Have you ever heard of Kyrgyzstan? Two years ago I had no idea where exactly this country was. And this year it was already the second time I traveled to this amazing country in Central Asia.

Everything started when Gerrit Beine asked me to join him giving a workshop about agile software development in Bischkek (here some impressions from 2012).

This year I was offered the possibility to teach, inspire and learn again in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. This time Michel Löhr joined in as the main coach for the agile workshop at KSUCTA University. And it was amazing this time I was already used to the not so good things like infrastructure or air pollution (which has improved in a good way over the last two years) and then on the other side I saw all this beauty!

The nature is stunning and looking to those massive mountains just outside of Bishkek is amazing. Hiking in those mountains was even more rewarding and then you had the people of Kyrgyzstan: Awesome! So friendly, hospitable, open minded and curious people it was a wonderful experience. Every day at least two students took care of us by doing activities to explore nature, culture, people or food. Thank you all for making this possible.

The 5 days agile software development workshop was a lot of fun where we taught the basics of Scrum. With a lot of games and interactive exercises so that the students could experience the agile culture first hand and learn to work and improve as a team and excel with each iteration.

I’m already looking forward to inspire, teach and learn more in this wonderful country called Kyrgyzstan in the next years.

With Turkish Airline to Bishkek

Madina our interpreter for the 10 days

Delicous pizza I could have eaten each day

Winner team of one of the many games we did to teach them real work life challanges

Yeah with my new Kyrgyz cap

Mounts outside of Bishkek

Teamwork

Winner team of another game, so much fun 🙂

Bazar impressions

Traditional meal

Michel and Sven on their way to Bishkek

Ok the space in this car is used well 🙂

OK this is an interesting menu 10kg lamb (!!!)

Alina

Thanks for the great day trip!

Michel and Sven enjoying the hike

Our stand at the fair

Test driven development exercise

Cinema

Thank you for showing me around

Awesome nature 🙂

Our workshop participants

street impression in Bishkek

Madina our interpreter for the time in Kyrgyzstan

mmmhhh how delicious

Part of the 1st student company contact fair in Bischkek

SCRUM Flow Overview

Company fair

Our favorite restaurant with our favorite waiter (he did not speak english and we no russian but sign language and pictures are going a long way 🙂

Preparing the workshop agenda

Interesting experience and out of my comfort zone but it was fun 🙂

Winner of the Marshmallow challange. Awesome iterative approach!

1 € = 70 Som

Food was very delicous

Students playing the Marshmallow game