Following up on last week's post, Stephanie and I had a great time at the Scottish dancing class. It was nothing serious and the dances aren't too hard. It's kind of like skipping around the room, which turns out to be a pretty good workout. We're planning to go to another lesson on Wednesday to prepare for the Robert Burns charity dinner.
Last Wednesday was also officially the old Russian New Year, but we celebrated it on Thursday. Boy did we celebrate it. The entire management team from the embassy got together at a local restaurant and had a great spread with salads, pickles, cold cuts (including horse), shashlik, and of course, copious amounts of vodka.
After many toasts, everyone was dancing and singing. I got some lessons on how to dance like a Tajik. It was a real blast and we stayed until around midnight. Of course, on Friday I payed for it. Fortunately, Tajik vodka is relatively kind and I wasn't hung over as much as I was still intoxicated on Friday morning. It certainly made my Russian lesson interesting. By lunch time I had more or less sobered up, but needless to say it I turned in early Friday night.
On Saturday Stephanie and I went to the gym, where I was confronted with yet another oddity of local custom. The guys at the gym said I had to change my shoes before I could work out. Having only gone in the mornings so far, I hadn't encountered this obstacle before and therefore didn't have a change of shoes on me. I think my annoyance showed pretty clearly and they let me work out anyway. I understand the custom in people's homes since they eat on the floor here. But I've yet to see anyone eat off the floor in the gym.
Saturday afternoon was a really nice day - around 60 degrees - so we met up with some friends to play tennis at the embassy. For some reason, they removed the net, but I would say that helped the game more than it hindered it. Saturday night I had some of the guys over to watch Eurotrip. We had the four P's of refreshment - peanuts, popcorn, pizza, and pivo (beer in Russian). One of my friends even brought wasabi flavored peas so it was technically the five P's.
Sunday started out a bit dreary, but started clearing up in the afternoon, so Stephanie and I went for a walk. I decided to take the camera along and capture some of the more day-to-day aspects of life in Dushanbe...
Narrow streets
Kids playing...
A monument to historical Persian figures...
Then we noticed the mosque off in the distance, and not having been there, decided to go find it.
It was pretty easy to locate the mosque, and while not amazingly impressive, it is a nice looking building.
On the way home, we noticed some nice mosaics near the Vastan Disco Club (haven't been yet),
and I also thought I'd get a shot of the local Shwarma place, advertising ice cream, hamburgers, cheese burgers, and such.
I don't know what the kangaroo has to do with anything. If you want to see more pictures from our little excursion, follow the link.
Today (Monday), we're celebrating Martin Luther King Jr. Day by being lazy. It was raining pretty hard this morning and then changed over to snow around lunch time. We spent some time reading in the attic room and just watching the snow fall out the window. I'd call it an excellent use of a day off.
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