As I write this about 2-3 weeks after we left for the second part of our journey, I know that all the little troubles that happened in our first few days really were the least of our problems we had to get through. Yes, the helpful airline agent that assigned an exit row seat to me made a little mistake and gave me the normal cramped space just one row behind the exit row. But he will probably get a similar treatment on the never ending flight they will provide especially for him in hell. Yes, the taxi driver did not pick me up at the airport to take me to my hostel, but I speak Russian, so what was the problem? And yes, the hostel did not have a room for us that I reserved about a month before our arrival. But this did not surprise me. At least I realized I was back in the Central Asia where a lot of things seem impossible but everything gets solved in the end. And so they found us a room in another little hotel at three o'clock in the morning without any problems.
Hynek arrived a few hours later and the next day we went to see our little Trabi in a garage. I guess I should say "my" garage, as in the 2015, while searching for a friendly accommodation for the Trabi, I made a deal with the owner of a local travel agency and we purchased an old Russian garage together. It was only about $150 more expensive for me than to rent it and it put me into the league of the famous real estate magnates. Or perhaps a bit above them because I don't think even Donald Trump owns an ideal half of the old Soviet row garage in Kyrgyzstan...not to mention that I have never declared a bankruptcy in order to "restructure" my real estate portfolio...
We went to the Turkmenistan embassy to get the visa that had been already approved before we left our homes, and as it took additional 4 days to get the stamps in our passports, we had a plenty of time to fix the car. By the way, one day I will write about an interesting subject of obtaining the visas for travel through Central Asia. Or maybe I will expand it into my PhD thesis; I bet there is enough material to cover a thick binder.
And so finally in July 2016, after changing and fixing quite a few things on our Trabi, we waved goodbye to Bishkek and were on our way back to Prague. Of course, some of the Kyrgyz police followed the precedent made by the Kazakh police and an incoming foreign vehicle meant only one thing to them: "Hey, look, the money is coming. Let's shake this tree a bit". After our Kazakh experience we are a harder tree to shake, but still there was one time when we left with sour faces while the policemen were quite happy that we made a contribution to their well-being.
Along the way we stopped at a little hotel out in nowhere to talk to its young owner. That was when I realized how easy it is to empty people's minds and then fill them with new incoherent ideas. His idea that Prague is full of vampires was probably the least silly of all the ideas he derived from the movies streamed by his illegal satellite dish. The other ideas that replaced the old Soviet ones with new religious ones while also mixing the two incompatible points of view were more troublesome. Somewhere, in one of his books, Dostoevsky claims that whereas religion wants to take man to heavens, the communism wants to bring heavens down to man. Living through the system that did not exactly deliver on bringing the heavens down to man, communism just did not do it for me. Then, a while ago, I realized some of the difficulties of the other concept too. But to achieve a complete mix of these two incompatible concepts through the means of killing all who disagree with either one of them seemed quite impossible. Yet it was something our young hotel owner thought to be an easy solution to all the ills of the world.
Perhaps I am wrong, but it appears to me that our hotel owner's ideas are not Central Asia specific, but rather that they just prove my point that once you erase the old ideas, being it through fear, greed, etc., it is way too easy to fill the mind with new ideas of hate. Way too easy in the Central Asia, way to easy in the Nazi Germany, and perhaps way to easy everywhere. That is, if you are looking for simple solutions to maddening events you feel unable to understand or change. Yeah, yeah, I know, you can derive your own conclusion too. And, in fact, what I needed more than pointless speeches was to figure out how to get our Trabi out of Kyrgyzstan.
You see, there was a little problem. It used to be that you could enter Kyrgyzstan and either sell your car there or park it there. Then, just about a week before we came to Kyrgyzstan in 2015, the country entered the Russian customs union and it all changed. You cannot leave the car in the country a day longer than what your entry visa shows. Otherwise, you have a problem; yet, exactly what kind of problem and how big nobody seems to know. So, with a youthful disregard (or was it senility?) we abandoned the car in my Kyrgyz garage last year thinking that we will figure out something in 2016.
Obviously, we did not figure anything out and now we arrived at the Kyrgyz - Tajik border. I went to the customs and presented our custom papers from the last year. As the customs official noted the 2015 entry date on our papers, a relatively lively discussion ensued. I claimed that we were told by the customs that we can leave our car in Kyrgyzstan for about a year, he claimed that we have to go back to Bishkek and get a pile of paperwork, then I claimed something and he claimed something else, until I brought up the subject of paying our fine right there at the border. After figuring out how much of the local money I have, he announced the fine at that amount. The money appeared on the desk and was raked into an open drawer. Then we exchanged a few pleasantries and with a new stamp we left for Tajikistan. So, in the end, it really was the least of our problems.
Hynek arrived a few hours later and the next day we went to see our little Trabi in a garage. I guess I should say "my" garage, as in the 2015, while searching for a friendly accommodation for the Trabi, I made a deal with the owner of a local travel agency and we purchased an old Russian garage together. It was only about $150 more expensive for me than to rent it and it put me into the league of the famous real estate magnates. Or perhaps a bit above them because I don't think even Donald Trump owns an ideal half of the old Soviet row garage in Kyrgyzstan...not to mention that I have never declared a bankruptcy in order to "restructure" my real estate portfolio...
We went to the Turkmenistan embassy to get the visa that had been already approved before we left our homes, and as it took additional 4 days to get the stamps in our passports, we had a plenty of time to fix the car. By the way, one day I will write about an interesting subject of obtaining the visas for travel through Central Asia. Or maybe I will expand it into my PhD thesis; I bet there is enough material to cover a thick binder.
And so finally in July 2016, after changing and fixing quite a few things on our Trabi, we waved goodbye to Bishkek and were on our way back to Prague. Of course, some of the Kyrgyz police followed the precedent made by the Kazakh police and an incoming foreign vehicle meant only one thing to them: "Hey, look, the money is coming. Let's shake this tree a bit". After our Kazakh experience we are a harder tree to shake, but still there was one time when we left with sour faces while the policemen were quite happy that we made a contribution to their well-being.
Along the way we stopped at a little hotel out in nowhere to talk to its young owner. That was when I realized how easy it is to empty people's minds and then fill them with new incoherent ideas. His idea that Prague is full of vampires was probably the least silly of all the ideas he derived from the movies streamed by his illegal satellite dish. The other ideas that replaced the old Soviet ones with new religious ones while also mixing the two incompatible points of view were more troublesome. Somewhere, in one of his books, Dostoevsky claims that whereas religion wants to take man to heavens, the communism wants to bring heavens down to man. Living through the system that did not exactly deliver on bringing the heavens down to man, communism just did not do it for me. Then, a while ago, I realized some of the difficulties of the other concept too. But to achieve a complete mix of these two incompatible concepts through the means of killing all who disagree with either one of them seemed quite impossible. Yet it was something our young hotel owner thought to be an easy solution to all the ills of the world.
Perhaps I am wrong, but it appears to me that our hotel owner's ideas are not Central Asia specific, but rather that they just prove my point that once you erase the old ideas, being it through fear, greed, etc., it is way too easy to fill the mind with new ideas of hate. Way too easy in the Central Asia, way to easy in the Nazi Germany, and perhaps way to easy everywhere. That is, if you are looking for simple solutions to maddening events you feel unable to understand or change. Yeah, yeah, I know, you can derive your own conclusion too. And, in fact, what I needed more than pointless speeches was to figure out how to get our Trabi out of Kyrgyzstan.
You see, there was a little problem. It used to be that you could enter Kyrgyzstan and either sell your car there or park it there. Then, just about a week before we came to Kyrgyzstan in 2015, the country entered the Russian customs union and it all changed. You cannot leave the car in the country a day longer than what your entry visa shows. Otherwise, you have a problem; yet, exactly what kind of problem and how big nobody seems to know. So, with a youthful disregard (or was it senility?) we abandoned the car in my Kyrgyz garage last year thinking that we will figure out something in 2016.
Obviously, we did not figure anything out and now we arrived at the Kyrgyz - Tajik border. I went to the customs and presented our custom papers from the last year. As the customs official noted the 2015 entry date on our papers, a relatively lively discussion ensued. I claimed that we were told by the customs that we can leave our car in Kyrgyzstan for about a year, he claimed that we have to go back to Bishkek and get a pile of paperwork, then I claimed something and he claimed something else, until I brought up the subject of paying our fine right there at the border. After figuring out how much of the local money I have, he announced the fine at that amount. The money appeared on the desk and was raked into an open drawer. Then we exchanged a few pleasantries and with a new stamp we left for Tajikistan. So, in the end, it really was the least of our problems.