Epsilon poses

All of the kids who came on the conference are in my Grade 11-12 English class, in which we're studying Brave New World. One student and I had a lot of fun doing Epsilon poses on the trip - Epsilon naughty, Epsilon scared, Epsilon happy, Epsilon confused, etc. [Epsilons are the lowest caste in the fictional future world of BNW - they are semi-morons.]

Letting my Samson side out

Cute kid

How cute is this kid? He turned and smiled at me when he saw me trying to inconspicuously take a picture of him. So adorable! (In case you're wondering, yes, there are cute kids in Bishkek, too, but I well nigh never walk around with a camera here, because I figure the less valuable stuff I have on me, the less I lose if I'm mugged.)

Beautiful streets of Budapest

Recently, I took some students on a leadership conference in Budapest. I enjoyed taking pictures of the lovely streets of Budapest, especially since we were blessed with perfect tourist weather on our two days exploring the city.

Valerie's Top 5 Amusements in Europe

From mid-June to mid-July, I was in Central/Eastern Europe with my parents and my sister. I thought I would share my top five amusements from that trip, in no particular order.

1) Dad dancing in Budapest



We went for a 'traditional' dinner one night in Budapest and the stage entertainment called my dad up for an audience interaction bit. Dad had to dance his weaving way through bottles on the stage, following a thigh-slapping, knee-jerking routine that he'd just been taught. Then he had to do it again - blindfolded. You can imagine the hilarity.

2) Mom sitting down next to a so-German guard



My sister Steph and I were cracked up by this image of our mom sitting next to this old school guard, totally oblivious to the incongruity of the image.

3) Taking pictures of beautiful things and places



There was no shortage of beautiful things and places to enjoy and to take pictures of. This one is inside a cathedral somewhere - after a few cathedrals, they all start to blend into one. My personal advice is that one cathedral suffices - if you've been to one, you kind of might as well have been to them all. The same goes for the old town bits of European cities - one old town is very much like another old town. Tourist-trappy but still lovely.

4) Germany's Wow Wow dustbins



Wow! I found a dustbin! Wow!

5) Being statues with Steph



Steph and I had a lot of fun being various statues. We amused not only ourselves but also all passersby. Lest you think it unfair that I got to be human while Steph was the dog, let me mention that on two separate occasions, I was a horse which Steph sat on.

Surprise holiday in China

So, I find myself unexpectedly sitting in Brett’s house (many of you will know him) in Tianjin. I thought I’d post a short update on the blog despite not being able to upload any pictures yet. How did I end up here instead of in Bishkek, you may wonder?

Well, just over two weeks ago, I left Bishkek for a few days in K.shg.r (Xin.ji.ang province of China) with two girls, one of whom I teach in Bishkek - I was their adult chaperone. Their family spent many years working in K.shg.r. We had a good time and the older girl was able to say goodbye to her home and her childhood friends, since she's going to college in the States soon.

Because of the recent unr.st, there were s.ld.rs on every street corner and we would often be passed by convoys of a.r.m.y trucks with s.ld.rs pointing g.ns with b.yonets on the ends at us as they passed (probably not intentionally - they were just staring because we were some of the few foreigners in the city at the time).

We weren’t allowed to take pictures of the s.l.drs and one time when I tried to get a picture of a famous m.sque, next to which happened to be an encampment of s.l.drs, a policeman immediately forbade it and ‘escorted’ us down to another part of the old city, making sure that we were well and truly not turning back before leaving us alone.

I do, however, have some pictures of the city which happen to have the tail end of some trucks in them. Will post these when I return to Bishkek.

On our way back to Bishkek, I was told that I couldn't enter Kyrgyzstan because my one month visa was single-entry only, and that had been used up when I got it at the airport. So I got to experience the joys of trying to get into the neighbouring country of Kyrgyzstan from China.

Unlike when you fly to Bishkek from, say, Australia, China does not allow you to board a plane without a visa, and in order to get a non-tourist visa, you have to jump through a number of bureaucratic hoops. It was near-impossible to jump through such hoops while in Xin.ji.ang province, because they currently have no internet and no ability to call anyone outside of China, so I flew to Beijing.

After a lot of effort from numerous people, two 9 hour round trips north to Beijing, and at least 10 mosquito bites from waiting in the Kyrgyz Embassy, I think I have managed to convince the Beijing Embassy of the Kyrgyz Republic to give me a one month business visa. As such, I should be able to fly back to Bishkek two and a half weeks after I originally planned to be back.

I think you could say I’ve been having an adventurous summer. Will post photos when I’m back in Bishkek.

Door codes

Most apartment blocks here have security devices on their doors that require door codes to get through. My mobile comes in handy for storing friends' door codes. This is the door code device on the blue door leading to my apartment block. While it looks better than many such devices, it doesn't actually work.