Central Eurasian Mission - Week 6 - April 24-30,  2017

Well - - we had an interesting event this Sunday afternoon.  I was minding my own business, quietly lying on our bed checking facebook (yes, I check facebook) and Dad was making broiled cabbage steaks (yes, it sounds weird, but they were tasty) when he heard a knock at the door.  Next thing I know, he comes into the room and says, "do you want to talk to a woman at the door who speaks no English?"  Uhhhhh, not really.....but I have to pretend to Dad that I can speak Russian.

So I get up, go to the door, and there is this small woman, older, in dirty paint smudged clothes (learned later she is helping remodel the apartment nextdoor).  In our best Russian, we greet each other....so far I am doing fine.  Then she holds up an electric kettle and blabbers at me.

I carefully explain that I don't speak Russian well, but I can understand if people speak slowly to me and use simple words.  Okay, now I'm ready for super understanding and a meaningful conversation.  She continues to speak in a very speedy blabber.  Miraculously I hear "no tea" and "boiling water" while she is holding up this electric tea pot or maybe a coffee pot.

Now, you might wonder how I heard and knew "boiling water".  In a purely coincidental incident, Sister Stice (who had organized "Spa into Spring" last week) had invited the three sisters (not the mountains - - the young volunteers) and me to go eat at THE grand mosque which is across from her apartment building (look at the pictures from last week and you can see the mosque from one of her high rise windows.)  Hmmm-I thought people go to a Mosque to pray, but in this case there is a wonderful cafeteria on the lower floor.  At the end of the serving line were two big urns that were hot so I figured the were full of tea and coffee.  We sat at the table and Sister Peterson (from Mountain Home Idaho) brings me a mug full of hot boiling water.  You're right, it was "hot boiling water".  Sister Peterson told me the word for "boiling water", and she explained that when Kazaks ask them/us if we'd like tea, we say "no thank you but" boiling water" would be wonderful".  I have digressed from the lady at the door and will now show you pictures of the lunch at the mosque.





My food was great!!  The  server said it was lasagna, but it wasn't, but it was, kinda.  We will take any out of town visitors to the Mosque Cafe to eat.  The lasagna was wonderful!!!!



So back to the boiling water lady.  I surmise she wants boiling water but not for tea so I invite her in, Dad gest a pot full of water and puts it on the stove and then we wait an eternity for the water to boil.

Through my eloquent language skills we learn that she has a son and a daughter and one granddaughter and that she is on the remodel crew next door.
She learns that we have six kids and sixteen grandchildren and live here and are not guests of someone.  Is the water boiling yet?????  Okay-get out the folder of family pictures.  We showed her all the pictures and she totally agrees that our family is beautiful and aren't grandchildren wonderful.

Water is very hot, is poured into her pot, and I am annoyed that I had not already prepared a dialogue for when someone knocks at your door asking to borrow a cup of sugar - or boiling water.

The big event of the week was our trip to Moscow.  I can hear you thinking-"oh how exciting".  Well, not really.  We had to go to the American Embassy to get our second passport.  And you're wondering, "a second passport?"  Here is the explanation.  Kazakhstan will only give a tourist a visa for six month,s and then you can get that visa renewed for another six.  So after that one year, you must leave and never come back - or something like that.  I guess the church has made some sort of arrangement with the American Embassy to issue a second passport (with exactly the same info and picture as on the original one), but it is only good for two years rather than ten years.  So when our first year here is over, we will fly to Kyrgyzstan  on the first passport/visa and return on our second passport/visa.  Yeah-pretty slick.

So we arrive at the airport and are met by representatives from the travel department.  We're sure they're legit.  They take us to a sleek black mercedes sedan and drive us through the traffic choked traffic of Moscow



to the US Embassy.  We were kinda expecting a fancy ornate building (like the Joseph Smith Memorial Building in SLC) but at, probably, a side door, behind truck barricades disguised as mountainous concrete planters, was the door and fence - on one side a uniformed Russian and on the other side an American....maybe a representative of America-just because it looked to me like his shoulder patch was that of a security guard not a US Marine guard.  And I wanted a Marine in dress blues!  This was the only picture I took - didn't want to press my luck and take pictures of the guards.



Inside it was terribly boring.  Uncomfy chairs, a little room with toys for wiggly children, reception windows.  I watched a national league baseball game for an hour while we waited.  Then we were called, signed papers, paid $110.00 each and were on way.

The Mercedes then took us to one of the church's office centers.



 We met up with the Larsons here who we'd gotten to know in the MTC.  They are one level above us in the humanitarian scheme of things (we are the privates and they might be.... sargents).  Went to lunch and decided to make a quick trip on the Metro to Red Square.





Fortunately we'd been to Red Square in 2004, on our first trip to Russia, so we weren't too disappointed to find that all the gates to the square were closed and locked (although we could see some people walking around)  We got this photo of St Basil's Cathedral which now, is a museum.



In 2004 we had not gone to the GUM (translates to the Main Universal Store).  Google Moscow GUM for great info.  This is a really an old ornate building built when people needed to be dazzled. It is now a really fancy shopping center where there are lots of people in the corridors but few to none in the shops.  It is like walking through shops in the big hotels in Las Vegas.  Expensive things to look at, too expensive to buy.  Really dark photos - sorry.   Then I took one of the ceiling because it is artistic with the umbrellas.





And the obligatory ice cream with the Larsens.



Outside on the pedestrian mall, on our way back to the Metro we saw this.  No translation should be necessary.



Translation;  Guests and Colleagues, Be a Hero at the Office!



Back in Astana we needed to do some work.  We visited an NGO group, named Bolashak- I have no idea what it means.  They had contacted us to request a meeting to discuss their plans to set up a growth room facility in order to commercially grow mushrooms and then sell them in food stalls or to grocery stores, or to elite restaurants.  Well - Dad was interested in this because the word "grow" was mentioned.  We met the people with whom we'll work if we decide to partner with the organization.

Here are Lazzat, Meirzhan, Zhandos, and on the left, our translator Aseemkhan.  They are super nice people, and Zhandos who will be heading up this project, actually knows how to and has previously grown mushrooms commercially.



They showed us this room which they want to transform into a growth chamber.  Yes, I know there are sewing machines in the room now - they are part of a project with Silent World, a group that helps hearing impaired people receive job training..  The sewing machines will be moved to another room and then the room transformed into a growth chamber.  We're excited about starting this, our first humanitarian project!



We've gone shopping - to destination shopping centers - just to see them.  This is the Eurasia Bazaar. It's another humongous building like one we described last week-just closer to our apartment. And we think there is an outdoor food market on Saturdays. The only really remarkable thing is that we were 'cheated' on a floor lamp which cost us twice as much as the one we bought last week - but we couldn't remember the cost on the spot.





Then one afternoon after all our work was done :-) we went to a super dooper incredibly fancy shopping center called Khan Shatyr that makes Pioneer Place, Clack Town Center, etc. look like pikers





The interior from the third floor



and the base of a thrill ride that sends the brave shooting up to the ceiling and then drops them.



At the base of the ride there was an area cordoned off in order to showcase a brand of jumping shoes that I think are used in fitness class situations.  The springy soles are attached to a inline skate boot.



The fun thing to watch was when all the children who, as soon as the music started, slipped under the restraining rope, and started to dance in the center space.


Even when bigger people started to 'exercise' the little kids continued to dance.



An amusement park is on the fourth floor - bumper cars, dinosaurs, swing and spin rides, etc.





The top - the fifth- floor has a pool and a sand beach.  We couldn't see it because you have to pay an entrance fee - we didn't want to replicate the previous  petting zoo experience.

Just in time for lunch we arrived at the Food Court on the third floor.  Everything an American could wish for was there - KFC, Burger King, Hardees, Baskin Robbins, American Hot Dog (yeah, I've never heard of it either) plus some ethnic places like rice-ish places and chinese-ish places.  We thought we'd try KFC since we've been told that the locals love it.  I'd prepared myself to order in Russian, and then we noticed a picture menu - so we just pointed.  Unfortunately we got spicy chicken wings, so Dad loved them and I endured it through the crispy coating until I got to the meat.





Here are some random pictures which have no part in today's 'story'.

Our apartment building , streetside view.  Ours is the middle building behind the stores.



Bolange spaghetti made from scratch - well, I had to scratch open the spice packet, purchased locally





Military vehicles parked on the street blocking a major boulevard.  They are preparing for a big parade next week honoring  the end of The Great Patriotic War (victory over the Nazis). And notice the woman whitewashing tree trunks, a springtime chore.



This one is for Warren and his beloved cat.



Bye for this week