AROUND THE WORLD IN 23 YEARS~KAZAKHSTAN

I didn't take this photo, but I could have!

Kazaks living outside of Almaty and Astana, their two largest cities, often live on the steppe, that vast wasteland, and trade route between Europe and Asia.

Here, life is hard, but life is real. The people respect each other and support each other, there are no fences. On the steppe, there are no police, no courts, no lawyers. These people take care of their own, both good and bad. Disputes are settled on the spot.

Once I was visiting a cotton farmer on the steppe, I asked him about lawlessness on this vast land far from the authority of cities? His toothless grin preceded a story about a horse-thief. On the steppe animals range free, the horses, sheep, goats, yaks, and camels wander miles from the farm but always find their way back to water and feed. There are no branding irons, farmers know their stock, even when there are hundreds or thousands of them. When a thief is caught there is negotiation, usually an exchange of another animal, or a rug. If the thief is destitute, he is invited back to the owner's farm and given a meal and lodging. This is Kazakhstan justice.

I was invited to hold an eagle on my arm. The Kazakhs hunt on horseback with eagles, their national bird. These birds can weigh up to 50 lbs, imagine riding a horse at full gallop with a 50 lb eagle on your arm. Women, as well as men, do this, like falconry in Saudi Arabia, where it's a national pastime with annual competitions.

I experienced things and met people in Kazakhstan like no other place on earth, it was an education in extremis, seeing, hearing, doing. You can't buy this.

Next stop Montenegro.

Comments

SILENCE IS APPROVAL~Jewish Meme

How often do we learn something awful, clam up, and ignore it, hoping it will go away. It never does, it just gets worse and our silence becomes its enabler. Life is like that, we don't want to get involved. We have enough to worry about and ignorance, after all, is bliss. Wrong, ignorance is acceptance. The easy analogy is governance. We sit in a management meeting or a board of directors where we become aware of something nefarious and keep silent for fear of being disloyal. To speak up takes courage and courage has consequences. When a whistleblower comes forward they are vilified, they become the victim of power and power corrupts. We've seen this in Washington for years, management teams being selected for their weakness rather than their strength. Weakness breeds indecision and silence, strength breeds courage. A new administration always starts with a ray of hope that the management team, aka the cabinet, will be outspoken and advise and consent with courage, no...

LEAD~MOTIVATE~INSPIRE, THAT'S WHAT A LEADER DOES

FRANKLIN D ROOSEVELT We're frightened because of COVID and the economy, fair enough, but consider history. The Great Depression and the 2nd World War didn't cause more death than the pandemic, they caused more fear. The difference is, in the 1930s and '40s we had a leader that told us in a calm, reassuring voice that "we had nothing to fear but fear itself. " Fear is a crippling emotion, it causes indecision and panic during times of peril when what we need is leadership that reassures us. Remember when your kids woke up in the middle of the night with nightmares, they were scared to death. What did you do, you held them in your arms and whispered calmly that it was alright, they were safe and had nothing to fear. FDR was the nation's parent he knew that we needed reassurance that we needed that calm, strong voice leading us through a crisis. I honestly believe Joe Biden is that voice and t...

COVID ISN'T A GAME

The Russians invented it, we're playing it. Do you remember Christopher Walken in Deer Hunter, the epic film about the absurdity of the Viet Nam War? That classic scene when Walken was forced to play Russian roulette for the entertainment of his captors had me flinching in my seat as he pulled the trigger. When your life depends on chance, in Walken's case, 6 cylinders in a pistol chamber, one loaded, five empty. The chamber is spun around like a casino wheel, you aim the pistol at your temple and pull the trigger. You're playing the ultimate game of chance, if you win you live, if you lose you die. The odds are 6 to 1, not bad in Vegas, but are you willing to bet your life or your good health on it? Remember, in a game of chance, the odds favor the house. Why am I going on like this? It's simple, I have family and friends who are rationalizing their protection against COVID, they're thinking that with such a small fraction of the community getting sick that I...

Search This Blog