This other expression that Americans have grown fond of using, myself included, has a different ring to it.  ”I’m just sayin’…” may have come from a t.v. show for all I know (having lived in other countries for as many years as I have, I readily admit that I don’t know the origin).  In any case, this has the air of knowing something others may not be aware while adding a kind of “aw shucks” attitude of getting it out there without appearing like a know-it-all.  It works something like this…

I recently read in an American’s blog about Kazakhstan that there was a fire at a brand, spanking new mosque in Astana on Jan. 13th of this year.  I can picture the location close to the Pyramid in the new part of Astana.  Apparently, Khazret Sultan was the largest mosque (able to fit 5,000 worshippers) in Central Asia and was not entirely completed yet.  No fire alarms were activated and thus the fire trucks were a bit delayed to the blaze to help extinguish it.  Unfortunately, one person died and I’m not sure how many were injured.  From reports about how the fire originated, it was said to be welding equipment that burst into flames.  Was it arson or was it REALLY an accident? (I’m just sayin’…)

Okay, let’s go back to Almaty when they were building a new airport there.  From the prior airport where my husband and I flew in and out back in 1993 to 1995, they definitely needed an upgrade.  Apparently, the contractors and builders of the new airport had it nearly completed and they wanted more money.  Their demands were not met and presto, the airport all burned down.  Supposedly, the combustion started from a kitchen fire, I’m thinking this was probably around 2005.  Or maybe it was soon after “Air Force One,” the movie with Harrison Ford in 1997. At the beginning it was filmed where the hijackers had the big jet land in Kazakhstan. (That segment was probably filmed in Moscow, Russia)

An Iranian friend of mine in Almaty was telling me this story of the fire (which I had never heard about)and  how she had to wait in people’s dachas near the airport for the flights coming in.  Pretty dismal.  Now Almaty has a newer airport to replace the old one and the other that burned down.  Was it arson or was it an accident?  ”I’m just sayin’…”

One final and I think interesting note.  The president of Kazakhstan was reportedly at the Russian Orthodox church during Orthodox Christmas on Jan. 6th.  I heard this from a friend on Facebook who personally met him there.  You see the power of social media these days?  I would not have known about the fire at the new mosque in Astana and I would not have thought the president would actually celebrate Christmas with other foreigners.  However, I do know that Kazakhstan wants to promote the idea that they are a nation of PEACE and can co-habit with many ethnic groups and different religions.  Just take a tour to the top of the Pyramid and you will get the sense that THAT is what a HUGE table in the center is all about. Negotiations with people from all over the world with more than contrary viewpoints.

What I can’t get over is when I asked my Kazakh students about their ancestors, some were full of pride that they had ancestry going back to Amir Temur.  This king was also known as “Timur, the Lame.”  He was considered charismatic and never gave up.  Also known as Tamerlane and he ruled by the strength of his army and with great unity.  Or how about Zahiriddin Muhammed Babur.  Supposedly his conquests were in India but my Kazakh students like to go back to the late 1400s where Babur supposedly won victories against India that had armies four times his own.  You ask Kazakhs about their distant but glorious past and it will be mingled with bloodthirsty battles.

So fast forward to present day 2012, what is REALLY going on in Kazakhstan these days? What about those workers on the mosque and other new buildings all over Astana? Are they really in unity about the current president’s objective to make Kazakhstan look good and peaceful to Catholic, Jewish, Russian Orthodox and Muslim all alike?  All faiths are peacefully represented with their own buildings in Astana, cathedral, synagogue, church and mosques.

I’m just sayin’…”Have a good one…with THAT!”

I get a little bit nostalgic for the things my Kazakh or Ukrainian students used to write and so I am including a few proverbs from some Central Asian students which applies to their culture of Uzbekistan.  I have often remarked to my husband that we could always go to Mongolia to teach.  He surprises me lately when he actually takes me seriously.  My pining for things foreign again is perhaps similar to the kid’s book titled “Alexander’s no good, horrible, bad day” where Alexander thinks moving to Australia will solve all his problems.  If only I had visited Samarkand and Bukara in Uzbekistan when I had the chance with my Russian friend Tatyana who wanted to bring me there nearly 20 years ago.  I knew Tatyana back when I was a Peace Corps trainer in Almaty the summer of 1993.  I should have taken her up on it because I believe Uzbekistan is closed off to Americans for now.

Anyway, doing a bit of reading up on the Uzbek culture I see they have similar attributes to that of Kazakhstan (small wonder since they are neighbors and come from the same gene pool).  Here are a few of the proverbs that seem to run counter to their governmental policies of keeping American tourists out.  I know Americans can get in, but from descriptions I have heard from fellow American travelers, it is NOT easy.

“A guest is as honorable as a father.”

“Hospitality is above enmity.”

“Seven neighbors are the parents of one child.”

“When guests come to one’s home, that family is full of abundance and luck.”

Finally, I’ll end with an Arabic proverb “Time is like a sword. If you don’t cut, it cuts you.”  I think it means to use your valuable time wisely in pursuit of useful activities.

“Nowadays,” I am trying to use my time wisely as I feel “grounded” in a good way in the U.S.  My husband and I continue to wait our summons on where our next job will be.  Stay in the U.S. or return to Central Asia (or even Mongolia).  Believe it or not, I actually miss seeing my students’ papers that read “to my mind.” Soon they will have such good English that all of those Russian translation carry-overs will disappear forever.

Streep was very talented on imitating Julia Child and her walk, talk and mannerisms (think “Julie and Julia” movie), Streep did the same with the honorable Thatcher’s accent and movements.  However, what I find remiss is that Streep was ready and willing to play the role of an aging woman with dementia. There’s nothing attractive about witnessing the fragile years of a deteriorated mind especially of one who used to be a world powerhouse such as Margaret Thatcher.

The following are Meryl Streep’s thoughts on her performance in “Iron Lady” from Internet Movie Database imdb.com:

“It took a lot out of me, but it was a privilege to play Margaret Thatcher, it really was. I still don’t agree with a lot of her policies. But I feel she believed in them and that they came from an honest conviction, and that she wasn’t a cosmetic politician just changing make-up to suit the times.

We on the Left didn’t like her policies but secretly we were thrilled that a woman had made it, and we thought, “Wow, if it can happen there in England, it could happen here.” But we’re still waiting in America.

She’s still an incredibly divisive figure, but you miss her clarity today. It was all very clear and up front, and I loved that eagerness to mix it up and to make it about ideas. Today it’s all about feelings. You know, “How do I come off?” and, “Does this seem OK?” You want people who are willing to find a solution. I admire the fact that she was a “love-me-or-hate-me” kind of leader who said: “This is what I stand for.” It’s a hard thing to do and no one’s doing that now.

[on what appealed to Meryl Streep about playing Margaret Thatcher] Women and power, and diminishment of power, and loss of power. And reconciliation with your life where you come to a point where you’ve lived most of it, and it’s behind you. I have always liked and been intrigued by older people and the idea that behind them lives every human trauma, drama, glory, jokes, love.

I consider all the roles I play a privilege but this one was special because there are such vehement opinions about her. People seemed to look at her as an icon or a monster and I just wanted to locate the human being inside those caricatures that we’ve seen over so many years. And to investigate myself what it must have been like for her.

[Streep responding to those who have criticized the emphasis placed on Margaret Thatcher's frail and confused old age] Some people have said it’s shameful to portray this part of a life. But the corollary of that is that, if you think that debility, delicacy, dementia are shameful, if you think that the ebbing of a life is something that should be shut away, if you think that people need to be defended from these images then – yes – then you’ll think it’s a shameful thing.”

Apparently, whoever wrote the “Iron Lady” script wanted the audience to be confused about Thatcher’s husband, Denis, appearing in her other world of delusion or reappearing in mere flashbacks in time.  Denis provides the comic relief necessary for this film and is entertaining when he tries to get Margaret to lighten up.  Endearing are their two children who wanted their mother to stay home and not follow her vision and passion to lead the country. Did Meryl Streep’s three daughters and one son have the same desire to have their mother home with them?  Seems she has racked up many movies in her acting career since the mid-1970s, same drive to follow one’s passion. Will someone play Meryl Streep’s tottering years when she goes senile?  I wonder.

What I liked best about the movie was the quote that Margaret Thatcher used.  If only Meryl Streep heeded these words and was not on the liberal left so ready to take an icon of freedom and democracy down.  A movie built around “selective memories” should instead showcase “Iron Lady” as having character of the right sort.

“Watch your thoughts for they become words,

Watch your words for they become actions,

Watch your actions for they become…habits,

Watch your habits, for they become your character,

And watch your character, for it becomes your destiny!

What we think, we become.”

All that above as an introduction to our speaker we heard today at our Rotary meeting. A retired army officer talked for a half hour about his military experiences in Iraq from 2005-2008, almost three years.  Col. Martin Breaker was in charge of detainee operations after the Abu Ghraib abuse scandal. He showed the four photos that went viral on the Internet and had more to do with putting Americans in harms way.  He in fact,  during his tenure as commanding officer, lost 17 soldiers under him. Always very sad.

I did not know, and maybe it was because I lived in Ukraine and never got the straight scoop, that it was American soldiers who had taken pictures of themselves in jail cells looking as if they were being tortured by Americans soldiers.  The Abu Ghraib abuse scandal the media took to the extreme and didn’t give out the true facts. Two photos were made to look like Iraqi “victims” with their arms extended as if hanging on a cross (black mask over the head and in a black gown) The other two photos had threatening black dogs snarling fiercely at frightened supposed “detainees.”

How did these photos appear to the insurgency in Iraq who were being propagandized to hate Americans?  Those two photos with extended arms were perceived as detainees being held at Abu Ghraib and tortured to become Christian. Anathema for those in this Muslim land of Iraq.  Did these American “jokers” also know how lethal the symbolic meaning of having black dogs as attack dogs?  We have our own superstitions about black cats but this was 100 times worse for any Iraqi civilian to see these photos.  Because Mohammed’s son was killed by a black wolf, the Iraqis are terrified of black dogs. It goes far beyond superstition but a real phobia.

In any case, the usual suspects (Americans who posted these photos on the Internet) were rounded up and sent off to serve their own time in prison back in the U.S.  I’m not sure that the media is ever penalized for aiding and abetting in not getting the accurate story out.  What I found out from personal testimony of Martin Breaker was these errant soldiers did not have good leadership at this detention camp. Also they had been trained to be M.P.s and not simply guards for detainees.  (the guards have non-lethal weapons with rubber bullets) Martin had to go in and clean up the mess and help befriend the Iraqi people who were scooped up for being at the wrong place at the wrong time. If there had been a bombing or a blast, all in the area were considered suspects.

Who were these detainees at Abu Ghraib? Often the insurgents would find those who are extremely poor and offer them $300 to do the dirty work for them.  Anything from digging ditches to setting off bombs.  In some cases, they had no choice. Marty gave one example where the terrorists came to a home packed with Iraqi people. When they refused to comply, they took the youngest girl outside and shot her dead. Then the terrorists came back into the house to get the expected cooperation they had been initially looking for.  Another case where there was a farmer living close to the 12 foot cement barriers surrounding the camp, he had a 16 year old daughter. The soldiers who were patrolling the camp would often throw over the wall some bottled water to give to the family.  Turns out the insurgents killed the daughter because she had talked to Americans.  Such is the hate of the terrorists for their own Iraqi people, think how much more they must hate the American soliders?

Martin’s job was to not only clean up the mess created by the Abu Ghraib photos that were used against Americans but to also get information from the Iraqis once they were befriended.  He wanted to marginalize their effectiveness as terrorists by showing that they cared about them. The average time spent at the camp was 18 months and at one point there were 60,000 people, mostly young men between the ages of 18-29. To adhere to Geneva Convention protocol, millions of dollars were spent to make sure they had three meals a day and clean water and also shoes on their feet.  Many Iraqis had never owned a pair of shoes before.  Their tents were air conditioned which was especially helpful when the temps in the summer would shoot up to 127 F degrees. Each person was provided a prayer mat and also a Koran if they could read it.  Some of them realized that they had been lied to about the good will of Americans.

Many of these poor people who had been abused by their own Iraqi government before and then were being terrorized by the insurgents, when they were processed into the detention camps some had very severe health issues.  Saddam Hussein had not helped his people and those considered wealthy were people who could afford medicine.  One problem when administering remedies for the high frequency of diabetes and T.B. was that people would hoard their medication and not take it.  Those in charge with the diagnosis had to make sure they would make themselves better and not try to sell the medication once released.  Those with T.B. were isolated for about six weeks from the rest of the camp.

What was their favorite thing to watch on t.v. or watching movies?  Mickey Mouse cartoons.  Were there women?  Yes there were some.  Also families were allowed to visit which boosted the morale of those detained.  Martin talked of one man who was being interrogated for information that might lead to better intelligence (no waterboarding was used). There was one old man for six months who would not talk, they dubbed him Mr. Mute. Once they got a woman officer who was 30 years younger to come in to ask him questions, all of a sudden he started talking and giving valuable info.  He continually asked her to marry him.  She, of course, had no interest but hey, whatever works.

I had asked if there were some who did NOT want to leave the detention centers.  Afterall, for some of the Iraqis, they had never been treated better or fed so well.  Martin had an answer where an older gentleman didn’t want to go back home because he had four wives that would be nagging him.

Martin also talked about the trial for Saddam Hussien which could take a whole ‘nother blog but suffice it to say that being in this madman’s presence was enough to know he was a psychopath.  Martin said it would be easy to imagine Saddam talking to two people, shoot the one person dead and continue to talk to the fortunate living person as if nothing had happened.  He complained of many things and once the verdict was found he was guilty, Saddam was released by Martin and the U.S. military into the hands of the Iraqi people. You know the rest of the story…

Martin ended his slide show with “Freedom is Never Free.” That can be true for any country, any time period.  Our American freedom was bought with a price, maintaining our freedom from two world wars meant great sacrifice.  I fear that we trivialize our freedoms and the Arab world is preying upon what we have. The use of terror was something that Stalin was adept at.  Btw, Saddam had his library full of books about Stalin, so he was taking his marching orders from a fellow madman.  I hope that my American friends stay safe in an environment that is very volatile.  I’m glad that Martin shared from his perspective what it was like to be in a place where he was shot at and threatened with mortars on a daily basis.

We have SOOO much to be thankful for and I believe we need to personally thank our servicemen and women who give up their family life and comfortable homes to do the dirty work for us, making our lives free and secure.

shocked and appalled at what evil people do to get vulnerable girls to become prostitutes.  This incident happened in Afghanistan and it continues to go on, but child brides are also supposedly kidnapped in Kazakhstan. The numbers of victims have escalated.

Who is following up on these girls? Can the authorities be trusted to do their part in upholding the law? Most of these girls go unwillingly to be “brides” or wives to their captors and the in-laws, that is known as “bride-kidnapping.”  In some cases it is due to economics and where elopement saves face for the families to avoid the payment of dowries. Whatever happened to the young child brides from 100 years ago in Kazakhstan who would work on their dowry carpets to bring to their new home? (I hope to find out more from a Kazakh woman who lives in Tucson, Arizona) I also learned that Kazakh families in the past, who had children marry each other, became very close.  How does that work out now when a Kazakh (or Afghan) woman is trapped into being married to a man and then is essentially a slave to her mother-in-law and the rest of the family?

I’m wondering how much of the traditions from yesteryear were stamped out entirely during the period of communism when in the 1960s it was outlawed for young women to create their dowry carpets.  So many questions about Kazakh traditions and culture…so many MORE questions about how young girls are being currently snatched up to not be kidnapped brides but to be prostitutes either in their own country of Kazakhstan or exported out by their traffickers to other countries.  Too…many…sad questions.

This young Afghan girl is hopefully getting a new start on life after she heals up in India.  She has certainly gotten the world’s attention by her resisting what she knew to be wrong. Thankfully her uncle cared enough to try and save her. How many other young, innocent girls at this present hour are trapped?  What can we do to help half way around the world?

“The magnitude of this misery in Moldova is astounding.  Over 450,000 girls have gone “missing.”  Nearly half a million girls have vanished into the night…and as the clock counts down more will join them…”

…As Chrissie (Philip’s wife) and I began to comfort orphaned children it became evident that what they craved most was a smile and a warm embrace.  I realized my personal mandate was not just bringing them “stuff”…what these precious orphans needed from me was to be their Dad.

That’s where I met Stella.  She was a small handicapped girl, with a pronounced limp, but who possessed a huge personality and spirit.  We formed a special bond and she became my ever-present helper during trips to Modolva.  I joyously watched her grow from a young girl to a delightful teen.  But then on one of my return trips I walked into the orphanage and Stella was gone.  No one seemed to know where to find her.  I was heartsick.

I searched relentlessly for her. I would ask everyone: “Have you heard where Stella went? Do you know how she’s doing?” Then one day my answer came…Stella was dead.  She became a victim ensnared in Europe’s vicious sex trade.  She was used by men over and over again, contracted AIDS, and perished, homeless, helpless and victimized until she took her last breath.

Stella and innocent girls just like her are abused because they have no place to call home when they turn 16.  And the sex traffickers are sickeningly clever. They approach girls like Stella pretending to be a friend.  Here’s how they deceive: A woman may approach a girl on a bus and ask if she would be a live-in nanny for her children.  Or a man may approach a girl and tell her that his brother owns a restaurant in Italy and needs workers for the kitchen.  He’ll pay $300 a month.

The innocent and homeless girl will jump at a chance to be a part of something and traffickers prey on this vulnerability…Instead they are sold into the sex trade for as little as $3,500. And then, there is no escape.  A girl is raped 30-40 times a day with their owners profiting as much as $350,000 per year until they are ‘used up’ or dead.  The only way for us to dry up this market of innocent girls was to establish homes where good could triumph over evil…one girl at a time.  An in doing so, Stella’s “voice” remains alive for girls who would otherwise be homeless, powerless and eventually silenced.

In 2007, the original Stella’s House was born…” Check out the website…

However, I believe the traffickers have moved to Central Asia where they can prey on other young girls who are vulnerable and unprotected because it is not talked about.  People are becoming more aware in Kazakhstan but there is much work left to do to create a safe environment for girls.  Did you see what happened to the young girl in Afghanistan who was kidnapped to marry some guy in the military and they tortured her to go into prostitution.  She fought it tooth and nail. (literally she lost several finger nails and had her ear burned) I may blog about that tomorrow.

Who are following the girls (and boys) in the former Soviet Union with ideas of hurting them for their own financial gain?  Are they reading this blog now? Read yesterday’s blog to find out why I ask these two questions.

What I’m reading about “Stella voice homes” there are too few dads to meet the needs of Orphans in Moldova and perhaps Kazakhstan now.  Please read on about what one man with a HUGE father’s heart wrote:

About Stella’s voice from the founder, Philip Cameron.

“…this fragile girl is an orphan in Europe’s most impoverished country: Moldova.  Though Communism dies here, there are vestiges of that sad mindset still in place. Incredibly, Moldovan orphans are treated as outcasts, common thieves, parasites…though they have done no wrong.  They are rarely encouraged, often ridiculed, all but starved and housed in conditions unspeakable.

In this environment young girls have no self-worth or self-esteem. They think of themselves as forgotten and forever lost.  When you speak with the girls they cannot even define the concept of “hope” though in their language there is a wonderful word for it.

So as the clock ticks away a mere girl of sixteen shivers on her thin cot.  She is hungry but she is used to that as she has gone to bed hungry every night of her life.  But tonight is different.  This is the last time she is allowed to sleep on a cot and take a meal of thin soup.  Soon she will be out on the street with nowhere to go and no one to turn to.  You would think she would be glad to escape an orphan’s misery but this is not the case.  Because she’s heard the rumors and wonders why so many that left before her simply disappeared.

She does not know she’ll likely walk right into the arms of sex trafficking profiteers.  Before being discarded she will become merely a profit center for her perverted captors and their clients in Europe, the Middle East and beyond.

The magnitude of this misery in Moldova is astounding.  Over 450,000 girls have gone “missing.”  Nearly half a million girls have vanished into the night…and as the clock counts down more will join them…”

(to be continued)

Here’s what I find troubling, the top key word searches were “Kazakhstan girls” or “Kazakh girls.”  That happened several years ago when I had innocently titled a blog “Little Girl in Pink.” LOTS of hits on that one blog entry where I finally took the photo of the young Kazakh girl down.  I believe there are some strange viewers out there who have wrong motives for wanting to see these girls. Maybe these viewers move on to other sites that show lewd pictures of girls and I mean young girls. Apparently trafficked girls in the U.S. get started as young as 13 years old on average. According to Steve Graham from Australia (CEO of ACT) there are 1.2 million children trafficked every year throughout the world.

Here’s the breakdown of who is following this blog and from different continents.  Europe actually includes Kazakhstan in its statistics which I find amusing:

Europe: 17% United Kingdom, 13% Kazakhstan, 8% Turkey, 7% Germany, 6% Poland

North America: 90% U.S. 9% Canada (I know who my Canadian follower is) The others from the U.S. I’m not sure who they are but hopefully friends and family

Africa: Ghana 23% (I know who that American follower is), Morocco 17%, South Africa 14%, Egypt 13% and Algeria 6%

South America: Brazil 46%, Argentina 18% (other countries but too fragmented to mention)

Oceania: Australia 81%, New Zealand 15%

Asia: Philippines 24%, India 15%, United Arab Emirates 8%, Malaysia 7%, Pakistan 4%

Asia has me most confounded, why isn’t China included in these statistics?  Is it because the Chinese are not allowed to have WordPress or even have any blogging?  I would expect North Korea to not have a showing but why not Korea? My biggest WHY is how come the Philippines so high? They have a very literate population in English, as does India.  I can understand why Australia is so high, I just have a new follower (mentioned above) who heads up ACT (Against Child Trafficking). I also have friends I have met over the years from Australia and New Zealand.

To me this was interesting to speculate on and tomorrow I will write more about Stella’s Voice.  It is something that I hope would start up in Kazakhstan. Children who are released out of Kazakh orphanages because they are “grown up” at the tender age of 16 or 18, I can’t remember which, are to fend for themselves. Traffickers know how to pick them off very easily because they are so vulnerable. What I read about the situation in Moldova was horrifying.

(to be continued)

6. What is the role of Multi National Companies in Kazakhstan?  The multinational companies such as Deloitte, Citibank, Shell, Chevron and other oil companies all provided jobs for those Kazakhs who were well educated.  It was said that a lawyer from Kazakhstan who knew Kazakh and English and how to write well could easily start out with a salary of six digits in US dollars.  The incentive among young Kazakh people is to get hired in a multi national company for better pay and a chance to travel outside the country.   Sorry, since I only worked in education I can’t answer that question very well. I DO know that in Almaty, where I taught English at the university, the emphasis was on business. Many of these students got jobs right away with the multinational companies once they graduated with their “western” degrees.

 

7. What are the key factors driving the economy and will this be sustainable in the long run? The country is flush with natural resources in minerals and oil. They are also the highest exporter of uranium, surpassing Canada, so supposedly they have money. However, I think that there are certain people who are getting the money and others who are languishing.  They do not seem to know about philanthropy, they have been taught under the Soviet system that capitalists are greedy. So when capitalism was opened up to them, they are on the take and will take full advantage of “opportunities” that come their way legally or illegally.

With this kind of mentality to be out for number one, it is not sustainable.  There is corruption and those who are at the bottom will rise up against this.  I think we are already seeing this happen in western Kazakhstan with the strikes at the mines.  Something is very much amiss in Kazakhstan with the “slave mentality.” I saw this worked out in the university where the higher-ups lorded it over those who were to be subservient. Nothing egalitarian about conducting staff or business meetings.  The human trafficking is another issue that is not good.  The traffickers are moving into Central Asia and Kazakhstan is a target as well as a harbor for those victims who are trafficked from other countries.

 

8. How do you view the standard of living in Kazakhstan (e.g. medical facilities / poverty gap / infrastructure / education)? Medical facilities in the big cities are adequate. I visited quite a few while in Almaty. But anything outside of the big cities are probably abysmal just judging by what I know of the educational system.  Imagine having a doctor who cheated on his exams, he will not make a good doctor where there are real people with real life and death problems involved.

 

9. Comment on tourism in Kazakhstan.  Tourism could be a great thing for Kazakhstan if they could get their beautiful and scenic areas cleaned up.  Unfortunately, the Kazakhs do not know how to keep their environment pristine.  My husband and I visited several of the nearby lakes to Almaty and the people just throw out their garbage so that it looks like a big trash dump.  There is no civic pride in keeping their park areas beautiful.  People will not go to far out of the way places where it is still untouched because the roads are so bad and they would have to really rough it to have that kind of adventure.  Someone with an entrepreneurial spirit would have to take advantage of what is there but I suspect they would have to pay lots of bribes in order to get anything done.  Such is the corruption that exists at every level of government, local, province and up to the top management on a national level.

 

10. Please comment on the cultural heritage of Kazakhs.  I do not know that much about the Kazakhs’ cultural heritage since I don’t know their language and really didn’t study their history much.  I did ask my students to tell me about their great grandparents. They did so with great pride.  You are considered a good Kazakh if you know the names of your ancestors going back seven generations.

11.     What is the impact of tightening government control on country legislation (registration of religious groups) This last question is very tricky. The tightening of control of a lot of things such as not letting blogs flourish is an example of no freedom of expression by young Kazakhs. This is the freakish thing about a young country that is run by older people who were schooled under the Soviet system. Their default button is to become more centralized and tighter controlled instead of less so.  Picking on certain religious groups will only backfire but it is true they are afraid of extremist, terrorist groups.  Once that goes awry like an Arab spring, then that will scare off the multinationals who bring in good business for their country.  Trust is needed for peace and calm to reign throughout the land. So the leader of the country is doing a very delicate and dangerous dance.  Keeping the terrorist influences at bay while being courted by the Chinese who are communist and trying to relinquish the fingerprints of the stranglehold that the Soviet past gave to them.  There has not been a democracy in Kazakhstan and when the leader expires, the vacuum created by no future leader being groomed for succession will be the most awful thing to witness…”

2. What areas do you see a gap for improvement in the long run for success? The huge gap is TRUST. People don’t trust each other and there is much corruption and much nepotism.  Your Kazakh family comes first before expertise.  Westerners will have to trust the Kazakhs if they will invest in businesses in Kazakhstan. Broken contracts or greed makes those foreigners who come to help teach a bit careful.  By the time the expat teacher arrives, it is too late, there are many surprises.  I think the Kazakh wants to think of themselves as “clever” and want to take advantage of the unsuspecting, trusting foreigner. Afterall, they have been indoctrinated from Soviet times that western capitalists are greedy and selfish so they are just gouging them first.

The one thing that IS improving is service mentality, the Kazakhs seem to know they have to have a good reputation as a restaurant or hotel in order to have repeat business.  But for the long run, they need to gain the trust of expats instead of trying to grab for the money and not listen to the voice of authority or reason on how to use the money wisely. OR to not lose the trust when the contract is not abided by as understood in three languages.  I could go on and on with this question but TRUST is very, very important to build and maintain long term partnerships.

3. In your view, what key opportunities or threats exist for the nation? The threats for Kazakhstan will always be the same as they were 200-300 years ago.  China has always been a huge threat, as is Russia.  However, the Arab spring has Kazakhstan feeling very nervous, thus the “snap election” for their current president who has been president for the last 20 years.

Opportunities would be to utilize the expertise that young Kazakhs come back to their country with after being on the Bolashak grant (Kazakh term meaning “future).  Other students have been on similar grants with IREX and have studied abroad and have learned how western nations tick the short time they have absorbed it.  The opportunities for older people to learn from the younger would help speed up the pace of modernization. However, the older people feel threatened by those who are younger who know more.  So this is a difficult balancing act they have to do between generations.

4. What are the key benefits and challenges of working and living in Kazakhstan?  The amazing ex-pat community is the key benefit of living and working in Kazakhstan. People who are willing to take on the challenge of living in a country that is broken and feels like a hurting proud nation with past glory.  I use the example of Ukraine when we taught there that it was like dealing with a colicky baby, it needed to be fed and burped.  The diapers needed to be changed, they were, as a nation, taking baby steps in the late 1990s.  Perhaps during that same era Kazakhstan was doing the same.

NOW in 2007-2011 the post-Soviet baby of Kazakhstan acts like a teenager.  They act as if they want the keys to the car yet they don’t know about paying for the insurance or buying gas.  They just want to go and carelessly drive around with the family car.  They are rebellious and want the benefits of being considered a “developed nation” while they are still in their formative years of development.

So that was the challenge of living in the country of Kazakhstan. They are NOT a developed country yet, if you look at the WHOLE country. However, with more time and maturity they will get to that stage but you can’t just look at Astana and Almaty and judge that as “developed.”  In like fashion, the Kazakh peoples have a sense of impatience and want to take the foreigners’ money but do not want to be accountable for what they do with it.  It is very maddening for those of us expats who are in positions of authority, experts from other countries to see this nonchalance about capabilities and expertise and to be trashed for what WE know as experts in our field.  Essentially, we are all on short contracts, we are trying to work ourselves out of a job so that the Kazakh can stand up on their own without our aid. Much like a mother nurturing her baby to become a teenager and eventually adulthood.

If you take the training wheels away, they will start riding the bike on their own.  However, there seems to be a sense of national pride at stake that they even NEED us in the first place.  How often we thought as expats “They NEED us but they don’t WANT us.”  A very strange paradox because the Kazakhs are supposedly known as a very hospitable people.  There are many good stories from the past where Kazakhs helped those foreigners like the Koreans or Ukrainians who were dumped off of trains during the Stalin years of purging “Enemies of the People.”  The Kazakhs would care for these people who were left to die on the steppes. Things are different these days after twenty years of “independence.”

Unfortunately, the Kazakhs know they NEED help but they are sometimes too proud to acknowledge that.  Also, because Kazakhs come from an oral tradition, they know so much about their own culture but they do not realize that most of the world does not even know they exist because nothing much has been written about them.  Those Kazakh students who have gotten fellowships or grants to study abroad find that out the hard way.

The most vexing thing about living in Kazakhstan is the “They need us but they don’t want us.” And that runs through all matter of experts from whatever field be it in oil, accounting, banking, mining, etc.  I heard this from other expats and so that gets back to my original point.  It doesn’t matter if they are from Norway, German, U.K. Canada, Australia, wherever you are from as a westerner, you have more in common with each other than living amongst people in an unknown country such as Kazakhstan.  The Kazakhs are trying to find their own identity from their rich past. But also they want to fit in with westerners in the present 21st century while holding on to the baggage of their Soviet indoctrination. This makes for a very complex kind of maturing into being proud of who they are as Kazakhs, it will take time.

5. Can you comment on customs and ways of life of Kazakhstani? I did not know many Kazakhs and their customs or ways of life.  I only knew the educated ones and the Kazakhstanis I would consider those who were born in Kazakhstan but are not necessarily of Kazakh ethnicity.  The Kazakhs are very proud of the fact that they have so many ethnicities living peacefully beside each other.  They have their holidays and their rituals and practices but I think a westerner, like a former Peace Corps volunteer, who lived in the rural areas would do a better job of writing about bride kidnapping, trained eagles that hunt game, sheepherding and nomadic lifestyle with yurts, etc.  I lived in the urban setting where all such Kazakh customs are little known to me.

(to be continued)