Saturday I hopped on the bus with our first year students and headed for a town called Talas, which is about 200 kilometers from Bishkek as the crow flies, but it turns into a six-hour drive. We headed westward from the city around noon. 90% of KG is mountains, so you can count on going through some serious scenery go get there. The first part of our drive was hot and tiresome. And finally we got into the mountains and started the ascent. At first the ascent seemed reasonable, but then we got into this area where the switchbacks were endless. And our fellow drivers...

Well, do you remember back in driver's ed, how your teacher taught you never to try to pass when you could not see the oncoming traffic? The Kyrgyz think that rule is for cowards. Our own driver mostly followed the rule, although he passed much more aggressively than I liked. But then there was one moment where we were behind a slow gas truck. The road was curving to the right into a partial tunnel, and our driver just decided he had had enough. He pulled off to the left, and sure enough here was an oncoming car. Two of the girls in the second row shrieked. But the drivers of all three vehicles, gas truck and our van and the oncoming car, all took sensible last-minute action and our near death was averted. I told the driver to drive more conservatively, and he did not repeat that stupidity.

Bishkek has an altitude of 800 meters, roughly the elevation of Tucson. The mountain roads were leading us to Too Ashuu pass, over 11,500 feet. The air grew colder, the mountains were tightly packed and fiercely sloped, their tops scraping the bottoms of the clouds, ruggedly beautiful and amazing. At 11,150 feet we came to the Kolbaev Tunnel, built in 1961, which progresses through nearly 2 kilometers of solid rock. It reminded me of the Eisenhower tunnel, except it was quite a bit narrower with two-lane traffic, but no lane markings and fairly bumpy.

Out the other side of the tunnel we descended into a valley fed by mountain streams. Yurts housing families were here and there with their livestock, which was usually horses being raised for meat, but sometimes also cattle and sheep and goats. Where there was enough snow run-off, the grass grew ankle high, and occasionally there were low bushes, but almost no trees. This is all summer forage for livestock.

After passing along the length of the valley we ascended again through more mountains up to Otmok pass, which seemed fairly low but turned out to be 10,800 feet high. It only seemed low because we had already gained so much altitude. Then we descended again into the valley that was our goal. Traversed it took another hour or so. For the night we were staying in three separate homestays. My own hostess was a woman named Altyn, which literally means ‘gold’ in Kyrgyz. I forgot to bring my camera to the dinner table, but to say it was full would not be an understatement: we could barely make room for the tea cups. We ate till we couldn't move, at which point the whole family asked us why we weren't eating more. Typical, that. On the table was:

• Rice pilaf with mutton
• A salad of cucumbers, tomatoes, onions, and dill with a sauce of sour cream, mayonnaise and garlic
• Chak-chak, which is little squares of fried bread covered with honey
• Lepyoshka, which is baked bread
• sliced watermelon
• a plate of golden raisins and dates
• bowls of raspberry syrup/jelly
• a plate of candy and cookies

Later we joined up with the rest of our students for a campfire behind the hosts' house. To my surprise we actually heard the call to prayer from the nearby mosque. It's the first time I've heard that in KG. (One of our students refers to the locals as “Muslim Lite.” It is quite atypical for them to go to the mosque outside of things like weddings and funerals.) And of course there were the standard campfire antics. At one stage, though, some of guys decided they wanted to break some branches with their fists and karate chops. This gave me pause. Normally my theory of college students is, “They are now adults. Let them make their own mistakes and learn from them. Minimal interference is best.” However on this occasion we were a six hour ride from the nearest hospital. If one of them broke a hand in the process, that would definitely compromise our weekend. I put my foot down. This, methinks, is what it is like to have children...

Eventually it was time to break up. We all went back to our homestays. The place was quieter that any place I've been in decades. Not a single vehicle sound. We slept like the dead.