it possible for the objects to conceivably exist without the illumination? Yes, they would still exist as essentially the same objects minus some characteristics that are incoherent in a universe without illumination. Could illumination exist without objects? No, illumination is differentiation of light and that requires matter. Therefore it is matter that is determines consciousness, though the existence of consciousness alters (though does not determine) the existence of matter.

The Lama admits aversion to the notion that the matter determines consciousness, because, I believe, it weakens the centrality of the main concerns of Buddhism: morality, alleviation of suffering and attainment of happiness and perhaps even whispers nihilism and the irrelevance of moral orders. I assert that while some ground may be lost to moral relativism, there is still plenty of room for consciousness to operate as a powerful affective agent of material reality, if not as a co-determinate.

There are a few concepts that may be fitting analogies/examples of this position. Before the Big Bang, at which time The Dalai Lama (informed by contemporary physicists) asserts that all matter and space-time existed as a singularity. The laws of physics that govern the universe after the Big Bang (and inform our understanding of it) break down at this singularity. Nevertheless, this linguistically incoherent state determined our contemporary spacio-temporal universe. In one sense they are continuous in that at no point is one moment-place divorced from the precedent and following moment-place. Yet over a broader perspective they are clearly distinguishable, in one state the laws of physics apply, in the other they do not. A similar distinction seems plausible pre- and post-consciousness. In fact, as consciousness changes it is conceivable that our universe undergoes change. It seems impossible but quantum physics shows that the measurement of a quality is often deterministic.

A person is more than the sum of body parts, so too may consciousness be more than the sum of the material inputs that compose it.

Basically I would put forward that, at least for now, there may be a middle way that allows consciousness to be fundamental determined by material reality but that allows for consciousness to significantly affect our perception material reality.

This has some basis in my experience and the experience friends have shared with me. My friend Ben describes how certain locations, New Mexico and Washington, have distinct (though sometimes overlapping) realities. When he is in either of these places he feels connected with that “loop” of reality consisting of the people, places and past he experiences in either NM or WA.

For me, traveling in the wilderness with friends allowed me to appreciate the relativity of space-and-time. Going far away without friends has given me some perspective on consciousness and the relationships that, for me, define it. Also, I like wilderness and world travel because they are interesting in their own right as well as revealing of different perspectives. The ideas are related but I don’t want to give the impression that I sit in Bishkek and ponder the nature of consciousness all day.

The upswing of all of this is that I think there is firm ground to say that consciousness affects reality. So it makes sense to be kind, compassionate and understanding as that may disperse positivity and enhance the interconnected reality we share for the better. So even if our consciousness originates from the material world, The Dalai Lama’s quest is not irrelevant.

A lurchy struggling entry

One nice thing about students is that they are generally self-selecting as long as the class is not mandatory and the expectations high enough. As a result I've managed to shed about a quarter of the class at Osh Bazaar. While the benefits for the socially marginalized out state diaspora children may be negligible, the effect on my job satisfaction is good. I may have even managed to scare off a whole class by asking for lump-sum payment for a month. My middle-class students did not show up today, perhaps due to the depressing weather but more likely intimidated by the commitment. That is okay, I only want commited students. This is hypocritical because I will only be here for two more months but, that's life.

I read/edited a disturbing piece by my grad-school friend here that qualitatively documents a serious problem in Kyrgyzstan today: corruption of education. Kids as young as grade school buy their grades. Many parents even encourage it, diluted that their only child/oldest child is God's gift to grade-school and therefore and fault must lie with the teacher (if you have to bribe them so be it, so long as sonny gets a '5'). Her work focused on the Medical Academy here. A survey revealed (performed by a professional organization) revealed that 59% of students have paid for grades. MED STUDENTS. My lexicon is not advanced enough to express my disbelief without four letter words and exclamation points.

There is a whole range of methods to do it ranging from phone calls from powerful relatives to utilizing students with buddy-buddy relationships with professors to flat up ballsy go into the office with some cash and buy a grade.

There are lots of layers to the problem, most of them reinforcing and typical of underdeveloped countries (according to the little academia I have familiarized myself with). First the teachers are over-worked with class hours loads several times that of their US/European counter-parts. The result is that teaching becomes rote, undynamic, uninspiring, and uninteresting. It would follow that anyone in a job with the precedant adjectives would take little pride in their work. And people are underpaid. So if Richie Rich wants to buy a 5 and I can afford a non-Soviet TV, why not?

The students may be overworked too... they have to take stupid classes in Med School like Bibliography, sociology and foreign language. Making people with very specific professional goals study very tangential subjects is a recipe for justification of cheating and grade-buying.

I think the main problem, however, lies in the students. The ability to pay for grades generally benefits the students most of all. They are able to finesse the $/free-time ratio and still get the comfortable life-style persumably earned by rigorous study and excellent talent associated with doctors. But they complain how the professors are corrupt while they pay the bribes. In otherwords their is no ownership of responsibility for the problem. This is a general problem here (and everywhere). People complain about the corruption but when it comes down to waiting in line for a week or paying the bribe, most people pay the bribe.

After an hour of no progress in a line that seemed to have neither beginning or end, I would probably pay the $5 too. There are degrees of evil when it comes to corruption and I think that buying anatomy grades as a med-student is somewhere between cutting in line at the DMV and assisting a heroine trafficker.

I guess the point is that watching great chunks of decent people let engage in tacit support for corruption has refueled that self-righteous fire of self-accountability. So next time I get irritated about global waming (see NYT article 1 and NYT article 2, if the NYT is too leftist for you I've gone some old fashioned British libertarians at the Economist too), I get angry about world povery or US foreign poilicy, I am going to do a little something to change my own consumption patterns.

Then by all means, write I plan to write my congressmen.

Dealing with Reality: Foreign Policy, Climate Chage and My Semi-literate Cherubs

Foreign Policy

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=3660

This is an article, I found to be really revealing about the relationship between psychology and international policy. It argues that we prefer to interpret evidense that confirms our assumptions, that we expect our plans to work without problems (inflated expectations) and that we abhor certain loss, even if continuing statistically indicates the likelihood of even greater future loss (ever played blackjack?). The arguments have broad applications to Iraq, North Korea and Iran. I think that particularly in Iran's case a poor understanding of Iranian history hinders our ability to act rationally and instead leads us to over-deamonize the regime (even if Tehran is worthy contempt it may also be worthy of understanding).

Iraq will have to bleed painfully and will likely pull the region into aggression if not oughtright conventional military conflict before an eventual "that will have to do" peace can be reached in the post-Yugoslavian style. US military and economic forces should be commited to salvaging a battle that can be won in Afghanistan. Stability there has much deeper implications on many fronts than casual obeservers grasp. It would offer Central Asia a South Asian alternative to Chinese and Russian economic and political dominance. By offering the region's regimes option aside from being dependent on Moscow and/or Beijing one offers the option to engage the global community on an even footing. This encourages elites to invest in their countries, rather than plunder them. Once that happens the moderation and stabilization of behavior is furtile soil for the democratic reform and accountability that tends to marginalize destabilizing actors like Islamist. If the situation continues to deteriorate however, people may feel they have nothing to lose and much to gain by revolutionary upheavals.

The obsession with trying to salvage the unsalvagable (in that we are unwilling to make the sacrifices necessary to salvage it, like a draft) in Iraq, if allowed to continue, will silently but surely lead to disaster in Afghanistan. Iran looks aggressive today, imagine what it will be like surrounded by civil war in Afghanistan as well as Iraq. It will have every reason to be radical and aggressive in the face of potential destruction.

Contain Iraq (cut our losses as intelligently as possible) and don't lose Afghanistan. And press for resonable and achievable reforms among allies and foes alike. Turkmenistan will not wake up tomorrow with a feverish case of anglophilia and outbreaks of organized political parties, women's rights groups and a parliament. While it is an admirable tendency of US foreign policy to demand a degree of morality, we must base our policy on reality, not how we wish things were. You don't convince people that traditions like wearing a burqa should be stopped by attacking beliefs. Attacking beliefs (even with the best of intentions) only alienates.


Climate Change

I think one can see parallel biases in the discussion on climate change. I believe history will show that once again we should have been proactive rather than reactive on the issue. For my part, I don't think it is possible to be too green when one takes into account not only the damage done to the environment but also the political and economic risks we subject ourselves to by guzzle gas by the SUV-full. I also believe that properly explained in terms of externalities and infrastructure even hard-core individualist libretarians would reconsider their philosophically coherent stance. How many of such type advocate for the elimination of government funded road construction or a national army? Some problems are critical and require collective action.


My Semi-literate Cherubs

Things at the Alpine Fund are well. Lots of English classes.

The kids I teach at CPC (Center for the Protection of Children) near Osh Bazaar span a wider range of literacy than I expected. Some take about a minute to write a word. I always knew that illiteracy existed but it existed in the abstract. I am sure that some of the folks I met in Bolivia or Peru were illiterate. But I assumed that the illiterate people I met were the 60 year olds selling handmade tapestries and fruit outside various tourist destinations. The abstraction came to an abrupt end Tuesday. I was trying to teach the kids the alphabet and even after taking painfully long to copy much of the information, many didn't copy it coherently. It is sad but also funny watching a kid start to write 'A a apple' and so froth on the correct upper left portion of the first page his new notebook but by 'M m moon' be writing about an into the backside of the coverpage.

I just kept going. I dont have the Kyrgyz language skills to teach how to take notes. So, in a personal attempt to rectify ambition in the desire to wrought the world in my own image I have revised my expectations (and my plans accordingly). Rather than covering the simple present, present continuous and simple past, we will just go as far as we go. If some of the brighter students with more home support are able to use their English to keep studying with future volunteers, that is great. If the more average of the group enjoy learning and decide they want to do more of it (or for their kids someday to do more of it) then that is great. If some of the kids with much bigger problems in their lives than learning the latin alphabet feel that the world isn't always a mean place that tries to push you down, that will be great too. By these new standards freshly grounded in a new appreciation for reality and complete with new strategies for success along these lines, I hope to succeed.

Going Global

The Alpine Fund will be launched a 'my space' account this week. I am not necessarily pro-my space and the hyper-democratization of information in general but reality bytes these days, eh?

Hopefully we'll be able to use it to keep in touch with virtual people. Also, Ulan can learn about fiddlin' with his virtual self by checking out the AF myspace and then maybe making his own. Networking, Networking or just notworking? He will have to decide.

We sent out a big ol' email to all the widji folk asking them to forward a volunteering add to their outdoor programs. We have already had responses but so far only from people looking to come for a summer. That is all well and good but our institutional life revolves and kids and kids revolve around school.

Speaking of whom, the kids from CPC - Osh Bazaar are great. They are loud and energetic in a not shy way but still basically attentive. Not bad for a gaggle 15 of 12-13 year olds in a small room. Thus far we have no chalk, white or paper board. Hopefully we will remedy that soon. They speak almost exclusively Kyrgyz which is also a bonus for me because I need practice.

This last weekend we took some kids from CPC - Dordoi Bazaar (where our students Ulan, Adilet and Kuruchbek live) skiing for a day. We trundled on up there saturday. I spent the day snow ball fighting truant skiers and being wet.

I don't know about everywhere else in the world, but Central Asia is having another in a series of "abnormally hot" years. Maybe we should call them "years formerly known and abnormally hot." Bush is going to unleash an energy proposal. I can't wait to see how much he offers to pay energy companies that already are making record profits to seek new avenues of energy production. Nothing short of illiberal regulation will suffice I am affraid. The reason being that their are too many negative externalities in energy consumption for incentives to individual actors to work. The incentive for better environmental behavior lies with the whole, not the individual. That is why it requires models not based on self-interest. Judging by his most recent attempts to fix health care by further atomitizing the consumer and providing "tax incentives" for insurance this is not likely. As if the fault in America's health care system lay with workers scamming insurance companies into underpriced plans or unemployed persons requiring tax incentives for health insurance. Being un-insured or underinsured is terrifying. There is your demand incentive. Where is the supply incentive to provide coverage to those with pre-existing conditions or high risk groups?

But, it is much better than anything most of the world has, so we can be happy about that. In kyrgyzstan there is no coverage. But then oral surgery costs about $20 bucks. The question is then, do you want oral surgery at $20?

I just taught the first paying english class at the Fund. We are charging $1.30 for a one and a half hour class. Basically this will cover the costs of other classes and hopefully provide some access to the middle class. It is definitely a steal as normal class is 1.30 for an hour and that is not with a native speaker. Their mother sat through the class. Which was alright for me this time but that is about it. She kept interrupting to say that they already knew this or that and to prompt the students on the correct response.

I have been reading Dostoevsky lately. He is an interesting author to read because he is very much concerned with questions of the relationship between man and God, the purpose of suffering, and the tension in humans between good and desire. He also writes about all this stuff from an illiberal perspective. A lot of his criticism have yet to be properly answered from the liberal side. Take for example the problem that without God, "everything is permitted." That is to say that without some absolutist standards for judging moral behavior, how can one not slip into absolute relativism? This criticism has been well dealt with by individual philosophers that have formed coherent codes of ethics and morality without a deity at the center, however the problem is that none of these worldviews has the cohesive power of a religion. The coherence of one atheist simply becomes one man's noble efforts in the relativists' soup. Until the secular West has reconsiled its secular nature with some coherent system of judging right from wrong and demanding virtuous behavior, it will always be (rightfully) the object of absolutist criticism. What has US - and indeed Western - foreign policy been driven by if not simple material benefit? It has also been motivated by existential threats like the Soviet Union or Nazi Germany. In those situations foreign policy can be seen as virutous because the struggle for existence is viewed as a self-justifying end. But once existence is secure, the motivations are essentially greedy. That greedyness and consumerism has been the basis for all the major challenges to liberal hegemony be it from Fascism, Communism or Islamism.

I don't think there are any easy answers there. Most sorts of moral values justify the social context they came from; to project them onto others would be pompous. Such an value would have to be self-justifying. Perhaps environmentalism presents us with the greatest opportunity to unite behind a problem that may indeed be existential but need not be aggressive. The sorts of solutions that facing this challenge would require are likely to be inherently illiberal and allow us an opportunity for introspection and self-criticism without "proving terrorists right" or "being an apologist."

Speaking of terrorism, someone just through a snowball at my window and broke it. Scared the bajeezus out of me.

More shenangans and a coming change of scene

Last weekend we mounted another noble effort to teach kids how to ski. I already wrote all about it for the Alpine Fund blog. It should be posted by 8a CST, Tuesday.

Other than that, I will just lamely say that I am staying plenty busy with studying and teaching. We are taking a local English student up on her offer to teach class. We are going to put most of the current students together in one class to be taught by her. I am a little worried they won't take to it too well because her English is not great. Of course, she was nervous speaking to a native speaker for perhaps the first time. So we'll see how it goes.

I will shuttling off to Osh bazaar for sessions there. I will teach kids from the CPC (Center for the Protection of Children). These kids are mostly not orphans. Their families typically come from out-state more impoverished rural areas to work in the bazaar. The kids get caught because they need to work some to help their family get by but cannot work full time. Often they cannot affort to go to school ($5 for supplies for a year and a decent set of clothes) so they end up just sort of... well, marginalized if I might borrow an over-used term from anthropology/sociology. One could also say, screwed. When the kids work they load and unload trucks all day and/or haul heavy carts all through the crowded bazaar. Human Rights bruised by life's demands once again. What is an idealist to do?

CPC started out giving the kids hot meals. Then it started doing a little more and a little more. Now they have a school and from what I gather also function as a sort of community center (but no pool).

There is also a CPC enclave at the dordoi bazaar where many of our students live. I have had great experiences working with those kids so I have high hopes. When more volunteers come in the next few weeks (one next week, one within two weeks of that) we hope to start Proselytizing those masses to polyglutonny as well.

Ulan is now going to school. We also hired him to work 20/hours a week. He will make $50/month. This is good money. Adilet will take his place as the office intern. Hopefully it will give him some impetus to pick up the pace with the English. I think it goes a little deeper than that though.

Kids here really do not seem to learn how to study. So I am once again thankful for something I had no real means of accurately perceiving before: a good social and family framework for academic success.

I saw an add my USAID condemning corruption and reminding Kyrgyz citizens that they will go to jail if they get busted. I guess reminding a country they it is far down by world standards for corruption could fuels some beneficial national pride. It would probably be better not to put the USAID emblem on it though as it may be seen as condescending and meddlesome. (I think they are right, the US has a lot of introspection to do before we can start preaching like that again. Our city on the hill looks more like an Ivory fortress from here.)

USAID is alright but it wants to fix deep rooted problems with "business incubators," democracy seminars and TV adds. In other words, it wants a shiny solution to gloss over a negative feedback cycles of poor governance, unaccountability and instability. The US government likes to fund HUGE projects. That is all well and good but a lot of times they are pretty out of touch. It is sort of nice irony because that is what the USSR's infrastructure construction could be like. A lot of "volunteers" come over as missionaries. I am heavily biased but I think there is a strong undercurrent of ego-centrism (with the best of intentions) when people do good so that others will believe as they believe, thur reassuring the first believer that they must have been right in the first place. Terrible sentence for a complicated problem. Anyway, I find the attitude among that crowd to often be narrow-sighted and judgmental of local practices. The whole "The religion that I have been brought up to confirm for my entire life is right because it says I am right" dynamic is really intense when the proselytizer is removed from his or her cultural context.

There are a lot of religious folks and organizations that do really good work without trying to make everyone Baptist, Lutheran or Muslim also. Way to live the dream.

Yes, it is true, I judge people for being judgmental. But you better not judge me for it or you will just prove I am right.

Love to you all.

The Day We Tried to Buy a Car

Today we tried to buy a car. We made headway, the car is now 400 meters from where I write and we are agreed as to price and payment. Documentation is now the hang up. What a hang up. Documentation would not be a hang up except that we wanted it to be legal. I am actually the one that probably made it so. The other parties were oscillating. I thought that we should have every thing be legal on our end so that if the Norwegian government wants to see what we did with their money before they give us another grant, we can show them. I also thought that it could be useful for not committing a felony by US federal law (A 2003 law makes it illegal for US organizations to dupe foreign governments. Actually, it might only apply to bribes… but still). The negotiated price was 6,600. So we wanted a receipt for 6,600. They wanted to give a receipt for like 50 dollars. The car had been imported for around “50 dollars” this way they would not have pay 8% tax. Also we would have to pay a 5% registration tax for the value of the car.

From their point of view, it is simply win-win. All parties make avoid wasting money on the corrupt government. All parties get what they want. They were more frustrated and sad by our unwillingness to help ourselves than angry. They tried to get us to go for the 50 dollar solution literally 30 times. They had the time to do so because we waited around all day for some mysterious boss (of the import place where we needed paperwork from) to show up. He showed up while we were eating a late breakfast lunch at 2:30. Naturally he was not keep on loosing $500 of profit. Also it is apparently impossible to change the import value once it has been documented.

It all ended with us at the registration department. There some guy helped us come up with the plan that we would have the seller “buy” the car from the import company (he never registered it) and then we would buy it from him for 6,600. But we cannot get a receipt for this sale I think. So, it is all a shit show and all the frustration apparently is for not. It will all be technically legal though (I don’t get hung up on being technically legal in my personal life but running/working for an organization is not a place for one’s personal morality to loom over the law). If the Norwegians ask about their money our president will just explain or make excuses. The car will be registered in our director’s name in case we get audited.

It is frustrating that the whole system is basically set up to dysfunction. It was all backwards. At every step it resulted in more trouble and money to do things legally than illegally. It is because everything here can be bought and people regard paying taxes as basically being extorted. It is frustrating to be a part of the problem and not the solution. It is also part of a bigger problem for the Alpine Fund as an NGO. Bigger consistent donors want us to open our books and have receipts for everything. But no one but the most expensive (and often foreign owned) establishments give receipts and NGO are taxed here just like everyone else. The whole financial basis of the organization is actually illegal because we use an ATM to access our money from a foreign account or something to avoid paying 8% on every bit of money we take out. Our director claims we just play with the kids and that the crazy foreigners just pay for everything out of pocket. Basically we claim that we all but do nothing.

Then we arrive at the catch-22, the NGO cannot grow to meet its potential because the bigger donors want documentation before they give. We cannot give documentation because we are too small and need every last penny to stay afloat.

It all works out in the end but it often surprising how we get their.

Television in Kyrgyzstan

Kyrgyz Television

Since moving into my new one-man apartment, I have had so much too much time to learn about television in Kyrgyzstan. Despite the fact that Kyrgyz is lauded by linguists as being the purest of the Turkic tongues, Kyrgyzstan has been less zealous about language purity than other Central Asian nations. On the upside, this means that Kyrgyzstan has maintained some degree of Russian language schooling which helps to prevent isolationism. On the down side, Kyrgyzstan gets much of it’s news, information and popular culture filtered through Russian sources. Russian mass media is very much and ever increasingly dominated by the Kremlin.

Russian TV consists of 3 or 4 stations, none of them independently owned, and MTV Russia. When I turn on the tube, I am usually in search of a plot driven action movie. It is the best way to passively learn language that I can stomach (the only thing better is soap operas or talk shows for colloquialisms). Actually the “poppier” a media product is, the better a language tool it usually makes. Pop products are simple, catchy, unintelligent. This brings the comprehension threshold down to reasonable levels.

I tend to avoid MTV in the states as if it were contagious. Russian MTV has all of the characteristics of American MTV that I despise in spades. Its only redeeming quality is that it actually plays music videos. This is made up for by the fact that it only plays hip-pop and rap videos of the lowest caliber. It is easy to miss the glaring artistic deficiencies in the product when it is so thoroughly smothered in sex.

Here I have to digress for just a moment and admit my many biases and allow for some culturally differences. First the differences, Russians have a different take on feminine beauty than the West. Basically, few Russian women criticize the objectification of women. Many would appear to embrace it. Some attribute this to the Soviet system that officially promoted the “liberation” of women by demanding they both work and take the lioness’ share of the burden of caring for a family. Some might say it is because of the instability follows the Soviet collapse that women are all too happy to trade feminist ideals for the stability of traditional roles. Some would say otherwise. Whatever the reason, women are hyper-feminized relative to Western Europe and the States. On Russian TV stations scantily clothes attractive young girls sing songs and dance seductively. These shows are on most all of the time. What surprised me most was not their existence but their outstanding acceptance and even popularity. In Russian and here in Kyrgyzstan men and women, young and old have asked how I enjoy the “spectacles.” The question is not only free of the bitter irony that would dripping from such a question if anyone I knew from home were to make a similar inquiry but is actually almost rhetorical. It usually seems to be granted that I am naturally blown away by the artistic brilliance of large breasts and a fit butt waxing and waning to a drum machine’s beat while computer generated sounds accompany the vocalist. A computer program could write a program to write the sounds. Just take a music theory 100 class and make the computer match the chords to the drum machine’s beat.

Before I got carried away, I was trying to say that the standard of beauty vs. sexy is different as is the value of musical complexity. These spectacles, instead of being popular only among boys/young men and hyper-hormonal youngsters of both sexes, are embraced with pride by many people of many backgrounds (even Soviet university professors).

I’ll take what ever is behind Door number 2: Baseless feelings of intellectual and moral superiority! YESSSSSSS.

Just as I was getting comfortable in my one man apartment with ivory trimming, who should appear before me in Russian MTV form but Jeffery Sachs, Columbia Economist, author and general thought provoker. With him, his Lovely Assistant Angelina Joleigh to tour Africa and chat about transactions costs and other obstacles to development on a journey that has the heart warming and wrenching in turns. And here I am, in Bishkek, watching a minor lesson in development economics with African examples on MTV, but in Russian, in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.

The utility of celebrities in promoting responsible, sustainable and realistic policies is… tricky. But, I can confidently say that without Angelina (UN Ambassador of Goodwill) the message would not have made its way to where-ever Soviet TV sets are being quickly replaced by vastly superior imports. If we have to build a new pantheon of celebrities of sports and screen to link our increasingly atomized selves to a larger conceptual community, we might as well have them use their powers for some human empathy. The vanity of our divinities can wear thin after a while.

So not all hope was lost. The show ended and what followed was another episode of the same series. This time “Diaries” documented the ascent of The Pussycat Dolls to fame and fortune. Reassuringly disgusted once again, I renewed my search for that elusive plot driven action movie. On Russia’s official state TV network aired a show about a crime fighting German Shepard and his human partners. On the other channel I found another episode of some Russian show that features Russian secret agents, disguised as Arabs, taking names and kicking “Wahhabist” butt in the Middle East. So, yes, these is a Russian equivalent to Team America… only they take it seriously. I was not sure whether to laugh or cry. I always try to laugh.

Despair, sweet hilarious despair.

New Years in Bishkek, Predictions for 2007

New Years in Bishkek is a pretty big deal. There are costumes, Old Man Winter and a full supporting cast and fireworks. Lots and lots of fireworks. Television showed many a Russian spectacle. Kyrgyz TV rang in the New Year in proper public access fashion. Funding for Kyrgyzstan's television channel must be pretty grim.

For the New Year, I moved into a new place. Living by myself has given me more time to read, study and write as well as more space to move around in. I am sure that eating meals solo will get old before it gets fun but I am enjoying it for now. The one-roomer has a huge main room plus a bathroom and kitchen. Newly remodeled in the southern hub of the city for only $150/mo. I also trimmed my beard.

I am trying to figure out how I will use the skills I have so far tried to accumulate. Assuming I learn some languages, have a good grasp on expedition leadership and a little emergency medicine, where do I go from there? As my time in Bishkek is almost half-way up, I also see my time "experimenting" and trying to "see how I like it" as coming to a close too. That is all subjective (many amazing 30 year olds do not know what they want to do with their lives and have already done so much), but I nevertheless want to have a more well articulated purpose to work towards. Ideas abound but the implications in terms of time, dedication and relationships with friends and family scare me. Everything worth doing seems too terrible and anything where happiness seems assure also appears uninteresting (which would undermine the original happiness). So I will ask anyone over 40 who is reading thin, does all of life seem like a rapid succession of destiny transforming cross-roads or is this mostly a hullucination of the 20-30 year phase?

I wrote a few predictions for the year(s) to come. I have never done it before and I think it will be fun to see how I am doing in a year.

I think 2007 will be a year for moderation of US policy having over-stretched ourselves of late. Because of a necessarily more hesitant US, the rest of the world will have at it. Russia, haveing held itself together and steadily rebuilt some semblence of internal order, will reassert itself as a as a regional hegemon, built upon gas. Russian nationalism, however, will begin to look skeptically at flashy Moscow. The provinces will demand their dues (which the kremlin/oligarchs will be uninterested in providing), stoking the flames of the ancient Moscow-periphery divide.

Things in Somalia will get nasty as Islamists, though removed from power, find more subtle ways of raising money and waging war. Look for a repeat of every other attempt to crush a rebellion whose main grievence is being crushed.

The EU will continue muddling its way towards governance and look inward, rather than outward for direction. A disillusioned Turkey will move towards Islam, but a conflict with the PKK /Northern Iraq in the East will keep the secular nationalist heart beating strong.

In Iraq all hell will break loose, faster and more hellishly than expected. The breakpoint will be Turkey's intervention into Northern Iraq in the Spring. This will discredit the central government's ability to govern to such an extent that all observers and parties will be forced to admit civil war. For anything to become governable to the Sunnis will have to sort out their secularist pan-Arabian/Revolutionary Sunni Islam identity issues. Eventually (certainly not in 2007), some kind of a three entity solution will come forward. As there are geographic consistencies to ethnic distributions, a partician will come out of it. Bagedad will be Shia after a Sarajevo-like phase.

China will face more riots and structural constraints on its harmonious ascent. China's gilded age will be recognized as such as the CCP starts to lose more control over what happens in the country. Barring a huge foreign policy crisis, however, China will continue to grow. Human rights abuses in Xinjiang will become more widely known after the release of Kite Runner's film version (to be filmed in Western China's Xinjiang province).

2007 will be a clutch year for Kyrgyzstan as it tries to sort out all of the implications of the new constitution. There is a contest for power a foot. I think political Islam will become more popular, especially in the South now that a Southern Kyrgyz has been in office and failed to deliver anything but graft. North-South elites will continue to bicker over the government while frustration builds among the people.

In Latin America things will generally get better and better, more and more stable politically. However, the inequity of NAFTA and CAFTA will become more apparent. People will be howling about in year within 5 years the US will be forced to substantially change its stance on farm subsidies or undo the trade regime it built.

Globally, there will be greater consensus and more concerted action on global warming.

I do not know anything about anywhere in Africa and I will not pretend to. (Somalia fits in with the cycle of Islamist revolution from Iran to Algeria of the 20th century).

Through the course of my life-time I think that issues like global trade, global warming and reform at the UN will start to form the proto-type for a regime that regulates the interaction of states in a manner similar to how a state regulates the interactions of actors within a given country. Realism is a fact of life, however, over the long run it is the best interests of the powerful to create a system that stabilizes and justifies the status quo. In order to do so, however discretion and atonomy will be given up. The US will be more keen on this project in a year or so, surveying a messy and expensive result of unilateralism. The appearance of chaos usually underlines the need for order. Order implies restraint, which in turn puts a premium on the freedom of disorder. We will move into an ordering phase by the time another president is sworn in.

Happy 2007!