Bishkek in 2015 is a city which has not lived up to its precocious beginnings. Its population grew from less than two hundred in 1876 to nearly ten thousand at the start of the twentieth century. It was half a million by the 1980s and is nearly nine hundred thousand today. But its leafy, too-wide avenues feel dusty and deserted. The agrarian racket of the huge rookery which fills the trees along the main street could not sound much less urbane. Independence – Ala Too – Square sits squatly across from the state historical museum, the massive, blank concrete edifice of which dominates the ceremonial heart of the city. The Kyrgyz flag (a sun and a yellow yurt frame on a bright red background) presides over it atop a forty five metre pole. But Dushanbe in neighbouring Tajikistan has a flagpole four times taller and if the Central Asian countries…