No visit today, as it was Sunday.
Yesterday, we agreed on a meeting point for lunch with the translator and coordinator at 1:00. We decided to eat under the Amstel tents outside of the Astana market (our new favorite grocery, et. al.) We each had a beef sheshlik (kabob) each, Michelle started with a cucumber-type salad, Jason had the Uzbekistan rice pilaf (plov here in KZ). All of the food was incredible…the best food we’ve had yet!
After lunch, we walked couple of blocks from the Astana market to “Pucha” a 3-story children’s-only shopping mall. We bought Wyatt a ‘stolen from a Chinese factory making Gap clothes’ Gap lightweight jacket. The jacket may have been hot, but the prices weren’t. The jacket was a somewhat-reasonable (although clearly not discounted) $20US. We are hoping that the caregivers will allow him to wear this outside as it is forecasted to be 80 F tomorrow. We’d hate for him to have a snowsuit on when he could reasonably wear a swimsuit.
After that, the coordinator went home and the 3 of us walked down the river. We sat down on a park bench along the riverwalk. A few minutes later, a group of 7-10 ten year olds were hanging out within earshot of us, speaking Russian of course. The translator kept us apprised of what they were saying. They new that Michelle and Jason were Americans, but were unsure of the translator as they’d only heard her speak English. The loser of the Rock, Paper, Scissors game had to come ask us what time it is to see if the translator could answer. She did, and the ½ the kids that lost the bet moaned in disgust…evidence that ten year olds are the same regardless of their hemisphere of residence.
Yesterday, Michelle discovered that the Astana Market has boneless, skinless chicken breasts. So we prepared them for dinner, walked back to the Astana Market for dessert (which like most desserts here was not very sweet), found a park bench, sat a spell, and back home (de moy).
Happy Easter! Today was Easter here at the Russian Orthodox Church and as a sign of new life/Spring parishioners were given blooming pussy willow branches (kind of like Palm Sunday in the US).
Tomorrow we’ll see Wyatt at 10. Here’s hoping for no snowsuit.
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