Bribing policeman in Kyrgyzstan made me so uneasy.

i finally learned how to spell the name of this country while writing this (in 3 languages)

Wait, Kyrgyzstan?!?!

How the hell did I get to Kyrgyzstan from Bulgaria???

Well… Here is full video about it.

Watch me spinning a wheel of fortune to decide which country I’m going to.

Dennis arrived on my birthday in Bulgaria. On the drive home we talked many different topics, but always circled back to the “What’s the next plan” question.

I got so super annoyed looking up flight tickets to many random countries that night, that I almost decided to stay in Bulgaria.

Lebanon, Afghanistan, Crete, the Baltics were on the list, among other many “stan” countries. We simply couldn’t decide.

At least, before beers.

Dennis has this cool app on his phone, a wheel of fortune you can fill with whatever you want to fall quick (or funny and random) decisions.

We did that.

A failed hitchhike to Istanbul a day later, way to small kebabs and a 5h flight to Bishkek, here we are.

Back on the topic of corruption:

You could find Kyrgyzstan police in every little village on our way from Bishkek (capital) to the famous lake “Yssyk-Kul”

“Is there so much crime in Kyrgyzstan?” you might ask.

Nope.

It’s corruption.

I have no stats nor exact numbers on this topic for any country of the world, but we can all together assume (and this is what research confirms), that corruption is higher in 3rd world countries in comparison to western Europe.

This is being influenced by many factors like wealth, surveillance, transparency, infrastructure etc.

During my week long visit in Kyrgyzstan, i felt safe.

Except of safe from policeman.

I’m over exaggerating on the topic, nobody pulled a gun, nobody would even have thought of that, but I was so angry and so disappointed that a country as beautiful as Kyrgyzstan would make me hate driving towards the next city and wait for the next police stop.

Every city. Every other little village had them.

For no specific reason. Oh, sorry, besides the money of course.

Imagine this:

an overweight policeman waves us over

“Salam, brother! How are we doing?” he asks with his filthy, greedy smile.

The one, that you feel uncomfortable with. The “I got power and I will take you apart, just in a few seconds” one. But in such a cheap way.

“All day standing here, in the sun, a hard job we have!”, said the other overweight policeman.

“Why are you crossing on red, brother?”

"I didn’t.”

“Yes, you did.”

“No. Certainly not. It just got green.”

the other, overweight policeman pushes his partner away from the windows and loudly asks us: “Can you provide any photo or video proof?”, he says, looking at my empty windshield.

“No. And you?” I caught him off guard.

“Все с Вами понятно!” (Alright, I see how you are), he mumbles while turning around from me and escaping this conversation. (How am I? FAIR?!)

I step outside. The evening sun blinds me so I squint me eyes.

“We could go to court in Karakol tomorrow and I will demonstrate valid video fixation of you crossing on red light, unfortunately it would take an hour or so to show you the proof now because of the…”

“How much.” I break in.

His smile gets wider, his face lights up. He really does look like a pig.

He knows, Karakol is 2h away from here.

He knows, I’m a tourist.

He knows, I want to continue driving as the sun is setting and my destination is far.

“From the heart, brother, how much you have!”

I grab my wallet and wave it in my hands, inquiringly looking him in the eyes.

“Here?” I mumble.

“In the car, brother.”

Dennis sits inside and awaits my Russian skills to save us from Kyrgyzstan cops. He goes silent as he sees my face.

He says he just looked outside at the traffic lights. You can’t see them from here. And even if you did, you can’t see shit because of the sun.

I give him my phone and say “Film this.”

I put 600 Som (~6.5€) between my documents and address the fattest from the group of policeman standing outside.

“Here, look once more at the documents.”

We drive off. I laugh. Dennis asks for the price of this stop and laughs too.

“That’s why fuel is so cheap here - ba-ha-ha!”

But I feel strange. As if somebody just used me. As if somebody broke my personal boundaries, touched me without consent or harassed me.

“That was so unfair.” I say and we talk about it for the rest of the ride.

Funny enough, we get stopped once again.

10€.

30€.

We see policeman stopping cars that are falling apart.

Locals. Workers. Woman. Teens. Elder.

They don’t care.

They take from their own people, from their own country, from their own village if they feel so!

“[…]corruption directly causes a decrease in investment, a decline of human capital, and political instability, and therefore indirectly inhibits economic growth. […] Swaleheen (2011) concludes that corruption has a direct negative impact on economic growth […]”, School of Economics and Management, Wuhan, China.

“[…] The rise of corruption lowers the government revenue that is actually invested in public capital […]”, Maxim Ivanyna, Alexandras Moumouras, Ptere Raganzas, 2014.

Look how beautiful this country is:

My western values do not allow me any understanding of how you could possibly take from your own community.

Famous community builders speak all the time about transparency in decision making while creating and leading a community.

About honesty and co-participation.

About constant reunions and intimate connections.

About inclusion.

This trip certainly fortified these values for Nomad Nexus to me.

A perfect example of lacking knowledge, communication and transparency on a national level with huge consequences for a whole country.

Nevertheless, AMAZING trip.

That was RIDICULOUS! I absolutely loved Kyrgyzstan and would hihgly recommend going.

If you do, do following:

1. Get yourself Yandex Maps and YandexGo - these are Russian Google Maps and Uber/Bolt alternatives. You can rent scooters, order cheap taxis (1-5€ per ride), food, and probably your future wife over there (or an eagle?)

2. Defo book a car in advance. We didn’t, so it caused “THE Search”. Cars are expensive, Kyrgyzstan is very famous for it’s SUV adventures with whole roads (that were forbidden for us on a normal car). Pro tip here: international drivers license.

3. Nobody will want your Kyrgyzsian Som’s back home, not even airport exchanges. Get rid of it.

4. Connect with local people, they are kind, respectful, funny and social. The far-eastern hospitality is a contrast to the cops. I recommend going here: Сhokos Bar

Thanks for reading the 1.192 words.

Watch the full Kyrgyzstan video here!

Cheers,

Danny.