Strolling in the Foothills of Mt. Ag ri in Bishkek!
Kyrgyzstan is a small country in Central Asia that acquired its independence after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. It has a 198,500-square-kilometer area and a 5.2-million-strong population. Some 52.4 percent of the population is Kyrgyz, 18 percent Russian, 12.9 percent Uzbek and 2.5 percent is Ukrainian. The official language of the country is Kyrgyz, but Russian is also widely spoken.
This lovely Central Asian country, which for 15 years under the leadership of Askar Akayev had been searching for a way out, has started feeling the excitement of this search more intensely, particularly after the Tulip Revolution which was staged in 2005. In Bishkek, where we came to watch the finalists being chosen to represent Kyrgyzstan at the World Turkish Olympiad, we also saw that the opposition is preparing to hold a huge demonstration on April 11 to force out current President Kurmanbek Bakiyev. Bakiyev is a leader who pursues a conciliatory policy with the opposition and accordingly appointed Almazbek Atambayev, a leading figure of the opposition, as prime minister at the end of March.
The political panorama that will develop in Kyrgyzstan after the demonstrations is, of course, very important. However, in this column I will instead share with you the different impressions I got during my short visit to Bishkek about the Kyrgyzstan finals of the World Turkish Olympiad held in Bishkek on Saturday.
The scene we encountered in Bishkek as a group of Turkish journalists indeed made our chests swell with pride. Witnessing in person the distance that has been covered in 15 years in Kyrgyzstan by teams of Turkish educators and the Anatolian businessmen who sponsored them, inspired by the vision given by prominent Turkish scholar Fethullah Gülen -- all this stirred a great excitement in me.
The things that were achieved in such a short span of time, despite the stagnation for centuries, made me feel as if I were in a surrealist world of dreams. But why should I feel differently? A Kyrgyz girl reads one of the most beautiful poems of the famous Turkish poet Sezai Karakoç with such sentimental intensity and so eloquently that it would be difficult to hear such an outstanding performance in Turkey. A Turkish song, "Homesickness Is an Arrow in My Chest," sung by a Russian girl stings that precise feeling into our chests. Again, another Turkish song sung by a Kyrgyz girl transports us to a different world. Another Kyrgyz student sings a folk song peculiar to Anatolia, accompanied by the kopuz [an ancient Central Asian musical instrument invented and developed by Turks] took us to the foothills of Mt. Ağri. The teams comprising Kyrgyz and Russian students doing classic Turkish folk dances carries us to the frenzy of the Black Sea or to the serene lands of Anatolia. After each poem, each song and each folk dance performance, we enthusiastically and tearfully applauded the witnesses of a yet-unwritten legend.
The great zeal we witnessed in Bishkek will be experienced in Istanbul this June, as it took place last year, but with a difference: It will be a hundred times more exciting because the same excitement we felt in Bishkek will be experienced in more than 100 countries. These streams of enthusiasm will overflow and unite into a single river in Istanbul in June. Children of all colors, from more than 100 countries, including Cambodia, Tanzania, Argentina, Thailand, Japan, Mongolia and Ukraine, will speak in the language of love fed by a culture of love. Through Turkish poems, songs and stories, they will send the good tidings of peace and serenity to the people of these lands who have had to endure all sorts of persecution throughout the centuries and who hope to establish an order of peace, tolerance, understanding and love in the world.
What we saw in Bishkek was in fact a small model of what is currently being experienced in over a hundred countries. However, it is a moral duty for us to provide some detailed information on this event. The first Turkish school in Kyrgyzstan was inaugurated in 1992, when the new system established after the collapse of the Soviet Union was not yet in operation and when poverty was everywhere. The number of schools at the high school and university level rose to 21, including Atatürk-Alatoo University, where the final leg of the elimination in Kyrgyzstan was held. Listening to the personal memories of Cafer Topcan, the deputy chairman of the Sebat Educational Institution Board, who was among the first to set foot in Kyrgyzstan, reveals the magnitude of the great efforts and sacrifices behind the results obtained today.
Now nearly 5,600 students receive education in the Turkish schools in Kyrgyzstan. The number of students who have graduated from these schools is 3,225. The total amount of money donated by Turkish businessmen for the investments in education here is around $50 million. When we witnessed the scope of altruism, we realized that it would be impossible to achieve any of this but for the volunteer teachers there, even if the amount donated were to be $250 million. Each a shining start in Kyrgyzstan, the Turkish schools have space for 900 students, for which slots 53,000 students applied, which in turn demonstrators what attractive places they have become for the Kyrgyz people.
The students studying at these schools are not only taught the sciences, Russian, Kyrgyz, English and Turkish but also how to become good children, good citizens, people with a heart full of peace and good moral character. What attracts such a big number of people to these schools is undoubtedly this understanding that targets giving the children a good moral character and which raises them as good people.
I congratulate the education volunteers who made us feel such incredibly fervent sentiments and the faithful and noble people of Anatolia who did not withhold their support in any way by putting their trust in these altruistic people. I would like to extend my heartfelt thanks to these people who spread the words of love to the world on behalf of all of humanity.
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