A Season of Change

The snow has come! Yesterday we were walking around in 15 degrees and it felt a bit like Spring but, as predicted, the clouds have moved in overnight and after some rain, the city has turned white. We can’t help but find it exhilarating at this stage, especially as it is not very cold yet and there was much excitement about the first snowy walk to school this morning.

Other areas of our lives are changing too. Our Russian teacher will be on maternity leave from December to April so we will continue to study using a number of courses we have.  Jane will also begin to give cookery lessons at the Youth Centre every fortnight which she hopes will help to develop her spoken Russian. Putting down our three weekly lessons for the winter will change some of the routines of our week that have been in places since we arrived 15 months ago. It does feel liberating but we very much hope we can sustain some of the language-learning momentum we have gathered.

Another significant recent change in our lives is that from April next year one of our main supporting groups have decided that after sixteen years of faithful partnership, the time has come to part ways as they feel that they and Oasis are moving in different directions. This is sad but not unexpected news for us and means a change in how some of our support is provided. We are working hard on putting that in place but financially this leaves a significant gap. If you would like to support us in any way please do get in touch to find out more about how that could be done.

Lastly, we could not have foreseen that our colleagues, The Walkers, who re-joined us in May  (having been evacuated with their baby son in September 2012) would be leaving again so soon. They recently resigned from Oasis (for reasons unrelated to our work together in Kyrgyzstan) and will finish their work with us this month. We will miss them very much. Such are the challenges of team leadership!

Winter is coming!

Last Friday, for the first time the temperature was a shade below zero degrees centigrade as we set off for school. The skies are still clear and blue and the days beautiful, but there is definitely a chill in the air. One of our colleagues claims that she can smell that snow is on it's way…

In some ways the coming of winter is fun, especially as it brings the possibilities of winter sports! Rosie has recently started ice skating lessons and the thought of getting up into the mountains with snow on the ground excites us all! But we are also aware that for many people it is actually very difficult and miserable when it gets cold. In particular, we are mindful of one of the boys who Oasis has walked with over the last few years and who had lived in the transition home that we were running, but who has recently chosen to start living on the streets again. Sadly, despite working hard over the summer to get himself enrolled at an art school, and making a good start both in the studies and in settling into a dormitory, he has been encouraged by some of his old 'friends' to return to his former way of life, has dropped out of the college and is living on the streets of the city.

On a happier note, a couple of weeks ago we were contacted out of the blue by a local organisation who had 19 boxes of winter clothes for us to distribute! It turns out that we had written to them about a year and a half ago and not heard anything back… They however, had not forgotten us, and when they recently received a consignment of packages from the US, they earmarked some of them for us! It has been really good to be able to pass these on to many of the young people that we are walking with (including, of course, the chap mentioned above).

A (re)opening

Last Friday we celebrated the opening of our Youth Centre. In fact it was a re-opening as we have been running the centre for about a year, but have recently moved it to our own property which had perviously housed the boys transition home. Over the last weeks we have been working with some of the young people to paint, repair and generally renovate and it was great to be able to formally open the new centre!

The youth centre is one of the ways that we meet with young people who have been brought up in government institutions such as orphanages and children's centres. Another is that we have linked each young person that has been in touch with a member of staff. Last week one of the young people contacted her 'case worker' and said that she had been thrown out of her home and was now living on the streets; please could we help? It turns out that after she had left her orphanage in the summer she had gone to work in a holiday area and had somehow come across her mother. Initially things had gone well and she had moved in with her mother, but after some time the mother became angry and threw her out. Fortunately we were able to find her a place to stay at a children's centre and will continue to walk with her over the next weeks as she tries to make a fresh start… again. 

In other news… Felix and Rosie are on half term and having a well earned rest after a busy few weeks at school. They have both recently had orthodontic treatment, which so far has gone very well and Felix will be getting a full set of braces over the holiday (lucky chap!) And we have just really enjoyed a five day visit from some friends and on their last day (yesterday) we had an hour of snow - the first of the year. It seems that autumn is about to end...!

A New Term

So far, September has had a 'new term' feel to it. Felix and Rosie started back at school, we have had visitors from England with us for a week, and it has felt like there have been some new beginnings at Oasis too.

Felix and Rosie were very happy to get back to school; 10 weeks holiday sounded wonderful, but with many friends away, the days had become rather boring! There are quite a lot more children who have started at school this year; Felix is no longer one of two boys in a class of 9, but is now one of four in a class of thirteen! And Rosie's class (grades 4 and 5 combined) has grown from fourteen to nineteen children! For Felix in particular, this means that there are more people to make up a football team!



There is a lot happening in Oasis at the moment. The boys moved out of our transition home and into university dormitories or shared flats in the first week of September, and have started studying and working. So far this change seems to be going well for them, and we will continue to support them as they start to live more independently. We have had a lot of young people who have recently left institutions start to come to the youth centre that we run which is great, and we are working through the practicalities of how we walk with each of these young people. And the youth centre itself has just moved from a rented flat and into the property that was the transition home; as you might imagine, after housing six teenage boys, there is quite some cleaning that has been needed / still needs to be done!

On the down side, amid these changes and the excitement of fresh starts, some of the team have been ill (the health of one person being of particular concern).

In other news...






Rosie had her ninth Birthday at the beginning of September which she celebrated with a swimming party with a few friends.









We finally visited Lake Issyk-Kul for a couple of nights with friends visiting from England. We already recognised that Kyrgyzstan is a very beautiful country, but were blown away by what we experienced; as well as the fun of staying in a yurt, the water was clearer than anything that we have ever swum in before, and the mountain views more extraordinary and spectacular than anything that we had ever seen. We spent the day drinking in the scenery and views and saying 'wow' to each other!

And Jim had a few days off, cycling in the hills and mountains behind Bishkek with Mike, one of our visiting friends from England. Our biggest ride took us from 750m above sea level (where we live) up to just under 2,260m, which meant about 6 hours of almost continuous uphill cycling. It only took about 1.5 hours to get down and home!!!

It's good to be home!

We arrived back in Kyrgyzstan last Friday after four wonderful weeks in the UK. Most of the time was holiday, and we could not have chosen a better time to be there, as we arrived at the beginning of the 'heatwave' and it only rained on three days! We were very fortunate too that for three of the weeks that we were there we were staying within an easy walk of the sea, so were able to swim on most days (and often at least twice!). It was lovely to see our families and many friends and we were very blessed by the meals, conversations and generosity that we were shown throughout our stay.

Our first day - just below Beachy Head on the South Downs

An evening on Eastbourne beach

Fighting the tide with cousins on Aberdovey Beach, Wales

On top of Cadair Idris, North Wales

Overlooking Aberdovey Estuary








Nevertheless, by the end of the time we were looking forward to getting back home; Felix in particular was looking forward to getting to grips with his latest toy, an electronic drum kit which he had saved up for and bought a while back on e-bay. It is now set up in his room and so far the neighbours have not said anything...

In our absence, there has been some really good progress in the work that Oasis is involved with. In particular, the three boys from the transition home who had taken exams before we left received their exam results and all did well, one of them exceptionally. They have all now got places in university - something unheard of for boys who have come through the Government 'Reform School'. We are also excited that one of the other boys, about whom we had been very concerned, suddenly took the initiative to visit, sit exams and then enrol at a local art college, and is really making a big effort to start the next chapter of his life. They will all be moving into university / college dorms over the coming week, which is another big step for them and we are preparing to walk with them on this journey. One of the boys however is still a cause for concern; he did not do as well in the exams as he hoped and he has yet to find a place in college.

It took a while to get over jet-lag and go to sleep / wake up at the right times, but we are all very happy to be back and are really looking forward to the year ahead!

Celebration!

For the last few years Oasis has been running two transitional homes; one for boys and one for girls. The young people now living in them had nowhere to go when they left the government institutions where they were brought up and were at risk of living on the streets; over the last three years twelve young people have lived in these homes. As we have mentioned in previous blog posts we have been working towards these young people starting to live independently, and in the last couple of weeks, after much preparation, all the girls moved out of their Oasis home. Two have moved into a rented flat together and will be looking for work, one has moved to another centre and the fourth will be moving in with one of the members of staff in a fostering-type of relationship and will continue with her schooling.

So last Friday we all celebrated by having a picnic in the mountains. Of course, we were not celebrating the fact that the home is closing, but rather all the fantastic things that have happened: amongst other things, all the girls have improved their education, they have learnt how to look after themselves, they have had internships and work experience, some have had part time work, and they have been a part of a loving and supportive community. Lot's to celebrate!

The picnic site

The way home!

The six boys will be making a similar transition from their home over the next two months. As with the girls there will be much to celebrate, but also much to prepare for; it is a huge step for each of them.

The Silk Road

The Silk Road was an ancient trade route; goods produced in China (including paper, jade and, obviously, silk) travelled West, whilst glass and silverware, spices and wool (to name a few) travelled East. There was not one fixed road, but a network of routes, and all passed through Kyrgyzstan; in fact today one of the main streets in the city is called 'the Silk Road' - and we live just off it.

The presence of this route meant that a millennium ago this part of the world was bustling - and very wealthy. Large cities dotted the route, and last weekend we joined a trip to visit a number of these. Today they are just archaeological sites in the middle of rather beautiful countryside and quite some imagination is required to picture them as they might have been. We stood on the small hillock pictured (right) and were told that it was part of the largest human-moved mound of earth anywhere in the world, ever, and was the base of a city where hundreds of thousands of people lived.


We discovered that various religions co-existed at this time on the Silk Road; alongside Islam, there is evidence of a thriving Nestorian Church, of Zoroastrianism, and Buddhism. We saw mounds that were once Buddhist temples; and came across an ancient Zoroastrian necropolis, where bones were piled after the (somewhat grizzly-sounding) burial rites were performed - the photo shows a 1,000 year old (or so) skull that has recently been exposed.




It was a fascinating day, and it is extraordinary to consider that Kyrgyzstan was once at the physical heart of the global economy.

Spring

Spring has arrived in a big way in the last few weeks; turning a bare and brown city into a garden. There are trees everywhere in Bishkek and the transformation has been fast and gorgeous. The park outside our kitchen window is bursting with colour again and we recently found out that tulips are native to Kyrgyzstan and grow wild in valleys here.

Jim is back on his bike and enjoying some longer rides at the weekends. This coming Saturday he is joining a local group for a 50km cycle event. He has also started work again on his MA dissertation after a 10 month break whilst we got settled, and is looking forward to finishing it (which he has to do by the end of June!)

We celebrated Easter by watching the sun rise over Bishkek a few weeks ago. And we are still enjoying some special Easter breads and egg decorating this week, because Orthodox Easter is this coming Sunday.

For Oasis the coming month is looking busy in a number of ways, not least with new arrivals: two of our colleagues have just had their first child, a little boy and all doing well. The Walkers, the family that were evacuated back in September with a very ill one month old are returning soon, so we are all very much looking forward to that. Also, today, a short-term volunteer arrived to join our team for six months. Meanwhile we continue to make progress with the necessary changes to help Oasis empower vulnerable young people. To be honest, much of this would make pretty uninteresting reading for a blog (the development of financial systems, strategic planning, fundraising, staff training and so on) but we are seeing progress and are encouraged at the way things are developing.

Beware the (r)ides of March...

The Noorus festival (the second public holiday of the month!) marks the  first day of Spring and is a big celebration in Central Asia. In Bishkek, people were out and about, visiting friends, eating special meals and generally celebrating together. As it was also Jim's birthday, and he had just returned from a ten day trip away for Oasis meetings, and it was the first day of school holidays for Felix and Rosie, it was an extra celebration! We wandered around the city enjoying the atmosphere and ended up on a big wheel - the 'Bishkek eye'?!

Beware the (r)ides of March...!

Now that is a real kebab...

The Oasis meetings went well and it was great to be with people who are both colleagues and friends, some of whom we have known for ten to fifteen years. It is exciting to hear how work is going in different parts of the world, and esecially to hear about how work continues in Mozambique, in particular among widows who are HIV+ and with the development of a new project to improve community health and hygiene and which is helping over a thousand households to live more safely.

Meanwhile, back in Kyrgyzstan, Oasis is facing a number of significant challenges as we seek to develop increasing sustainability for our work. In particular, we are helping the young people currently in our two transition homes to move towards living independantly over the next five months and this is taking a lot of energy; we are developing a strategy that will help young people to make a better transition from living in government institutions to living independantly; and we are working out how to fund all this in a sustainable way. It is quite a challenge and there are times when project finances have been extremely tight and uncertain.

And finally, a very Happy Easter! We are looking forward to celebrating in the mountains as the sun rises. We will have two Easters this year, as we will also be able to celebrate it on May 5th with friends who are a part of the Orthodox Church!

International Women's Day

Today, the people of Kyrgyzstan are celebrating International Women's Day in a BIG way. Everybody has the day off and the shops and roads were frenetic with shoppers and cars yesterday as people bought gifts for their wives, mothers and daughters. It is a bit like Mothers Day but everywhere men great you with a "congratulations!"

The children have had a day off school so we headed for a snowy walk in the mountains with two other families. On Wednesday we were in t-shirts and it was 25 degrees centigrade and within a day it was minus 3 and snowing hard.

We have had two mornings of fantastic strategic planning with our team this week, thinking about how Oasis might best enable young people to make a positive and successful transition from institutional life into society and a community of their own. It has been great to have a colleague from Oasis UK here for the week to journey with us through this process.

But the highlight of the week for me (Jane) was hearing from two Kyrgyz women at the International Women's Club on Tuesday morning.

One woman told us her story of being bride-napped 15 years ago and how she escaped. Another told us about being a mother in law and having daughters in law in this culture. Their stories were a stark and very real reminder to me of the situation of many young women here who face the threat of bride-napping every day, as it is such a prevalent practice in Kyrgyzstan. It has also made me appreciate that I have grown up with a lot of freedom and many great opportunities as a woman in my own culture.

So to all you women out there: you are awesome! Speak out, be who you are, have courage...you are beautiful!

Six months today!

Today we have been in Kyrgyzstan for six months!

Overall, we have really enjoyed our first six months here. There has been much that has been great, such as our lovely flat, our Oasis colleagues, and Felix and Rosie's wonderful school. There have (of course!) been plenty of challenges - communicating in Russian is high on this list! And there has been plenty that has been unexpected (walking to school in minus twenty degrees is not as unpleasant as it sounds!) We have made some friends and plenty of mistakes (back to the Russian language challenge again!) and experienced the high and the lows of culture shock. The photos at the end of the post might give a flavour of our first few months.

There is much to celebrate for Oasis over these last six months; we have grown as a team, certainly numerically (there are currently 12 of us), but more importantly in our relationships, respect for one another and in how we work together. We have started a youth centre for young people leaving government institutions (so called 'social-orphans') and have nearly completed a life-skills course at the government 'Reform Home' for some of the more 'difficult' young people that are in government care. And organisationally we are making good strides in developing better finance processes and organisational sustainability.

The review we wrote about in our last post has led us to start working intensively with the ten young people currently in the Oasis transitional homes to help each one of them to live independently within the next six months. Whilst this is a challenging prospect for each one of them, it will be a really positive step and we will walk with them through the transition and for some time afterwards, providing the support, encouragement and help that they will need as they make decisions.

 Independence Day Celebrations (August 31st) 

   

Oasis Team Meal at our flat (September)

Mountains 30 minutes south of Bishkek (October)

Rosie in end of term play (December)

 Finishing our joint 1,000km run, Bishkek (December 31st)

Skiing in the mountains south of Bishkek, Chinese New Year (February)

The view from our kitchen window (much of December, January and February!)

Project Review

Over the last week we have been doing an intensive review of our transition homes, which Oasis has been running in Kyrgyzstan for two and a half years. It has been amazing to hear about what has been achieved... all the young people have continued with their education and some have done really well; two are preparing for university (unheard of for young people from the Reform School which is a bit like Borstall); we have helped some of the young people to receive official documents such as passports and birth certificates which they had not had previously and which are vital in order to get a job; all but one have done internships and had work experience; we have helped some of them to find and contact family members; and all have been kept safe from involvement in serious crime and from being trafficked. This last point is not to be underestimated; for girls from orphanages in particular, there is a high possibility that they may end up working in the sex industry and indeed all the girls in our transitional home know of friends from the institutions where they grew up who have ended up as commercial sex workers.

But alongside all the achievements there are things that have not gone so well; transitional care homes are expensive to run, the costs are on-going, and we have never been able to fund the work as we would like to; for the staff who are with the young people each day the work is also intense and we have not been able to find enough people willing to take on this work for the long term that is needed to build relationships; and helping the young people to move to a point of genuine independence has not happened as well as we would have liked.

The next exciting step is to look to the future - how do we take all these lessons from what has been achieved and what has not gone so well, and improve our work with young people to help them to make a successful transition from a life dependant on the institutions where they have been brought up, to life on their own? There are no easy answers...

Christmas Holidays!

December 25th is not a special holiday in Kyrgyzstan; we even had a discussion as to whether we would close the office (we did!). The children though had broken up from their school so Jim took a few days off and we enjoyed a few days together at home. Christmas Day itself was very different to usual; we got up early and set off early to the nearby mountains to go skiing! As it was not high season and a normal work day, the pistes were almost empty, and Jim and Felix tried snowboarding for the first time. Felix is now hooked and unlikely to ever step into skis again! Christmas lunch was a ham roll each, but Jane had prepared a wonderful roast for the evening and we all thoroughly enjoyed our first December 25th in Bishkek.

On the last day of 2012 we completed our family challenge for the year of running 1,000 km (see our running blog - link on the right). We ran in melting snow and +4 degrees which felt almost tropical after the temperatures of the previous few weeks.

Whilst Christmas Day is not a holiday, the New Year is, and big time! We saw the old year out and the new year in at our flat with some friends and at midnight watched from our balcony as fireworks erupted all over the city in celebration. There was no planned display - people simply set them off wherever they were, and the sky was constantly lit up. It was an impressive sight!

And as for new years resolutions... we recently watched 'the Age of Stupid', a film set in the future and imagines what the world might be like after catastrophic climate change. The narrator looks back to 2008, when human beings still had the opportunity to do something and asks why we didn't. It is was a timely reminder and prompt about the realities of human induced climate change and our response to it. Among other things, we will work out our carbon footprint now that we are living in Bishkek (and making more flights) and work out how we can both reduce and take responsibility for it.