Happy Kurban Ayt!

Hi All-

To celebrate Kurban Ayt, we had a lazy morning here at the apartment. I lounged in the bed for a bit while Peter fed Rinat. And then the boys played for a good long while as I cruised the internet. Rinat declared that they needed to play all sorts of Field Day games so they had a 3 Legged Race, an Egg Spoon Race (with plastic dinosaurs in place of eggs), and some sort of race where you hold a balloon between your bellies and try to run without it falling down. Then they had a pretend sleepover. Rinat truly is pretty easy to entertain when you can give him undivided attention. It’s just the 4 hours at the baby house that’s killing him. And going to lunch every day where he has be sit still and behave in between visits. And he doesn’t always get something that he considers edible. He has his moments but overall he’s doing ok.

After hanging out for a good long while, we decided to get out and about while we had some time off so we called up our friends from Georgia and we all walked over to the Green Market to see what we could see. This is the first day that it has been truly cold since we got here so we all bundled up in layers and hats and gloves and headed out over the bridge. Rinat loved going over it because it crossed the train tracks. We could see all of the people down below getting on and off and the men directing the trains. It was a very neat thing for a small boy who is train obsessed. And then the market itself was, as most markets I have been to around the world, a buzz of people and activity. There were stalls for fruits, vegetables, seeds, nuts, pickled things, shoes, coats, hats, and even a yurt that served what we assume is chai. In between the stalls were people shopping and men pulling very large wagons full of wares that looked like it would hurt a lot if they fell on me. And several places that made samsa and the like. Good stuff. We got some of the most amazing crunchy almonds and sweet golden raisins and a round of naan with sesame seeds sprinkled on top and a flower stamped into it. Why is it that things taste so much better when they are bought at a place outside? I think Rinat ate about 3,000 raisins as we wandered and Peter and I put a good dent into the almonds. I regret not getting any better photos but I just feel so conspicuous with this giant camera. The lens that I bought when my old one broke a day before we left (that is a lot better than the one I had actually) is longer and so I could sneak some in without being too obvious but I still feel weird. I’ve always wanted to take a class on how to take good travel photos- especially ones of people. Maybe that will be something I can do once we get back.

Then we wandered back across the bridge and ate at a place called Basilico and it was good pizza. Really good. There was no English on the menu but between the limited Russian that I can figure out and the Italian, we figured it out. It’s owned by the same people who own the Charlotka in the mall (with the good lattes and cake) and the Ukrainian place (good Perogi and Chicken Kiev) and the middle Eastern place (with good Lagman and Plov). They seem to have it all figured out because every one of those places is good. So much for losing weight while I’m here.

Then Sasha picked us up from there and we spent two glorious hours with our little boy. Again, it felt a little bit festive in there. The nannies/mommies turned on music and let the babies crawl around the floor. It was almost like a party. And our sweet Rinat was especially sweet to Sumo today. He was giving him hugs and kisses and tickles and patting him on the head and saying “You have the cutest little face ever.” Melt…

The only crimp in our day was the email that I got this morning saying there are no flights out from Almaty on Dec 5th, 4th, or 3rd (let me remind you that our visa runs out the 5th). I mean, come on already. And then our friends from France said that the Astana airport is going to be closed from Nov 30-Dec 3 for the OSCA summit. So maybe we’ll be coming home even earlier than we thought? I dunno. We’ll just have to see what kind of magic Natasha can perform.

And our day ended pretty wonderfully with a happy boy who played games with me, ate a full dinner, and is now playing Birthday Party with Bubby and Puppy as his guests. Could life get any better?

Love to all, -m