Summertime... and the living has indeed been easy. School's out, everyone's in a laid back frame of mind, and there are lakes to be swum in, shashlik (barbecued lamb kebabs) to be eaten, and sunshine to be enjoyed. It's a glorious time of year.
Highlights of the summer (in chronological, and not ranked, order):
(1) Camp Boomerang: set in a valley nestled in the Alatau mountain range just outside of Taldy Korgan in the southeast part of the country, camp was pretty awesome. I lived in a yurt, went on lots of hikes, and got thrown into the river on a near-daily basis by my campers.
(2) Central Asia Teachers of English Conference (CATEC): I roll up to what is possibly the swankiest resort in all of Kazakhstan straight from camp, covered in dust, and looking something quite like a hobo. The Alatau Resort in Almaty was probably the nicest place I've stayed in not just in KZ, but ever. I gave a presentation along with my local counterpart teacher, and spent the rest of the two-day conference going to various sessions, meeting new people (like PCVs from Turkmenistan, which was way cool!), and seeing the other volunteers who were also presenting (5 of us in total).
(3) Russian camp: 15 of us invaded the picturesque town of Shuchinsk, located 4 or so hours from Astana. It's full of pine trees, lakes, and general natural splendor. It's called the Switzerland of Kazakhstan, if that paints any clearer a picture. We had Russian lessons in the mornings, and spent our afternoons napping, chilling by the lake, or going for walks/hikes. Most of the volunteers there were Kaz-18s, which was really cool as I'd not met many of them before, but there were 5 from my group, the 19s, who crashed the party. Good times: playing drunken Risk, getting into slap fights, and generally having a blast.
(4) LONDON~! By far, the highlight of the summer. I stayed with my grandparents, which is really like Home #2 for me, and did the rounds amongst all my aunts, uncles, cousins, as well as old friends around London. Ate more ethnic (Indian, Chinese, Thai, Turkish, Italian, Korean) food, and more fresh fruits and vegetables (salad!! with lettuce!!) than I have in the past year. Which was fantastic! It was a gloriously good time: wandering about the Tate Modern, street markets, shopping on Oxford Street, picnics in Hyde Park... the list goes on. It was exactly what I needed, some solid relaxation before returning to KZ for this final year.
And so, here I am. Back in the former USSR. I'm heading up to Lake Balkhash for an extended weekend there to hang out with Alex (whose site it is) and a few other volunteers. Then it's back to site for good to prepare for the coming school year, etc. Summer has been wonderful, and it's so very quickly coming to a close! Now I've got 5 months of snow, ice, and cold to look forward to. Alas. Let's just hope it passes as quickly as summer has.
