Current mood:

envious

Such and such
First of all, about last night. As mentioned, we headed to Kim’s place for movie/laundry night, which turned out to be a bad idea, because now we’re bitter about our quarters. Her apartment makes ours look like some sort of camel breeding facility. She has a foyer, tables, clocks, closets, 2 sinks, a shower curtain, a larger kitchen with a blender and cooking utensils, nice carpet, curtains, wallpaper, a ceiling, and much much more. It was nice doing some laundry though, and Kim was kind enough to let us take the apartment’s drying rack home with us (yes, she even had one of those!) So we ate pizza at the palace of luxury and watched L.A. Confidential. Though seemingly impossible, it was likely we had even more stares as we walked home with a bag of wet clothes and a large folding rack thingy. Ok, that was last night, on with today.

Yet another thrill a minute day here in Kazakhstan. Um, let’s see, we had breakfast, watched the news, showered, futzed around, and then met Eugene for lunch at Rush Hour, Sarah’s favorite communist lunch place. A guy in line behind us asked Eugene if we were Americans, so he told him we are spies. He jokingly asked if there wasn’t enough land in America, so they have to come here for ours. He was kidding, but probably only a little. He then proceeded to stare at us the entire time we ate.

Our visit was especially exciting today. Since the temperature has dropped to about 18 degrees, we decided this would be a good day to take the kids outside for a glimpse at fresh air.

Kim wasn’t feeling well (not my fault!) so we were on our own with both of the fluffy lumps of child. Now you may ask why Sarah is not bundled up like the kids. It’s because I fooled you – it’s actually 78 degrees out today. These people are loco about the weather. Seriously bonkers. But you knew that.



They don’t get out much, so we spent about 15 minutes in complete silence, walking around the playground areas of the orphanage. I’m not sure their expressions even changed from that of abject wonderment even once. Asella did at several times touch Grant’s face to make sure he was real, as to them, we had apparently entered into another dimension. It was interesting, and we hope to be able to do it again, maybe without the inflatable sumo suits next time, but probably not.



The nursery was a bit chaotic today, so the head teacher conscripted me to play the piano to get the kids to put a cork in it. After breezing through the Rach 3, I delighted the tiny tots with a few sonatas by Liszt, a piece or 2 by Bach, and the entire song catalog of REO Speedwagon. They were duly impressed. If the keys of G and A didn’t sound like a yeti pulling an inebriated yak though a colander, it would have been beautiful.



Other than that, not much to report today. The dollar is down a bit, if that interests you. So whatever you all are doing over there with it, cut it out. We walked to the grocery store to help the security staff practice their overt surveillance. Yes, I do mean overt. Then we bought some tomatoes off a street vendor. Yes, that’s not a euphemism. After settling in for the night, we made dinner in our small kitchen, using the one cooking utensil we have (that we had to purchase today at the store) and ate spaghetti from our laps. Well, from the plates sitting in our laps. (We have no table – one of the many reasons we go out to eat every 30 minutes.) All righty, getting punchy, so off I go.

Have a good week at work or wherever it is you spend your days. And be nice to yaks.