Day 6 – rush-hour in marshrutka

Difficult or not, today I had to wake up in the morning. Lena was taking me to a friend of hers who had studied in London and was keen to meet me. She also told me to bring my certificate of graduation from University.

This friend was Korean and lived in Sector 12 of Bishkek, so it was a good 35 minutes by marshrutka. I’d heard that these little buses were packed in the mornings, but I wasn’t ready for this. I thought the bus was full and we wouldn’t be getting on, but Lena squeezed in and I ended up perched on the dashboard facing the back of the bus, neck bent because of the roof, and with the driver grumbling that my English bottom, with which his bus was greeting the oncoming traffic, was blocking his view of the wing mirror.

As the marshrutka progressed through the city, a couple of people would get off at each stop only to be replaced by three or four more people. How many people were on board? I tried to count, but couldn’t see far enough to count all the people standing, let alone those sitting. There must have been at least 20, maybe 30 people on board. I didn’t want to think about what would happen if we crashed. I’d be picking shards of glass out of my arse for weeks. Of course, marshrutkas offer a perfect opportunity for pick-pockets, of which there are many in Bishkek, and as an Englishman I was an obvious and easy target. So I tried to protect my pockets, maintain my balance, and keep my backside out of the driver’s way, all at the same time.
I had no idea where Lena was. Had she got off without me noticing? Was I alone on a marshrutka with no idea where I was going, or how to get back? For the time being, there was nothing I could do. I couldn’t even look for her: at the last stop, my T-shirt had got caught in the door, and now I was trapped until the next stop.

Public transport was different in Pakistan. For one thing, they would squeeze four people onto two seats, and had few people standing. Conversely, they would increase the capacity with people hanging onto the sides of the bus, and then double the capacity by putting people on the roof. Another big difference was the segregation. Women would sit at the front of the bus with the driver, or sometime in the back, with four women squeezed onto a bench of two seats, but never with men unless it was a husband or father or something. Bishkek, with its own form of sexual equality, crams as many people onto a bus as possible, regardless of race, gender, size or shape. Equality is a good thing, but maybe a little discrimination against people who haven’t washed for weeks would be better. I’m not calling for anything severe: maybe just a small law stating that they are not allowed onto marshrutkas, and certainly not allowed to stand with arms raised and their fully-loaded armpits pointing directly at my nose. Buses here are just plain buses, without any artwork. In Pakistan they were bigger and covered in gaudy decoration (see picture. I can't find any good photo of a marshrutka.)

As we got further from the centre of Bishkek, more people began to get off, until I could give the driver a free view of his wing mirror, escape the armpits, and push my way down the bus in search of Lena. There she was, sitting serenely on a seat at the back. The front of the bus was still packed with people, the back had no free seats but plenty of free standing room, and with a roof above head height.
Lesson no. 1: get to the back of the marshrutka, unless you really want to greet oncoming traffic with your bottom and bury your nose in someone’s unwashed armpits.

Lena was quite amused by my experiences. She seems to take delight in the fact that I don’t really have a clue what I’m doing here. An old lady prodded me in the leg and said something unintelligible before pushing me out of the way. “She said she needed to get up. You can have her seat,” explained Lena. Why do Russian people sound so aggressive when they’re being nice?

By the time we reached Sector 12, the marshrutka was empty: just me, Lena, and the lingering smell of those armpits. The Korean gentleman worked in an office as a private lawyer based in a modern-looking shopping centre surrounded by crumbling Soviet-era apartment blocks. He was a nice chap, though I found it hard to believe he had lived in London for three years. He still had a very strong Korean accent and it was difficult to understand him. Not having much to say for himself, he showed me photos of his recent wedding, and I realised that the beautiful Kyrgyz girl in the office was actually his wife. She looked about 14 to me, but you can’t get married before you’re 18 in Kyrgyzstan. She was actually 19 years old. I’m not sure if all Kyrgyz lie about their ages or if they just age slowly here, especially when they’re young. In Pakistan, guessing people’s ages was a hit-and-miss affair, because often they didn’t know themselves. Here it seems you guess the age, add five years, and you’re in the right area.

The hidden purpose behind the visit became clear: as a lawyer, Sergei (how many Koreans do you know called Sergei?) could vouch for the translation of my certificate of graduation, which his wife and Lena began translating. As a graduate of Cardiff University, my certificate is bi-lingual, in Welsh and English. Conversely, although I’ve graduated from Cardiff University, I’m not bilingual. The English the girls translated without too much trouble; the Welsh caused some arguments before they gave up.

Now that the rush-hour had passed, the marshrutka ride back into town was less chaotic. I started lessons at 1pm and worked until 8.30. Talking Club with the Intermediate classes was interesting; grammar was often difficult. To make it worse, Ulan asked me to cover some Talking Club classes with Elementary students. That was really tough. How do you have conversations with people who know just a few dozen words in English – and how do you spin it out for a 70-minute lesson? By the end of the day I was again exhausted, and not too happy when Ulan asked me to start at 7.45 the next day: one of the teachers was ill and another was due in court (she’s in the final stages of adopting a Kyrgyz boy as her son) and so he needed me in all day to cover for them.
Home, bed and, eventually, sleep.