Bishkek is similar to other cities in Kyrgyzstan and central Asia in terms of its dense population of monuments. All former USSR countries that we have visited have also been similar in this aspect.

Whether this is a key Russian form of propaganda or just the Russian sense of public art, I’m not sure, but all former USSR countries seem to have a large number of monuments with many of them party and war related.

Bishkek was no exception as we saw statues and monuments galore in the city. I’ll just give a glimpse of them in this posting but they were everywhere in the city.

This is the Monument of Revolution of Kyrgyzstan. It is right on a main boulevard in the city’s central square area. The Kyrgyz people are pushing away the darkest part of the old elite that ruled the country to create a better future for their children and generations to come. (or something like that). The protestors that inspired this depiction ended up being shot and killed. This monument stands right across a small side street from the Presidential office building.

This is a statue of Lenin, pointing to the “happy future”. While it is in a nice location, it used to be located in a much better location in the central square. The Kyrgyz moved it to here but didn’t get rid of it. The central Asian countries still have many Russian citizens and still have important ties to Russia for trade and investment, so they have not gotten rid of most of the Russian statutes, just changed their locations to less prominent places.

Nora and Vicky are at the Victory Monument in Victory Square. It’s dedicated to the Allies victory over Nazi Germany in World War II. It has a statue of a woman, representing wives and mothers, waiting for their husbands and sons to come back from the war. It also has an eternal flame. The overall shape of this monument was made to resemble a yurt. The central Asians still like to maintain visible forms of their nomadic ancestry. There was no fighting in central Asia during world war two, but Russia forced millions of central Asians to fight in the war and they suffered heavy casualties.

These two Russians are Karl Marx and Frederick Engels. They are in a beautiful park area and right across the street from the old KGB building. Who knows, maybe they were wired for listening.

This was not my best photo as I never saw the front of this monument. This is Mikhail Frunze who was a Bolshevik and revolutionary leader who was born in Bishkek. He lived mostly in Russia and was closely related to Lenin. He was so famous during the Soviet era that this city was called Frunze, only to be changed to Bishkek after they broke free of the Soviet Union.