We’ve all encountered them at some point or another. They’re easily identified by their choice of baseball cap or hoodie (often both), pasty complexion splattered by the telltale spots of poor diet and drug use, inability to grasp the basics of the English language, and for reasons that are incomprehensible to all but their fellow ‘ASBOs’ they ride bicycles designed for children half their age. For sure, these are the ‘feral’ youths who are plaguing the streets of Western society.
So to Kyrgyzstan, where reports of a ‘feral’ youth of a different kind have emerged. Authorities have taken an unnamed fourteen year old boy into care after they discovered he’d been living in a dilapidated sheep shed for the past eight years in a remote mountainous region of the country. His parents left to find work in Russia back in 2000, trusting him to the care of his sick grandmother. For reasons unknown, though, he moved into the ramshackle instead, and after his attempts to mix with children from a nearby village were met with teasing and bullying he took on the life of a hermit.
Unable to speak, use a toilet or a shower he’s now in hospital in Bishkek, the capital, suffering from Mowgli Syndrome, the state having become aware of him after villagers discovered the body of his grandmother. Tragic as his case may seem, and with most of the 3,500 children in Kyrgyzstan’s orphanages falling into prostitution and crime, maybe this is one ‘feral’ youth who should remain as such.
And yes, you’re right, I haven’t mentioned that Kyrgyzstan is a majority Muslim country. This isn’t the Daily Mail, you know . . . .
