Touchdown: Almaty

Plane journeys in Central Asia are always sociable affairs: perhaps it is the fear of impending doom that draws the passengers together. That said, today's flight was, from a safety perspective at least, unremarkable. No one (not even the airhostesses) was smoking in the toilets and, as far as I could see and hear, no part of the plane fell off and on to the runway during takeoff. I would like to say this is indicative of the regional airlines' progress in matters of safety and customer service but, sadly, that would be an exaggeration. Air Astana remains the only Central Asian airline with a sufficient safety record to be allowed to fly in European airspace, and this monopoly is unlikely to be broken anytime soon.
I have travelled to Kazakhstan many times over the last few years but, bar one too-brief visit, I'm yet to explore the nation's economic and cultural capital as I would like. The city is, more often than not, imply somewhere to change planes en-route to somewhere more remote; such hasty visits cannot do it justice.
What strikes you first about Almaty is its superb location. Soaring, snow-capped peaks hold the city in their embrace; even as I write in late August the snow and ice continue to glisten, sparkling in the warm, bright sunshine.
Situated on the historic Silk Road, close to the borders of modern-day China, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, Almaty is inevitably a cultural melting pot and a trading and transport hub. Whilst the USSR held sway across the region, Almaty was the perfect site for a regional capital and thrived; after independence, however, proximity to other countries (especially China) was feared to be a double-edged sword and the government shifted north to the new city of Astana.
The political exodus has, fortunately, done little to harm Almaty's vibrancy. Many companies, embassies and educational institutions continue to have their headquarters there, and the temperate climate makes it a more pleasant place to live and work.

Sustainable tourism in C. Asia

If you are unable to pick out Kyrgyzstan on a map, do not fear: you are not alone. With a population of little over 5 million, this Soviet Union successor state sits quietly nestled between China, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan and, with the exception of its charmingly named ‘Tulip Revolution’ in 2005, has barely made a mark on the western media. The country is largely rural and, until recently, tourists to the region have generally bypassed Kyrgyzstan in favour of package tours to the great Silk Road cities of Khiva, Bukhara and Samarkhand in neighbouring Uzbekistan. Kyrgyzstan cannot compete for architectural splendour, but is slowly fighting back, giving foreigners the opportunity to share in its stunning natural environment and nomadic culture through living, socialising and travelling with the people of Kyrgyzstan. Through this community-based approach, Kyrgyzstan has begun to make its mark as the world leader in sustainable tourism.

The largest ethnic group in Kyrgyzstan are the Kyrgyz, a Turkic people that make up around 70% of the population. They are traditionally semi-nomadic herders, living in yurts (felt and animal skin tents built around a wooden frame) in the mountain pastures during the summer and then bringing down their sheep, yaks and horses to escape the snows at the end of September. When the yurts are in the summer pastures, you can travel from one to the next, staying with local families and using their horses. The Community Based Tourism organisation (CBT) has a network of local guides across the country to help you find your chosen homestay in the seemingly endless mountains, take you trekking and show you the very heart of Kyrgyzstan. They are not professionals in the tourism industry but usually farmers and herders in neighbouring areas, sharing their personal experience without any of the crass commercialism of tour buses, action-packed itineraries and the rest of the West crammed in beside you.

The highlights of Kyrgyzstan have to be the lakes of Issyk-Kul and Karakol, surrounded on all sides by the soaring peaks of the Ala-Too Mountains. Despite its elevation, Issyk-Kul never freezes; it is heated from below by volcanic activity. The warm water has enabled a number of sanatoria with thermal springs and mud baths to develop on the northern shore, but the real attraction in both areas undoubtedly remains the natural landscape. Whether you explore it by horse or on foot with a guide and porters, it is easy to see why this part of the world was so little known until the arrival of Russian explorers partaking in the Great Game.

Kyrgyzstan’s greatest draw is that in a world where the greatest sites are so often spoiled by the presence of too many people, well meaning or otherwise, you can still leave the capital, Bishkek, and enter into a natural environment of awe-inspiring proportions that is still completely untouched by mankind. The few people you encounter, with their temporary shelters, mobile flocks and four-legged transport leave no mark on the landscape when they move on, and so if the country’s tourists were to be any different, it would be nothing but destructive. Kyrgyzstan has, it seems, got the balance right, bringing in much needed tourist dollars and projecting an overwhelmingly positive image to the international community without falling for model of tourism that blights so many other developing countries.

Darjeeling (un)Limited

My apologies in advance for the erratic layout of this post - I am in Dubai and so blogspot has auto-set to an Arabic language version, including setting all my lines and some of the punctuation as if I were writing right to left!

 If you saw Wes Anderson’s film The Darjeeling Ltd. and thought you might like to recreate the adventure, start well before the plot begins and take a pilgrimage to Glenburn. It was whilst staying on this, the most magical of tea estates, that Anderson conceived the idea for the film. Quite frankly, he could hardly have been anything but inspired.

Some 600km from Kolkata and an hour or so from Darjeeling town, the Glenburn Tea Estate clings to the foothills of the Himalayas, bordering the kingdom of Sikkim. Kanchenjunga, the world’s 3^rd highest mountain, dominates the horizon and two rivers, the Rungeet and the Rung Dung, entwine themselves as they run through valleys not out of place in a Tolkien novel. Overlooking it all is the Burra Bungalow, Glenburn’s boutique hotel and former home of the estate manager, your host Sanjay Sharma.

Other than the spectacular natural environment, there are two things that set Glenburn apart from other places to stay in Darjeeling or, indeed, elsewhere in the world. Firstly, you will never be crowded by other people. There are just four rooms in the Burra Bungalow and another four are due to open later this year. The result of this is that it simply doesn’t feel like a hotel; you are a guest in a home, welcome to roam around the estate all day and then return for drinks, dinner and lively conversation around the giant dining table once darkness falls. Next, the attention to detail of Glenburn’s staff (who outnumber guests five to one) is second to none. Freshly prepared picnics, afternoon tea and fresh juice appear from nowhere across the estate whether you are trekking the 2 hours down to the river or merely mooching in the garden. The food, ingredients for which are grown organically on the estate wherever possible, is exquisite and guests are treated to both Nepali and Naga dishes as well as international cuisine. The homemade breads and chocolate brownies slip down a treat.

Lest you think that Glenburn exists to provide a tourist paradise, you need to think again. Huge energy is undoubtedly put in to making the Glenburn experience perfect for visitors but the fact remains that the estate’s principal business is tea. The estate comprises 1600 acres of tea and jungle and employs around 900 people in tea production. A population of 4700 people is supported by the estate, which clothes and feeds them as well as providing health care and education. The estate’s management take responsibility for local development and if you’re interested will share every aspect of their work with you, from factory tours and tea tastings to school and hospital visits. Glenburn offers you an unrivalled opportunity to retreat from the rest of the world but also the chance to understand and engage with the community that works and lives on the estate.

Kolkata Crumbles

Kolkata grew from a small-time port in the 17^th century into the capital of British India, a little piece of London on the edge of the subcontinent. The city’s architecture was a physical manifestation of the power of the British Empire, designed to demand respect from those who saw it and also to remind them that sovereignty came from England alone. Sixty years after independence, the historic sites of this erstwhile capital are crumbling away. Once magnificent buildings are decaying from negligence, lack of funds, ownership disputes and uncontrolled squatting.

The Currency Building on Dalhousie Square, the heart of colonial Kolkata, bears a sign proclaiming proudly that it is a heritage building, protected by the law and the Archaeological Survey of India. The sign, however, is the only thing intact in the place. Wrought iron work pillars are skewed and missing, the building propped up instead by semi-permanent scaffolding. Plaster work and stone facings have fallen away to reveal the untreated brick, shutters swing from their hinges and pigeons fly in and out of the windows. If the site were ever scheduled for demolition a bulldozer would not be required; a strong sneeze would probably suffice.

The Currency Building’s situation epitomises the problems faced by historic buildings under government control in India. Listed status may well help protect against fly posting and vandalism and provide an injunction against demolition proposals, but if the funds and initiatives are not there to stop the building collapsing of its own accord, what real benefit is there in being listed? If nature is left to take its course, Kolkata will lose her past entirely and be left with nothing but an overcrowded, characterless and dirty concrete jungle.

The solution to the problem seems to lie in private-public partnerships. Just one block away from Dalhousie Square is St. John’s Church, a relic of the late 18^th century and one of the oldest buildings still standing in central Kolkata. In 2004 the World Monuments’ Fund listed St. John’s as one of the world’s 100 most endangered sites, prompting American Express to come to the church’s rescue with money for its restoration. The work was finally finished in 2007 and today the tower, clock and columns of St. Johns stand secure and freshly painted, a tribute to Kolkata’s past.

Phantoms of the Opera

The neo-classical façade of Bishkek’s ballet and opera house looks a little out of place surrounded as it is by concrete, Soviet municipal architecture and the characterless front of the Hyatt hotel. The opera house stands as a solitary reminder that the Russians did not arrive in Kyrgyzstan only in the wake of the Communist Revolution; the city had been a Russian garrison since the middle of the 19^th century. A love of the Russian ballet and European opera has endured despite a century of dramatic social and political change.

The Soviet Union, already a generation into the past, also left its indelible mark on Bishkek’s opera house. As you climb the stairs from the main lobby to the balcony, the ceiling is painted with a brilliantly coloured fresco. However, whereas one might expect the usual buxom nymphs, bacchae or cherubs to be frolicking across the ceiling, instead you are met by the smiling faces of the Soviet Union's numerous ethnic groups - the happy peasant is alive and well.

The Cold War’s separation of the USSR from western Europe influenced not only the fabric of the opera house but also the productions on its stage. Touring companies came only from within the Soviet Union and the new works premiered almost all originated in Moscow. Operas with supposedly bourgeoisie plots or morals were out of favour; in fact, Mozart’s famous opera The Magic Flute did not get its Central Asian premiere until it was performed in Bishkek in 2002.

Even today, the cast of the ballet gives testament to Central Asia’s turbulent past. Among the ballerinas are not only Kyrgyz and Russian dancers but also, quite unexpectedly, Koreans. Koreans were forcefully resettled from the most eastern parts of the USSR to Central Asia in a bid to prevent them joining forces with the Chinese and conspiring against Moscow. Although many of Kyrgyzstan’s ethnic minorities have emigrated since independence in 1991, the existence of a disproportionate number of Korean restaurants in Bishkek is a reminder of their former presence. 

Last but not least, the phantom of the USSR stalks the opera house bar in the form of Georgian champagne. Incredibly cheap, incredibly sweet and not always all that palatable, Georgian wines and champagnes were the mainstay of a Russian or Central Asian cellar throughout the 20^th century. Trade embargos prevented European, Californian or South African vineyards selling wines to the USSR, so the Soviets were entirely at the mercy of the Georgian growers. Whatever they grew, regardless of quality, was quickly sold and the habit has not yet been kicked: warm, sweet champagne remains the drink of choice in the opera house bar.

Afghanistan: history of a land of culture and anarchy

"Afghan history is a morass of empires and dynasties, conquest and collapse, creativity and decay."

Bijan Omrani, author of Afghanistan: A Companion and Guide, unravels the past of this turbulent land at the heart of Asia, and traces its story from ancient times to the modern era. Listen to his most recent lecture at the British Museum by following the link below:

http://www.britishmuseum.org/whats_on/events_calendar/recorded_events/afghanistan_history_of_a_land.aspx