Day 4: Arrival in Almaty
The plane landed in Almaty and we all got our things, exited the aircraft, and huddled together in a shuttle bus that would take us to the migration office. There, I had to show a lady my documents to confirm that I was able to be in the country. Then, I went to pick up my luggage and pass through the international arrivals and departure gate.
I passed through the gate and saw a large amount of people waiting behind a line, some people holding signs and others looking through the gate. I passed through the left side of the crowd and tried to search for what would seem to be my host family. I kept searching and searching, but couldn't seem to find anyone in the crowd that matched the image that I had constructed in my mind from the few pictures I saw of them. In the meanwhile, people would frequently ask me in Russian if I needed a taxi, and I would just politely decline. One of these taxi drivers even mistook me for a Kazakh!
About an hour passes and the crowd thins out, yet I still can not find my host family! After a couple of attempts, I am able to connect to a wifi service that didn't require me to have a Kazakh cellphone and the spotty, yet existent Internet is my one lifeline. I send a message to our resident director (RD) Harry about the situation and just continue to wait.
Over the next hour, the situation clears up and my host family meets me at the bus stop right outside of the airport. Phew! It turns out that there was a mix-up with some information and my family believed that I would arrive tomorrow, and not today. However, the staff was very quick to respond and clear up the mix-up asap as well as provide me assurance that things were ok.
At orientation, they told us not to smile in public, but while being in the car with my host family and looking around at the city, it was impossible for me to not have a large grin plastered on my face. Me and my host family went through some quick introductions: how was my flight, how long have I been studying Russian, is this my first time outside of the country, etc. Of course, all in Russian. Thanks to the intensity of the flagship program at PSU, making the switch from complete English to complete Russian was natural to me. I wasn't taken aback by the signs written in both Russian and Kazakh, absent of English.
After about 15 minutes, we made it to the house, and my host family shows me my room. I set all my belongings down and immediately take a shower: I felt very grimy after the 22 hour flight! Kazakh toilets look different from American toilets in that the toilet seat is rectangular and the bowl is very deep, kind of like a pelican's throat. Also, specific to my host family's apartment, the shower/bath was a strange system: it was a Jacuzzi style bathtub with a detachable shower head next to the spout where water comes out. There was a handle for controlling the water-flow and temperature, and a knob right next to this handle for switching between water exiting from the bath spout or from the shower head.
I managed to take a shower and shave, and found that my host father, Adilbek, left for work today. He has work off tomorrow, but today he works until around 4:00PM. My host mother, Assel, on the other hand, was off work both today AND tomorrow! Assel and I ate a large breakfast together and went into deeper discussion about our interests, lives, and family. For breakfast we had some bread in the form of a disk, called щелпек (shelpek), sliced meat sausage, sliced tomatoes, tea, and some sweets. We ate the shelpek and sausage by hand, tearing off a piece of shelpek and eating it in combination with some sausage. My host mother explained to me that they like to eat large breakfast, followed by a smaller lunch, and even smaller dinner. Eating this way would help with digestion. Just like my mom would, Assel commented that I was very thin, and encouraged me to eat a large portion of food.
I decided not to sleep yet, as it might make it more difficult for me to adjust to the time difference if I sleep in the morning, Kazakh time. So, me and my host mother went on a small excursion through the city and to my school, using public transportation. The apartment complex nearby the apartment was surrounded by other apartment complexes that looked very similar, so it was easy to get lost. I took note of some landmarks that would lead me back home.
At a local shop nearby the apartment, Assel treated me to some fermented horse milk (kumis, кумыс) and I was able to see a sheep's head in person, smiling at me. All the meat and milk in the shop was from local sources, so it was all very fresh. Kumis has an interesting taste: it's a bit sour and has a distinctive taste that is for some reason familiar to me, but I can't put my finger on why. we finished our glasses of kumis and headed down to the location where my school was located. Looking around the city, I felt like I was in the Philippines.
We got to the school and were allowed to look around inside a little bit. The campus is a satellite campus, meaning that it isn't the main campus. However, this satellite campus is situated in the city, whereas the main campus is further away. Assel and I walked around a bit and got some ice cream from a popular chain. The servings were so large at this particular chain that even the smallest size was too much for us! We walked around a wide, stretching foot-road and look around at various goods and paintings sold on the street. Additionally, we both wrote three words on this book and a guy explained our personality based on the handwriting. He thought I was tadjikistan and when I revealed that I was actually Filipino, he began to speak about how my hand-writing (I wrote three English words, not Russian words) looks like Sanskrit, mentioning how old Filipino text looks similarly. Alright, sure man.
When we went back home, we had a small meal consisting of the soup borscht (борщ), leftovers, and carrots. We had tea and talked more about Kazakh culture and traditions. My host family is muslim, and they just finished ramadan, which consisted of fasting while the sun was still in sky. After the nice meal, Assel left to visit a friend and I took a small nap, setting an alarm for the time when Adilbek would return from work.
Even though my alarm went off, my body just instinctually turned of the alarm and went back to sleep. This small nap was starting to open the floodgates of how tired I was -- I hadn't had a break from the time that I left the airport in D.C.! My host mother gathered me to the table at around 7:00PM to eat with Adilbek, and we had a hearty meal of borscht, dumplings called manti (манты), some more shelpek, and karta (карта), which is slices of beef alongside slices of intestines. It was all very delicious!
We went out on the town together and before returning home stopped by an Uzbek restaurant and had some barbecued meat on skewers, known as shashlik (шашлык). It was all very good, and we discussed Almaty. We spoke about what kinds of people and food are in Almaty, and about some Mexican food. I told them that if I could find the correct ingredients, I would be obliged to make some Mexican food for them.
See more pictures here
Back at home, I did not have trouble falling asleep. I finished up and posted my blog post for yesterday and headed off to bed at almost 2:00AM.
I passed through the gate and saw a large amount of people waiting behind a line, some people holding signs and others looking through the gate. I passed through the left side of the crowd and tried to search for what would seem to be my host family. I kept searching and searching, but couldn't seem to find anyone in the crowd that matched the image that I had constructed in my mind from the few pictures I saw of them. In the meanwhile, people would frequently ask me in Russian if I needed a taxi, and I would just politely decline. One of these taxi drivers even mistook me for a Kazakh!
About an hour passes and the crowd thins out, yet I still can not find my host family! After a couple of attempts, I am able to connect to a wifi service that didn't require me to have a Kazakh cellphone and the spotty, yet existent Internet is my one lifeline. I send a message to our resident director (RD) Harry about the situation and just continue to wait.
Over the next hour, the situation clears up and my host family meets me at the bus stop right outside of the airport. Phew! It turns out that there was a mix-up with some information and my family believed that I would arrive tomorrow, and not today. However, the staff was very quick to respond and clear up the mix-up asap as well as provide me assurance that things were ok.
At orientation, they told us not to smile in public, but while being in the car with my host family and looking around at the city, it was impossible for me to not have a large grin plastered on my face. Me and my host family went through some quick introductions: how was my flight, how long have I been studying Russian, is this my first time outside of the country, etc. Of course, all in Russian. Thanks to the intensity of the flagship program at PSU, making the switch from complete English to complete Russian was natural to me. I wasn't taken aback by the signs written in both Russian and Kazakh, absent of English.
After about 15 minutes, we made it to the house, and my host family shows me my room. I set all my belongings down and immediately take a shower: I felt very grimy after the 22 hour flight! Kazakh toilets look different from American toilets in that the toilet seat is rectangular and the bowl is very deep, kind of like a pelican's throat. Also, specific to my host family's apartment, the shower/bath was a strange system: it was a Jacuzzi style bathtub with a detachable shower head next to the spout where water comes out. There was a handle for controlling the water-flow and temperature, and a knob right next to this handle for switching between water exiting from the bath spout or from the shower head.
I managed to take a shower and shave, and found that my host father, Adilbek, left for work today. He has work off tomorrow, but today he works until around 4:00PM. My host mother, Assel, on the other hand, was off work both today AND tomorrow! Assel and I ate a large breakfast together and went into deeper discussion about our interests, lives, and family. For breakfast we had some bread in the form of a disk, called щелпек (shelpek), sliced meat sausage, sliced tomatoes, tea, and some sweets. We ate the shelpek and sausage by hand, tearing off a piece of shelpek and eating it in combination with some sausage. My host mother explained to me that they like to eat large breakfast, followed by a smaller lunch, and even smaller dinner. Eating this way would help with digestion. Just like my mom would, Assel commented that I was very thin, and encouraged me to eat a large portion of food.
I decided not to sleep yet, as it might make it more difficult for me to adjust to the time difference if I sleep in the morning, Kazakh time. So, me and my host mother went on a small excursion through the city and to my school, using public transportation. The apartment complex nearby the apartment was surrounded by other apartment complexes that looked very similar, so it was easy to get lost. I took note of some landmarks that would lead me back home.
At a local shop nearby the apartment, Assel treated me to some fermented horse milk (kumis, кумыс) and I was able to see a sheep's head in person, smiling at me. All the meat and milk in the shop was from local sources, so it was all very fresh. Kumis has an interesting taste: it's a bit sour and has a distinctive taste that is for some reason familiar to me, but I can't put my finger on why. we finished our glasses of kumis and headed down to the location where my school was located. Looking around the city, I felt like I was in the Philippines.
We got to the school and were allowed to look around inside a little bit. The campus is a satellite campus, meaning that it isn't the main campus. However, this satellite campus is situated in the city, whereas the main campus is further away. Assel and I walked around a bit and got some ice cream from a popular chain. The servings were so large at this particular chain that even the smallest size was too much for us! We walked around a wide, stretching foot-road and look around at various goods and paintings sold on the street. Additionally, we both wrote three words on this book and a guy explained our personality based on the handwriting. He thought I was tadjikistan and when I revealed that I was actually Filipino, he began to speak about how my hand-writing (I wrote three English words, not Russian words) looks like Sanskrit, mentioning how old Filipino text looks similarly. Alright, sure man.
When we went back home, we had a small meal consisting of the soup borscht (борщ), leftovers, and carrots. We had tea and talked more about Kazakh culture and traditions. My host family is muslim, and they just finished ramadan, which consisted of fasting while the sun was still in sky. After the nice meal, Assel left to visit a friend and I took a small nap, setting an alarm for the time when Adilbek would return from work.
Even though my alarm went off, my body just instinctually turned of the alarm and went back to sleep. This small nap was starting to open the floodgates of how tired I was -- I hadn't had a break from the time that I left the airport in D.C.! My host mother gathered me to the table at around 7:00PM to eat with Adilbek, and we had a hearty meal of borscht, dumplings called manti (манты), some more shelpek, and karta (карта), which is slices of beef alongside slices of intestines. It was all very delicious!
We went out on the town together and before returning home stopped by an Uzbek restaurant and had some barbecued meat on skewers, known as shashlik (шашлык). It was all very good, and we discussed Almaty. We spoke about what kinds of people and food are in Almaty, and about some Mexican food. I told them that if I could find the correct ingredients, I would be obliged to make some Mexican food for them.
See more pictures here
Back at home, I did not have trouble falling asleep. I finished up and posted my blog post for yesterday and headed off to bed at almost 2:00AM.
Greetings! Thanks God that you arrived on your final destination safely. Sorry to hear that there was a miscommunication. I know, you are so resourceful to find a way to resolve it - mama won't worry a thing ;)
ReplyDeleteNow, why the horse milk is fermented that I thought milk there would more fresh? First time I heard horse milk being consume .... and did you just say that taste familiar? It might reminds you that you prefer me to wean you earlier, hee hee. For the record, my own milk was sweet.
So... that so called karta tastes like my paklay then? I thought only Filipinos love to eat intestines. Well, sounds like you might find some Filipino cuisine over there then. Wish you luck on your Mexican food for your host parents!
Hmmm.... your look is pretty common everywhere? Here in NM, you look like Latino or Mexican, over there they think you are Tidjakistan and absolutely if you go visit your auntie Gigi in Cebu, nobody thinks you are actually an American :-) Oh my hunky boy, you just look like about anyone in every place.
Again, thank you for sharing all of your experiences and daily activities. Love to read each day.
Hugs and prayers,
Mom
Yves! I'm reading through your posts and am so so excited for you. Mанты are AMAZING. :)) I'm glad you finally get the chance to relax and enjoy Kazakhstan.
ReplyDelete