Photographing Balykchy - Jo Kearney ARPS

Jo Kearney is a video journalist and photographer. She has worked as a video journalist for the international news agency Associated Press TV for more than 25 years filming news and features. She has been based in Asia and the Middle East covering global news stories. She now lives in the UK and has spent the past 3 years covering Brexit among other things.

Photography is her passion and when she is able to Jo travels to carry out photo projects. Her main photographic interests are travel, portraiture and documentary. She has long had a fascination for the Soviet Union and in 1992 spent 8 months travelling around it following the fall of communism. Since then she has returned to photograph in the former Soviet republics and has recently done projects in Kyrgyzstan.

In this edition of The Decisive Moment we take a look at one of those projects, Balykchy - Portrait of a Former Industrial City. This feature starts with Jo’s account of how the project came to life, from initial idea through to its execution and is followed by a presentation of the project itself.

www.jokearneyphotography.com

Jo Kearney ARPS

My guidebook described Balykchy as a “warts-and-all symbol of decline in a postSoviet transitional state” with its rusting relics of communism. It also didn’t recommend staying overnight.

Pictures of rusting boats in the abandoned port and crumbling statues of Lenin piqued my interest. I’d spent six months travelling around the Soviet Union in 1992 and I had an eerie fascination with all things communism particularly after having grown up in West Berlin in the 1970s.

On my first trip to Kyrgyzstan in 2016 I passed through Balykchy a couple of times as it is on the crossroads of the main artery that travels east and south. I’d stopped and spent a few hours photographing there but hadn’t really got under the surface of the place. At that time, the main aim of my trip was to photograph the nomad people at Lake Song-Kul. But I decided to revisit Kyrgyzstan and I wanted to find a story to photograph in Balykchy.

Jo Kearney ARPS

I spent some time researching Balykchy and found that mass unemployment since the break-up of the Soviet Union had led to the departure of working age adults to find work in Russia and Kazakhstan. Many had left their children with their ageing parents and when I read this, I decided to make this my story.

There didn’t seem to be any organisations to contact in Balykchy, but I did find the details for a journalist living in the capital who mentioned a government-funded day centre for pensioners operating in the town. After numerous emails and phone calls I finally got hold of someone and was told I could visit the centre.

Jo Kearney ARPS

In September 2018 I flew into Manas International Airport on Turkish Airlines and took a taxi to the bus station in Bishkek where minibuses depart for the two to three-hour journey to Balykchy and Lake Issyk-Kul. I’d been told by the charity that my translator, Azamat, would meet me at the bus station. I disembarked and saw a middle-aged man waiting expectantly. He introduced himself and helped carry my bags to his ancient Volkswagen Golf with its cracked windows. I don’t think it would have got us far if we’d had to travel around Kyrgyzstan, but it did the job of transporting me around the town.

He suggested that the first priority was to find somewhere to stay. I’d already looked online and hadn’t seen anything, but Azamat said there were a couple of hotels and a few bed and breakfast places. I checked into a hotel situated on the edge of the lake which was a reasonable $50 a night. There didn’t seem to be any other guests.

Pensioners at a day centre

Jo Kearney ARPS

Our first stop was the day centre, a large ramshackle bungalow, where pensioners gathered for warmth, a hot meal and tea and coffee. They were a merry bunch made up of Russians and Central Asians reflecting the migration that took place during Soviet times. Many lived on their own as their children were scattered across the former Soviet Union, so the centre provided a lifeline for them.

Kasimbek Jumaliev with Sabirjan Ibrahamov at a day centre for pensioners

Jo Kearney ARPS

I spent a few hours with them and took some photos to send to the centre’s organisation and while I was there I met Olga Ogarkova, who invited me to her home, mentioning that her elderly neighbour cared for her grandchildren as her daughter was working away.

Olga Ogarkova’s old photos that show life during Soviet times

Jo Kearney ARPS

The following day after a freezing swim in the lake, Azamat collected me up from my hotel and we drove to Ogarkova’s home, a tsarist era bungalow in a dusty street. Visiting her home gave an insight to life in Balykchy. She told me about life during Soviet times and how everyone had a job and been able to eat well. She produced photos taken during holidays in Moscow and Uzbekistan and was happy for me to photograph her looking at them. She prepared food for us - eggs from the chickens in the garden and ripe tomatoes from her vegetable bed with fresh bread. She introduced me to her neighbour Valentina Pogojeva who was happy to be photographed with her grandchildren after they returned from school.

After a few days I had photographs of some of the pensioners in their homes plus the devastated industrial infrastructure of the town, but I only had one example of a grandparent caring full time for their grandchildren. Then Azamat had an idea. He contacted the local government social security office and told them that I had come from the capital to write a report on the situation. Within a few hours we were given the addresses of two families.

Valentina Palamar looking at photos of life during the Soviet Union when travel was subsidised

Jo Kearney ARPS

We drove to the outskirts of the town and found Samira Omuralieva and her three grandchildren living in a rundown bungalow. They were happy to let me photograph them so I took pictures of them sitting around their kitchen table and together on the sofa.

Then we visited Gulbubu Sarapldinova and her grandsons Aktan, 11, and Akbar, 10. We found them digging potatoes in the garden. Sarapldinova’s son and daughter-in-law had left several years ago and not returned and she was left to raise her grandsons. They made ends meet by keeping animals and growing vegetables. I took photos of the boys helping their grandmother dig potatoes and looking after the animals.

93 year old Yekatarina Zinchenko with a photo of herself during Soviet times when she worked in a military canteen Her daughter lives thousands of miles away in Vladivostock

Jo Kearney ARPS

I’d spent just under a week in Balykchy working on the project, but I had a couple more projects to photograph so I said goodbye to Azamat and joined another driver to travel south to my next stop Min Kush, a former uranium mining town.

Jo Kearney ARPS