Day 11, July 5, 2009, Sunday, Jekshembi: Well, yesterday's poor weather resulted in some new information and a fun day after all. I am always reminded of the quotation in Pooh's Birthday Book for July 2nd birthdays which is “Suddenly, Piglet realized that it was a much better day than he had thought it was.” My friend Joe Weaver had one and he maintained it religiously, always sending some homemade art project to you for your birthday. At any rate it was that kind of day. The weather was cold and windy and the beach was out of the question. So, [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 10, July 4, 2009, Saturday, Ishembi: If it were not for this travel diary and my Mac, I would not really know what day it is. I am not even sure how many days I have been in Kyrgyzstan at this point, except that it appears to be day ten according to the diary. One loses all track of time except for sunrise and sunset in places like Lake Issy-Kul. And that, of course, is the point. Gulnara, Emil's mother, Timurlan's aunt, and my friend, arrived sometime late last night and is sleeping in one of the rooms. Timka waited [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 7, July 1, 2009, Wednesday, Sharshembi: Today is the last day that I can tell people I am Altimish-Alti, since tomorrow is my birthday and I will have to begin saying that I am Altimish-Jeti. Sixty-seven, and I am celebrating my birthday for a second time in Kyrgyzstan and this time I am at the 2nd largest alpine lake in the world, and probably the 4th or 5th highest in altitude. I think we are at about 5-thousand feet or so. What an experience for me. Timka and I made it to the beach yesterday around 11 am after a [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 5, Monday, Duishombu, June 29, 2009: What an excellent day yesterday turned out to be. I finally made enough noise to get Timka out of bed and thinking about going to the beach around 10 a.m. No one seems to be ready to head to the beach in this country until nearly noon or later. I see very few people heading down to the water on the roadway that leads to the beach before 10 am and it seems yesterday that most went to the area that serves the motel around 1 p.m. The beach was not very crowded on [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 6, June 30, 2009, Tuesday, Sheishembi: Did I mention the rain? Yesterday was a washout, no trip to the beach. The clouds darkened and gathered over the mountain tops and then brought the rain and cold down with them. It was snowing at the higher elevations and there is new snow on the mountain tops that we can see from our motel and our vantage points. I have tried to look-up just how high these mountains and the lake are, but I don't have that information stored in my computer. I put the pdf version of one guide and some [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 8, July 2, 2009, Thursday, Beishembi Surprise, surprise, we are still in Cholpan-Ata at the Cafe Chebek and the motel with the empty swimming pool. Our plans to return to Bishkek were changed around noon. Emil called from America to tell me that we were not going back to the city until Friday. When we had first worked on a bit of a schedule for me during this month without him we had discussed staying at the lake for about a week. Apparently when he found out that his mother had only scheduled 4 days, he changed everybody's plans. Timurlan [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 9, July 3, 2009, Friday, Juma: Yesterday's excursion was less than fully successful. And the problem was the 15 year old being a teenager all morning. First he did not want to go to town, even though I tried to explain that there were things I wanted to do there. I needed to use the internet and I know that after 8 days of not having access that I would have an hour's worth of work on the net, along with some emails that would require a response or at the very least would need to be read. But Timka [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 1, June 24, 2009, Wednesday, Sharshembi: Arrived at 1:00 am at the airport in Almaty, Kazakhstan. Needed a transit visa to be able to travel by car to Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. The transit visa was available after completing a two page form and handing over $15 to the unsmiling young woman at the counter. All attempts at charm and ineptitude were of no avail. The father of my friend Emil Ismailov, Borat, and two friends of Emil's came to meet me at the airport. From the airport we drove into Almaty and stopped for a visit with Emil's brother Anatoly and [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 2, June 25, 2009, Thursday, Beishembi: I was up early this morning after sleeping most of yesterday. Five o'clock and I could not really return to sleep. I had some coffee, read for awhile, then went back to bed until about 7 a.m. I am the first one to rise in the household. The others seems to sleep later. I brought Reza Aslan's new book, Cosmic War, God, Globalization and The End of the War on Terror, with me for the trip. I read more in that this morning and I have finished the book this afternoon. Now I realize [View Full Entry]

---

---

Day 3, June 26, 2009, Friday, Juma: I have awaken early again. I woke up quite naturally about 5 am. I thought I would just go back to sleep, but my head is filled with practical matters. So, I got up and took a shower, made some coffee, and realized that I did not bring the other books I wanted to read with me. Luckily, I do have the works of Said Nursi downloaded into this computer. I have been reading and discussing the Nursi with Emil, but it has been slow going. The original works are in Persian, it was [View Full Entry]

---

---