Lisboan training

April 23-May 3, 2017

Every year, one of our most looked-forward-to trips is the spring triathlon training camp with WITC.  Igors does an awesome job organizing a week for 10-15 guys and gals to do some training, but also to enjoy a break away from Warsaw.  Past locations included Crete, Fuertaventura and Tuscany.  In 2017, we went to Portugal.  I had always wanted to go to Portugal, and the only thing I really knew about it was what I had heard in Hawaii - a Portuguese man-of-war is like a jellyfish, and Portuguese sausage goes well with eggs and rice.  The camp fell next to the long May weekend, which gave us the perfect excuse to stay in Portugal after the end of camp.  So we could make sure to eat and drink any calories that were burned during the training. 

An added bonus was that the trip was the day after Zosia and I got engaged.  You could say we had an engagementmoon in Portugal. 

The tri-camp in Silves can be summed up pretty simply: daily swims, cycling, sore butts, a couple runs, plus a ton of good food, wine, and fun.  Spending it with a bunch of good friends doesn't hurt either.  Unlike past years, we didn't stay in a sports resort, instead choosing an apartment in a residential area, and using the community's indoor pool.  It was different, but a lot of fun since we had an entire villa to ourselves, including a small common area and outdoor pool for hanging out. AND WE HAD A DRONE!!!  Do you hear me???  I finally got to play with a drone and use it to film the music video.

Ok, so I need to work on my drone flying skills...

So that's enough talking about tri-camp.  Here's the video.

Very hard training session

The Atlantic ocean somewhere

Even Silves has a castle

I promise, we did exercise

After the week-long camp, a few of us headed up to Lisbon. Portugal isn't that big, but it is long (that's what she said).  The train from camp in Silves in the south took about 4 hours to Lisbon, which is in the middle.  Porto is in the north, and that would have been another few hours to get to.  So we'll just save Porto for another visit.

Determining the best neighborhood for a home base is always a challenge when visiting a city for the first time.  We asked a bunch of people for the best area, and most people suggested around the castle.  I didn't even know there was a castle in Lisbon, so that was already something exciting for me.  But as we all know, living next to a castle likely means living on a hill.  And Lisbon's hills are no joke.  The walk to the apartment wasn't that far from the train station, but it was far UP from the train station.  Around every corner in Lisbon is another windy hill to climb up with a fat suitcase full of triathlon gear (windy, as in "wine-dee", not as in "win-dee". So maybe that should be "winding"?).  It seems like you are always going up hill, even when you're going down.

Nice views of the city after climbing the hills

Lisboa

One pleasant surprise about Lisbon was that the prices were not as high as other Western European capital cities (like Paris or Rome or London).  We noticed quite a few abandoned buildings, right next to new, modern developments, so it seems that their economy is still not in an ideal condition.  The architecture is beautiful, with the cobblestone streets and the iconic tiled buildings.  The language is interesting, in that for some reason I thought it was similar to Spanish, but in fact it sounds nothing like it.  It's quite hard for me to understand how they pronounce words, since many letters don't make the sound I'd expect based on the spelling.  The pronunciation also seems a bit more harsh than Spanish (except when spoken by beautiful ladies of course).  I was surprised to read that Portuguese is actually the 6th most common language in the world, thanks mostly to the trillions of people in Brazil.

The downside of a vacation during the holiday weekend is that everything was closed on May 1st.  It's also common practice, as in other southern European countries, for shops and restaurants to be closed for siesta in the afternoons.  So we had to plan around that.  But it didn't seem to affect the drug dealers, as they were standing on every corner of the main walking street at all hours.  At least they were polite.  But if you aren't expecting to be offered drugs by 17 different people within your first hour, it can be a bit shocking.

Speaking of drugs, some of the food was very addictive.  There was great seafood everywhere.  In Silves, my favorite meal was fish from a hut on the side of the road. A pastel de nata (plural: pasteis de nata, obviously) is probably the best thing you'll ever eat in Portugal.  It's an egg custard and you can basically swallow them whole because they are so delicious...a perfect mix of sweet and gooey, with a hint of salty and savory.  We went to the town of Belem, where the pastries were born, created and sold by Catholic priests in the 1800's (inspired by something similar in France).  We waited in line to eat in the famous Pasteis de Belem cafe.  Speaking to the popularity, the cafe seats over 400 people.  By the way, Belem (which they pronounce in a way that sounds like "blame") is the Portuguese word for Bethlehem.  I think it's because Jesus used to eat these pasteis every day after school.  By the way again, I don't know how to pronounce "pasteis".  But I can tell you that they aren't those little stickers that cover your nipples.

I'll take a few dozen of those, please

We had a lot of other good food as well - on our first night, we enjoyed a nice Mozambique restaurant, because obviously Mozambique was a Portuguese colony thanks to Vasco da Gama.  This made me wonder if Mozambique is both the name and the adjective?  Another favorite was the bifana, which I ate for breakfast every day at the cafe next to our Airbnb.  It's simply juicy pork boiled in oil, and placed in a bread roll.  Super healthy.  And even though I don't really love olives, and definitely don't really love sardines, we got used to eating bread, olives and sardine pate, which was served before every meal.

Who needs ice cream when you have bifana?

To drink, obviously port is nice (and a trip to Porto awaits), but they have really nice wines as well.  And towards the end of the trip we discovered ginjinha, a cherry liquor that tasted even better than the Polish wiśniówka.  It's sometimes served in a chocolate shot glass, which you eat after you are finished with the drink. I guess it's a chocolate shot "cup", since it's not actually made from glass.  It's even better when you just put the whole thing in your mouth, chew it a few times, and swish the liquid around before swallowing.  That's not what she said, you sickos.

Wish we had discovered this earlier!

In addition to the food, the sightseeing was splendid.  Obviously you can't go wrong with simply wandering around the city.  The castle is nice, the views from the hills are amazing, and every other street is a work of art.  We did the free Discover Lisbon walking tour, which was definitely worthwhile, as long as you're ready for the hills.  They showed us some of the churches around the city, told some of the history of both the Romans and Moors, and explained that statues of kings on horses usually show how the king died - two horse legs off the ground shows that he died in battle, one leg off means that he died from injuries suffered in battle, and all legs on the ground means he died of boring natural causes.  I guess this is standard everywhere.

Outside of Lisbon was also wonderful.  Sintra is a must.  We were tempted to spend some time at the seaside instead, but the castles in Sintra were more appealing.  The train takes only 40 minutes, then you can take a bus (434) between the main sites for 5.50 Euros.  Gary, Inka and Ania met us there for some castle exploration.  The Moorish castle was amazing.  The old, gray fortress walls flowed around us, which somehow reminded me of Morgan Freeman in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves.  Pena Palace was completely opposite; loud and colorful, reminding me of Alice in Wonderland, where you'd expect to see fancy people with big white wigs.  But equally impressive.

Feeling Moorish

I spotted Alice

In the end, we saw three different castles, which was more than enough to make me happy.  For some reason I didn't image Portugal to be a place for castles, but I am glad that it is.  And there were so many other nice things about it that we'll definitely have to explore more of the country someday.  One other thing on the to-do list: find out where Hawaiian Portuguese sausages come from.  

Andy

Our dear friend Andy (a person) moved to Basel, Switzerland back in July, and he has been greatly missed in Warsaw.  Andy's a great guy, and he's been a wonderful friend over the years. But now that I think about it, he's already left us a few times (to move to SF, to go on a long backpacking trip, to Run Wisla), so blah blah blah, Same Same But Different.  Ok, stop it, this post is not about Andy and how we're sad without him.  The point is that for his last couple weeks in Warsaw, he stayed in my apartment with me.  It's always nice to have guests over...there's some comfort in the sounds of other living creatures in the house (that is, if you know who those other living creatures are).  So when he left for Basel, we tried our best to immediately replace him.

This is Andy, the human

On the 1st of July, we attended a 4th of July party with a bunch of friends.  A couple of them, Martins and Anna, had a pet "mouse" (at home, not at the party), for which they were looking for a new home.  They asked Zosia if she'd be willing to take him in, and of course Zosia's eyes lit up like someone just gave her a giant chocolate bar.  She dreams about a day when we have a dog together, which I also want, especially if they invent dogs that don't shed, smell like fresh laundry, and can pee in the toilet.  After several games of flip cup, she asked me if we could have a mouse.  I don't remember saying yes (see previous sentence about playing several games of flip cup), but I guess I did.  I honestly thought it was some strange dream.  She asked me again the next morning, and again without thinking what it really meant, I confirmed my previous response.  Little did I expect, later that day, we had a mouse. 

It turns out it's not a mouse, but a "degu", or koszatniczka in Polish. Martins had bought it for his daughter about 8 years ago, and now that she's a teenager, apparently there are more important things to do than take care of a rodent.  They also planned on getting a second cat, and it was a massacre waiting to happen.  So, that Sunday we said goodbye to Andy (the person), filmed a short scene with our friends for an episode of Househunters, International (yea, I had to throw that in there), and picked up the degu.

But first, let's become famous

Apparently they didn't know for sure if it was a boy or a girl, but they'd been calling it Jenny for the past several years.  Since we missed Andy a lot already, we decided to change the name to Andy, and just pretend he was a boy.  One Andy out, one Andy in.

He already knows how to write his name

He's actually really sweet, as long as you get past the fact that if you saw him in real life, you'd jump on the table and complain to the landlord.  After a few days getting comfortable, he decided that he didn't need to run away from us when we let him out of the cage.  At first he didn't seem to like to be picked up, but since Zosia started grabbing him the minute she sees him, he has learned to live with it.  We were hoping that he'd like to jump on our shoulders and sit there like a parrot, but when we picked him up from Martins (actually it was a "her" at the time we picked her up), she climbed on his shoulder and peed.  So that idea kind of faded away.  Plus, he seems kinda fearless (or dumb) and sometimes jumps from high places...so we don't trust him enough to let him crawl around high places on his own.

It took a while for him to want to come out and play with us

Don't jump (or pee)!

He lives in a 3-level cage, with a running wheel, a shelter and hammock, lots of hay and shoe box full of sand to bathe in.  Martins gave us all the food and supplies that they had...a true "starters kit" for a degu owner.  We learned that degus usually live 8-10 years max...which is a bit sad considering he is already 8.  But let's not think about that right now.  He likes to eat treats out of our hands, and hides peanuts around the kitchen in plain sight.  He thinks he's being sneaky, but if you look around when you visit, you're bound to see them around the apartment; in the corner between walls, near the edge of a rug, or on a shoe.

Zosia is now a bit more aggressive in trying to get Andy to play with her.  Watching her take off the top of the cage, tipping the running wheel over trying to get him out, begging out loud "please come and play with me"....it gives me images of an 6 year old trying to get her hamster out to play with her, not understanding why the animal doesn't respond to the harassment.  When asked, Zosia admitted that she indeed had a hamster when she was a kid and treated it in this exact same way.

Andy and his mom

Playing games on iPad together

So even though Andy (the human) has been gone a few months, it's like he never left.  Besides having the same name, here are some other similarities between Andy the degu and Andy the person:
- They are both hairy
- Girls think they are cute
- They both recycle (Degu reuses his food crumbs as a bed)
- They can both fit in your pocket - and they both don't like to be put in there
- They both squeak and make cute noises
- They are both vegan
- They both like to run
- Degus come from Chile and Andy has been to Chile
- They both sleep close to where they poop

Just to make sure that they aren't actually the same person, I identified a couple differences:
- Andy was never called Jenny as a kid (though his mom's name is Jenny, which is a strange coincidence)
- I don't think Andy has ever peed on Martins
- That's probably all of the differences

They're not the same person

Some of you know that Andy (the degu) got a bit sick back in October.  It wasn't really an illness, but he lost a lot of weight and wasn't eating.  It turned out to be the best possible type of illness, in that it could be fixed.  All the signs pointed to ingrown teeth (getting skinny, dropping food when trying to eat, rubbing his mouth with his hands, and making "tsk" noises with his teeth).  I read about it online and it looks like teeth overgrowing and digging into gums is a common issue.  It makes eating painful, so he lost nearly half of his body weight (from 200ish grams to 110 at his lowest).

Nothing could stop Andy's visit to the pumpkin patch

I had been away for a week and Zosia was coming over to feed him every couple days (which is normally OK), but when I got back he was noticeably skinnier.  It took some time away to notice is....since we had seen him every day before that, we didn't notice that he was losing a couple grams each day.  He was still active and friendly, but something was wrong.  He was also always cold, sitting next to the heater pipes or even crawling on our feet, rather than sitting on the floor.  When he was in his cage, he was always buried under the blankets.

Sitting on the heater pipe is one way to warm up...

This is another way

Turns out he was cold because he didn't have any fat on his body.  We had to search for an "exotic" vet, but finding a vet from Bali or Sri Lanka in Warsaw is not easy.  What?  Oh, that's not what an exotic vet is.  But still, vets that deal with exotic animals isn't so easy. The first vet we found didn't seem confident that she could fix the problem, even though she recognized the problem right away.  Andy's back teeth were the biggest problem, but she said she couldn't grind them down because Andy was too weak for anesthesia.  This meant she thought Andy needed anesthesia, which scared us.  So she cut the front teeth only, which didn't require any, and sent us home.  We needed to come back after he gained some weight.

That first night we brought Andy home from the vet, I honestly thought it was the end.  He was in shock from the shaving of his front teeth, weak, and couldn't even put his legs under himself when we put him in his "hospital" box (we made a small nest for him with a heating pad in a cardboard box to make it easier to monitor him).  His eyes were half open and he looked like a rag doll.  It was hard not to cry and want to try anything possible to make him better.  Poor little guy crawled under Zosia's shirt and slept there for hours.  The image of Zosia laying on the bed, whispering her love to Andy (the degu, not the person!), and Andy trying to squeeze as close to her as possible to absorb her warmth was heartbreaking.  But it also reminded me that I am a lucky man to be marrying such a caring soul. 

So much love...

Around midnight, we were laying on the bed, falling asleep, and Andy started crawling around.  We immediately jumped up, excited for a sign of life, and tried to feed him.  We tried everything we could think of, but remembered that we couldn't give him sugar.  Peanuts are supposed to be a rare treat, but we knew he loved them, so we tried.  They were too hard.  He finally managed a bit of food until he was too weak to continue and went back to sleep.  I was cautiously optimistic, but still tried to brace myself for Andy not being with us the next morning.

We were so happy to see him moving around more the next morning.  Over the next couple days we tried everything we could think of: puffed rice, soft oats, bread soaked in water...I even baked some "degu cookies" which I saw online.  We didn't leave his sight for a couple days.  Then we realized that we should use the syringe to feed him, which we had been using to give him medicine.  Looking back, I don't know why we didn't think of this earlier.

He fell in love with this syringe

Upon hearing the news of Andy's struggles, friends came over to see him.  It was really sweet.  He is "just" a rodent, but in a few months already became part of the family.

He was getting a little better, but we weren't convinced.  So we took him a few times to see a different vet we read about on the internet.  It required us leaving work early and taking two buses to get there, but he turned out to be very capable and helpful.  We got to see with our own eyes the procedures he was doing, so it made us feel better that we understood the problems and the solutions.  Though it wasn't always pretty.  He promptly used a metal contraption to lock Andy's mouth in an open position (which Andy hated and it was hard to watch), and shaved down his back teeth.  The first vet always took Andy to the back room so we actually never saw what she did to him.  Maybe this was for our own benefit, but it made it hard to understand what was going on.  The second vet also confirmed that YES, Andy was in fact a boy!

We weighed him every day to check his progress, and each morning started with us crossing our fingers as we put him on the kitchen scale (which we bought specifically to weigh him), hoping for 1 or 2 grams more than the previous day.  We had to feed him every few hours, about 5 times per day.  This meant we had to go home every day during lunch (also to change the heating pad to keep him warm in the cage), and meet at home immediately after work, even if we had other plans.  We are also grateful to our friends who helped Zosia when I was out of town for work.  It was a true team effort, but it was never a chore.  Maybe that's what parenting is about.

At first he struggled to eat 6 ml of food from the syringe, but eventually, he was eating over 20 ml for each meal.  We had fun making different food smoothies for him in the Nutri Bullet (broccoli, peanut butter, degu food, seeds, etc) and shopping for low sugar baby food.  As he got stronger, he looked forward more and more to his feasts.  He went crazy over the parsnip mix.  We were starting to think he was better, but he didn't want to admit it, so he could continue with this royal treatment.

Chillin' out with peanut butter on a spoon, just like my mom used to do

Over the next couple months, we grew closer with Andy, and the best part is that Zosia finally moved in to my apartment!  At first it was due to necessity, so we could feed him together in the morning (it was impossible to feed him without 3 hands).  But now she can't go more than an hour without kissing and hugging him.  In the middle of dinner or exercising in the living room, she'll just stand up, walk to the cage to grab him (I can hear Andy squeak "not again?!") and walk around with him wrapped snugly in her hands, pulled up to her nose, completely forgetting about what she was doing before.

Even Zosia's brother has mastered the "Smash your nose into Andy" pose

Andy is now more like a dog than any other pet.  When we let him out of the cage once in a while, he follows us around like a puppy.  We don't let him go in some of the rooms, but when we open the doors to go in or out, he's always right behind trying to sneak in.  He especially likes to sneak into the bathroom to hide behind the washing machine.  He likes to sit on our laps, even crawling up my leg at the dinner table to get close to me (or probably closer to the food, but let's just pretend).  Currently his favorite thing is when Zosia lays Andy (the degu) face up on her chest and scratches his stomach.  He likes eskimo kisses and nibbles our fingers as if to groom us.

Andy Claus is back to normal!

One thing that the doctor mentioned is that Andy needs friends.  I read some forums and joined some Facebook groups to see what people say about degus, and everyone says that they shouldn't be alone.  This might explain why Andy is so interactive with us.  The forums were also good to learn what else to be careful about (no sugar diets, monitoring his drinking to identify signs of diabetes, and generally that we should weigh him every week or month to see any changes).

So, of course, we decided to get two more Andys, I mean degus.  We're supposed to get them very soon, so stay tuned and we'll let you know how that goes!

Party of 3, soon to be Party of 5?

Codebreaking in Poznań

December 29-30, 2016

Sitting at home during the 2017 holiday break, I was bored, thinking about how I passed the time during last year's week between Christmas and NYE.  Ok, I wasn't bored, but I did think about it.  Then I remembered that Zosia and I went to Poznan, and that I didn't write anything.  So, exactly 1 year later, here it is.

Often when living abroad, in the middle of Europe, it's tempting to visit the surrounding countries, since it's so easy to get to a Latvia, Turkey, or Italy from Poland compared to from Seattle.  This is what I did during my first few years in Poland.  New countries every month.  But sometimes we forget to explore what is essentially our back yard.  I've lived in Poland for over 7 years, and there are still places in Poland that I haven't visited.  Luckily, I've been to most of the main hard-to-pronounce places, such as Gdańsk, Wrocław, Kraków, Kazimierz Dolny, Toruń, Zakopane, and Białowieża (and now I'm realizing how weird those words look if you are not familiar with the Polish language).  But until Christmas 2016, I hadn't explored Poznań.  I had been there for a triathlon a couple years before, but I didn't see anything except the big lake and about 90 km of empty roads around the city.

So Zosia and I made a last minute decision to go to Poznań, located 3 hours away, half way to Berlin.  Poznań was established sometime in the 10th century, and was for a time a German city.  A lot of people there speak German as their second language.  I found it amusing that the reception lady at the hotel spoke English with a German accent, even though she was Polish.

Poznań Old Town

Along the river

One of the interesting neighborhoods there is Ostrów Tumski, a small island in the city with museums and the oldest cathedral in Poland.  Several Polish kings are buried there, including Mieszko I, who was the first Christian ruler of Poland in the 10th century.  That's about the extent of the educational part of this post.

The old cathedral doesn't look old

A king is buried there! But it was blocked off so we couldn't get close

To help us with more sightseeing, we found a tourist scavenger hunt game on the internet, and spent a couple hours exploring the city looking for clues.  I'm serious.  Two grown people walking around the city, inspecting wall engravings, looking into strangers windows, circling the same blocks over and over...I'm sure we didn't look suspicious (or pathetic) at all!  Anyway, it was a lot of fun and I definitely recommend something like this.  The website we used had many different themes, but ours was Codebreakers, as a tribute to the Polish code breakers from WWII who studied in Poznan.  You've probably heard about Alan Turing, but apparently the Polish guys had a big influence on his core breaking success, even though they are not really mentioned in the movie "The Imitation Game".  And since the weren't mentioned in a Hollywood movie, probably nobody knows that it happened.  If you find yourself in Poznań, give it a shot (though some of the clues didn't make sense...we managed to figure it out...and since we successfully cracked it, they put our names on the website for a couple days...FAMOUS!).

Breaking codes and taking names

It was really cold walking around, so we also needed some alcohol blanket.  That led us to the Lech Brewery.  The beer is nothing special, but it's always fun to visit breweries or wineries as a tourist, because somehow the tour becomes more fun as you sample the goods.  Funny how that is.

"Lech" is the sound you make when you clear your throat

Unfortunately a couple restaurants we wanted to try weren't open due to the holiday.  Na Winklu for baked pierogi, and Yetz Tu for ramen both left us sad and hungry.  It's frustrating when the restaurants don't ask for your permission before taking time off.  Then it makes me wish I owned a restaurant that was so successful that I could just close it and not worry about losing revenue or customer loyalty due to breaking their hearts and causing them to die of starvation.  Who am I kidding, they probably don't care that I wanted to give them my money.  And of course, I'll still go the next time I'm in Poznan.  They win.

We had to settle for this beauty

Thanksgivingstan in Almaty

Nov 18-27, 2016

Turkey.  Potatoes.  Cranberries.  Pumpkin.  These are the essentials of an American Thanksgiving dinner.  And luckily I was able to have them all on Thanksgiving 2016, even though I was in Kazakhstan.  The composition of the meal, however, took a bit of creativity.  The nice folks at our Almaty office took me out to dinner and made sure I got what I needed: duck breast with pumpkin, roasted potatoes, fried turkey salad, and a cranberry martini.  Close enough. 

Thanksgiving dinner

When I landed in Almaty, the trip was off to a good start.  After 11 hours of travel (a 6.5 hour flight from Frankfurt), plus a 4 hour time difference, I arrived in Almaty after midnight.  With a crowded border control, filled with a bunch of tired, grumpy passengers, I expected the worst. But the border agent smiled, saying the words "Welcome", "Thank you", and "Goodbye" all in the same conversation.  I don't think that has ever happened to me in my entire life.  Another pleasant surprise was that there was snow everywhere.  It was November 19, and there was at least a foot of snow on the ground.  But actually, I don't think I imagined Kazakhstan any other way.

I flew out there a couple days before my work obligation, to spend some time touring the area.  After a couple hours of sleep, I met Aigerim, a local friend from work, and one of her friends, whom she only refers to as "crazy".  We headed up to the mountains (Shymbulak) to meet Yuliya, another PwCer, whom I've known for a few years.  Unfortunately, I didn't have any snowboarding gear, but it was still nice to go up the gondolas, walk around in the snow drifts, and enjoy a couple hot toddies.  I don't even know what a "hot toddy" is, and I probably didn't actually drink one, but when I think of a warm, alcoholic beverage consumed while surrounded by snow, I call it a hot toddy.  We couldn't see much through the heavily falling snow; Yuliya even teased me, saying that the toilet was down the hill, requiring a hike through zero-visibility.  I probably would still be there trying to find it, had I listened to her.  I've taken long trips to the bathroom before, but not because of getting lost in a snow storm.  A couple weeks earlier, while in Riga, I had to buy snow boots because of a sudden snow storm there as well...which was a good thing, because I wouldn't have managed without them.

With Aigerim and Yuliya

Lots of snow everywhere

View from the office

After coming back to the city, I met with Russian Inna and her husband Zhenya.  Inna worked with me in Uzbekistan in 2015, so it was nice to reconnect.  Our second "Stan" country together!  In all honesty, it's nice to travel with her, not only because we get along and have similar sightseeing interests, but because she speaks Russian and can communicate in this area much better than I can.  Her husband didn't speak English, but I could tell he's a very insightful and funny guy.  It's nice how you can get along with someone even without speaking the same language.  He was constantly joking around, though admittedly some of the humor was lost in translation; one joke went something like "why does the sun rise and set?"  "Because Japan is raising their flag for the day".  I have a feeling Zosia would have been laughing, but I could only manage a crinkled nose and a "huh?".  We walked a bit through the snow, and took the cable car from the city to Kok Tobe, an amusement park on the hill.  It was similar to the park in Tbilisi, but because it was cold and snowy, there weren't any people there.

Inna, the bird lady

Although they consider Almaty the "soul" of the country, Astana is the capital.  I didn't go to Astana, but the concept is interesting to me.  They moved the capital from Almaty to Astana (then named Akmola) in 1997, then renamed it to Astana (which means "Capital City") in 1998.  It's a planned city with big, attention-seeking buildings, in the flat plains in the middle of nowhere.  And it's cold, similar to Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.

At first glance, the people in Kazakhstan look Asian.  That's because they are, dummy, since it's Central Asia.  But I just want you to know that I didn't see a single person who looked like Borat or his award winning sister.  Generally Kazakhs are Muslim, but more in tradition than in religion, if that makes any sense.  I'm not sure if this is a Muslim tradition, but one important custom is that the youngest son has to ("gets to") take care of the parents when they get old.  It's just a way of life; they don't question it.  There are also Russians and other Central Asian and Eastern European ethnicities living there.  During WWII, a lot of Koreans were deported to Kazakhstan from other parts of the Soviet Union, so you can find a few Koreans (and Korean food) as well. One of the girls at the office is Korean, grew up in Russia, and now lives in Kazakhstan.  I had to ask her to explain it a couple times.  Another thing that confused me is that some people speak Kazakh, some Russian, but not everyone speaks both.  It's possible that you wouldn't speak the same language as your neighbor, even if you've both lived there your whole lives.  Lucky for me, people that I interacted with spoke really good English.

Since Kazakhstan is so large, flat and desolate (in a good way), some of the largest gulag camps were there, including concentration camps for the Japanese WWII POWs.  One such camp was very close to Almaty Lake.  When I explained to a taxi driver who took us to the lake, that we also had camps for Japanese in the US, he wasn't surprised.  Until he realized I said Japanese AMERICANS.  Then he was shocked. Yeah, me too.  Kazakhstan is also home to the first and largest space launch facility (where the Soviets launched the first satellite and person into space).  So basically Kazakhstan is like Houston or Cape Canaveral.

Lake Almaty itself was beautiful, though some of that beauty was buried under heavy snow.  But I can imagine how it looks without the snow.  In fact, I don't even have to imagine, you can see it here in a photo that I didn't take.

Great Almaty Lake

How it's supposed to look

The lake is a source of water for the city, and there are exposed pipes running down the hill.  While up there, I started to film a submission video for a TV travel show application.  I heard about the need for an English speaking host for some travel show, ala Anthony Bourdain, so I submitted a video.  I haven't heard back yet, but it's only been 10 months, and I'm sure it just takes time for them to go through all of the applications.  I expect a call from Hollywood any day.

It's not easy to be a TV host

Another thing I am waiting for is to be told about the house I might have won.  There is a brand of restaurants called Parmagiano, and while I was there, there was a contest in that you would receive a certain number of entries in a drawing every time you spent a certain amount of money at one of the different restaurant brands.  If you're reading this, you can come live with me when I win the house.  I'll know you read this if you say the password "Stacy's pita chips".  Life will be comfortable for you there, not only because there will be at least 10 bedrooms (I assume), but because Almaty has McDonald's, Starbucks and Uber now (my ride from the hotel to the office only cost 30 cents), so it will be just like home.

Maybe this is my new house?

Call an Uber and you can avoid these taxi lines on the side of the road!

Eternal flame

Because it was Thanksgiving, of course that meant a lot of eating.  In addition to the modernized Thanksgiving dinner, I actually was able to have a second one.  On the next day, Yuliya took me and her young son to the American Chamber of Commerce Thanksgiving celebration.  There were a few American families around, but it seemed that most of the guests were local, with some ties to American companies.  The sight of 4 roasted turkeys put a huge smile on my face, but unfortunately, there weren't a lot of other traditional Thanksgiving dishes.  It was hard to deal with the fact I wouldn't eat any pumpkin pie.

Other local foods I had during the week were a horse t-bone steak (nice), rabbit liver (not nice), a tasty cafeteria dinner with undefined meat, rice, potatoes, salad and bread for only $3 (double nice!), and a couple servings of beshbarmak.  The version of beshbarmak that I had was made with sheep meat and noodles, a bowl of broth on the side, and a slice of horse sausage.  It was salty and fatty, but had a really nice flavor.  I needed some ayran and bread to balance the richness and unclog my arteries.  At the restaurant "Gakku", they also had camel and horse milk, sheep lungs and intestines, and something called "sub products", which scared me. I didn't try any of that, but they also had sheep head, so you know it's a legit place.  A more "normal" traditional food (from Uzbekistan), are manty dumplings.  They were so good that I found an Uzbek restaurant in Warsaw so I could eat them again.  Another restaurant I would recommend to a visitor in Almaty is "Kisklak".  The beshbarmak there was the best of the places I tried, and they have traditional robes hanging on the wall, which I assume are for customers to wear while eating.  Maybe?

Beshbarmak from Kisklak

I hope that photo isn't to show who you are eating

All this talk of intestines and heads is making me hungry.  And I'm already looking forward to next Thanksgiving...only 2 months away!

Georgia, the countryside

August 2-9, 2016

Part 2

Tbilisi was great.  And writing this I can't stop thinking about the food and wine of Georgia...  If you haven't been to Georgia, please go!!  You can read about Tbilisi here.  So here's a little about the rest of the trip...

The first stop after Tbilisi was David Gareja.  No, not the French DJ who collaborates with the top hip-hop and pop artists...but that's David Guetta.  David Gareja is not even a person.  Well, actually he was a person; a saint actually.  But these days, David Gareja refers to a 6th century complex of monasteries located near the Azerbaijan border. In addition to the standing churches and chapels in the complex, a short hike up the mountain will reveal a series of caves with centuries-old frescoes.  I expected some form of blockades for preservation, but anyone can walk right up to the caves, touch everything, and take a nap or have a picnic.

David Gareja monastery

They might be jumping to Azerbaijan

Frescoed caves everywhere

That night we stayed in a village called Udabno, at a hostel run by some Poles.  Everyone was speaking Polish in the middle of the Georgian countryside.  There were cows everywhere, and we went on a jog with 5 dogs.  They stayed with us the whole time, as we passed through the village, over some hills, past a lake and back.  They growled to keep the riff-raff away from us, and they were polite enough to turn their heads when a couple of us had to stop to relieve ourselves in the bushes.  One of the 5 was a bit more shy, staying several meters behind the group, but obviously wanting to be included.  He was like the new kid at school who lingers around the popular kids, waiting to be invited to join.  They were all really sweet until their animal instincts took over.  As we passed another small gang of dogs, a couple of "our" dogs brutally attacked another one, who honestly seemed to be minding his own business.  Maybe he was paying for a past quarrel, or maybe he whispered something offensive about the bitches in our group.  I don't know, but it was tough to see them bite and choke another dog, while we couldn't do anything.  We wanted to break up the fight by trying to talk to some reason into our friends, but the barking was louder than our shouting, and I don't think they speak English anyway.  I'm not a dog expert, but trying to physically intervene when big angry dogs are viciously attacking each other (not playing) is probably not a good idea.  Upon closer examination, most of the dogs had parts of their ears, tails or skin missing.  It's the Wild West out there.

Our running buddies

The hostel

That night in Udabno was memorable, in a good way (except for the part when Maciek's snoring shook the whole building).  The hostel also had some pretty good food; the bread with meat inside being my favorite.  I don't know what it's called, I just ordered "bread with meat inside". The "bread with beans inside" was also very good.  The environment in the hostel bar was very relaxing, sitting on the long wooden benches with a beer and the cool summer night air. It created the perfect mood for some fun games.  We played one of my favorite card games, Kings, for hours, which led to all of the other hostel guests and visitors to the bar to join in, and Jay and/or Ash pulling down their pants.  I'm not sure if the two events were related or not.  During a break, Zosia showed a card trick and the entire bar cheered when she correctly guessed Jay's card.  It was magical and I'm still kicking myself for not getting it on video!

Bread with meat inside...soft and juicy!

All of this fun was a good distraction for me, considering my heavy heart after mom's passing.  But once in a while there was wi-fi and I'd check emails, texts and messages from friends sending condolences from all over the world.  It brought me back to reality a bit, which was both good and bad.  It made me sad, but also made me realize how amazing it is that so many people care and had nice things to say about my mom.  I was getting messages from guys who hadn't seen my mom in 20 years; from high school, from SCAA...everyone wanting to share fond memories.  I'm so grateful for all those people and the love I felt from afar.  Of course, I felt the love from the guys I was in Georgia with too....they really got me through the difficult time.

The next part of the trip was another highlight for me: the wine.  I've always been a fan of wines from Georgia (one of the oldest wine regions in the world, by the way), especially Kindzmarauli.  I'd be lying if I said I could remember how to say this word...the reality is that it's my favorite when I drink it, but I never remember how to say it well enough to order it. Generally I prefer the semi-sweet Georgian wines, which taste like juice.  During the Soviet Union times, Georgian wine was one of the most popular, but due to poor Georgian-Russian relations, Georgian wine was banned from Russia from 2006 to 2013.  During my first trip to Russia, I went to a Georgian restaurant but was surprised when they didn't have any Georgian wine on the menu. Luckily that ban is over now and every time I work in Moscow, I spend at least one dinner in a Georgian place by the Sheraton.

We spent a day in Kakheti, visiting a couple vineyards (Tsinandali and Khareba) and trying lots of different wine.  It was similar to visiting Napa Valley, though Napa has a lot more drunk tourists.  One of the cool things about Georgian wine is that they age and store it in clay pots (called qvevri...also no idea how to pronounce that), and the leftover solids (skin, pulp, etc) are distilled into the Georgian brandy called chacha (which I know how to both pronounce and drink).  I especially liked drinking wine out of the little clay cups.

Wine with this view tastes good

After a night in Signagi (with another dog who liked to run), we spent a good part of the next day driving to Kazbegi, our destination for some hiking.  Kazbegi is on the northern part of the country, so we had a long drive from Signagi, which is on the eastern part. Noemi and Maciek were doing a great job of sharing the driving duties.  Each of them had their own styles...one of whom caused the passengers to develop sweaty hands.  I won't say which one.  Maciek definitely enjoyed the bumpy roads, and passing cows and slow trucks.  Noemi preferred less adventure.  They both helped us arrive safe and sound, and generally we didn't get lost.  What else could you ask for?!

Cows and trucks dominate the roads

They even pulled over when I (or I should say "someone in the car") had an emergency situation...some food didn't sit well, and as we were driving through the mountains, "someone" needed a toilet.  But where can you find a toilet along the highway in the mountains?  So we pulled over, and "someone", let's call him "Tom", ran out.  He (or she...it coulda been a girl!) didn't want to be seen by the other passengers in the car or the cars passing by, so he climbed down the pretty steep edge of the road, out of sight.  The hill was very steep, so he had to be careful not to go too far, otherwise the hike back up would be difficult.  He found a place in the gravel to dig a hole and take care of business...but unfortunately, just like in a slap-stick comedy, the roll of toilet paper succumbed to the law of gravity...and went tumbling down the hill. The toilet paper ROLLED DOWN THE HILL!!!  It rolled down in slow motion at first...teasing me, I mean teasing "Tom" as if to say "I'm still almost within reach...come get me"...before falling dramatically at least 300 feet to the bottom.  Even though I couldn't actually hear it, I could sense the crashing and echoing sounds in my head.  I mean Tom could.  Tom was tempted to chase it for a bit, because, as mentioned earlier, he was surrounded by gravel and rocks, meaning no plush leaves or spare rolls of TP laying around.  But chasing it would risk falling down the hill himself, with pants around his ankles.  Luckily, he managed to find a few small (and I mean SMALL) leaves and a old milk carton buried in the rocks.  That would have to do.

On the way to Kazbehi: Zhinvali reservoir

Kazbegi (and Kazbek mountain) was very nice for hiking.  The first hike was up to a monastery on top of the mountain.  The view from the top was gorgeous.  It wasn't that long, but it was a very steep climb.  There weren't that many tourists around generally, and most of them seemed to be Russian or Polish.  Luckily none of them noticed Tom when he had to take another break amongst the trees and cows to relieve himself.  He literally squatted among a group of cows, because he couldn't find any place without cows or people...he figured the cows would be less offended.

Hike up the mountain

Say CHEESE!!

We're SOOO FUNNY!!!!

The next day we did a longer hike, which was more flat, but still as impressive.  It passed through a small "village" with just a couple small homes, including what seemed like a nunnery.  We met more giant friendly dogs, took some pics and enjoyed a small picnic.  Since our friends Andy and Alan were running the length of the Wisla river at that time to promote a clean river bank, we decided to pick up trash along our hike as well.  We did pretty well!

Ash needs a WITC shirt

A little picnic in the "village"

Our trash collection...not bad!

On the way back to Kutaisi, we stopped in Uplistsikhe for a short visit.  It's literally a town built into the rocks, dating back to 600 BC.  It was fascinating to see, but there was not a lot of information posted about what we were looking at. It would be more engaging if there was a description of everything...or maybe we were supposed to hire a guide.  Generally I noticed that about Georgia...there are awesome things to see, but it's not developed enough to provide sufficient information so you know what you're looking at.  You can also see that they aren't prepared for boatloads of people since the restaurants often don't have everything on the menu (and sometimes not even half of the things on the menu).  The waiters don't seem to think it's a problem if they don't have that particular dish...from their perspective the customer should be happy that they have anything at all, and that you should simply eat what they give you.  My first reaction to this is somewhat negative, since we are conditioned to expect to receive exactly what we want at a restaurant.  However, imagine going to a Georgian family's home for dinner.  You don't "order" food - you simply eat what they prepare, and it's probably going to be awesome.  So why are we so upset if a restaurant doesn't have our first (or second or third) choice?   Anyway, I'd say that Georgia is not yet for the casual tourist.  But I absolutely recommend it.

Uplistsikhe

Our flight back was from Kutaisi, so we headed there for one last evening. It was an amazing week and Noemi was especially helpful remembering all the places and people from her previous trip a few years back. I was impressed that she still remembered everything.  It's been less than a year since this trip for me (yes, I know this post is super late), but I wouldn't remember all the stuff we did without writing it down.

The question now: What's the next trip that Doremi will organize for us???