Mountain bykes, pictures, memories and hopes

When I entered my new office the first time, there was only Nuriana and Natalia. I already knew it; all the others were in Geneva for a series of meeting, and I would have met them just one week later.

In a moment of chatting, Nuriana asked me if I did suffer from cultural shock at my arrival. Apparently, they were appalled by my denial and they probably didn't totally believe me.

After, Natalia started telling me that many many people are not even aware of Kyrgyzstan, but that they often fell in love with the country to such an extent they won't leave it anymore.

To be honest, apart for confirming me in my previous hypotesis, this affirmation left me a bit skeptical; I can believe this is a beautiful country as all the world - or at least the people who haver been here - say, but to be charmed till living here forever... well, let's just say this is another story.

Now I know she was right.

No, I didn't fell head over heels for this place; not yet at least. But Oskar did. Hopelessly.

Oskar is the Human Rights Advisor sent to Bishkek two years ago in the framework of the Action 2 Programme of OHCHR. He's an Austrian man fond of all mountain sports: Climbing, Trekking, Hiking, Paragliding, Canoe-Kayak, Rafting, and many more. He spent every single moment of leisure time exploring the country and practicing these sports, liasing with local sportsmen and trainers and discovering the most remote corners of Kyrgyzstan.

Now, the Action 2 programme is reaching its natural end and he has to leave his post here in Bishkek.

Today was his last day in the office, tomorrow at 5am he will be leaving the country to be back in Austria. It took a lot to him to phisically leave the building, it seemed as there was always something missing or something wrong in the situation. I saw in his eyes the same desperate bafflement of someone who suddenly lost his place on hearth I felt when I had to leave my desk in Vienna.

It's an hearthbreaking moment that you can't understand if you did never really love your job and jobplace.

You suddenly feel like you just woke up from a fascinating dream where you were a happy and active person; now you're awake, and you feel as having to restart from the very beginning. It happened to me after just six months of work round the clock in Vienna, I cannot even imagine how could it be after two years.

Anyway, he left with a huge baggage of souvenirs and pictures, and the intimate hope to finding a way to come back here working, someday.He storaged here in Bishkek many things for this reason.

Most of all he left me his mountain bike.

I will take good care of it and I hope I will be able to give it back to him very soon, so we'll go climbing, rafting and byking together here in this fascinating country.