“Everybody has a dream, images of the fantasy life they’d lead if not trapped behind an office desk. Saffia’s dream was to live in the sunshine. She didn’t realise it would lead to raising her first child up fifty-eight steps in a Kyrgyz concrete tenement.
Saffia had barely heard of Kyrgyzstan when she agreed to move there with her water-engineer husband, Matthew. Kyrgyzstan is a small country of huge landscapes, a smudge in the vastness of Central Asia. Saffia arrived in the ex-Soviet republic fifteen weeks pregnant, scared about life in a country where people eat sheep eyes, drink fermented mare’s milk and live in felt tents.
When Kyrgyzstan descends into anarchy after corrupt parliamentary elections, Saffia is trapped in Bishkek. She witnesses the Tulip Revolution and the violence and insecurity which follow as politicians, mafia gangs, crime lords and Islamic militants exploit the political void.”
ExpatWomen's Interview with Saffia
ExpatWomen:Saffia, hats off to you for having the courage to give up your legal career to follow your husband to Egypt and then to Kyrgyzstan. What convinced you to go each time and how brave or apprehensive were you? What scared you the most?
Saffia: In retrospect the biggest decision was to leave the career I’d worked so hard for so long to get – I think I really surprised friends at how easily I gave it up after all the work I’d put in. But at the time it felt like the right decision. I wasn’t completely happy in my work and it seemed the right thing to follow Matthew. It was incredibly exciting to be given the opportunity to try a different lifestyle and I was determined to make the most of it – a drive which has helped me persevere and publish my book.
Looking back I’ve realised how easy it would have been to stay with my career, even though it wasn’t completely right for me. Having made the decision very young to become a lawyer I stayed doggedly on that path, taking exams and making applications. It never occurred to me to question what I was doing until Matthew suggested we move to Egypt. Taking this chance has opened up so many different possibilities which might have otherwise passed me by.
Moving to Kyrgyzstan I was very scared about the whole pregnancy issue – I was fifteen weeks pregnant with our first child and very apprehensive about the new things that were happening to my body. I was obsessed with making sure I ate properly - difficult because there were only limited foods available, and finding reliable medical care - difficult because healthcare was very old fashioned and all in Russian. I’d not been encouraged by medical staff in the UK who questioned my decision to move to such an unknown country. But I felt it was more important to be with Matthew at that momentous time of our lives rather than sitting at my parents’ house waiting for something to go wrong. There were some anxious moments, which you can read about in Revolution Baby, but I definitely made the right decision.
ExpatWomen:How did your experiences compare to your pre-posting expectations? What surprised you the most in each location?
Saffia: I didn’t really have any expectations about Egypt, it was my first posting and I was too busy being anxious about the sensibility of giving up my job and leaving the country with a man who at that time I wasn’t even married to! It was a real culture shock. We were in Aswan in southern Egypt and it was very basic and there were few westerners so I really stuck out as someone different.
Kyrgyzstan was also an unknown because I’d heard so little about it. But knowing it to be on the silk route I had conjured images of camel caravans and tiled mausoleums so was very surprised how Soviet the capital Bishkek was. But I tried to enjoy the new experiences rather than wishing I was somewhere else.
ExpatWomen:What do you consider to be your biggest learning abroad and why?
Saffia: Living abroad has taught me what an amazing standard of living we enjoy in the West. In England the media is permanently negative about facilities like the National Health Service but we rarely appreciate how lucky we are. Compared to life in places like Egypt and Kyrgyzstan, living in the UK for most people is easy – modernisation has just created different problems.
Having seen people existing by eating scraps from bins in Kyrgyzstan, I try very hard not to waste food, and I no longer take basics like clean drinking water for granted. Through Matthew’s work as a water engineer I have learnt that about 2 billion people in the world still don’t have access to clean drinking water. In Kyrgyzstan, villagers were walking miles in freezing temperatures to break holes in ice and scoop out water. They were suffering from typhoid and hepatitis and children weren’t getting an education because they were too busy fetching water. Matthew’s project was to pipe clean drinking water into remote villages but people would still only have standpipes in the street – never again will I take taps and flushing toilets for granted.
ExpatWomen:Turning now to your book, congratulations – you have achieved what so many expat women dream of doing – which is to tell their story and have it published! Can you please share with us your experience in writing the book: What made you start? What gave you the strength to keep going? How long did the process take? And what tips or traps can we learn from, for our own writing endeavours?
Saffia: Writing started as therapy. I’d moved from a twenty-four hour a day job to rural Egypt where I was alone with my own time all day. I could either sink into bored depression or find myself a project. I started by keeping a journal of all the extraordinary things which happened. When I emailed extracts to friends they suggested I write a book and with little else to do I thought, why not!
Having Revolution Baby published has been a long, hard journey, starting from when I went to Egypt seven years ago. I’ve learnt a lot – about writing and the publishing industry, which I’ve realised is a very difficult industry to break into. My book about living in Egypt was continually rejected but by then I enjoyed writing too much to give it up so started a book about living in Kyrgyzstan when we moved there, keeping a journal and reading up about the country and its current affairs.
Eventually, after being rejected time and again for “not being famous” I decided that rather than let this obsessive celebrity culture defeat me I would get my book out there myself. I turned to self publishing, spurred on by my friend Alastair Humphreys who cycled round the world, self published his books and has had great success. I felt I had an interesting story to tell and being a determined and stubborn person, didn’t want to let the idiosyncrasies of the publishing world beat me.
I’m so glad I persevered. People are genuinely enjoying my book; I’ve had some great reviews and fantastic feedback which makes all the hard work and sacrifices worthwhile. Having two young children I’ve had to do all my writing in the evenings which means I’ve had to be very self-disciplined – and rarely relax or watch television. It’s been hard on Matthew too, but he’s been an amazing support. He’s played an important role in the life of Revolution Baby – he’s my technical assistant and created my fantastic website www.saffiafarr.com
My advice would have to be, keep believing in yourself, however many knock backs you get, and if you really want to be published, explore all avenues and persevere; it’s not an easy journey but very satisfying in the end.
ExpatWomen: Where to next… another posting? Another book? Another baby?
Saffia: Another baby! I’m expecting my third child at the end of April and with two active boys, aged four and two, that’s keeping my hands full. In my spare time I’m trying to do as much marketing for Revolution Baby as possible and I also have plans to publish my book about living in Egypt, called “Puddles in the Desert” but that will have to wait a while as first I want to concentrate on my family.
We are currently based back in England but Matthew is still travelling on short projects abroad, to Bulgaria, Croatia, Vietnam, Bangladesh and even back to Kyrgyzstan. There is always the possibility of another long term placement. Some days I do miss the adventures of living abroad, although at the moment I am quite enjoying being part of a settled community – and not struggling to make myself understood every time I leave the house!
ExpatWomen:Thank you very much for your time Saffia. We wish you and your family all of the very best for a wonderful and prosperous year.
Saffia: Thank you. I hope that other expat women will be interested in my story – one which they will be able to relate to in so many ways.
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