First 4 days in KZ

Welp, I made it on time with no trouble! I have been here for 4 full days and I am slowly but surely getting settled. I've been with my team a lot - catching up and getting to know them better! Tara and I went shopping - I bought a pretty bed spread and a few other needs! It is hot hot hot here - and there is no AC so I bought a fan and keep the windows open!! One thing that is hard is the language - it is really frustrating not being able to communicate much at all with anyone but my team so I am excited to develop a bit in that!I begin language school tomorrow so I will let you know how it goes :)

New concept: So, in order to go shopping the other day, Tara and I had to catch a taxi. We walked to the busier road and she stuck her hand out and this white car pulled over almost immediately. She told him where we wanted to go and they agreed on a price and we got in. I noticed it didn't really look like a taxi and I said, "Tara, is this a taxi?", she said "yea, everyone is a taxi." So, pretty much - we are hitchhikers here and it is totally normal! haha!

Last night we had a little get together. The jet lag finally hit yesterday and I have been exhausted ever since so I was struggling to stay awake. It was good for me because it wasn't a huge crowd or even close to it. I got to know one girl pretty well- I was able to share my story with her and she seemed to be interested. We are going to hang out again this weekend.

Also last night we grilled hot dogs. After I was done eating - Tammy looked at me and said "do you know what you just ate?" - Yea, the hot dog was made of HORSE!

Today the team and I went to 2 different campuses that we will be working with. Students t one of them are required to speak English. University here is not like in the US. It is not the next thing to do for everyone - these students are driven and focused and WANT an education. Our team paired up and went to 3 different English classes and spoke. It was an "intensive English class" and all of them were incoming freshman. I met one girl in the class - we ate lunch together and she showed me around campus and her dorm.

Tonight we ate dinner in a Yurt. People live there but apparently they kind of run it as a restaurant as well. We ate Shaslik (no idea how to spell it :) but it is sheep. We also ate logmon which is like thick noodles with vegetables, meat and a soup like sauce. We also had cucumber and tomato salad with chai (tea). It was great!

This is a Yurt:

This is Tara with a cow...

This is my team eating in the Yurt

Tara and I eating Shashlik!