An 'interesting' afternoon

On Monday 12th January I was on my way home from my first Russian language lesson. This involved catching a bus and then walking a short distance. As I walked from the bus stop I had a stack of stuff on my mind and was in a bit of a daze. Just as I approached our building I heard somebody asking me to stop. Being in a place where very few people speak any English at all I was sure that they were not calling me so I continued to walk. I heard the voice again and looked back and saw 2 men signalling for me to stop.  Then they asked for my passport.
That was a problem!
I didn’t have my passport as we had just completed our paper work to register our stay with the Immigration Police. One of our friends had picked up our passports from the Immigration Police that afternoon but we had not yet received them from him. Due to the fact that I only speak 3 Russian words (please, hello, internet) all I could do was stand there stating that I only speak English and I didn’t have my passport. They continued to ask for my documents and I continued to say that I only speak English and I don't have my passport.  One of the men motioned for me to follow him and I saw the open door of his unmarked car with other men inside. He told me to get in. There was no way I was getting in his car and I told him that I wasn’t getting in. He told me to get in again and once again I refused. One of the men had a badge on his sleeve which looked like it may have been a police badge, but I wasn’t certain that they were who they said they were.  After a brief stand off I was able to point to my building and communicated that I lived close by.  I really didn't want to bring these guys home to meet my family but I was left with very little choice.  They came with me to the front door and came inside our apartment. I still didn't feel safe but I was able to call our friend who speaks Russian and who had our passports and she was able to sort things out.  20 minutes after our conversation on the street began they were ready to head off.  As they left one of them attempted to joke with me and said that next time they would lock me up. I didn’t find his humour very funny at all.
Now my passport comes with me wherever I go.

It’s all Russian to me!

For the first time in my life I feel like a foreigner. Hardly anybody speaks English and only a few signs are written in English. It is like I am 3 years old and beginning to experience reading for the first time. Most signs are written in both Russian and Kazakh and it takes me ages to work out what they say (if I am able to at all) and I have very little idea what the signs mean. So far I’ve worked out the sign for Café’s, Pharmacies and Butchers.
On my first attempt to do some shopping on my own I bought butter milk instead of milk (it tastes like natural yoghurt and not at all like milk). I only made that mistake once. The kids hated it and I have been the only one willing to drink it. As the week has unfolded I have grown in confidence and I’m getting better with shopping. Usually I point to the product and nod my head when they pick it up. I have absolutely no idea about the numbers yet so the shop keepers show me the price of my shopping on a calculator. The shops closest to us are general stores and there are a number of people who sell their goods on the footpath. You can get a loaf of Kazakh bread for about 30c and a BBQ chicken (which they cook in their oven on the footpath) is about $8. My favourite is called Shashlik and we’ve eaten it once. It’s like Lamb kebab sticks and they cook it on the footpath on their makeshift BBQ’s. Definitely worth a try if you’re ever in Kazakhstan.
The road system here is crazy and cars are forever merging and beeping their horns at other vehicles. We have been catching buses everywhere we need to go and usually that is ok. We’ve only had one bad bus trip and it was bad enough to do us for the rest of our time here. We had a stack of trouble getting the pram on the bus, we got knocked off our feet when the driver suddenly stopped and the bus started to take off while we were half off. It costs 35c per adult for a bus trip and the kids ride free, so it’s pretty convenient and inexpensive.

We've arrived in Kazakhstan

After 36 hours travelling (including sitting around air ports and waiting for transport connections) we are finally in Shymkent.

Our trip:

We left Hong Kong at 5pm Sunday afternoon and caught a flight to Beijing, arriving at 8.30pm. The kids did pretty well on the flight and it was almost enjoyable this time. After arriving in Beijing we had to make our way through Customs, to the next International Terminal and sat around until 12:30am. By this time both kids were asleep and things were going smoothly. I had feared that neither child would sleep but we were fortunate enough to be able to take our pram as far as the gate at the airport and Sammy found it pretty easy to sleep in the pram. One of the biggest frustrations was going through Customs in Beijing where they made us take our sleeping little girl out of the pram so they could put it through the xray machine. I wasn't very happy about this (knowing that there was no guarantee that she'd go to sleep again) and frustrated when they also tried to get me to take the wheels off the pram to fit it into the machine.

Our flight from Beijing to Almaty (Kazakhstan) went pretty well also. I found it pretty humourous when at 2am they asked me whether I wanted the chicken or the fish. At that time of the morning I'm not really used to eating at all so decided to decline her kind offer. Both kids had a sleep during that flight and probably ended up getting 4 hours sleep that night. Considering how little sleep they got on the way from Sydney to Hong Kong I was happy with that effort.

We spent our first day in Kazakhstan at the airport hotel and wandering around Almaty. We all headed off to catch the bus but Sammy hated the freezing cold (maybe -10?) and refused to wear her gloves and screamed all the way to the bus stop. Allison took her home and Jack and I headed into town with our friends. We had such an awesome time. The scenes in the park reminded me of something out of 'The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe'. I took a stack of photos but none of them really do justice to how beautiful it was. Jack got to play in a park on play equipment covered in snow. He thought this was pretty special.

After hanging around Almaty for 12 hours we headed off to catch the overnight train to Shymkent.  This was a pretty strange but pretty cool experience.  We were in a sleeping cabin which had 4 bunk beds with a small walking space between.  We had to fit all of our luggage and us in the cabin for a 14 hour journey.  We made the most of it and had a good night eating snacks and sleeping.  Jack said this was his best night ever.  Al slept with Sammy and I slept with Jack to make sure neither of them fell off their bunks during the night.  We hit the sack pretty early and with the motion of the train managed to sleep quite well.  

At 7.30am we arrived at the train station in Shymkent.  The biggest shock was that it was still pitch black at this time of the day.  It could have been 3am for all we knew.  From there we took a couple of cabs and dumped our stuff at our new place.  After a massive journey we had finally arrived.