Day 197 (Kyrgyzstan): Bishkek I (getting the visa preparation out of the way)

by markus

So, off to the office where the documents were waiting for me. Little did I know that I would be spending all day there in the end. It was a good thing, so thanks a lot to J. for letting me do this. Lots of space to lay out all the papers that were in the package, checking for things and printing out, among other things, scans of all of my last three passports. Yikes … and filling out more and more forms still.

The internet connection in this office was absolutely smoking … it gave me the opportunity to upload all the pictures in one go practically. At the end of the day I had a couple of days posted, pictures uploaded, but most importantly I also had everything in order for the visa interview tomorrow. I am also getting a $1 bill from Nazar as I have come up dry finding one here in a few places. Nazar and I also met up through the human rights project and yet again, if I stayed over the weekend, I would have received an invite to a wedding.

Little bit of a shock today as I was preparing things … I get an email from the consular section. Argh …. time change!!! I was flabbergasted. I don’t want any changes!!! Turns out that the main road is closed for a summit meeting tomorrow morning and it was rescheduled for the afternoon. Ufff …. But those emails where the subject line is ambiguous … can’t stand them.

Today, news percolated of an earthquake in the South of Kyrgyzstan. There is no need to worry, I am not close. I would have been though had I not come up here to Bishkek. Bit of a scary thought. It would have been quite possible that I would have been staying in or around the village of Nura which has apparently been almost completely leveled today. Keep the people in mind there – my bike is in the area too, but this is not a major concern at the moment. I will see what state it is in when I get there.

Really, this was a day in the office … no pictures. Go to the flickr site for those of the Pamir, I have been told that they are worth checking out.