A young Turkmen woman with red hair was pretty calm when telling about her motherland she hadn’t seen for years. She is a former student of American University of Central Asia (AUCA) in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan and recently she transferred to American University in Bulgaria. “I changed my hair color ‘cause I’m feeling my live is changing”, she said and smiled. What was the reason for a pretty successful promising student to leave the place she had lived in for 2 years and go to a foreign country which is much farther from her homeland than Kyrgyzstan, where people do not widely speak Russian (her second native language and the language of international communication in Central Asia) and where she has neither relatives nor friends? Especially if the university she transferred to will not give education of significantly higher level to her?

“It might sound ridiculous, but if I live in Eastern Europe I will rather have a chance to visit my homeland and see my parents than if I live in Kyrgyzstan,” said the young woman (she preferred her name to not be mentioned). The problem is that Turkmen students who live and study in Kyrgyzstan are all afraid that once they leave for their homes to spend their summer vacation in Turkmenistan, they won’t be allowed to come back to Kyrgyzstan in time, so they might lose a semester or even more. Such cases have occurred repeatedly, and the reasons of delays are never explained to the students. “I haven’t seen my parents since 2009, and this year finally I will be able to go to visit them. If I had stayed in Bishkek, I probably would not dare to go to Turkmenistan until I would have graduated from AUCA in 2014.”

The situation is not unique for the particular student. Zara Hayytmuradova, AUCA senior from the department of Journalism and Mass Communications, explains that the process of obtaining Kyrgyz visa in Turkmenistan is like a “vicious circle of going around all the offices”. You also need a special approvement from The Ministry of Education of Turkmenistan and a lot of supplementary documents to depart for Kyrgyzstan to study. Not all the applicants manage to stand this struggle and those who do still have issues with Turkmens authorities. One of Turkmen students in Bishkek said: “It’s a murky affair with us studying here. Talking about this brings problems.”

Actually the problem turns out to be much broader. Members of Turkmen students’ community in Bishkek affirm that overall citizens of Turkmenistan have incredible difficulties with travelling to Kyrgyzstan. Getting any response on that from authorities of Turkmenistan or diplomatic officials in Kyrgyzstan is impossible as there is no official policy or law in Turkmenistan to somehow hinder visa obtaining or to impede citizens’ travelling to other countries of CIS.

Turkmenistan from the very moment of obtaining independence in 1991 has been a very closed country significantly detached from the rest of CIS. One of its modern problems is the outflow of youth, i.e. young people strive for getting education and working abroad. That issue (typical for many developing countries) is mostly referred to by Turkmen students as to a cause of not allowing them to study in neighboring countries. Especially Kyrgyzstan as a place of unstable political situation and recent revolutions of 2005 and 2010 carried away tens of lives. Especially at American University because of sustained beliefs of imperial interest of the US in the region.

Last year a lot of Turkmen students of AUCA had to transfer to universities of Russia as they were prescribed to by Turkmenistan side. Only those could stay who did not have match in majors at AUCA and ones provided by Russian universities. The situation gets worse and worse from year to year.

Another anonymous Turkmen student from Bishkek told that in order to meet her parents she and her parents have to go abroad to the same place. “It does not always work due to the cost of the trip,” she says.” It is expensive for a student to afford a ticket to some other country. But I try to meet with my family every other year”

The ways to solve the situation are unclear and unidentified. Basically, now most of Turkmen students have to stay in Kyrgyzstan for all 4 or 5 years of study without visiting their motherland.