My first piece for the Glimpse Correspondent’s Program is up on Matador, called “How to move to Kyrgyzstan and start a business“. I will let you know now that there is not a speck o...
Ah, the harsh reality of trying to keep up with blogging. I always told myself I wouldn’t apologize for long absences and I wouldn’t ever feel it necessary to defend them. But geeeeez, yo...
Let’s get the obvious out of the way first. Yes, even Kyrgyzstan has a Fashion Week. In fact, more than 150 Fashion Weeks a year are organized all around the world. Still, having never attended...
My rock star husband couldn’t resist starting a band over here in Bishkek, so he and three other expats (two Americans and a Swede) formed Plov for Two. (I think the name started as a joke, and...
This. This is amazing. The weather is gorgeous. The living situation is working out better than I could have hoped, and the garden is really shaping up. Farrell and Carl (one of my housemates) spent ...
I’ve spent a month in my new house now, adjusting to all of the new space and sharing it all with my office, roommates, and their office. To be honest, one of the hardest aspects of college for...
My family thinks I’m in Russia. My friends think I’m a journalist. A lot of people I meet in Bishkek call me a spy (and I think they’re jerks). The House Hunters episode said my hus...
On March 21, Kyrgyzstan celebrated Nouruz (Navruz, Nooruz, Nowruz, etc). It was explained to me by several people that it’s a Muslim holiday to celebrate Spring. Wikipedia tells me that it is, ...
It’s necessary to set the scene with this music, a clip from the movie “From Dusk til Dawn.” The details of my night are a bit different from the movie. I walked into the Russian Dr...
Wow, I had forgotten how much I don’t like moving. The mad rush to pack up everything was multiplied by three as we tried to empty out my apartment, the office and our new roommates’ apar...
Gold tunduk chandeliers? Offices with showers? Marble staircases? Houses only half-constructed? All of the above. Even though there were a few gems in our search for a new house/office, the majority ...
Ten houses in two days. We saw ten houses in two days. There is definitely an art to being able to soak in the layout and character of a house after only a ten-minute walk-through, and I found myself...
We’re moving! After nearly a year living in the same apartment (more than a year in the same courtyard), Farrell and I are shifting ourselves and the office to a brand new location. But it̵...
Farrell and I came to Kyrgyzstan with a nice bit of savings, which we sadly watched dwindle away while getting the business started. With some (very big) changes coming up in my life in Bishkek, I fi...
When it rains, it pours. I have a recent blog draft outlining my fears that things at the company were fizzling out and it might be signaling the possible end to Kirstin in Kyrgyzstan. Then we starte...
Just a quick post about some big news. I’m so ridiculously excited to have been chosen as a Glimpse Correspondent for Spring 2012! As a photo correspondent I will produce two photo essays that ...
Here are some photos from the second (and last) of my field trips with the photojournalism students from the University of Nebraska. This time we met up at 8am to go stand in the freezing cold at the...
Recently, a group of photojournalism students from the University of Nebraska come to Kyrgyzstan for three weeks for what must be the coolest class assignment ever. Through my connections at AUCA, I ...
On December 16, a friend and I went “on assignment” to an annual festival that celebrates the diverse group of ethnicities that call Kyrgyzstan home. It was hosted in the Kyrgyz Drama The...
Temperatures have dropped again in Bishkek, another sign that winter is most definitely sticking around, despite certain predictions that Kyrgyzstan wouldn’t get a winter this year. With decrea...
(the title is shamelessly stolen from an email written by a good friend about her envy-inducing Southeast Asian Adventure.) These are facts about Kirstin: - She loves to cook and bake and eat - She d...
I think I did a decent job keeping up with my resolutions. All things considered, I’m achieving many things that weren’t on the list. For example, I’m earning a salary from the busi...
January. Watching the Ak Maral dancers perform at the Bishkek Philharmonic. February. Farrell and I take a short trip to Osh to interview journalists for a research project on Kyrgyz media. March. I ...
Happy New Year! For the second time, I celebrated in Bishkek, surrounded by friends, food, and my wonderful husband. Just like my Christmas trip to Chon-Kemin, I was really happy to spend this time o...
Farrell and I spent Christmas weekend in Chon-Kemin again, this time in a different guesthouse located in a similarly quiet and small village next to the one we stayed in last year. The crowd was dif...
The temperature in Bishkek today reached an astoundingly chilly high of -16 degrees (Celsius). Snow fell steadily all of yesterday, although when the weather is this cold, I suppose it won’t ha...
On November 27, I attended a concert in Bishkek that was organized by the Kyrgyz branch of the Red Crescent for HIV/AIDS awareness. As of now, I’m pretty lost when it comes to knowing who’...
Recently the topic of bride napping has been coming up in the news more than usual (see the Washington Times, Telegraph). Now with the release of a five-part documentary from Vice, the topic is getti...
The longer I’m in Bishkek, the less I write about it. It’s not that I no longer have things to say, but there’s a specific concern that takes over when it comes time to hit “p...
I’m thankful… …for many things. …for being done with that gigantic market research project that took over my life for 2+ months. …for the new and exciting projects IR...
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