© Tim Dirven / Panos Pictures..KYRGYZSTAN..A Family playing cards at the end of a working day outside their yurt at Song-kol lake...With the fall of the Soviet Union, the Russian economic crisis and the closing down of heavy industry, unemployment rates grew very high in Kyrgyzstan..Kyrgyz people returned to traditional livestock raising and the nomadic traditions of their forefathers..Half of the year, from May till October, families live together with their animals on the meadows. In spring they leave their villages and homes for a yurt (a felt tent) in the mountains..Life follows the slow rhythm of the herd. Mares are being milked, sheep are being herded, shepherds cross the valley with their animals and return to their yurt in the evening..Shepherd and herd live in harmony with nature..In autumn man and animal return fattened to the village, ready for the harsh winter.