Habitat for Humanity Kyrgyzstan
Newsletter 1 – February 2007

Hi all

You are all the people who have either expressed a strong desire, or committed to, coming to Kyrgyzstan this summer (July 2007). Or you have shown such extraordinary interest in the whole project, that we feel compelled to keeping you in the loop on what we are doing. That way, in case you are still sitting on the fence, you can decide one way or the other.

This note is for people who might well possibly perhaps come to Kyrgyzstan in July. It’s time now to start confirming one way or the other. We will still love you if you need to pull out, but we need to start planning. And that requires knowing how many people are coming.

Who’s coming and who’s not?
16 is a good number for our build. At the moment we think we are at about 11 or so. People we are counting on joining us in July are as follows:

Emma's Mum and Dad, Peter M, Teresa H, Francesca A, Massimo M, Joanne P, Dave G, Lorraine F, Mike, Laura and me. It’s rather PDI-ish and Habitat right now, all very special people. Joanne, you have mentioned bringing a friend. Is that still on? She’s more than welcome.

In addition, people who have expressed considerable interest – and we would love you to come – are: Bryony H, Jeanne N, Sue G, Rhonda G, Danette P and John T.

Those expressing mild curiosity (past or present) are: Nancy S, Damian G (and partner), Carol S, Joy H, Anne O, Donna DiM (actually, you were co-opted), Anne G, Diane M, Jennifer S, Kathy B, and Laura McK. Any of you actually planning on coming? (Would love you to, but it seems that it’s not at the top of your priority list for summer hols!).

Finally, Lynden L, Zuzana W, Nicole J, Katinka W, Jim & Cheryl J, Trisha C, Victoria T, Betsy K and Lotta H – we know you won’t be coming this time – all for good reasons like important birthdays, weddings, anything – but I said I would keep you in the loop. We will do it again some time, okay? If any of you have a burning desire to postpone the wedding and come, just let us know.

So – first come first served at this stage. We’d love to have a full complement of 16, so please let us know one way or another.

What’s the plan?
Okay, so what are we going to do? Here’s the fledgling plan (and sorry for those of you who need more detail than this. We are actually astounding ourselves with this level of advanced planning).

Saturday 14th July, fly overnight into Bishkek, capital of Kyrgyzstan; arrive early Sunday, and get to a cheap hotel we will organise
Sunday 15th July: morning, sleep in; visit Bishkek market; travel 6 hours south-east to Barskoon on the shores of the beautiful Lake Issyk-Köl (varied spelling for this, but it’s in a beautiful area with high mountains and lovely things like that)
Monday 16th and Tuesday 17th July – construction work with the family selected for us in Barskoon (more on this in future newsletters)
Wednesday 18th and half of Thursday 19th July – time off for “rest & relaxation” – probably take Kyrgyz horses up into mountains with guides, walk around, see nice views, stay overnight in a “Yurt”, be catered for by locals
Thursday 19th pm – work on the house
Friday 20th – work on the house, farewell dinner
Saturday 21st am – possible work on house, and farewell; Saturday pm – travel back to Bishkek; Saturday evening/short night – rest
Sunday 22nd am very early – fly back overnight.

This plan is not fixed in stone, but our wish to work in Barskoon (and not the capital Bishkek) is firm. Some advice I was given by a friend whose organisation does humanitarian work is “always get away from the capital”. Yes there’s poverty in Bishkek too, but they still fare better in terms of benefiting from international aid. Few international aid organisations get out into the region, and Habitat is the only aid organisation working in Barskoon.

So – do you like the sound of this? We want us to have 1½ days R&R – after all, it is holiday for us. At the same time we want us to put in a good few days’ work on the house, since we want our contribution to be felt by the family. It’s a big deal for them when a group of people turns up, and they will want to treat us well. In return, We want us to pull our weight, make them feel the contribution of having us there, and be glad that we bothered. Our experience in Armenia was that we didn’t work enough (!) so we decided that we work 4 days, not three (as in Armenia). We hope that suits you all. We can still do some fine-tuning, but let us know your wishes quickly, and if there’s a massive request for something or other, we will do our best to accommodate.

What’s it going to cost?
Sw have worked out a budget togehter with our host in Kygyzstan, Elzat. “In-country costs” come out at about $960 (Convert it quickly into Euros – it feels a lot better – approx €730!). We are certain it won’t be higher. It could well be a little lower. In addition, there are flights and visa(s) ($35 on arrival) to pay for. If you want to see a detailed budget, please ask, but basically, 40-50% of the fee is a donation to Habitat (local and global organisations); of the rest, 50% is our R&R; and the rest (frankly, very little) is accommodation, food, water, transport. Insurance is also covered.

Your place is secured for the trip once the deposit for Habitat is received. If you are sure you want to do this, please let us (Emma or Laura) know.

NOTE – Mike, Laura and I are all paying our way 100%. We figure you’d expect this, but typically Habitat and volunteers cover someone if they have organised a trip and/or raised money. We’d rather see the money in the Habitat system, and lower the costs to a manageable level for all of you.

Accommodation and life in Kyrgyzstan in general
We hope you have all “roughed it”. This is not the Conrad hotel in London. This is not a Marriott. This will be sharing basic rooms/apartments, having basic toilet and washing facilities, and eating basic, simple food. We will have bottled water, so no worries there. We will also have fabulous hosts who are so delighted with our presence you will contemplate jacking in your commercial day job and doing something to leave the world in a better place on a day to day basis, haha. But it will be basic. If that’s not okay for you, pull out now. We can all do it for a week, right, even after all those nights we spend in 3* hotels?

Info on the country
If you want to do some background reading on Kyrgyzstan, here are two useful sources:
https://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/kg.html

The Lonely Planet Book (which I have bought and looked at the pictures of – lovely!) can be bought on Amazon – here’s the UK link, but use the one closest to you. Also a phrase book which we haven’t bought (yet) - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Central-Asia-Lonely-Planet-Clammer/dp/1864502967/sr=8-1/qid=1172526055/ref=pd_ka_1/202-7755299-1443804?ie=UTF8&s=books

Here are some lovely photos Emma found: http://fr.trekearth.com/gallery/Asia/Kyrgyzstan/page1.htm
Check out the site http://www.cdc.gov/travel/easteurp.htm for medical information and necessary vaccination information, and http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1765.html for US travel advisory information (the US sites tend to be most conservative).
Regarding vaccinations, simply check that your Tetanus jab is up to date (you need it done every 10 years). This is just because of simple cuts that can occur on a building site. Otherwise, no vaccinations are recommended for Kyrgyzstan.

Flights

While Habitat generally recommends that people meet in a central city and fly together to the final destination (logistics, sense of security, “mother hen behaviour”, etc), we know that a number of you either want to do your own thing before and/or after our little adventure. So, all we ask is that you plan your travel so that you are in Bishkek by 9 am on Sunday 15th July at the latest, and plan to leave not before Sunday 22nd at 2 am. Before and after that, you can do what you like. Oh yes – and let us know travel itineraries (mother hen behaviour).
If you basically plan to fly in and out of Kyrgyzstan, then consider flying into Istanbul from wherever you live, and then fly on Turkish Airlines into Bishkek, dep Saturday 14th July from Istanbul (flight 1348) at 17h00, arr Bishkek 1h10 am Sunday 15th. Return flight would be dep Bishkek Sunday 22nd July (flight 1349) at 3h20 am (ouch!), arr Istanbul Sunday 22nd July at 6h20 am. Currently this flight is $630 including taxes. You’d need to get to Istanbul too of course.

Visas
Visas can be obtained on arrival ($35), or from your own country’s Kyrgyz embassy. If there isn’t one, then the Russian, and/or Kazakh embassies also do it. But it might simply be easier on arrival. For Armenia in 2005 we did it on the internet, and it cost more than on arrival. Feel free to see what you can do on this site, but it looks more pricey than $35! http://www.visatorussia.com/russianvisa.nsf/kyrgyzstan.html?OpenForm&AF=7265F56221167715C325707300475039

Next steps
Okay – what else do you want to know? Please send your wishes, and the information will be in Newsletter 2.

If you are definitely absolutely planning on coming you need to do some administrative work. Please ask for the two forms to fill out. Please complete them and fax (sorry) to Laura Ferent on +36 1 411 21 71.

We’d also like to make sure that we can prepare a newsletter that includes information on the family we will be working for, and a bit about each of us.

Thanks all!

Emma, Laura, & Mike