Bringing Home Abroad
In conversation with Chagaldak Zamirbekov about »NEST (Уя)« 

Experimental theatre from the Central Asian country of Kyrgyzstan is a rarity, but one presented at the Schaubühne’s FIND 2025 festival. I speak with director, Chagaldak Zamirbekov, about his company’s production, »NEST (Уя)«, which examines questions of home. I am especially delighted to speak to him because Kyrgyzstan––more precisely its capital Bishkek––was my home in 2004 when I worked there on an education project.

Zamirbekov’s piece looks into many Bishkek apartments and the lives existing there, asking what matters to its inhabitants. The answers––both of the director, and of his characters––come as themes, some of which are presented here:

Home.

The COVID-19 pandemic, when the ideas for this piece came together, was an opportune time to think intensely about the concept of home because, as Zamirbekov tells me, »Everyone found themselves home again«.

He asked, »Why is it that when we are not home, we want to go home? And when we are home, we want to leave it so much?« The play’s name, »NEST«, came from this contemplation of a »space that raises you, and then you leave it. But do you leave it, or keep coming back, adding more stuff to it? What does this relationship to home look like?«

Language

If your country is your home, what is your home’s language? Its Heimatszunge?

Kyrgyzstan was conquered by Russia, included in the Russian Empire, then subsequently the Soviet Union. It became independent in 1991, but the history of colonisation remains polemic in language politics.

In what language should the people of Bishkek speak? Russian is still a lingua franca in the capital, even though many consider it the language of the oppressor, as opposed to the Turkic language Kyrgyz.

Zamirbekov tells me these feelings have only exacerbated, with anti-Russian sentiment caused by the war in Ukraine: »The Russian language came from colonisation. There have been many attempts to speak more Kyrgyz and less Russian.  But I think that over time we have taken the issue in a more relaxed way as we realise that even though Russian came from Russia, it has become the language we speak as well, part of how we communicate.  Nonetheless, there are efforts to prioritize the Kyrgyz language with decolonial reflection coming from young people and the government«.

I ask what the language of theatre in Bishkek is, and he replies that both languages are used, depending on the theatre. But among cosmopolitan theatre artists… »the language question is not raised very often«.

A Corridor

For this project, stage designer Marat Raiymkulov and Malika Umarova suggested that the audience sit in a corridor that leads to an apartment where the action occurs. The view is as through a camera obscura. It is an enclosed space, where many things can happen (the director compares it at one point in our conversation to an enclosed yurt, and the oblique view through the tent’s flap).

»NEST« is composed of many stories gleaned from ordinary people in Bishkek. The director tells me they are »not very surprising or far-away characters, but next-door characters«. Their stories are told in everyday apartments.

»Of about thirty interviews––with the elderly who criticized the young, the youth who were in conflict with other young people, from different parts of Kyrgyz society, or different parts of the country but living in Bishkek––we chose six stories that connected the dots somehow«.

Zamirbekov often felt like a voyeur: »Whether you wanted to or not, you started noticing little things about how they do stuff in their spaces. You are not only hearing their story but also understanding them from the choices they make in their space. The corridor in our stage design was important to keep that sensation of peeking into other lives, of watching another life intensely«.

Audience

When »NEST« was shown in Moscow, many Kyrgyz migrants to Russia were present, and so the company felt their audience intimately understood many of the issues discussed in the piece. When »NEST« played in Brussels at Kunstenfestivaldesarts, certain things were the same: the corridor space was reconstructed. But the audience, naturally, knew less about Kyrgyzstan than the one in Moscow.

I ask Zamirbekov how they adapt to these differences in culture and audience, and he tells me, »The play always changes not only according to the space, but to who is watching it«. Improvisation is something that provides a solution, he explains, but less so on European stages, where the presence of subtitles restricts the company to the script.

»The important thing is not to pretend that we are back in Bishkek. In Brussels, we did not fake we were at home. Everyone is aware we are not. So, there needs to be new ways of interacting with the space. We try to play it honestly, and explain: »Yeah, we came here from Bishkek, where we perform in a space somewhat like this…« We find that honesty and go from there, adding monologues, and searching for ways to really connect with the audience at a level of equality. Our actress Asylbek kyzy Zere helps because she speaks English and acts as a bridge between the audience and the theatre company«.

Exoticisation

For many, the very name »Kyrgyzstan«, and the fact that many abroad can’t quite place it on a map, lends the country an air of mystery, of what the British writer of the »Stans«, Fitzroy Maclean, called »The Back of Beyond«. There is then the touristic image of Kyrgyzstan, as an agrarian country of mountains, horses, and nomadic people in yurts. (Perhaps I edged on this typecast, asking the troop whether there’s a special significance to a theatre piece about home produced in a country that has a nomadic tradition.) Then there is also the post-Soviet industrial stereotype, of a country that is a poor and »developing« place, built of block Communist housing. To pigeonhole the Central Asian republic in any of these (sometimes contradictory) visions is tempting but does a disservice to the company and the lives they present to the stage abroad.

»When we go abroad with this play, we always worry about being exoticised«, Zamirbekov continues, »What we don’t want is for people to look at us as if in a zoo, thinking how badly Kyrgyz people are living. This makes us nervous every time we prepare to go abroad. That we will be looked at like people from a »third world country«. Of course, we have many problems to tackle. But the audience might see more than that. Or the problem is perhaps in us? We have that fear. Maybe it’s in us. But I always like to turn the question back to the host country: »What about you? What do you have here that you are worried about? How are you approaching the question of home?« I think turning these questions back helps establish a more human and equal connection«.

Safety

»I often get comments from people in response to the piece, protesting that »Kyrgyzstan is not about this, it’s about that«. I would just like to add that my perspective is very personal, and I’m not looking to analyse the piece and tell you what it is about. There’s nothing to declare«.

I reply, »Sometimes, there is a feeling of safety, in being able to say a theatre piece is about this, or that«.

Zamirbekov replies, »Yes, when we get invited to perform, you can see from the way we are publicised what an audience wants to see. But I ask you to be cautious about what this piece is about. Perhaps we don’t know«.

**

With thanks to Asylbek kyzy Zere for translations from Kyrgyz and Russian to English.

Уя (Nest)