Alive and Happy

I am alive, no need to worry. The absence of writing in this blog does not mean that I am ill or that I have nothing to write about. In fact, I am overwhelmed by activities, and every time I go online another volunteer is usually nearby not so patiently waiting to contact his or her own loved ones, or facebook.
They keep us too busy to miss home too much, which might be a great plan although it is exhausting! We have Russian class, NGO class, English clubs, tutoring and adjusting to a host family. And I walk 30 minutes to school, so I am gone from 7 AM until 7 or 8 at night! Russian is very difficult… and the progress is slow. I feel like a small child, and just stare blankly most of the time. It was exciting to me to be able to buy yogurt at the local store, or a banana from a vendor.
My family is so sweet! I live with a momma, a sister, and a cousin. There are usually other family members here too, mostly women drinking tea. I live in a house that is very nice (with satellite TV). We have an indoor bathroom with hot water, and also an outhouse squatter. I try not to shower too much, and my friend Melanie can tell by my appearance when I shower. I figure that’s the Peace Corps way. We have occasionally had caviar with breakfast. I had cornflakes, once, too, which was almost as exciting to me.
The food is taking some adjusting to. My dear sister wakes up and makes me breakfast and packs my lunch. We eat mostly carbohydrates. A LOT of bread and potatoes. I also have eaten about 5 tomatoes, 5 cucumbers, and 4 pears a day. We have delicious soups with dill, meat, and noodles often. One of my favorite dishes is called “macaroni molleko”. It is noodles in milk. But I like it. There’s bread at every meal. One of my favorite things about Kazakhstanis is their respect for bread. Bread is very symbolic in many religions and cultures (The Bread of Life, Breaking bread, etc). Here it is very disrespectful to waste it, and it is always served at every meal. There are a couple varieties-one is exactly like pizza crust! WE have a lot of tea, I probably drink 15 cups a day. I miss coffee though.
There are many other peculiarities about Kazakhstan. I love the diversity! I went running today and met a lovely German family down my street. The woman said she would like to go hiking with me! It is nice to be able to communicate with her, even in my non-fluent German. On my run, I passed a lot of livestock, even though I live in the city (50,000). I was afraid I would startle a cow on one side and get hit by a car on the busy road on the other side of me.
The country is beautiful with snow capped mountains. I hope to go hiking this Sunday. On Saturday we might explore Almaty!
The group is wonderful, and I think I will make many wonderful friends among the other trainies. But we still have 2 months of intense together time, so I guess we’ll see.