Sgaz the cat is curled up under the radiator and I just got back from dropping a bunch of t-shirts off at a print shop to get the ‘Hike for a KAZ’ logo printed on them. There is a pilots’ college behind my house, and the trainees are out there marching and singing very soviet sounding songs, just like they do about 3 times a day every day. And this punk kid outside is yelling up at his girlfriend’s window:

SAMAL ! [with a heavy stress on the MAL.]

He does it every day around early evening. Exact same intonation every day, and he never says anything except her name. Not sure what the deal is there. I live in one of these big block housing projects, so there are about a hundred windows he could be yelling at.

The printers think I’m crazy for getting t-shirts printed in January, even though I explained that I’m just planning ahead (not a popular concept). I can see their confusion, because it’s not t-shirt weather, it’s -30 outside. It’s the kind of cold where you have to factor an extra 10 minutes in for getting bundled up before you leave the house. The kind of cold that I was definitely not an authority on before, and maybe I’m still not. But if you’re about to move somewhere cold for the first time, I’m pretty sure I can give you some advice. Things that a warm weather person never wanted to know but does:
• Mittens are warmer than gloves
• Some chapsticks freeze if it’s cold enough
• Most lip glosses freeze if it’s cold enough
• All scarves are not created equal
• It doesn’t matter what you’re wearing under the coat and boots, nobody’s ever going to see it. One time when the university’s heat was out, I wore my pj’s to work because I knew I’d never take my coat off. In case you haven’t seen a photo of my winter get-up, the only clothes that are visible under my coat and boots is about 2 inches of my shins.
• Electronics freeze
• Mascara = pain
• Zippers are better than buttons
Etc.

The question I get most these days is: “Do you have snow in America?”

How do I explain that, Yes, there is snow, but where I’m from you can escape the snow by driving a couple of hours west. It would be hard to grasp because you can literally take a train for 3 days across this country and see the same empty, flat landscape and the same bitter cold the whole way.

Right about now that grass hut in the jungle village is sounding pretty nice.

It’s not all bad though. I mean, it’s all a cultural experience, right? I get to see the parents pulling their kids around on sleds, and the baby strollers that are fitted with ice skate blades where the wheels should be. In the winter everybody has a cool hat (me included now!) and you can’t see any of the trash on the ground. The thick steam of the Russian sauna down the street is all the more fabulous on a day this cold, and there is a certain pleasure of walking through your front door and ‘being home’ after the tedious walk back to your house on the icy road. This is a new pleasure for me, never having experienced a place where being out in the elements can be so hostile. Ducking off the street into a cozy hole-in-the-wall café feels like a valiant escape accomplished, and a hot drink is more comforting and can feel luxurious. And there’s no arguing with the fact that a fuzzy purring cat on your lap is way cuter on a cold day.

So, the main reason that I have sought out an internet connection today is to post photos. In some of them you can see various classrooms, my apartment, and other places where I spend a lot of time (including the “marshrutka” bus :-/ )

blog jan

Some other things you might notice:
• They start in July and end in January. You will notice that there’s not much of an autumn in between.
• I didn’t get a dog - it was Melanie’s. We went a little pet crazy over here. What’s worse is that I suspect that Sgaz is just using me for my American passport.
• The petite Kazakh woman is my friend Mira - we’re buddies.
• I taught Spanish classes all summer. Lots of fun.
• Disaster averted: I was trying to hug a horse and it tried to head-butt me.
• Lots of mosques and Orthodox churches next to each other. Not sure why.
• Even babushkas wear Gucci knockoffs.
• The two young Kazakh boys playing scrabble are Nursultan and Danyar, the neighbor kids. They come over twice a week to play with Sgaz, play various games and practice English (which translates to “tease the hell out of Sgaz, cheat at various games and talk trash using several choice phrases in English”) They’re cool kids though and we have a lot of fun…although, the older one has repeatedly threatened to ‘gobstop’ Steffen on the street. ‘Gobstop’ is apparently a slang term that roughly translates to mugging someone. What?! More on gobstopping at a later date.
• I saw the President of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev, when he came to visit Aktobe. It was a huge event for the city. Pretty big deal.
• Christmas was fun. Many thanks to: Our neighbor, China, for providing a cheap fake tree and countless gaudy decorations; family, friends and the Monterey Institute for sending packages and cards; and all of my colleagues at Zhubanov University for throwing a great Christmas/New Years party.
• There aren’t a lot of picture of cold weather because it’s too cold to take my hand out of my glove to take a picture. I miss hooooome.


Also I just want to tell all of my family and friends in Sacramento, Chico, Monterey, Reno, LA and beyond: I love you, I miss you, and I think about you all the time even though I don’t write. I know that’s a lot more sappy than the average me, but I guess that’s what this kind of stuff does to a person.