Day 12 - Horsing Around (Cholpon Ata)

Cholpon Ata, Kyrgyzstan

After a pretty grueling day yesterday we decided that maybe it might be nice to take it easy today.

Honestly, sometimes you need some nice simple days sprinkled in your trip just to relax and reset.

So, what did we get up to today?

Well, alot of food and alot of horses…

Breakfast

First thing on tap was a nice nutritious breakfast.

The temperature was 13c this morning which is easily the coldest temperature we’ve had for this trip.

It was also another day of an overcast sky with bouts of rain here and there.

So, on went my pants and jacket and in went my umbrella into my bag.

Today we bypassed our “free” sad little plate of food at the hotel’s restaurant and walked down the street instead.

While at dinner last night, I noticed there was a pretty decent breakfast section on their menu so it was a pretty easy choice of where to go this morning.

For me it was a nice, fluffy omelette with salami and a side of potato croquettes and for Nathan and full on English breakfast.

Yeah, our string of non-local food would continue on today but, I promise, I’ll go back to authentic food soon, okay?

RIP Umbrella

After breakfast, we made our way over to the Hippodrome where there’s a little arena behind it showcasing events with horses.

We arrived at just after 11am and it was non-assigned seating so we found a spot on the edge of the grandstand.

Not the best seats, but not the worst either.

It seems the events had been going on for a bit cause we joined as a match was just finishing.

We literally sat down, watched for 10 minutes, and then it was over.

All of a sudden a drove of people started making their way to the exit.

I wasn’t too worried though because I knew there’d be different events throughout the afternoon and, sure enough, many of the people stayed in the stands.

We took the opportunity of all the people leaving to go find better seats closer to the middle of the field.

Stupid me left my umbrella laying on the ground by my feet and, sadly, it was gone when I went back to find it.

Sigh, my poor little umbrella.

Hopefully I could dodge the intermittent rain we’ve been getting before I could get my hands on a new one.

Horses!

Over the next couple of hours we watched a variety of different events.

First there was Tyiyn Enmei which is a competition where riders gallop down the field and lean over to grab flags out of the ground.

Next was Kyz-Kuumai which translates to “girl chasing”.

A woman gets a head start riding down the field and then a man gallops down to chase her.

If the man catches up to the woman before the finish line, he wins the right to steal a kiss while riding at high speed.

However, if the man fails to catch her, the roles reverse, and on the ride back the woman chases the man and can strike him with a traditional horse whip as a sign of victory.

Now, that’s some match making right there!

Next was an extraordinary display of 4 different horsemen lit on fire as they rode through the arena.

I’ve never seen anything like that and it looked like it was straight out of a Hunger Games movie.

Acrobatics on horses was next with riders leaping on and off and side to side and backwards on their horses.

It was a crazy sight to see and the crowd would ooh and aah as each rider passed by.

Finally was the bronze medal match of Kok Boru which is one of the highlighted events during these games.

We actually paid for tickets to the gold medal match tomorrow so it felt a little like cheating watching this match.

The game is like a version of rugby on horseback where riders must pick up a goat carcass and drop it into their opponents goal.

Again, the crowd would go wild whenever a player was able to pickup the carcass and then when they scored.

It was just cool being amongst this atmosphere watching everyone happy and excited.

Lunch

At 2pm we headed out to grab some lunch.

Before leaving for the trip I had marked 3 different restaurants in the center of town that had either been reviewed or suggested on different websites.

We grabbed a Yandex (their version of Uber) to the center of town and walked to the first one.

We sat down, grabbed a menu, spent time doing Google Translate, and finally selected what we wanted.

They were out of it.

Sigh.

So, we went to the next place.

It was empty and looked like it may be closed.

On to the third…

Um, where the hell is it?

Yeah, couldn’t find the third place.

We eventually walked down a side street and came upon a restaurant attached to a hotel.

After a quick scan of the menu we finally sat down again to enjoy some lunch.

By the way, even with Google Translate, I’m still not sure half the time what I’m ordering because the translations are so off.

One of the items translated to “praying mantis” and I’m pretty sure that’s not a thing or at least I hope it isn’t.

Anyway, for lunch I had chicken with peppers and a side of mashed potatoes.

Again, not a truly tradition Kyrgyz dish but it was yummy and that’s all that mattered to me.

After lunch we walked down the main street to find me a new umbrella and, as luck would have it, it literally started to rain not even 2 minutes after I found a place and bought one.

Phew. Bullet dodged.