The Lay of the Land….

Jacob woke up with a bit of a sore tummy. I won’t go into too many details, let’s just say his tummy hurts. We decided not to go for a walk this morning. We usually go exploring the city after breakfast. We’ve found all kinds of wonderful and some not so wonderful shops, people, buildings etc.

After breakfast this morning I ran across the street to get a few more juice boxes and some bottles of water. I was thinking as I was playing human Frogger (an old video game) going across the main street that our friends back home might want some insight into our new world.

First and foremost, never drink the tap water. We are constantly carrying bottled water, from small hand held bottles to big jugs. On the surface that seems pretty easy until you think about things like brushing your teeth, ice in your drinks and shaving. We use the bottle water for brushing our teeth. No ice no matter how safe they say it is. Shaving is a challenge here. I was tempted to purchase an electric shaver here with the proper plug. Instead, I shave in the sink, careful to keep the water away from my mouth, and using antibacterial hand gel as aftershave. The anti-bacterial hand gel is a must, we try and carry it everywhere. As bad as the tap water is, some of the restrooms we’ve encountered are down right scary, especially at the orphanage. Jacob has had to use the bathroom a few times while were at the orphanage, and we’re pretty sure that’s why his tummy is sore this morning.

Eating can be a challenge, as our Russian is pretty bad. We have to find places with English menus. Another tall order, fortunately, our hotel has a wonderful little restaurant with an English/Russian menu. The staff is awesome. Most of them don’t speak English. They try and take care of us, and love Jacob. They have asked what he likes to eat, and have tried to make special dishes for him. There are two Sisters Tatiana and Valentina who work as waitresses. They are both so nice. We taught them how to make cheese fries, in broken English and Russian it was harder than you think. The servings are huge at breakfast. We have stockpiled food in our room. We brought peanut butter and usually make sandwiches for lunch. There isn’t peanut butter here. We brought some to Dasha and she loved it, she had never had it. We even have a small coffee pot, thankfully, Kim brought a few pounds of Starbucks coffee and we enjoy two cups in the morning. The restaurant has a good menu for dinner, and I tried “Forcemeat” or horse meat last week. To be honest, I didn’t realize what I was eating until it was too late. Apparently this is a popular food here. It was pretty oily, but not bad.

We have a good size hotel room. Two twin beds (we’ve pushed together), I feel a little like Dick Van Dyke, Kim likes to think of us as Ricky and Lucy. Jacob has a large crib bed that he really doesn’t fit in, but he can step in and out of. We have a really good air conditioning and heating unit in the room. The bathroom is nice, and the shower has hot water (most of the time). Jacob and I shower together, and know not to drink the water. All in all our room is nice and we are comfortable.

As I mentioned earlier, crossing the street is a challenge. In America, pedestrians always have the right of way. Here it’s the opposite cars always have the right of way, even if they are driving on the sidewalk, wrong side of the street or running a red light.. Everyone’s horn seems to work really well. Crossing a street can be a little tricky, heck the cars often drive on the side walk, so I’m constantly keeping an eye out. The horns and drivers have been my personal challenge. We’ve had a few cars beep at us, and my first reaction is to want to give them the one finger wave, and explain to them that that’s not very nice, especially with my four year old in tow, maybe using some of my old navy speak to make sure they understand the point. On more than one occasion I’ve been tempted to pull a few drivers out of their car and bounce them off the pavement. God is testing me, and I seem to have everything in check. Pray for my patience.

The cars here are such a mix. There are Toyotas, Hondas, some names and styles I’ve never seen. Generally the care are smaller then the cars in the U.S., and there are a lot of micro-buses. These are like early versions of mini-vans and VW buses from the 1960s. There are a lot of the old 4 door coupes left over from the Soviet days. These cars look right out of the old James Bond movies, not the cool sports cars but the coupes the KGB chased 007 around in. These KGB roadsters seem to be made of iron, we’ve seen a few wrecks where these cars seem to do more damage than they receive. Some of the cars here have the steering wheel on left side and some on the right side of the car. They do drive on the right side of the road, at least in theory. Emissions controls don’t really exist, so the exhaust smell is pretty strong. The traffic laws and lanes seem to be a suggestion and not a requirement. I’m so glad we have such an awesome driver I wouldn’t want to get behind wheel here.

We have become pretty proficient at shopping. As we rarely find any English speaking merchants, we use our little bit of Russian and the merchants all have calculators that they use to show us what things cost. I’m sure I’m paying the “stupid American” price for goods, but things are relatively inexpensive here. The local currency is the Tenge, pronounced Tan-gay. I jokingly refer to it as monopoly money, so I’m not completely sure what we pay for things. Rick figured that 5000 Tange was equal to about 40 dollars. I hate long math. Tipping is confusing. The restaurants usually add a 5 or 10 percent gratuity. I tend to over tip so I leave a little extra. We tip the hotel staff for bringing up the laundry, but they seem surprised.

The people here are so interesting. It’s truly a melting pot of Asian and Eastern European culture and ethnicity. As you walk down the street nobody makes eye contact or smiles. I must look pretty silly saying hello in Russian and smiling. I’m sure they think I ride the short bus. The people seem to have big hearts however, they take such good care of Jacob, and all the children seem to be treasures to them. The orphanages are busy because people can’t afford to feed their children, or pay for heat in the winter. It’s sort of the ultimate sacrifice. I believe they love their children, and know they don’t have the means to care for them. So, to ensure the kids survive they turn them over to the state. I can’t imagine what that would be like, I have to thank the Lord everyday for my blessings. It’s so far from reality in the U.S. that I have to take a moment to take it all in. I pray for these people, this nation is so young, the people want to move forward, break away from the old Soviet bonds. From a historic perspective, Kazakhstan is like a young United States breaking away from Great Britain’s rule. I hope they are blessed with wise rulers as we were in our countries early years.