sweet gauze, chicken fat, and pee tea. YUM.

So, I just got home from a PERFECT day.
And, I don't use the word perfect lightly.
We woke up early to meet a few Peace Corps
friends and about 25 students for a day in the
mountains. Today was a Kazakh day, no holds
barred! First, we rented a bus…it was incredibly
old and had twenty seats.
We had 32 people. Perfect.

Before we boarded, we purchased cotton candy
from the street vender nearby. This is when we
discovered this little linguistic treasure: The
word for "cotton candy" in Russian is literally
translated "SWEET GAUZE." Again, awesome!

We boarded the bus and were on our way. It
was about a 2 hour drive…1 hour on th highway,
one hour fourwheeling across the steppe in our bus.
Seriously, this was our bus on a dirt two track, flying
across the steppe. There may or may not have been
more than one time that I was convinced we were
going to roll… Also, since we were headed to the
mountains, we had many steep hills. The bus, being
the gentleman it was, couldn't handle the uphills while
full. So, we handled the up-hills ourselves by deboarding
and hiking up, and then reboarding and continuing.
Serioulsy, adventure.

After we arrived, after hiking the last mile or so, since
the bus was tired, we began to set up our picnic.
When Kazakhs picnic, MAN do they picnic. We all laid
out our blankets and filled them with food—cookies,
bread, meat paste, anchovies, grass salad, and a couple
of whole cooked chickens. You know, normal picnic
stuff. We also brought a GIANT kazan (like a really
heavy pan) to cook plov (Uzbek national dish consisting
of rice, veggies, and meat) and set up a fire pit to hold it.
We lit the fire and let the oil start heating, and then
headed off to do our own thing.

My own thing included using a t-shirt to "filter" the stream
water into the tea kettle, boil the water, and make tea.
The tea tasted like dirt and pee.

After the tea failure, I set off with a group of students to
play volleyball. In order to do this, we had to cross the
river and climb the mountain about half way up to
where it flattens out. As we all know, I don't have the
best track record with icy, fast-moving rivers of melted
snow mountain water. Well, regardless of my track
record, I was the only one wearing appropriate footwear
to get wet (Chacos, I love you.) and I am pretty confident
in my swimming/rescuing abilities, should the need for
those services present itself. Well, we all crossed safely,
and I only had to rescue one person, which resulted in
incredibly wet jeans. Completely uncomfortable? YES.
Smart enough to bring a change of clothes? NOPE.

Today I learned that I've got absolutely no problem
peeing in public. How did I learn that, you wonder?
Well, wilderness+35 people+wilderness=zero privacy
and zero facilities. So, me and a friend wandered off to
find a tree that would offer some privacy. And then,
we just dropped 'em and squatted. I could see at least
30 people while I peed. And it all came out just fine.

Also, Kazakh people never pee. Seriously! We drank
soda and water and my pee tea, and not a single national
peed. We left at 8am and came back at 8pm. My average
American bladder is nothing compared to the basketballs
inside these people!

Finally, we always here about how Taraz is one of the
oldest cities in the world (settled 3AD) but we never see
the historical proof around here (we have communism
to thank for that.). Well, today we stopped at some ruins.
We were given, in English, this information about these
weird piles of stones: "These ancient buildings were either
a Chr!stian monastery or a Buddhist monastery or a
resting place for silk-road travelers or nothing but a
pile of rocks." Fascinating? You better believe it.

The night ended with 6 Americans at my flat, eating
homemade pizza and playing Boggle and Speed
Scrabble. WHAT AN AWESOME DAY.

Pictures above:
1. Walking the last mile while the bus drove ahead
2. Cooking plov on the fire
3. 6 Americans at the weird ruins—L-R: Mark,
Michael, me, Carolina, Jennie, Courtney