Posts tagged Russia

North Dakota Joke about Wireless and Ongoing Surveillance

June 11, 2013 · Filed under Blogroll · Tagged , , , , , , ,

Surveillance is important but not the kind that we have been served up lately, it has gone on for decades but not on Regular Joe Citizen of the U.S. Now we can ALL be treated as suspects if we said the wrong thing from 20-30 years ago. Thanks to Edward Snowden for having a conscience about all the power he had as a techie. Now he is back in hiding after his 12 minute video-taped interview from Hong Kong. I watched it and thought he was quite articulate.  The liberal press would paint him as some kind of high school dropout who became a grunt in the Army.  Pretty miraculous to be a low-info kind of guy and to have that much knowledge about computers and access into that many people’s lives. People will long question whether what he did was right or wrong to be a whistleblower.

Granted, Snowden is toast, now that he has been identified.  However, his biggest fear is that nobody will do anything about the intrusive surveillance to keep our government accountable for all the access and privilege they have for what we do from phone calls to texting to what we put up on the Internet. I DO care about what information is held on me because I know what they did to people in the former Soviet Union.  I know what the leader of “the” Russia would like to do to some people who don’t agree with him. I know what they did to millions of people who lived in Ukraine 70-80 years ago who didn’t tow the communist party line.

We watched the movie “The Internship” this past weekend and it was funny in a few places.  It showed how people my age or younger are feeling like dinosaurs if they didn’t get in on the computer technology wave.  Also, it shows that students at age 21 are cynical about their future and do not live the American Dream.  They have high tuition debts to pay back but no jobs to speak of. They may be tech savvy but not much on people skills and not many experiences outside of their virtual world.  It was a sad commentary on both generations. The funniest line in the movie was when Vince Vaughn was trying to explain the concept of Instagram to these geeky teammates of his at Google. He kept saying, “On the line” when he really mean “online.”  The kids patiently listened to him telling him that it had already been thought of before.  He enthusiastically blathered on with “on the line.”  The part with the strip tease bar scene was bad which made PG-13 rating embarrassing.  I think they can’t be believed anymore.

Well, I promised a joke so I’ll end my blog on this funny note.  More a joke on North Dakota but just the same, one that needs to be preserved.

“After having dug to a depth of 10 meters last year, Scottish scientists found traces of copper wire dating back 100 years and came to the conclusion that their ancestors already had a telephone network more than 100 years ago.  Not to be outdone by the Scots, in the weeks that followed, British scientists dug to a depth of 20 meters, and shortly after, headline in the UK newspapers read: “British concluded that their ancestor already had an advanced high-tech communications network a hundred years earlier than the Scots.”  One week later, “The Nordic Klub,” a Minot, North Dakota newsletter reported the following: “After digging as deep as 30 meters in corn fields near Velva, ND, Ole Johnson, a self taught archeologist, reported that he found absolutely nothing.  Ole has therefore concluded that 300 years ago North Dakota had already gone wireless.”

Leave a comment »

Poems by Anna Ahmatova (Part II)

May 18, 2012 · Filed under Blogroll · Tagged , , , , , , ,

Continued from yesterday’s blog posting, translated into English by Sasha Soldatow. Anna Ahmatova somehow knew how to write of her dark experiences in the former Soviet Union.  Perhaps not unlike contemporary slavery that prevails in human trafficking which continues unabated around the world.

VII

THE VERDICT

The word landed with a stony thud

Onto my still-beating breast.

Never mind, I was prepared,

I will manage with the rest.

I have a lot of work to do today;

I need to slaughter memory,

Turn my living soul to stone

Then teach myself to live again. . .

But how. The hot summer rustles

Like a carnival outside my window;

I have long had this premonition

Of a bright day and a deserted house.

[22 June 1939. Summer. Fontannyi Dom]

VIII

TO DEATH

You will come anyway – so why not now?

I wait for you; things have become too hard.

I have turned out the lights and opened the door

For you, so simple and so wonderful.

Assume whatever shape you wish. Burst in

Like a shell of noxious gas. Creep up on me

Like a practised bandit with a heavy weapon.

Poison me, if you want, with a typhoid exhalation,

Or, with a simple tale prepared by you

(And known by all to the point of nausea), take me

Before the commander of the blue caps and let me glimpse

The house administrator’s terrified white face.

I don’t care anymore. The river Yenisey

Swirls on. The Pole star blazes.

The blue sparks of those much-loved eyes

Close over and cover the final horror.

[19 August 1939. Fontannyi Dom]

IX

Madness with its wings

Has covered half my soul

It feeds me fiery wine

And lures me into the abyss.

That’s when I understood

While listening to my alien delirium

That I must hand the victory

To it.

However much I nag

However much I beg

It will not let me take

One single thing away:

Not my son’s frightening eyes -

A suffering set in stone,

Or prison visiting hours

Or days that end in storms

Nor the sweet coolness of a hand

The anxious shade of lime trees

Nor the light distant sound

Of final comforting words.

[14 May 1940. Fontannyi Dom

X

CRUCIFIXION

Weep not for me, mother.

I am alive in my grave.

1.

A choir of angels glorified the greatest hour,

The heavens melted into flames.

To his father he said, 'Why hast thou forsaken me!'

But to his mother, 'Weep not for me. . .'

[1940. Fontannyi Dom]

2.

Magdalena smote herself and wept,

The favourite disciple turned to stone,

But there, where the mother stood silent,

Not one person dared to look.

[1943. Tashkent]

EPILOGUE

1.

I have learned how faces fall,

How terror can escape from lowered eyes,

How suffering can etch cruel pages

Of cuneiform-like marks upon the cheeks.

I know how dark or ash-blond strands of hair

Can suddenly turn white. I’ve learned to recognise

The fading smiles upon submissive lips,

The trembling fear inside a hollow laugh.

That’s why I pray not for myself

But all of you who stood there with me

Through fiercest cold and scorching July heat

Under a towering, completely blind red wall.

2.

The hour has come to remember the dead.

I see you, I hear you, I feel you:

The one who resisted the long drag to the open window;

The one who could no longer feel the kick of familiar

soil beneath her feet;

The one who, with a sudden flick of her head, replied,

‘I arrive here as if I’ve come home!’

I’d like to name you all by name, but the list

Has been removed and there is nowhere else to look.

So, I have woven you this wide shroud out of the humble words

I overheard you use. Everywhere, forever and always,

I will never forget one single thing. Even in new grief.

Even if they clamp shut my tormented mouth

Through which one hundred million people scream;

That’s how I wish them to remember me when I am dead

On the eve of my remembrance day.

If someone someday in this country

Decides to raise a memorial to me,

I give my consent to this festivity

But only on this condition – do not build it

By the sea where I was born,

I have severed my last ties with the sea;

Nor in the Tsar’s Park by the hallowed stump

Where an inconsolable shadow looks for me;

Build it here where I stood for three hundred hours

And no-one slid open the bolt.

Listen, even in blissful death I fear

That I will forget the Black Marias,

Forget how hatefully the door slammed and an old woman

Howled like a wounded beast.

Let the thawing ice flow like tears

From my immovable bronze eyelids

And let the prison dove coo in the distance

While ships sail quietly along the river.

[March 1940. Fontannyi Dom]

First published Sasha Soldatow Mayakovsky in Bondi Black Wattle Press 1993 Sydney.

Translated by Sasha Soldatow

 

Leave a comment »

“Bad Writer is a Bad English Teacher”…oh really?!

April 30, 2012 · Filed under Blogroll · Tagged , , , , , ,

The attached photo is a wonderfully warm, Kazakh teacher who got hurt by her own educational system while teaching at a westernized university in Almaty. I knew her to be a good, motherly type mentor to her university students.  She is neither a bad writer or bad teacher but her superiors dismissed her without any explanation.  I’ll withhold her name but let it be known that I witnessed several painful injustices (my own included) within this so-called institute of higher learning while teaching three and a half years in Kazakhstan.

I want to highlight the writings from two Kazakh women in this blog. One I know only from reading a website titled “Vox Populi” and the other is a former student of mine.  I think the two go together because they are suffering the same angst of living in a country of Kazakhstan that is going through phenomenal growth spurts.  There’s baggage from what used to exist from the Soviet Union, yet hopeful anticipation in what could be their future in Kazakshtan.  The first one is named Madina and a summary of what she said in Russian in an interview to Vox Populi after I used Google translation.

“A typical dream for us 30 year olds in Kazakhstan is to go where we feel our rights are not violated, where there is law and order and where the government works for its citizens.  I am part of an astonishing generation, we were born in the Soviet era where we grew up during the breakup of a single state (USSR) but have taken off running during the construction of a new nation (Kazakhstan). Therefore, many of our own parents will never understand that we have a sense of choice.

When I was 27 years old, I began to choke on what surrounded me, the country, the people, our laws.  My friends and I found the easiest way out, we just ran away and left for a half a year to the United States.  America seemed at that moment a bulwark of democracy.  I left Kazakhstan with the underlying idea of staying in the U.S.  This is so typical of us to dream to go somewhere else…but experience showed us all the same problems in the U.S.  Eden, NO!  I went back to Kazakhstan but I came back more relaxed.  I learned to accept the imperfections of the world.

Even with blatant injustice in Kazakhstan, my contribution is to keep working on this project to uncover everything that happens in our country to show a different life, to expose social problems and talk about difficult situations.  Unfortunately, I am not a revolutionary in spirit, to ride with a sword.  Also, I do not like publicity, but I admire people who are active citizens righting wrongs.  If we had a “Swamp,” I would have walked out.  No, instead I have gotten up on a stage, not to be encouraged but to be listened to and supported.  Civic engagement in Kazakhstan doesn’t happen because the majority believes that stability is better than change.”

Here’s the second one from Aigerim, a former student of mine who nails it about where the problem of slavery works into the mindset of the Kazakh citizen. She was a teacher who got in trouble with her superiors for pointing out some errors in her contract.  They are to teach critical thinking to their classes but at the same time they are to obey and not object to injustices.  She is NOT a bad person, teacher or writer…read on:

“Bad writer is a bad English teacher. I want to be a good teacher, or at least not another person reciting same old song or grammar rule. I stand firm on the point that any skills or knowledge taught should be relevant.

When I conducted IELTS classes at my former work place, which is an elite focused and fully funded from President`s fund, I committed to turn this extra-curricular free of charge classes into a writing experiment. We watched and reflected on films, then wrote on blogs. Some of students created and posted their own poetry. Indeed, learners came up to a stage where they reflected on their lives. They wrote great essays about teenage suicides and problems of education in our country.

While my students were making their best in critical thinking, my own free speaking brought me into trouble with a department manager as I enquired too many questions on controversial points in a contract. Well, I don`t regret appealing against bosses, I am quite happy with my new job. When my writers learned about my resignation due to my being a wrong format, one student replied with a phrase that still warms my heart, “If you’re A4 format and they’re A5 (smaller), that doesn’t mean you’re a bad teacher, you’re just different.”

Young people can think critically until they are framed into stupid rules. Nowadays it is common to think that you have to say what your teacher wants to hear and you get a point, do what your boss wants and keep your place of employment. The problem of slavery exists not only on construction sites and massage parlors, but in thoughts and enslaved wills of ordinary people.

My colleagues were obedient and got another year of their teaching contract. However, I wonder whether these teachers are able to teach young people to think critically and act globally.”

I love my former student’s writing about being different and indeed she is NOT a bad teacher or a bad writer.  On days like this, I feel the same where it is difficult to write and English is my native language.  Some days I feel defeated in trying to explain from my “A4 framework” that I don’t fit in with the A5 environment whether it is in the U.S. OR in Kazakhstan.

Comments (1) »

Answers to Questions about Kazakhstan (Part V)

December 25, 2011 · Filed under Blogroll · Tagged , , , , , , ,

Merry Christmas! Here’s my final installment to this five part series of answering 11 questions about Kazakhstan. I’ve had fun recalling scenarios that happened to me or things I thought about during my 3 1/2 years of teaching in Almaty and Astana.  These questions asked by another foreigner were good, I thought.  I invite those who feel more knowledgeable than me, to add your comments so we can all benefit.  Not much is known about this BIG country of Kazakhstan. I would wish MORE people from the West would know and visit it.  Here’s the last part:

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…”

 

Leave a comment »

Answers to Questions about Kazakhstan (Part IV)

December 24, 2011 · Filed under Blogroll · Tagged , , , , , , ,

If you enjoyed the last three days of my answering just one question I was asked, then just know that I only have two more parts left to answer the remaining 11 questions.  Here is how I answered the following questions:

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)

Leave a comment »

BRIC’s Complicated Bureaucracies and Our Complicity in Human Trafficking

October 28, 2011 · Filed under Blogroll · Tagged , , , , , , ,

What is it about the BRIC(K)(S) countries which are supposedly the economic powerhouses? They simultaneously have very complicated bureaucracies to work through in order for tourists to visit their lands.  Kazakhstan is among the list of eight nations which are coincidentally in the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) structure.  Some would like to add Kazakhstan and South Africa to make it spell BRICKS but the first four letters is what is traditionally known in the world of economics as the countries to watch as they continue to flex their monied muscles.

To get visas and the wait time tourists are resigned to go through is the following for these difficult-to-get-to countries:

1) India – $76

2) Russia – $140 – 90 day wait

3) China – $130

4) Brazil – $140 one month

5) Bhutan – $20 – 3 months

6) Iran – $30 3 months

7) Kazakhstan – $40 – one month

8 ) Saudi Arabia – $500 (if you want to do the hajj, you have to have money, obviously)

Here’s what was originally written about Kazakhstan and the seven other countries :

KAZAKHSTAN
Apply a month in advance.
Fee: $40

Why Go: Fictional Borat may have put Kazakhstan on the map, but it’s actually the ninth-largest country in the world by size and a place that combines Islamic, Western, and Soviet culture into an unusual mix. Adventure seekers come for the many mountains, which provide both trekking and skiing opportunities. Others come to explore the nomadic past of the Kazakhs and to see UNESCO World Heritage attractions, including petroglyphs and nature reserves that are home to such species as the rare Siberian white crane.

Why It’s Complicated: When it comes to visas, all the “Stans” can be tough, according to Habimana. For Kazakhstan, for instance, you need to write a personal letter of intent to the embassy in Washington, D.C., stating the purpose of your trip, the places you plan to visit, and your dates.

What to Do: Follow the instructions on the embassy’s website, and apply a month out from your trip (approval takes a couple of weeks). While the government enacted new rules in 2010 to try to simplify the process, what that means for tourists remains to be seen. Fans of bureaucratic garble will appreciate the official description of the changes, which are “aimed at further liberalization and streamlining of Kazakhstan’s visa regime.”

My young university friend just returned from the Not For Sale Global Forum in Sunnyvale, CA had many impressions that were exploding in her head after listening to about 50 speakers.  However, the main thing about the evils of human trafficking is that it revolves all around economics.  So, if there is any common thread among the BRIC countries, they appear to be one of the worst offenders when it comes to using people to build up their own economies.

We already know what happened to the Soviet Union when they forced their own people into labor camps to work off their being too wealthy (i.e. kulaks or Enemies of the People).  Those during Stalin’s time who were not of the correct political stripe or who told the truth were punished. They were forcibly sent to hardship posts in the gulags of Siberia and Kazakhstan. Unfortunately, many of the talented ones died.

So, the same can be written about these modern day, complicated countries that have too much paperwork and red tape to go through. The BRIC countries undoubtedly have bureaucrats who are pocketing the visa money. No surprise there with corrupt governments from the very top. They are also turning a blind eye to those traffickers who are bringing people in or out of their country illegally. Police are easily being bought off with huge sums of money so the trafficking of innocent people continues.

Westerners, who should know better, do not want to be a part of this complicity of trafficking by remaining unaware and silent on the subject.  How can we help? By traveling to these countries to see with our own eyes? As aforementioned, that becomes an arduous process money and time wise. Laws must be placed on the books, law enforcement must be mobilized to catch the predators in the BRIC countries and those victims who have been enticed and trapped free to return to their families and their lives before slavery. Maybe another way to avoid all the red tape is to be wise as shoppers and not buy products that have come out of BRIC economies?  Hmmm…I wonder if that will ever catch on in the U.S?

Hopefully we will not be part of the complications in human trafficking by our complicity of silence, ignorance and doing nothing?

Leave a comment »

Slavery Footprint and Uninformed Persons (Part II)

October 12, 2011 · Filed under Blogroll · Tagged , , , , , ,

I will continue on the theme of the Slavery Footprint survey which will help explain how this all started for me in Kazakhstan.  That country is so unfamiliar among Americans, they typically mix it up with either Russia or Afghanistan if they DO have a sense of where it is on the globe.  Simultaneous to this and as little known is the topic of slavery and human trafficking among most Americans.  So when you combine the two topics I have a passion about, you come up with a lot of blank faces or confusion.  The following are two fictionalized composite conversations I have had with some uninformed persons:

Uninformed person UP: ”Where did you say you lived and taught again?”

Kazakhnomad – KN: ”Kazakhstan, for three and a half years. Kaz–Akh-Stan. Difficult to spell, even more arduous to pronounce.”

U.P. ”Is that close to Afghanistan?” [for some reason everyone knows how to pronounce that country]

KN: ”Not really, the closest neighbors to Kazakhstan are Russia to the north and China to the east.”

U.P. “So, what did you think of teaching in Russia?” [the most irksome question because it means they either didn't listen to me or they don't know that Kazakhstan has been an independent country from the former Soviet Union for 20 years.]

KN: ”Yes, it is perhaps easy to confuse Russia with Kazakhstan.  However, the Kazakhs look Asian in appearance while they speak a Turkish kind of language which is their native language. It’s true, they DO speak Russian simply because they were under Soviet rule for 70 years.  In order to survive, they learned to speak and read Russian.”

Here’s another made up conversation that I encounter concerning human trafficking:

U.P. ”You mean we still have slavery? I thought that was abolished two hundred years ago with Wilberforce and other abolitionists!!!”

KN: “No, today there are about 27-30 million slaves in the world as we speak.  Slavery is worse than ever.”

U.P. “Yes, we hear about far off, obscure countries that have slavery, maybe stone age tribes that are not connected to the 21st century.”

KN: “I first encountered the slavery/master mentality when I lived in Central Asia. But I also saw glimpses of it in my past travels to Hong Kong, living in the Philippines as a Peace Corps volunteer, and teaching two years in China.  Mostly though, the master/slave attitude is prevalent in Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan because of age old traditions that marginalize women. They also are using many men from Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan to help build skyscrapers with their oil money they have in Kazakhstan. Sixty percent of the slaves in Kazakhstan are men, they need shelters and rehabilitation for them.”

U.P. ”These unfortunate people who are supposedly slaves by your definition and who live in poverty should be thankful to foreign organizations who provide employment opportunities. These people can move up in life to be employed by some tobacco or cotton plantation or on some construction site.”

KN: “With our western sensibilities and code of ethics, yes, employment means honoring a contract where the employee would be treated fairly and would get the wages they had been promised.  Sadly, there is trickery involved where the desperate person is told one thing and then the next thing they know their documents and freedom have been stripped from them, they become slaves…”

U.P. ”Hopefully those victims of trafficking will be freed and helped to get a job. Very sad indeed.”

KN: ”Saddest of all are all the children in India, China and Africa who are used to help make products for us.  They are missing out on their education to better themselves and have hope for their future.”

So, you see as an embattled educator my mission is to inform people about a region of the world I care about deeply and make people aware of the ugly concept of slavery which is lived out daily in desperate places all over the world.  Even in my own home state of Minnesota or in the neighboring state of North Dakota, slavery is going on.  I found out that in western North Dakota many young girls from the Indian reservation are being brought to the “men camps” near Williston and Dickinson and they are forced or tricked into being “prostituted women.” These girls are forced into this smarmy “occupation” because there is wealth from oil money in western North Dakota and too few women around.  Oil money has perverted many morals in Kazakhstan as well.

What is to be done about the demand? Where are the morals or ethics in protecting those who are powerless?  What can those who become informed about slavery in the world DO about it?

(to be continued)

Comments (2) »

Highlights from Kazakh Readers’ Comments on my blog

July 20, 2011 · Filed under Blogroll · Tagged , , ,

I started this Kazakhnomad blog almost four years ago when I returned to Kazakhstan after a gap of 15 years.  My intention was to inform a western readership about this amazing country…the good and the bad.  If you read the following articulate comments written by Kazakhs, you will see that my base of readers is perhaps not as western as I first thought.  I have had comments from Dutch, French, German, Spanish, British, etc.  When looking at my daily hits I can also tell that my blog readers are from Italy, China, Singapore, Japan, Korea, etc.  What I value most are the comments from the Kazakhs and Kazakhstanis who can inform me about their country.  See what you think and feel free to comment…

The following is from one of my former students, naturally she would be flattering.  Read tomorrow’s blog entry and there are some contrary comments:

“I like reading your blog. You write so many useful and educating things. My part of work is so easy, I just read what you have analyzed for hours so even days or years. You bring us a ready dish just to swallow. Reading your topics I even wonder: ”How do you find time and power for all of these?”
 Concerning the above given quotes I want to add that we also have this proverb “It is better to see once than hear 1000 times”. I think some of suchlike quotes are common for all Central Asian countries. Waiting for your next blog and anecdotes.”

Education

“Hopeful view, I’d really like to think in a similar way, but I don’t. A metaphor. If we see education as a house, there was an imperfect but a solid house built at the time Kazakhstan was part of Russia, then the USSR. Since the independence, education has never been on top 1000 list of priorities of the country’s leaders. Too bad so sad, they said. C’est la vie. Now the house is half-broken half-deserted only a pitiful reminder of the past glory, quality and strength. It’s leaking everywhere, the water, heating and sewage systems work sporadically if they do. Power comes on and off. Basically it’s rapidly deteriorating and is nearing a collapse. A complete rehaul is required. If it had been properly maintained, repaired, reinforced and added to, then it would be the same house or even better, but, alas, now it’s in a really, really bad shape comparing to what it used to be.

Yes, too bad they’re beautifying the tip of the iceberg whereas the bottom part is quickly melting away…”

“Glad to hear such praise about our younger generation. I was a bit pessimistic about the way they are, but you actually gave me some hope and a reason to be proud.”

 The following is from another commenter about education in Kazakhstan:

“Yes, teachers are low paid in KZ, it doesn’t matter university or school teachers. I don’t think that there are teachers who work unpaid, at least their salary is government based, so it is paid on time. But nowadays problem of downsizing, every government budget based organization are dismissing their employees, so the others who remain has to work twice. That means much stress, because I think most difficult part of being teacher or for ex: doctor not teach many students or observe many many patients, but the paperwork that has to be done. This takes more time then their direct job duties.”

Bribery and Corruption

“Interesting. Yes, even in the Kazakh army the high-ranking officers force soldiers to build their houses… It’s terrible. There wasn’t much of such shameful exploitation of the vulnerable in the USSR times… It would be something out of the ordinary if something like that happened. The educational system was way, way better at the time. Both of my parents are retired university professors. Many things that you can see happening these days are uniquely Kazakhstan or post-Soviet phenomena rather than rudiments of the socialist system.

And I agree that people in ex-USSR do not trust each other. In the West, the people tend to trust each other except when they see a reason not to. In ex-USSR, people tend not to trust each other except they have firmly proven their trustworthiness to you.”

(to be continued )

Comments (2) »

1930s photos from Central Asia

June 17, 2011 · Filed under Blogroll · Tagged , , , , , , , ,

Rare to have any photos from the 1930s in Central Asia, rarer still to see what kind of Soviet education was going on in Almaty, Kazakhstan.  A Kazakh friend of mine (she has an interest in history as an economist) sent me these photos and an explanation about what these pictures of Central Asians were about.

“Rabochiy Fakultet (Workers’ Faculty) though was quite an important part of education policy of early Soviet Union.. According to Russian census in 1897 there were only about 5-6% of literate people in Central Asia. So this institution was supposed to bring the illiterate peasants and workers up to speed in a very short time to enter higher educational institutions. In spite of all the horrors of Stalin’s time, there were still something positive in educational sector (especially for Central Asia). “

Leave a comment »

“Now we shall be able to talk” from Rawicz’s book

May 28, 2011 · Filed under Blogroll · Tagged , , , , , , , ,

I have written this before, I’ll write it again in today’s blog: I LOVE old books.  However, I don’t count Slavomir Rawicz’s book necessarily that OLD at 55 years.  It recounts what had happened back in the early 1940s. But just the same, I came away learning more about Circassians.  I had not heard of Circassians before from my Kazakh students, yet I am well aware of Tatars, Chechens and other smaller people groups.

But first let me relate the dialogue in this 1956 book that piqued my interest in Circassians. If you have read my past several blogs, the group of escapees from a Siberian camp had entered Tibet and were on their way to Lhasa, or so they told people along their 4,000 mile trek:

“Welcome,” he said in Russian. “Now we shall be able to talk.”

We were rather taken aback.  He spoke Russian easily and without hesitation.  I had to remind myself that there could be no danger so far south of the Soviet in a chance encounter with a Russian.

He waited for me to reply and when I did not he went on eagerly, “I am a Circassian and it is a long time since I met anyone who could speak Russian.”

“A Circassian?” I repeated. “That is most interesting.” I could not think of anything less banal to say.

His questions tumbled over themselves. “Are you pilgrims? It is not many Russians who are Buddhists. You came through the Gobi [desert] on foot?”

From what I have gathered off the Internet with a cursory glance is that there are not many Circassians who are Russian Orthodox but this man in the Rawicz’s story was. Living in Tibet, he looked by his clothes more Mongolian yet spoke Russian. He was very proud of being Circassian as many independent Muslims are today.  I learned there are 500,000 Circassians in southern Russia and several million diaspora.

What’s interesting is this article I came across about Georgia [the country] which proclaimed the genocide against the Circassians. Read the following link. Also know that in a military campaign that was carried out in 1860-64, the Russian imperial historians recorded the deaths of these Circassians who lived in the Caucasus mountains.  Proclaiming that this was a genocide 150 years later but then Armenia will have its chance to ask for reparation from Turkey about the genocide that happened almost 100 years ago against the Armenian people.

Who can talk about these atrocities when there is division of languages, memories have faded and history books have been revised away from the truth?   “Now we shall be able to talk” will only happen in a perfect world where truth tries to mend the fractures within cultures.  It won’t be happening any time soon in Kazakhstan where many people from other nationalities were deported and dumped in Kazakhstan.  Ah…so much sadness…

 

Comments (2) »

« Previous entries
Next Page »
Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 42 other followers