I got back from Central Asia yesterday - after three weeks of road-tripping with Gareth, Christoph, Ollie and Sascha. We managed to cover quite some distance: Starting in Almaty, we made a 36-hour excursion to Astana (…), then back by overnight train to Almaty, from there by car to Karakol, then a four-day tour along the southern shore of lake Issyk-Kul, after which we stayed in Bishkek for two days; then by An-24 to Osh and directly off to the Alai (afoot the Pamirs) with old driver friend Hadji. After a 40km walk across a big pass, we went back to Osh, Bishkek and finally Almaty. Phew.

There are a few things I’d like to write about in the coming weeks (fingers crossed). First, I definitely found Astana very strange and want to have the post go along with pictures fellow traveler Christoph took. Second, another entry on Sary Moghul is definitely in the pipeline, hopefully I’ll be able to quote Peter’s piece once it’s up on the wires. Again, Christoph made beautiful photos there, so I hope they’ll go along with it. The third one I’m not 100% sure about yet is a more general piece on my impressions this time. As I had the benefit to visit most places for the second or third time over four years, I thought of writing a personal report here. Let’s see how far this gets.

Almost a year has passed since I wrote the last entry on my own personal blog. I have not been writing a lot on neweurasia lately either, so I don’t even have that excuse at my disposal either. Have I been too busy in my new job? Not really, they are actually treating me quite well. Let’s see…

- Schwartz and I have teamed up again (I had the pleasure to chill with him in Philly a couple of weeks ago). We’re aiming to produce a book out of the 3,000+ posts that have been written on neweurasia since its inception three years ago. Check out the blog here.
- I have written two articles for Steppe Magazine, Central Asia’s first real glossy. The first is about, yes, Blogging in Central Asia and can be seen/read here. The second one is forthcoming in the new fourth issue and will be a restaurant review.
- I have used the above mentioned trip to the States to equip myself with the latest Mac accessories and have resumed to make electronic music. Until the results are sounding OK-ish, I will keep them to myself!
- Another trip to Central Asia is in the pipeline, this time for only three weeks playing the tourist. Gareth, Sascha and Ollie will join me in what will surely be an exciting road trip visiting several new places (Astana, Sary-Chelek) and showing my friends my favourite place afoot the Pik Lenin.
- Lastly, work has been good, and I can’t believe that it’s already been eight months since I joined the company. Inevitably, that makes me think about the future quite frequently recently. At this stage, I have got no idea where the journey will take me. I have some things in mind, mostly connected to Central Asia and Russia, but how it will all pan out is an unwritten paper yet.
- Oh, I shall be attending the Global Voices Summit in Budapest this June - it’ll be great meeting up with many people that I haven’t seen in a while. In that vein, it was also great meeting many of my neweurasia friends in Riga earlier this year during the Latvian Barcamp.

By the way, have I mentioned that Groningen is a really sweet place when the sun’s out?

Thanks to Rob for prompting me to update this place. I aim to do this more often from now.

PS: The Flickr photo stream - at the time of publication - shows Koxe and Tina’s sweet daughter Kjella.

So - not a lot of updates on my personal situation lately. But now that I’m done with my Master’s in Development Studies in Cambridge and have spent a so far great summer in Berlin - I thought it’s time to let the 4-odd readers of this blog know that I am moving to the Netherlands next week.

The Netherlands? Well - I am going to live in a small place in the east of the small country, actually - and to be more precise, in Groningen. I’m not afraid of small rural places anymore, and Groningen is supposedly a student place not unlike Cambridge, with 40,000 students out of a population of 200,000.

So what am I going to do in that place? Finance. Getting to know the numbers behind the workings of an oil company. And playing the drums again. Quite a lot of things actually. My parents will drive me next Friday. Getting excited!

This reminds me of one of my old web design clients Christina Asquith who wrote down her experience as a Philly Emergency Teacher in book form.

…comes from Afghanistanica and is called “Imaginary Chechen Attacks”.

…and it’s been Craig Murray. Check out this video from about 3:00 onwards:

Craig Murray:

I received an e-mail a week ago from a gentleman called Ben Paarmann, who’s actually a professional neoconservative - he’s an American neoconservative. He’s employed actually by the Soros foundation, although his - Ben’s - politics are far to the right of George Soros. He works for the Soros Foundation on Central Asian issues in Berlin.

Ouch.

I’m - actually - German, and - actually - I wouldn’t call myself a professional neoconservative. Oh, and I also don’t work for the Soros foundation. Where the heck did that come from?

Thanks to Nick for sending me the link.

Nice:

Adam Kesher berichtet von der Lage in Kasachstan. Dort werden am 18. August Wahlen abgehalten – allerdings unter einigen merkwürdigen Umständen. Ungefähr zehn Prozent der Abgeordneten des Unterhauses werden von der „Versammlung der Völker Kasachstans“ gewählt, die 1995 ins Leben gerufen wurde, dem Präsidenten Nursultan Nasarbajew untergeordnet ist und so etwas wie eine Vertretung der ethnischen Minderheiten darstellen soll. Da aber deren Zusammensetzung ebenso unklar ist wie die durch die Versammlung Gewählten, ergibt sich ein nicht sonderlich demokratisches Bild. Auch die sogenannte „Legalisierung von Besitz und Geld“ sorgt für Probleme: die Opposition sieht dies als einen Versuch der Geldwäsche – Profiteure dieser seien vor allem Mitglieder der regierenden Nur-Otan Partei (Strahlendes Vaterland) und deren Verwandten. Immerhin zitiert Kesher den Blogger miliz-kz (Link in Russisch) der hoffnungsvoll ist, dass diese Opposition mittlerweile ein gutes Bild gibt und nicht mehr in kleine Grüppchen zerfallen ist, auch wenn das, wie er zugibt, keine große Rolle bei der Wahl spielen wird.

Bankenkrise in Kasachstan

Ein weiteres Thema, möglicherweise noch wichtiger aufgrund der Vorhersehbarkeit des Ausgangs der Wahlen, ist die derzeitige Bankenkrise in Kasachstan. Die oben erwähnte „Legalisierung“, länger anhaltende Gerüchte über einen bevorstehenden Kollaps des kasachischen Bankensystems und nicht zuletzt die US-amerikanische Finanzkrise haben dazu geführt, dass das Thema „Wahlen“ in der kasachischen Blogosphäre verdrängt wurde. Alle großen Banken haben die Anzahlungsrate bei Krediten und Hypotheken drastisch gessenkt, zwei Banken geben bis September überhaupt keine Kredite mehr aus. Für Finanzexperten steht allerdings außer Frage, dass die vorhandenen Stabilisierungsinstrumente (Gold und Devisen Reserven) und der stabile Erdölpreis ausreichen werden, um eine deutlichere Krise abzuwenden.

Turboweekend, friends from Copenhagen. Freaking brilliant tune below. Formerly members of Kevin Beige.

I’ve assumed the Regional Editor position on Global Voices following Nathan’s resignation. These are big shoes I intend to fill, but I hope my feet are big enough (as Ethan thinks on the GV mailing list).

This is hilarious. Very reminiscent of this. Or this: