Central Eurasian Mission - Week 8 - May 8 - May 14, 2017

On Monday we decided that we would do something culturally significant (I guess the parade met this category).  In the newsletter from the US Embassy, there was a notification of an event that sounded interesting  - Handicrafts Fair "Territory of Needlework" at the Aruzhan Trade Mall.  That sounds great- I like needlework, Dad likes everything.  After searching on our bus app we figured that bus #61 would take us there.  And this is what we found - yet another mall!



Surely, inside, there would be a vacant storefront which the Handicraft Fair had rented, and inside there would be delightful needlework pieces of art.  But, no/nada/nothing/Hечего/zip.  We looked everywhere.  On the first and second floor there were shops and on the third was the amusement park and Food Court.  Great rides for kids - kinda like Dave and Buster's but with actual rides rather than just arcade games.  There was a baked potato shop with all sorts of filling.  Here is the Lylya Kebab with kebab meat, sugar pod type peas, and pickles.  You name any kind of combination of fillings, and it was probably available.



Then we saw the "Give me Waffle" cart - just like Waffle Palooza or Waffle Love.



We stuck with the tried and true Bambino gelato cart.  No picture-how many pictures of  people eating gelato can legally be published in a blog?

We left and headed to the bus stop across the street.  We came upon some huge hot water pipes used for heating homes.  I can't remember if I've mentioned this, but most dwellings are heated by this hot water that comes from a central heating plant  The hot water flows in these pipes to an apartment building and then through all of the hot water radiators in the dwelling.  It really heats up the living space - so much so that you have to open windows in order to lower the temperature to a comfortable level.  In our building, the heat was "turned off" at some central location on April 15th  and our rooms turned cold - we had to close the windows.  These pictures show how big the pipes can be. We've seen smaller ones right in front of apartments too.  I think the pipes are only above ground in older sections of the town as there aren't any visible pipes near us.






Dinnertime - should we have left over homemade mac and cheese or go to a shashlik place we discovered on our way back from the parade?  Dad chose the Shashlik place!  Cute little cafe.  The owner was outside sprinkling the dirt with water and then sweeping the moist dirt away.  Annoying finger in the way.



Cozy inside with really delicious shesh-ka-bobs.





Speaking of food---- we were led to believe that, here in Kazakhstan, you can't buy the spices you want/need.  That just isn't true.  The spices are here, you just have to find them and, of course, everything is written in Russian or Kazak.  In the ANVAR next door store we found all sorts spice packets just like in Fred Meyer or Safeway..  Here are two racks of spice mixes - different brands





And here is the homemade (at least not out of the box made) mac and cheese I made for lunch.  Macaroni, milk, cheese, and spice package (I could have made a white sauce, but I chose not to).  Leftovers tomorrow.



I know that at lest 70% of you have been wondering about the cars in Kazakhstan - what are the cars like, etc.  Actually, they're just like ours except very few chevys and, maybe no fords.  And practically no pickups.  That being said, I did see my first pickup, a Toyota, in a nearby parking lot and in the two days since I saw it, I saw two more on the streets.  (In Spain, we only saw one pick-up in six weeks).  I was excited, so I took this picture.  Delivery trucks and busses are different looking.



I decided to take a survey of the cars in our parking area.  I counted them one morning and walked behind all the cars to read their make if I couldn't figure out the emblem on the front.  There were 49 cars.  In our apartment building there are 27 units and an additional 27 in our next door building.  So the 49 cars here were from our building and possibly from our next door neighbors.



Mazda - 2
Toyota sedans - 10
Toyota Highlander - 1
Toyota Land Cruiser -5 ( the country's most popular SUV, hands down. They're everywhere)
Toyota Rav 4 - 1
Note - 1
Honda sedan - 2
Honda Pilot - 1
VW - 1
VW SUV - 1
Nissan -3
Lexus - 2
Hyundai - 6
Deuter - 1
Audi - 1
Kia - 3
Kyron - 1
Skoda - 1
Mitsubishi - 1
Kia - 1
Skoda - 1
Chrysler -2
Unknown -  picture follows- Pete, what is this car?


I think I told you that we need to get our "Permission to Preach Certificates" so that we, as foreigners, can participate in religious activities - even in the confines of the church facility.....so no talks :-) or prayers until we get that piece of paper.  The YVs had received a phone call that our certificates were ready, so three of them and the two of us went to get them.  Two bus transfers and a short hike later, we entered the govt building, left our cell phones at reception (the woman taking them jokingly asked if we we also had a television to check), took the lift to the fifth floor....and were told, sorry but they are not ready...........  But the good part is that on the way back to our bus stop, the YVs took us to a bakery where the apple turnovers were remarkable - worth a second trip. And ....next door at a little shop called Elite Drinks (sign was in Russian) they have all sorts of American soda pops that .....were Great!!!  WE should have gotten 2 more..no five more each for both of us.



This was a slow week for our humanitarian work because the week was a major holiday and no appointmentss could be made.  What to do?  We went to another mall - I think we only have 2 to go. This was Keruen Mart, with Galmart (another grocery store with a large selection of 'western food').




It is really a huge building.  See the black part of the building on the left?  That is where the escalators are.  We didn't know where to go, so we went up and entered the upper part of the mall that would be suitable for NYC or SFO or CHI.  Very fancy stores, but no one in them.  I took a picture and was told, kindly, by a security guard the, "no no - no pictures".  Here they are anyway.






We kept wandering until we got to the Food Court.  Oh my gosh, it was like a covered football field.  If you look at Google Earth, you'd be amazed at this dome over the food court.



It was a  sunny day and quite hot outside. You can only imagine how hot it was in that foodcourt!

We still hadn't found Galmart, but after looking at the info board, we concluded that we needed to outside the building and around to a side entrance.  Which we did, but it really wasn't all that different from the other big food stores we've visited.  We did find two things that pleased us.  I know, it's common to you, but not here in Kaz.  That 510 grams of peanut butter cost us $10.00!



With the holiday, it was a weird week.  Behind our building is a big school and a mini track, and a hockey rink, a mini soccer field, and an enclosed basket ball/soccer area.  Plus there is a big open area for kids to play and climb and jump.  We surmise- and only surmise - that during the last four days of this national pride, we love the military week, the older boys of the school all gathered in camo pants and shirts and caps and played boy soldier with some adults, using a megaphone, shouting out commands.  It was fun watching them.  The marched and marched and were in and out of step.  They did push ups, pull ups. They threw dummy grenades. Here they are doing the duck walk






You can see our windows in the building behind, on the left.



Who knows if it was mandatory or the school's ROTC group.  Can you imagine this happening on the campus of OCHS?

I think I mentioned how our building is being remodeled = well the stairs and entrance door.  Here is how the workers mixed the concrete to do their work.



This is what I miss about home!!!



I only bring this up because one afternoon, after we had done all of our work, we went to yet another mall. To get there we had to take two long bus rides.  It was the furthest distance toward the outer edges of the city we've been.  I swear, the countryside was so flat that in the distance we could see the curvature of the earth.  And when the wind blew in gusts - which it always does- your eyes fill with grit, not the 'true grit' stuff John Wayne talked about.  Eventually we'll find our way to the boonies where there will be no cars or buildings, and I'll post a picture of the wind blowing on the steppe.

This was KEH Mart - a really super big building - actually a warehouse.





The grocery/food part was unremarkable except that the peanut butter was half the cost of the jars we found earlier in the week.  I didn't take any pictures of the massive displays of eggs or the bins and bins and bins of candy.  I think I was numb.  We wondered what was in the rest of the building, so we walked down a long corridor, past a security guard, and found, in the warehouse part, that numerous cubicles had been built, and people had rented them and were hard at work.  This is what should happen at all the closed K-Marts.



Here's the church building and some of the rooms.  Not supper fancy like in LO, but it works here.
The little store - to the left of the stairs - has a stairway that goes to the store underneath our church facility.  Ironically, it is a beer store.





The Chapel



Another room - I'll call it the Multipurpose room.  This is where we have English Club



Here I am talking and showing them my family picture album Warren gave me for Christmas.






On the second and fourth Saturdays in the evening, the is another gathering of friends from English Club.  It is not English Club, but simply a gathering where religion can be discussed if the conversation happens to go that way.  I've had interesting conversation or two.

Today Dad gave me rabbits!!!



In Relief Society we talked about the "certain women" in the scriptures.  Not just 'some' women.
There were three Americans, on French woman, an ethnic Russian, and four Kazakh women.

https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2017/04/certain-women?lang=eng

You can watch a youtube video if you want

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TY8IQrTfx68

Tomorrow morning we leave for Tbilisi, Georgia for an Area Humanitarian Welfare Conference. Should be interesting and fun.  We have a free day before the conference starts and we want to purchase a day trip from some sort of tour and take a trip up into the Caucasus Mountain!  Will return in a week.