Well, it's hard to look ahead and predict the future, but in the likelihood that I will be too busy to write what I already know about the city of Kyzyl when I get there, I'm going to lay down a bottom line (some of this might change when I get to the city and start using my eyes instead of the internet to look around).

First of all, Kyzyl is spelled like this in Russian:

Кызыл

And declines like this:

	singular (uncountable)
nominative	Кызы́л
genitive	Кызы́ла
dative	Кызы́лу
accusative	Кызы́л
instrumental	Кызы́лом
prepositional	Кызы́ле

Kyzyl means red in the Tuvan language (and many other Turkic languages). Kyzyl is the capital of the Tuvan Republic, an area 170,500 km² in size--an area comparable in size to Florida. Tuva is located in South-central Siberia and has a 1,305 km border with Mongolia. The highest point in Tuva is Mount Mongun-Tayga, with a peak of3,970 m (13,020 ft) and glacier of the same name.

To get a handle on the many changes that occurred in the political status of Tuva in the twentieth century, here is a brief Wiki-history lesson:

During the 19th century, Russians began to settle in Tuva, resulting in an 1860 Chinese-Russian treaty, in which the Qing Dynasty allowed Russians to settle providing that they lived in boats or tents. In 1881 Russians were allowed to live in permanent buildings. By that time a sizeable Russian community had been established, whose affairs were managed by an official in Russia. (These officials also settled disputes and checked on Tuvan chiefs.) Russian interests in Tuva continued into the twentieth century.

During the 1911 revolution in China, tsarist Russia formed a separatist movement among the Tuvans. Tsar Nicholas II ordered Russian troops into Tuva in 1912, in response to allegations that Russian settlers were being attacked. Tuva became nominally independent as the Urjanchai Republic before being brought under Russian protectorate as Uryankhay Kray under Tsar Nicholas II on 17 April 1914. This move was apparently requested by a number of prominent Tuvans, including the High Lama, although it is possible they were actually acting under the coercion of Russian soldiers. A Tuvan capital was established, called Belotarsk (Белоца́рск; literally, "Town of White Tsar"). Meanwhile, in 1911, Mongolia became independent, though under Russian protection.

Following the Russian Revolution of 1917 which ended the imperial autocracy, most of Tuva was occupied from 5 July 1918 to 15 July 1919 by Aleksandr Kolchak's "White" Russian troops. Pyotr Ivanovich Turchaninov was named governor of the territory. In the autumn of 1918 the southwestern part was occupied by Chinese troops and the southern part by Mongol troops led by Khanbaatar Magsarjav.

From July 1919 to February 1920 the communist Red Army controlled Tuva, but from 19 February 1920 to June 1921 it was occupied by China (governor was Yan Shichao [traditional, Wade-Giles transliteration: Yan Shi-chao]). On August 14, 1921 the Bolsheviks (supported by Russia) established a Tuvan People's Republic, popularly called Tannu-Tuva. In 1926, the capital (Belotsarsk; Khem-Beldyr since 1918) was renamed Kyzyl, meaning "Red"). Tuva was de jure an independent state between the World Wars.

The state's first ruler, Prime Minister Donduk, sought to strengthen ties with Mongolia and establish Buddhism as the state religion. This unsettled the Kremlin, which orchestrated a coup carried out in 1929 by five young Tuvan graduates of Moscow's Communist University of the Toilers of the East. In 1930 the pro-Soviet region discarded the state's Tibetan-Mongol script in favor of a Latin alphabet designed for Tuva by Russian linguists, and in 1943 Cyrillic script replaced the Latin. Under the leadership of Party Secretary Salchak Toka, ethnic Russians were granted full citizenship rights and Buddhist and Mongol influences on the Tuvan state and society were systematically reduced.

The Soviet Union annexed Tuva outright in 1944, apparently with the approval of Tuva's Little Khural (parliament), though there was no Tuva-wide vote on the issue. The exact circumstances surrounding Tannu-Tuva's incorporation into the USSR in 1944 remain obscure. Salchak Toka, the leader of Tuvan communists, was given the title of First Secretary of the Tuvan Communist Party, and became the de-facto ruler of Tuva until his death in 1973. Tuva was made the Tuvan Autonomous Oblast and then became the Tuva ASSR on October 10, 1961. The Soviet Union kept Tuva closed to the outside world for nearly fifty years.

[Copied verbatim from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuva]

A good question, as the days dwindle until my imminent departure is: how am I getting to Kyzyl? There are no railroads in Tuva (my personal favorite form of transportation in Russia) and according to my best sources of information, there are no longer flights to Kyzyl. I will be flying from Moscow to Abakan, and then heading to Kyzyl on one of the three roads that go in or out of the Tuvan Republic. Wikipedia informs me that these three roads include:

...A dirt track a dirt track over the mountains from Khakassia to Ak Dovurak, and an asphalt road over the passes between Khakassia (Abakan) and Kyzyl: both of these are cut off by snowfall and avalanches from time to time in winter. The third road goes south, turning into a track before entering Mongolia.

Once I am in Kyzyl, transportation should be less of an issue as there are municipal buses as well as minibus-taxis, both within Kyzyl, and connecting the city to other settlements. Ferries along the Yenisei River also exist.

[The following paragraphs are based on information from Wikipedia. I have rephrased things... most of the time. Luckily, I am graduated and therefore far beyond the reach of the Kenyon academic infractions board... muwhahaha]

Currently, Tuva is home to both ethnic Tuvans and Russians. There are 235,313 Tuvans who live in the republic (77.0%), and 61,442 Russians (20.1%). Ethnic tensions spiked in 1990 when
the Tuvan Democratic Movement was founded. The party aimed to provide jobs and housing (both in short supply), and also to improve the status of Tuvan language and culture. Later in the year there were a wave of attacks against Tuva's sizeable Russian community, resulting in 88 deaths. Russian troops eventually were called in and many Russians moved out of the republic during this period. According to my best sources of information, the situation is stable but not tension-free. To this day, Tuva remains one of the least "developed" and poor areas of Russia. Tuva's United Nations Human Development Index is 79/79, dead last in the Russian Federation. The index level is similar to Tajikistan and Bolivia.

Tuvan language is a Turkic language, an influence that dates back to ancient Scythian settlements. The most spectacular Scythian archaeological site known to archeologists, Arzhaan, is located in Northern Tuva. Artifacts found at the site date from the 7th and 6th centuries BC. The Tuvan language borrows many words from Mongolian, reflecting the period of Mongol control from 1207 to 1757. During this time, an area almost identical in boundaries to modern Tuva was administered under the name Tannu Uriankhai. After the Mongols, Tuva came under the rule of the Manchus (Qing dynasty) up until 1911. The Tuvan language, which is currently written with a modified Cyrillic alphabet, previously used Turkic runes, later Mongolian, then Latin alphabets. Official languages of the Tuvan Republic are Tuvan (Turkic) and Russian (Slavic). Outside Kyzyl, settlements have few if any ethnic Russian inhabitants and in general Tuvan is the first language of the people of Tuva.

Three religions have broad followings in Tuva: Tibetan Buddhism, Orthodox Christianity, and Shamanism. From what I have heard, Buddhism and Shamanism have some cross-over and are often practiced together. Ethnically and linguistically, Tuvans are closely related to the Khakass people to their North and the Altai people to their West. However, culturally, the Tuvans are more similar to the Mongolians to their South and the Buryat people to the East (still in Russia), with whom they have Buddhism in common.The Tuvan culture has a rich oral tradition, ranging from very brief riddles and aphorisms, to tongue twisters, magical tales, hero tales, scary stories, and epics that would take many hours to recite. The Tuvan people are famous for their throat singing, which has brought them to the attention of the West in recent years. Khuresh is the national style of wrestling, and Tuva's most popular sport.

I will be based at Tuvan State University in Kyzyl. The university was founded originally as the Kyzyl Teacher's College in 1952. As of 2002, the University had over 300 staff and 3000 students. I will be associated with the Philology College, in the Department of Foreign Languages. My students will be studying to become English teachers at schools throughout Tuva and will be in the first and second year of university. I will be teaching English conversation and written comprehension. In my free time, I will working with a Russian tutor 10 hours a week and researching Tuvan villages, hopefully collaborating with an existing international project focused on collecting oral histories out in the villages.

Kyzyl has a population of 105,931 (2004 est.) and claims to be located exactly at the Geographic Center of Asia. In Kyzyl, the Yenisei River joins with the Little Yenisei River, flowing North to the Arctic Ocean (the Yenisei is the fifth largest river in the world). The Yenisei eventually includes the runoff from the Angara River and Lake Baikal, as well as the Tuul drainage from Ulan Bator, the Mongolian capital, as well as many others. A series of hydroelectric dams along the Yenisei provide power and support heavy primary industries along the river. Especially downstream (to the North), industrial contamination is a serious problem. Kyzyl is located near Russia's largest open-pit asbestos mine, and has its own brickyards, sawmills, furniture manufacturing, and food-processing plants.

Well, my faithful readers, that is a lot of information and I think I will take a break now. But, as I learned at Fulbright training, something like 70% of people are visual learners, so I think I will close with a few images. First, a map: