My First Week in Kazakhstan

It's Thursday, and I'm going to keep to my schedule.  I found out that blogger and most other blog websites are blocked here in Kazakhstan due to a previous case where two blogs on livejournal and another site were deemed to be a threat to national security (or something to that effect), and so they blocked all such ilk.  I can edit and publish my blog, but I cannot see my blog (yay irony!), though hopefully by next week I can acquire a program that allows me to see it again.

It's been almost one week in Kazakhstan, and things are going okay so far.  No major shocks (well, not too major), but a lot of randomness and a lot of work to do for transition to try and make up for the first three weeks of June that didn't go quite as planned.  It's nice to see my team, all together, and I truly am looking forward to working with them this term.

Minor culture shocks so far:

• The flat has no hot water at all.  Apparently this only happened right before I arrived, but it's still somewhat strange.  For me, I view KZ as a mid-developed country, but it's a bit less developed than I had thought.  So far I'm able the manage the cold showers (which is huge for me, especially with my poor circulation), but I really hope the hot water comes back in the wintertime.
• There is absolutely no recycling here.  And they use plastic bags for everything.  It's a strange dichotomy for me, in that it's developed enough to have a proliferation of plastic bags, but not developed enough to recycle.  I remember (I think) in Kenya, where there also isn't really recycling, there were people who would go around and collect the trash to reuse it in some manner.
• When I first arrived, it was 4 am, my favourite time of day, and dark.  By 4h30am, when we were in the taxi to the flat, it was already light out.  I can't remember the last time I was awake this early when it was light out, and it was quite nice.  But I know then the winter will be that much darker too.  The view of the mountains is quite spectacular.
• Someone thought I was French. :p

The air quality is not that great, but so far I haven't had much of a problem breathing.  It gets quite warm during the day (high 20s-low 30s) and cooler at night (mid-high teens), but it's manageable and quite comparable to Madrid or Toronto, actually.  Winter should be more Calgaryish, I believe, due to the mountains that are really close by.  Their altitudes are somewhat similar (~1000m), but the nearby mountains are much closer and higher here in Almaty, so they seem much more majestic, if that's even possible.  I hope I get the chance to go hiking up in the mountains, because I really do miss the Rockies.

I'm still tired all of the time, possibly still due to jetlag?  I can't sleep in though, which is a good thing, because the MC office and flat are the same place, so when people are coming I have to wake up.

New favourite expression (that still doesn't really make sense to me... something about being quick): "Let's be short and pregnant!"

Until next Thursday!

I've decided I will be updating this every Thursday.  Why?  Because I like Thursdays, and I think that trying to schedule a blog update will actually motivate me to get it done.

Right now I'm at the airport in Barcelona, waiting for my flight to Almaty via Kiev.  I took the overnight bus from Madrid, so I didn't sleep much, and carrying all of my luggage across town made me so ridiculously sweaty that I'm glad I brought an extra shirt to change in to.

My adventure in Kazakhstan is about to start.  Somewhat scary, yes, but also exciting.  It hasn't really sunk in yet that I'm moving halfway across the world for another year; maybe once I get there it will.

It's been a great two weeks in Spain, but I'm glad to finally have my visa and soon a place to call my own.

As a side note, I really need to learn how to properly gauge the weight of my luggage, and/or start getting rid of more things.

Until next week!

New Year's Resolution

So it's been well over a year since I last updated this. It seems no matter how I try, or where I post, or what format, I just don't have the motivation to keep it up for long.

So let's change that.

I don't normally make New Year's Resolutions, but I've made one this year. Two actually: Communication and Commitment.

Anyone who knows me well knows that communication is not my strong point. I've been working on it over the past few years, but sometimes it feels like I have not made any progress at all. For a while last year I was really on top of my email... I even had it down to 9 messages that I had left to deal with after starting with 250... but then I got busy/distracted/etc. and now I'm up to over 450, many of which probably are so old that they don't need to be dealt with anymore. I try tricks and other strategies to improve my email communication, but nothing seems to work over the long term.

I think part of that reason is commitment. I'm committed to what I do, or at least I say I am, but I think I can go further. For me, I'm quantifying commitment as doing everything I can to make something happen; If I'm in, I'm all in. I have a tendency (as demonstrated by this blog), to start things and not finish them. I do consider myself more of an idea generator, and in that personality test I was definitely not an implementer.

So, what does this mean?

First, I'm going to try to post...

no, scratch that, not try...

First, I'm going to post here at least once a month with updates on what's happening in my life. My mom will be happy about that :p but I figure she's not the only one wondering what's going on in my life and where I am. I promise to not pull any more surprises like last summer ("Hi Brett, where are you?" "Oh, just in Kenya for the summer...").

Second, I've changed the way I use my email to better flag what messages I need to tend to, and which ones I don't. I'm trying to respond faster, and not let apathy get the best of me.

Third, I might need your help to keep me going. If you notice that I'm not responding to you, or that I've not done something I said I would do, call me out on it. I may be awesome, but I do need support. :)

So, if you've been waiting for me to do something, and I haven't done it yet, I'm sorry. I am working on it, but sending me a reminder won't hurt. My first priority right now is to my LC, and I know I have to send out a bunch of things related to planning, and I want to get them done tonight.

Later, I'll post updates about what I was up to this past year. But for now, it's back to work.

I could wash my clothes on his stomach

I need to update more. I've been so concerned with updating all the big things that have been happening that I've been neglecting the little things. So I'm going to start blogging about the little things, and bit by bit update the big events, like conferences, travels, and LC visits. They'll be tagged retro so y'all don't get confused.

Just finished watching the Real Madrid vs. AC Milan game of the Champions League (we won 2-0). My goodness, Ronaldo has the body of a Greek god! Also, I was proud that I could tell he is Portuguese (even though I already knew that) based on his accent in Spanish during a post-game interview. Yay me!

Additionally, at the beginning of the month, I was pissed off at the Mercadona (local grocery store) for posting a notice that they would be starting their winter hours a few days later. This basically meant they wouldn't be open by the time I got home from work, and only until 2 pm on Saturdays, closed Sundays. For a country that doesn't get winter, and took all of August off, I was super pissed off. But, it turns out its just the market vendors in the same building who are operating on the new hours, not the grocery store itself. But still, does no one in this country work like a normal* person?

*from my biased North American perspective, of course.

Espanish

I was able to talk to people on the phone in Spanish today, more than once! This is a huge accomplishment for me. When I first came here, I tried to answer in Spanish, but I ended up just saying "sí... sí... uno momento por favor" before passing the phone off to whomever I thought they wanted to speak with.

Now, thanks to a suggestion from Camby, I answer the phone in English. I think this causes people to speak Spanish slower and more clearly, as they can sense that I'm not a native speaker, even though they continue to speak in Spanish. Today I spoke with a businessman about a TN he has taken, and guy who was interested in going on exchange with AIESEC, and a girl who ended up being Scottish so we spoke in English.

Now I just have to learn how to answer the phone and talk in Spanish without the rest of the team giggling behind me, lol.

Where is my life going?

Sorry for the total lack of updates recently. Things have been super busy since Start Up, with Recruitment Weekend and IC taking up most of my life. I promise many retroactive entries for you to know what has happened in my life.

I'm still in India, a few more days until we return to Madrid. It's been a wild few weeks, and I'm very tired. I've seen a lot though, and I can't wait to share it all with you. I didn't take a lot of pictures, but just soaked it all up. Any pictures I have taken (or others have taken of me) will inevitably end up on facebook. :p

Start Up! Valladolid

I am oh so tired. It is almost three a.m. and I am still not done some stuff for tomorrow's session. I barely have a voice and no alarm to wake me up. I'm physically drained, my brain is sore from trying to understand Spanish, and every day except today has been uncomfortably hot. I don't have any time to get any of my non-conference work done, either personal or professional, and I'm rapidly falling behind.

I'm in way over my head.

I'm having the time of my life, and wouldn't change it for the world.