All of my travels and my arrival went well! The A340 to Frankfurt was really nice and I watch a couple of movies. I had a Panini and slept in the airport for about three hours prior to catching the last leg to Almaty. The plane to Almaty was a bit older and I slept most of the way. It was interesting because I felt like the majority of the people on the plane were Russian and not Kazakh. The girl sitting next to me on the flight was Kazakh, but currently attends school in Toronto. We didn't really talk much until the end of the flight, and it was rather humorous because she told me that she thought I was Russian until I started talking! The landing in Almaty was epic. The blue signal on the end of the plane's wing flashed intermittently in illuminating snow that flew by us so fast it looked like rain. As we looked down, the landing strip was a pure white blanket and the other passengers on the plane clapped as soon as we touched down safely.
Once deplaned, I had no trouble getting through the passport checkpoint and picking my luggage. A Kazakh man was waiting with a "KIMEP" (university) handwritten sign as soon as I exited and he took me directly to the dorms. It continued to snow as we drove to the dorms in his 1990's Hyundai Sonata and passed the numerous construction vehicle shops and Christmas lights hanging everywhere. The driver and I occasionally made comments to one another in broken English and both shared a laugh as we drove by a ridiculous ten story high replica of the Eiffel Tower!
Finally, we arrived at the dormitory and some security guards watching television handed me a key. We didn't speak, but they motioned for me to stay put. After a minute, a fellow student roughly the same age as myself came down the dilapidated stairwell. He introduced himself as Hudoidod (wha-doye-dod), but I had no clue how to pronounce it until he spent a minute with me phonetically describing the pronunciation and writing it down.
After showing me my room, Hudoidod headed to his room for the night and I began to unpack. It took me about an hour and a half to get all of my stuff situated. Then, I took a shower and headed to bed after writing for another hour.
The next morning I woke up at 9:30am. I couldn't sleep any longer even though I had only been in bed a total of five hours. (My room's curtains don't work so by 8:30am sunlight was pouring in.) Once dressed, I headed out to face Almaty for the first time. The dorms are nearly empty since the students are on holiday, but I did, by chance, run into the director of the dormitory on my way out who directed me to a restaurant to eat at down the road.
Coffee and Food was a sit down cafe directly across from the campus that has a few people and elaborate, but tasteful, Christmas decorations. It felt more like an upscale local coffee shop in lower Manhattan than a Kazakh cafe. No one in the cafe spoke English so I was forced to use my pocket Russian phrase book to order a pizza. The meal total for a Latte, Pizza, and bottle of water was around $15 dollars including a tip. Food in Kazakhstan is surprisingly expensive if you go to upscale restaurants and cafes. This was actually a bit of a surprise. I expected the prices to be similar to China. (A really nice meal in China is around $3.)
After finishing up my margarita pizza, which was superb, I headed down the street for a walk. I passed by a movie theater and decided to ask is they played any angliski (English) films. Nyet (no) was the response. I said dasvidaniya (goodbye) and continued on my walk. The sidewalk was covered in snow, as were the trees that line the Almaty streets. A few blocks later I encountered the Dostyk Mall and decided to have a look around. The mall was fairly empty except for the security guards that looked like secret agents and the cleaning staff that seemed to be mopping every storefront even though they were already clean. I walked around for about thirty minutes before heading out of the mall, but before exiting I picked up a bottle of water at the grocery store for thirty five cents.
Almost as soon as I left the mall a gang of three police officers dressed in military uniforms stopped me. They asked for my "documents." This is commonplace in Kazakhstan. Corrupt police officers often time attempt to scare people into bribing them. Luckily, the police that stopped me didn't speak English, so no attempted bribing occurred.
Once back at the dormitory, I decided to go by and visit Hadoidod. He was in his room watching YouTube videos whenever I knocked. After offering me tea, we ended up talking for a good four hours. I learned that he was originally from a smaller town south of Tajikistan's capitol, Dushanbe. We then proceeded to watch several videos about Tajikistan as Hadoidod told me about a nine-month exchange that he had done in Minnesota when he was in the tenth grade. Our conversation then shifted from life of campus to our hobbies and interests. Before we knew it, it was dinnertime and so we headed out to go to a local restaurant. However, once we reached the restaurant, it was closed for the holiday so we settled on a Turkish place. Hadoidod helped explain the menu and I settled for a vegetarian doner, red lentil soup, a liter of water, Turkish tea, and a glass of local a local drink called Kumis (fermented mare's milk). Everything was great, except I could only take one sip of the Kumis before calling it quits. It is impossible to describe how incredibly sour Kumis is. It is like spoiled milk that has the taste of an atomic warhead.
As Hadoidod and I ate, we discussed American foreign policy and our travels. He invited me to join him and some other friends for a visit to the Tien Shan Mountains to ski before school starts back. The skiing in Kazakhstan is equivalent in quality to those of Colorado, but at only a fraction of the cost. The Student rate is are $15 for a day for a day of skiing at the premier slope.
Since I couldn't finish all of my doner or liter of water, I decided to get it to go. Although it was no longer snowing outside, it must have been around eighteen degrees Fahrenheit. Hadoidod was visibly cold in is down jacket. Thank goodness for long johns!
I talked with Hadoidod for another hour in his dorm, we watched some American prank videos on YouTube, and we ate some chocolate from the local candy factory, Rakhat. Finally, I decided to call it a night. Hadoidod helped me set up the Wi-Fi in my room prior and was off. Although it was only 10:30am at night, I was exhausted! Before closing my eyes I looked up at the fortune taped to my wall that I had gotten from a fortune cookie in the Atlanta airport, "Nothing in life is to be feared; it is only to be understood." I smiled as fatigue got the best of me.
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