The continuing suffering of Lucy Cat

When I was in Russia, one of the lessons I taught several times involved the following construction, “Fall is a time when...” “Halloween is a day when...” etc. Several of my students – quite independently – crafted the following sentence: “Spring is a time when cats cry.” They insisted that cats always cry in the spring, as that’s when they want babies. Well, Lucy is continuing to support that claim. After writing my previous post, I managed to rig a contraption of plastic sheeting (the drop cloth from our paint party) and duct tape up over the bottom half of the windows, hoping that would allow me to keep the cats in while letting some fresh air in as well.

My plastic sheeting in the window idea...

Then, during my 20 minute break before my last class on Friday, four of my Korean students ran into my classroom to tell me that one of my cats was out in the street. Of course it was Lucy – who else? While Bagira and Grey Cat took the plastic sheeting as a sign that they should cuddle up together on top of my wardrobe, Lucy chewed through the plastic while I was in class and escaped into the great outdoors. Who knows how long she’d been out there. Luckily, my students helped me find her, as she was skulking around the neighboring courtyard (where I have seen a big orange tom...). It was actually quite amusing to me that after so many months in Korea – where nearly everyone I met hated cats – the four students who were enthusiastically helping me track my errant pussy were Korean... a minor plus to a relatively shitty situation.

Lucy continues to prowl the house, searching in vain for a boy cat to satisfy her; she sounds absolutely miserable, but she’s driving me mad. Plus, I’ve given up on the plastic sheeting – at least until she’s fixed – so I’m barricaded inside with the heat blasting, sweltering away. Yuck. I just hope Lucy doesn’t bring any kittens to this party.

Feeling a tad cranky

Lucy is in heat. She's the youngest of the three kitties I inherited when I moved to Bishkek, and she's the only one who came to me un-spayed. I knew she'd be going into heat soon, but kept putting off doing it because I don't have a cat-carrier and didn't so much like the thought of carrying her to the vet in my backpack. Anyway, she's started prowling around the apartment scouting - and crying - for a boy cat, and it is unceasing. Additionally, this started at exactly the same time that the weather became warm enough to open the windows (a must, as the state-provided heat is still blasting into my apartment). Unfortunately, as I live on the ground floor and my windows have no screens, I can't really do this, as Lucy just pops out the window and goes running down the street with her ass in the air. So I'm stifling in my apartment until I have time to both take her to and pick her up from the vet. Given my schedule and the vet's schedule, this doesn't seem likely to happen for two more weeks. Gah! Also, somebody (I'm assuming it was hormonal Lucy) peed on my awesome green coat last night. Grrrr, anger. Getting it clean is going to be a bitch.

This morning, after awekening to discover that my coat had been peed on, the power went out. Since the sun is already up by the time I get up (even though that's at 7am these days), it wasn't too much of an inconvenience. My MercyCorps Компаньон driver - the super talkative and friendly one - told me that the biggest power supplier to Bishkek is the Toktogul Hydroelectric Power Plant. He said that the plant used way more of its water reserve this past winter than usual, as people were using more electricity than usual to keep warm. This means that the water reserves are now low. As such, Bishkek is still shutting off power periodically to various disctricts in order to conserve electricity and to allow the water supply to replenish. Meanwhile, he told me that Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan have an agreement: U-stan gets water from the Toktogul reserve, while K-stan gets gas from U-stan. Since K-stan might have to renege on its part of the deal on account of low water reserves, U-stan is threatening to cut off K-stan's gas supply! Sheesh. There goes cooking dinner.

And speaking of my super-friendly driver.... it turns out that he's an Evangelical Christian! Booo. So now every day he tries to talk to me about god and keeps asking me to go to church with him.

Today was supposed to be my Kyrgyz lesson day... I got to class early, and waited for my fellow students to arrive, but no one came. Neither did the teacher. Eventually I sent out some text messages, and learned that class had been cancelled, and somehow everyone had been told of this except me. Annoyed.

Then I decided to quickly go and check my email. I figured I'd just pop into Шаттл, the crappy internet place by my house since all I wanted to do was check my messages. Well, the internet in Шаттл isn't exactly reliable (as I've mentioned before), but usually it works. Of course today it didn't - and like before, I still had to pay for the privilege of sitting in front of an offline computer, before walking 15 minutes to the other internet cafe. Sigh.

So I'm feeling cranky. And I guess now I'll go home and take my pre-afternoon-class nap in my hot and stuffy apartment with the horny and noisy cat.

Women's Day Paint Party

Saturday was Women's Day, which as I've mentioned in the past is a BIG DEAL in the former Soviet Union. While it was quite nice to get flowers and chocolate from my students, I could've done without the attendant drama (the unwanted attentions of the married man and the creepy twik guy, for example). Sigh. Why is it always the creepy and/or otherwise taken ones who are interested? Seriously, what gives? Ahh well.

My friends and I celebrated the holiday in a rather unorthodox fashion: we painted my kitchen/living room orange! Well, more of a bright peach, really. It's *exactly* the color I want to paint my kitchen in Waycross, and after seeing the results I'm even more convinced that this is the correct color choice. Anyhow, I posted only a couple of paint-party photos below, but there's a whole album of hilarious shots on facebook, which you can view by clicking here. Enjoy!

Before.

Mixing the paint was an interesting affair. See, here in K-stan, you have to mix your paint yourself. There's no friendly Lowe's or Home Depot staff member to do it for you. We were rather worried as to how it would turn out. Luckily, it turned out beautifully.

Voila! My new kitchen/living room!
Seriously, go here to view the full set of photos. Some are quite hilarious.

Of drivers and photos

Yesterday Kompanion had some sort of training pertaining to the ecology and environment of Kyrgyzstan (I wish I could’ve attended!) and as such I was without my morning class yesterday. I skipped my Kyrgyz class and slept until nearly 1pm. It was wonderful. Sadly, this means that next week I’ll be teaching my 8:00 Kompanion class on Wednesday morning in addition to the other four regular days – Boo!

Kompanion sends a car to The London School to pick me up in the mornings. My first two classes, I had drivers who were quite reserved, saying little more to me than hello. Thursday, I had a jolly, garrulous fellow as my driver, who wanted nothing more than to chat with me in order to practice his English. His daughter and grandson live in Tampa, so he was quite excited to learn that my father lives in Tampa. When he learned that his name, Evgeny, was the Russian equivalent to my dad’s name, Eugene, I swear he decided we were meant to be best friends. He says he’s going to try to get scheduled to be my driver as often as possible, which would be pretty cool.

Later Thursday, as I was taking a taxi to the Embassy, I had an interesting taxi driver. For one thing, he was totally hot, despite his mullet. Yeah, I said that. Shut up. He too was interested in chatting to practice his English. His car had the steering wheel on the right side instead of the left. While most cars here in Kyrgyzstan have the steering wheel on the left, I have seen a rather large number of cars with the steering wheel on the right. (Kendje and Bayan’s van has the steering wheel on the right, for example.) Anyway, my driver said that cars with the wheel on the right are much cheaper than those with the wheel on the left, so he purchased it because that way he could afford a car with more options. I asked him a question which, to be honest, has been bugging me for years: what are the differences when driving a stick on the right or on the left. I was imagining all the gears in reversed positions, and even possibly having to switch the clutch to the right foot... but apparently no. Everything is the same; it’s just that you’re shifting with the left hand.

My taxi driver then went on to tell me that if he gets pulled over for speeding, he just pays the cop 50 soms (less than $2) as a bribe, and everything is fine. However, if he gets pulled over for driving after drinking, he has to bribe the cop with $50 or $100, depending on the cop! Um, yeah.

Wednesday of this week was gorgeous: sunny and WARM. I was out and about without my jacket. For a while I was only wearing my t-shirt, and it was fabulous. I walked around the city, taking a bunch of random pictures for you to enjoy (below). The weather on Thursday had reverted to shit, and I was worried that we were going to have another spell of winter. Luckily, it seems to have been only temporary; today is gorgeous!

Jessica and Nick gave me this totally awesome fabric to cover my couch - which should go quite well with the orange walls which should be appearing later today!

My coolest slippers ever aren't faring too well, as Bagira *loves* them a little too much. It's hard to tell from this shot, but I'm holding her up via the slipper. She's about 3 feet off the ground and refusing to let go!

I have *very* fresh garlic on my windowsill.

The London School is located on Baitik Baatur St (Байтик Баатыр), although this is a new, post-Soviet name. No one calls it Baitik Baatur - everyone still calls it by its old name, Sovietskaya (Советская). In some places, some people have expressed their displeasure at the name change with paint.

Bishkek, like so many formerly Soviet cities, is cursed with a lot of Soviet-era architecture.

Here's some more.

There's also this terrifying Soviet era "fountain" (minus water), which is oddly fascinating.

More fountain...

...and even more!

Ремонт обуви, or shoe repair - one of the best things ever!

A nice Bishkek street scene.

Those of you who know and love Cheburashka will be amused by this!

Second Issyk Kul video uploaded!

I'm tired. Я устала. Мен чарчадым.

At least I can express how I feel in three languages. This month I was supposed to have an easier schedule. Instead of having my first class of the day begin at 9:00am, I would be giving that class to a fellow teacher and moving instead to a class at 11:30am, thus earning a good two and a half hours more of sleep time per day. The 11:30 class was scheduled to be held on-site at MercyCorps Kompanion... but after I'd agreed to take the class, they called and said that actually, a class at 11:30 would really disrupt their working day, and it would be best to hold the class at 8:00am. Yeah. And you know how stellar I am with mornings. The class itself is actually quite fantastic - the students are all at the same level, they're all highly motivated, participate in class, and do their homework. Plus they're all friendly and incredibly funny. It's a really great class... but 8:00am. Yesterday I returned to The London School after my Kompanion class just in time for my Kyrgyz lesson, in which I was utterly useless and all but falling asleep in my seat. Not sure how long I can keep this up!

Haircut!

After leaving the internet café on Sunday, I decided to set about getting my hair cut. I walked to a nice looking place about a block south of my apartment, and I managed to get myself a rather nice haircut for roughly $5. The scraggly mullet is gone... replaced with a much neater and shorter, and only vaguely mullety kind of do. It looks quite nice, actually.

Published!

The above pictures might look familiar to those of you who have followed my adventures for some time now; they’re from my Spring 2006 trip to Siberia’s Olkhon Island, and they’ve been published in Issue 2 of Everywhere Magazine! To all of you photographers, writers and travelers out there (amateur and otherwise) you should definitely check out Everywhere and upload some photos and tales. It’s incredibly addictive – not to mention that if they publish any of your stuff, you get $100. (Also, if you're interested: the photos I've submitted to Everywhere are here, and the stories I've submitted are here. And if you want to subscribe - and you know you do - just click here!)

A bazaar weekend

Friday night a group of us went to the Georgian (as in eastern European Georgia) restaurant downtown (I need to find out its name). It’s probably one of the more expensive restaurants in Bishkek, so we certainly won’t be eating there all the time; however, for a once in a while treat, it was definitely worth it. In addition to fancy décor (including obviously quality linen tablecloths and napkins), the service and food were excellent. I loaded up on my all-time favorite Georgian dish, hachipuri – yummy bread stuffed with incredibly delicious solugun cheese, AND made my evening even cheesier by purchasing an entire dish of bubbly melted solugun, mixed with tomatoes. Ahh, heaven. We split a bottle of some of the best wine I’ve had in recent memory (the Georgians do their wine and cheese to perfection), and left the restaurant feeling utterly content... if slightly light in the wallet.

Hachipuri and wine :-)

A giant bowl of bubbly melted cheese!

Eating the cheese made me incredibly happy.
Also, this photo has inspired me to get a haircut.
Wish me luck.

I might be almost thirty, but obviously I haven't grown up yet.

After leaving the Georgian place, we taxied over to Sweet 60s where Cadillac (our plov cooking friends) were playing, for some beer and dancing.

The band, Cadillac

Danyiar, bass player

Chingiz, guitarist and singer

Katy, Natalia, Jonathan, Austin, Nick, Jessica, Me
(OK, so this pic was froma few weeks ago at Sweet 60s...
but I didn't get any group shots from last Saturday!)

Saturday afternoon, Nick, Jessica, Austin and I went to Osh Bazaar for the purpose of stocking up on painting supplies. Apparently we’re going to have a paint party and paint my kitchen orange. (I’m sure my mother is reading this in disbelief, since I returned home last September with grand plans to paint my Waycross kitchen orange, as well as to paint that entire fixer-upper that she’d bought... and in the four months I was home, I managed to paint half of one wall. So we’ll see what happens with this paint nonsense.)

Anyway: on the way to the bazaar, we managed vaguely comfortable seats near the driver in an oversize marshrutka. Given our proximity to the driver, we ended up being passed people’s money and given the task of getting change for those who needed it. This is something I’m pretty accustomed to doing... but this time we tried our best to conduct all the transactions in Kyrgyz instead of in Russian! It’s difficult – especially knowing that most people here can speak in Russian – but it’s very rewarding. People just seem to grin ecstatically when they realize that a foreigner is trying to speak their native language. We ended up chatting with the driver (albeit mostly in Russian, since our Kyrgyz is nowhere near chatting ability), and it was probably the most enjoyable marshrutka ride that I’ve had anywhere.

After arriving at the bazaar, we decided to go to the souvenir-and-traditional-Kyrgyz-stuff section first. I ended up buying yet another pair of totally cool felt slippers and a really awesome felt bag. We did our best to speak to the sellers in our smattering of Kyrgyz, and we were definitely rewarded with smiles and conversation.

Awesomeness.

Before I left for Kyrgyzstan, my mom asked me to look for a Kyrgyz saddle for her. Well, I found one – although given that the saddle is going for more than she wants to pay for a horse, I doubt she’s going to fork over the funds to purchase it. (The man started off telling me he was asking $1500 for the saddle, bridle and all accoutrements, but quickly came down to $1400. While I could probably talk him down lower, my mom wants to pay less than $1000 for a horse horse, so I doubt there’d be any point.) Anyway, he did take out all the pieces of the set, so that I could take a picture of them for my mom:

(If you want to see details, click here)

Then we went and bought all the things we’d need in order to paint my kitchen. (Nick and Jess apparently love painting, and they painted their kitchen/living room bright canary yellow and their bedroom an awesome shocking turquoise, and they’re the ones spearheading this paint-party business.) Instead of buying pre-mixed paint like you’d get at Lowes or Home Depot, we got two buckets of white “emulsion” (whatever the hell that is) and four tubes of orange color to mix into them. We also bought rollers, paint brushes, masking tape, plastic sheeting and a coffee-serving-tray to serve as a tray for the paint. (The look on the paint/roller seller’s face when we tested the rollers to see which size fit in the coffee-tray was priceless.) All in all, we spent about $25 on paint products, and in theory, we’ll be painting my kitchen/living room next weekend. I’ll keep you posted on how this all turns out...

The first Issyk-Kul video has been uploaded, finally.