November 3 through 8, 2007

Saturday
This past weekend we traveled up to Medeo, which is a 30 to 45 minute bus ride up into the mountains. Medeo is one of the highest Olympic-sized skating rinks in the world. I was surprised at how big it actually was. I have even more respect for the Olympic skaters now. I felt like it was at least half a football field long, and perhaps as wide a football field.

The rink is surrounded by mountains, but on the southern side there is a towering dam. Joey and I climbed up the 850 steps to the top of the dam to see what was on the other side. To my surprise, there was only a trickle of water. A small amount of glacial melt was running into the dam. However, there were a few tall cement towers to the right side of the dam on the water holding side, so I assume that the water level gets relatively large in the spring. I would like to see the water level in the spring. I am interested in how much water is created by the mountain snow melting.

Once up at the top, Joey hung out and took a few photos while I climbed up a bit more. In the distance we could see Shymbulak, a well known ski resort here in KZ, and I wanted to get a better look if possible. From where Joey was, the view was a bit shielded by a mountain side. So I walked some more and got a better look of the ski village and the slopes. The slopes look very snowy, cold, and steppe. I don’t know if my Appalachian mountain skills are going to be enough for these monsters. We will find out soon enough.

When I was exploring, I received a phone call from Joey suggesting I come back down because the forest/brush fire was coming our way. At the top of the mountain we could see smoke billowing and some large flames. So I scrambled down the mountain back to the road, dam, and Joey. The steps down from the top of the dam were much easier than going up.

For lunch, we headed to the place where I took the English Club when Joey first arrived. However, we got sidetracked and took another trail. This trail led us up to another mountain ridge. We walked through an apple orchard, a camping area with a fire place, and a nice conifer forest. We had lunch in the conifer forest. The sun was going behind the mountains, so it was getting colder. We had a quick lunch and decided to head back. It was about 3:30 pm.

Joey had the idea to go down the steep gorge so we could climb up some more steps to get to another mountain ridge. I wasn’t too excited about climbing the steps, I liked the idea of going back down the trail we had just climbed up, and I really didn’t like the idea of sliding down the mountain side. The mountain side was too steep to walk down, so I let Joey lead the way. Wasn’t that kind of me? J I slid down the mountain on my butt. I was hoping I wouldn’t tear a hole in my jeans. I honestly don’t know how Joey got down. I was concerned about not tumbling head over heels down to the valley.

We reached the valley and climbed the steps up the mountain. However, we found ourselves in a resort type complex protected by a security force. We found a road and walked past, and got stopped by, two security guards. They wondered how we got into the complex. They only spoke Russian, so our explanation wasn’t extensive. But they let us go. Afterwards, we reached the gated exit and had to walk past the security guards, and dog, there. Luckily a truck was coming in, so we scurried through the gate.

So that was a fun day trip. :)

Sunday
James and I are looking for a new place. We have to move out of this place by November 22nd. So I went to a lady’s home to check out the possibility of renting a room. The walk is a little too much and there are not enough lights for my evening walks home. The place was nice, and the price was right. But I don’t think I can deal with the lack of security when walking home at night.

In KZ, it is very common for an older woman or couple to rent out the rooms in their home to people. This woman was going to sleep on the couch in the common room if James and I moved in. The common room is open to the kitchen. I tried to explain that we get home late and cook late as well. I don’t think that would work out well with her sleeping habits. I don’t know how much she grasped of what I was saying. We would have had our own bedrooms with locks on the doors. But she would have slept on a pull out couch. It is interesting what people will do here for money.

I finished grading my students’ midterm papers in the early afternoon. Twelve out of 34 students plagiarized. I was horrified. I also went to a museum with David and his cousin Aziz. Joey was doing blog stuff while I did this I think. After the museum, Joey and I played some basketball with the neighborhood kids. I then took him up to the home that I saw earlier in the morning. I wanted to make sure he felt similarly about the walk. After the dark walk, we headed back to his place to make dinner. It was a nice day overall.

Monday
The big event for Monday was that I found frozen spinach. I can’t for the life of me find fresh spinach, so I am ecstatic that I found frozen spinach. Other than that, it was a normal day. My tutoring family is still on vacation, so I didn’t have anything work-wise to do in the morning. They return this weekend, so I will be busy again next week.

Tuesday
The big event – I bought tickets to Thailand in December! Yep, Joey and I are going to Thailand for two weeks. I am super excited! We just have to plan the rest of the trip now…

Oh and Joey made some delicious chicken cheese steaks for dinner and chocolate covered pretzels for dessert. It was a good meal.

Wednesday
I gave a presentation for English Club about my family. I copied a bunch of pictures of family holidays so the students could see my immediate family, and some of my extended family. I didn’t have any all-inclusive extended family shots, but I managed. I showed a few pics of family vacations and us goofin’ off. It was fun to put it together, but a little sad. I miss family.

The other big thing I did was go down to the airline office and pay for our tickets, in cash. Here, they give the option to pay for your tickets within 24 hours. We are flying the KZ national airline – Air Astana. This required talking to an agent, going to the cashier, and returning to the agent. I don’t know if I would do the pay within 24 hours thing again, but who knows.