My Life in Kazakhstan So Far

Our first view of Kazakhstan from the plane

Touching down..

Almaty airport!

So some updates on my life in Kazakhstan so far!

1. Some Korean exchange students got their room broken into. They lost about USD$1000. Madness. Their room is next to the kitchen so the person probably climbed out of the kitchen balcony onto theirs. They didn’t lock their window or balcony door when they left the room.

Now everyone’s really worried. Especially me because previously our balcony window could not be locked! So Jingzhong shoved and pushed and shoved and finally managed to lock our windows. Since it’s so hard to lock them, we keep them locked all the time now and open the balcony door instead when we want some cool fresh air.

2. Our friend Babsi from Austria had her cell phone stolen at the Green Bazaar.

3. I’ve been limping since we got back from our weekend trip to the Big Almaty Lake. Right ankle hurts a bit when I walk on level ground or go down stairs. Going UP stairs is fine. But it’s most probably just some sort of strain. Might still go for an x-ray though.

4. Internet here can be a bit annoying. Last night I couldn’t connect from the 5th floor study room, so Jingzhong went down to the 4th floor study room to connect, then ran like a mad man up to the 5th floor before it could disconnect.

5. The 3rd Singaporean exchange student finally arrived yesterday! It feels so good to talk to someone who understands you when you say you feel shag and sian and all that. The other exchange students say they can tell that we talk much faster with Jing Liang, and accents become more pronounced too. Hahaha. Yes, there’s a Jingzhong and a Jing Liang. GG to non-Chinese speakers (everyone) on pronouncing their names.

6. Some of the people in the dormitory are not always very nice. They run down corridors late at night. They bang on your door and run away. They laugh and chat loudly in the wee hours of the morning. Every chance they get, they slam doors. I don’t get it. Why don’t they give a thought to others? Seriously. I don’t know why they are so inconsiderate. Of course not all of them are like that, but the noisy and inconsiderate ones are the ones you hear more right? GRRRRR. I’m thankful I live on the last room on the corridor and hence not many people walk past it.

7. My Russian is getting better. I can understand TINY parts (maybe just random words here and there) in people’s conversations and can sometimes guess what they are saying. 

8. Apparently Jingzhong and I look Kazakh. 

9. The girls here dress UP. And when I say up, I mean UP UP UP. Most of them wear heels to school everyday. It’s not just heels. But heels that are at least 3 to 4 inches high. Many of them like low cut tops. Others wear dresses that could be worn to prom! So I wonder what they wear to their actual prom.

Because of my ankle I’ve been wearing slippers to class. And on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, I only have class from 11 to 11.50am. And I live on campus. I am not about to dress up for a 50 MINUTE class that is just 40 METRES away. Hell no. So I wore shorts and slippers and everyone stared at me like I’m an alien. Because here, if they wear shorts, they team it with heels or at least covered shoes. If they wear slippers.. They don’t wear slippers. At least not flip flops. At the very least it’s flat covered shoes or flat fancy sandals.

10. Exercise books here all have tiny squares inside. I like that. For drawing graphs and boxes and stuff, it’s PERFECT. Already got one red one for Singapore when I get home. Teeheehee.

So just some updates on my life in Kazakhstan. I’ll try to get more pictures soon. There’s always a huge backlog, especially from our trips. Like to the Kapshagay Lake trip we took last last week. Which is causing Jingzhong and I to peel. Sunburnt.

MORE SOON.

Our Couchsurfing Host Lena in SPB

So we couchsurfed in Russia and it was a SUPER experience. The best ever. So now I will introduce our first couchsurfing host Lena. We stayed at her house for 2 nights. She had a beautiful (fat) black cat, but I can never remember her name.

Couchsurfing is great because you get to know people who live in that country you’re visiting. You can ask all sorts of questions about their life and culture. Jingzhong was particularly interested what it was like living during Soviet times.

We walk through a playground to get to her apartment. That’s her apartment you see! It looks very dark and dreary. But once you get inside her flat it’s a real nice cozy surprise.

The entrance to her apartment. It looks very nice here, thanks to Jingzhong’s camera, but it is actually much darker and scarier.

You walk up that small flight of stairs and turn right to get to the lift. When we first got there, I didn’t know they had a lift and when I heard that she stays on the 6th floor, I almost wanted to die because the bags were so heavy.

Our big backpacks were about 20kg each while the small black ones (if you can call them small la huh) weighed about 10kg. So I was carrying 30kg.

Here is the lift. It is tiny. The first time we went to her house after our night train from Moscow, we had to go up one by one because only one of us could fit with our backpacks and everything.

Just look at the width of it! If you are fat, you will have to take the stairs. Which will probably do you some good anyway.

Heehee funny picture.

You come out of the lift (it’s on the right of this picture) and that’s her door!

When we were staying at Lena’s, a girl from Hungary, Dora and a guy from Bologna, Richard were staying there too. It was lots of fun. We stayed up on most nights chatting, talking about our travels, what we were doing (studying / working) and where we had visited that day. I really enjoyed those talks.

Eating breakfast in Lena’s kitchen. Love the wallpaper.

Lena was really great. She was truly interested in talking about where we had visited in St. Petersburg that day and gave suggestions and comments. She actually has a 4 year old son but he was staying with her parents because it was the holidays.

Lena’s cat! She is apparently very scheming and nasty. Hahaha but she was only very nice to me. Maybe because I spoilt her by always scratching her on the head and under the chin.

We left Lena’s apartment to stay at Masha’s. But we met up with Lena for a meal right before we left for Moscow.

We went to this restaurant called the Idiot. Yeah. It’s vegetarian, but they offer fish. Hmmm. But anyway, the restaurant was decorated very beautifully. I had mushrooms and potatoes while Jingzhong had some dumplings. I cannot remember what they were called. We also ordered some green schkee soup or something like that which I didn’t like because it was sour.

I’m wearing red and white because it’s National Day!

Lena with her meal and one of the few pictures of Jingzhong and I together in Russia.

They gave us complimentary vodkas and that is the only alcohol I drank in Russia. Didn’t like it. Bleargh.

Well we have kept in contact with Lena even though we are now in Kazakhstan, and if she comes to Singapore (she really wants to), Jingzhong and I can’t wait to show her around! =) 

Okay, shall post about our other hosts another time!

Ti(red)

I am really sick of walking all morning, afternoon and night in St. Petersburg.

As you can see.

Ordering With Sign Language

Like I said, my Russian is not very good. Hahaha. In Russia we were fortunate to find restaurants of cafes that either had English menus or waiters who knew English. But there was one day where we were so hungry that we didn’t bother trying to find somewhere to eat from Jingzhong’s Russia Lonely Planet book but just walked into whichever cafe we found. 

So this is the cafe. And there were no English menus. And they had no one who spoke English. So we just pointed and gestured. But the guy who was taking our order knew at least ‘beef’ and ‘chicken’. Hahaha! I think we almost died ordering this. But it was pretty yummy. I like my corn salad. 

Heehee.

The Night Train

No, you don’t need to stick out your wand hand to flag one down but it was still an exciting experience.

Jingzhong and I arrived in Moscow on 5th August and were taken from the airport straight to the Leningradsky Train Station where we waited about 5 hours before we could board the night train to St. Petersburg at 11pm. 

The Leningradsky Train Station

I was having a headache from all the non-stop traveling and was DYING to have a bed, albeit a narrow bed on a train to sleep on.

I’m REALLY shagged out and I think it shows.

Second class cabin.

We shared it with two other guys. The bottom beds were seats that could be converted into a bed. I was really tired so I slept pretty early. Slept throughout the entire journey. Felt pretty good. And I was nice and toasty and warm.

When we got to St. Petersburg, we walked all over the place trying to find the metro station only to realise the entrance was INSIDE the Leningradsky Train Station, not outside. Walked forever with those heavy bags. Madness.

We had a fun time in St. Petersburg then went back to Moscow also via the night train.

Moscow Train Station

If you notice, they name the stations based on the destination of the trains. So the trains here mostly go to Moscow, so it’s called Moscow Train Station even though it’s in St. Petersburg. Leningradsky is the old name for St. Petersburg and is located in Moscow.

We waited about 2 hours before getting on the train to Moscow so we just found some corner and here is me resting. 

First class! Just two of us sharing a cabin. It looks much nicer, da? Breakfast (bliny with caviar) and packed snacks were also thrown in. Previously on second class we only had packed snacks.

Jingzhong and I looked SUPER tired. But it was nice having the cabin to ourselves and not having to worry that people would steal from us. We slept way sounder this time around.

=)