No Time to Sleep

We might have done the most risky thing so far, we rode in a car in rush hour. I have never been in a moving car near so many cars. Everyone tries to get to work by 9, so they all leave at the same time. Almaty doesn’t really have many highways to connect from place to place, so we were driven on many city streets en route to the conference this morning. Imagine a road, four lanes wide and two going in each direction…but the people going into the city occasionally and seemingly randomly weave into in the oncoming lane when there doesn’t seem to be traffic in it, and then cut back into their appropriate lane at will.

We were behind schedule and a police car went by in the “borrowed” lane – one black car was immediately behind it. What did our driver do? Jumped in behind the caravan, driove through several lights, and made some good time for several blocks. Then, for whatever reason, our driver then decided to pull back into the “normal” lane of traffic at which point a city bus pulled out of the normal, jam-packed lane, and followed the police and black car.

It is not be possible to write an account which truly captures the richness (and our perceived danger) of this ride.

In a great setting with beautiful decorations and live music from the balcony, we dined with the four of the directors organizing the conference salad, vegetables, eggplant-wrapped tomato, followed by Five Fingers and a dough-wrapped meat dish Mante followed by kabobs, interspersed with bread and water. Our hosts would add more food onto our plates (even “choot-choot,” just a little) didn’t work!
Piotr asked our hosts to avoid the vodka and wine or we might still be there toasting everyone. Apparently Kazaks have a talent for extensive toasts, up to 30 minutes for one person. That and the Vodka is before the meal, during the meal and after the meal, so we would have been there until midnight and the effectiveness of the presenters might have been a bit compromised.

Tip: avoid the marble-sized ball of dried cheese made from sour milk.

It has been rather quiet around here – I guess I needed a break.  School is now out, and we took a much needed vacation. I almost avoided the computer completely, but now we are back. I think for the summer postings are going to be a bit random (not the Monday/Friday weekly thing, which hasn’t been since early May anyhow).

I look forward to sharing more resources – this free text scroller generator came in rather handy in my preparations for a tech symposium I’ll be conducting for some of our staff next week. If you need an animated gif that types/scrolls text, perhaps you’ll find it handy also?

Til soon -