The Big Visit

For a four-day week, this sure didn't feel short! Hard to believe it's been a week already since I last posted, but with good reason. Last week was crazy.

In addition to the normal hustle and bustle, I found myself covering for the Facilities Manager while he is on vacation, getting ready for the arrival of a new officer that Stephanie and I are sponsoring, working with an advisor from our regional support center, and wildest of all, preparing for a visit from Richard Holbrooke - the U.S. special representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Being acting facilities manager doesn't put all that much of an extra burden on me as the staff are very competent. It's mostly just more to pay attention to, although we did have a partial roof collapse at our motorpool to contend with due to the lingering snow. Fortunately, no one was hurt.

Getting ready for the person we're sponsoring was fun, but knowing what it was like to arrive in a strange place in the middle of the night, we wanted to make sure everything was perfect. This mostly involves making sure the house is ready and that there is some food available before they get here. Then when the guy arrived, I went to the airport to meet him and made sure he was settled in at home.

The new guy is very cool and Stephanie and I both get along with him well. The nice thing is that he lives only a couple of blocks away from us - which is great since so far, we've been the only ones in this part of town. Part of being a sponsor is also to help get the person settled in at the embassy and around town. We've had fun doing that as well since it gives us another good reason to be out and about.

So being a sponsor is more fun than work in my book. It's just unfortunate that this experience coincided with the Holbrooke visit, which was unmistakeably work-ish. It's no secret by now that Special Representative Holbrooke has been on a whirlwind tour of the region over the last week, so Dushanbe was by far not the only embassy scrambling to prepare for a quick visit.

Preparation included making sure we reserved the appropriate rooms at the Hyatt as well as setting up a control center (basically a fully equipped impromptu office) for the staff to work from, not to mention putting together comprehensive transportation planning for the trip. There are an amazing number of moving parts involved with a visit like this including coordination of access to the airport and the presidential palace for the meeting, as well as making the most of public diplomacy opportunities - not to mention arranging security for the entire visit.

The visit was only scheduled to last from an arrival Friday evening to a departure Saturday morning but it had most of the embassy hopping for over a week. Fortunately, everything went more or less smoothly, and we handled several unexpected schedule changes and special requests without a hitch. I even got to enjoy a free breakfast at the Hyatt on Saturday morning. The only hiccup (which was not our doing) was when the group prepared to leave and had a problem with arrangements at their next destination. Suddenly, my stint at the Hyatt changed from a four hour day to an eight hour day. Still, at least I was stationed at the Hyatt and not at the airport in the rain.

Finally around 3:30pm we got the 'wheels up' notice and were able to shut down and go home. Saturday night, we blew off some steam at the embassy Valentine's Day party - better known as 'The Love Fest' and then went on to a friend's house for some more dancing. We had a great time and it was a much needed release after a rather tense week.

Today, the weather finally cleared after a couple of weeks of rain and snow. It was actually a rather warm and beautiful day. We took our sponsoree around town to help him get familiarized with the area and to do some shopping at the bazaar. On the way I was able to snap some photos:

The town hall...

A car with some interesting cargo...

And a tandoori sambusa oven at the bazaar...

As the weekend winds down, I have no doubt it will be another busy week as I need to catch up on things that didn't get done while I was tied up with the Holbrooke visit. Since I'm leaving for my conference in Washington next Saturday, I really need to get everything in order.

And finally, the most amazing thing is that as of this weekend, we've been here for 6 months!! It's hard to believe we're already a quart of the way through our tour. In another 6 months we'll already figuring out where to go next. And so the adventure continues.

Chillin' In Dushanbe

As I'm writing this post, on the evening of President's Day, I'm looking out on a quiet snowy yard. Now, I know this is nothing compared to recent snowfalls along the east coast back home, but it is nice to finally have it look like winter for an extended period of time. Apparently it is rather unusual to have snow on the ground for more than a day or so. Actually, for most of the week it was snowing pretty much constantly, but not accumulating too much, which is perfect in my book.

On Saturday a group of people from the embassy went to the Museum of National Antiquities.
While not what you would call 'world class', it does have a pretty nice collection of artifacts showing the different cultures that have washed over this part of the world throughout history - the Persians, Greeks, Arabs, Mongolians, and others have left there mark.


Among some of the interesting items were the skeleton of an ancient princess who towered over 6 feet tall in life,

dating back to the time when Zoroastrianism was the main religion. We also saw a set of skulls, one of which had the oblong shape that some cultures in Africa achieve by wrapping the head in tight cloth at a young age.
There were also statues and parts of statues showing evidence of the presence of the Hindu religion...
stone tablets written in Arabic...
and the main attraction an enormous stone Buddha, which took up an entire room by itself.
I also noticed a painting which showed the founding myth of Rome (Romulus and Remus being suckled by a she-wolf) - which you may remember I was perplexed a statue of the same scene when I was in Khujand.
Our guide explained that it was evidence of trade between ancient Rome and this part of the world. Pretty impressive.


Interestingly, our guide also glossed over an entire section of stone age artifacts, stating that as a converted Christian, he didn't believe in the stone age. We held our tongues and enjoyed the rest of the tour very much.


After the museum, Stephanie and I took in the sights of a snowy Dushanbe and had lunch at a Georgian restaurant.
For more pictures of Dushanbe in snow as well as from the museum, click the picture below.

Museum

On Saturday night, we braved a rather heavy bout of snow to attend a Marti Gras party at the Deputy Chief of Mission's residence. Despite the weather, a lot of people showed up and we had a really good time drinking hurricanes and dancing the night away.




We celebrated Valentine's Day on Sunday by going to brunch at the Hyatt with another couple. It was a nice treat and the food was great as usual. It's certainly nice to be able to go to the Hyatt once and awhile and pretend that we're not in Tajikistan. While we like it overall, it can be trying at times.


Today was pretty cold so we mostly stayed in. Our only excursion was to go to the dentist for a cleaning. The experience was... interesting. My Russian is not well developed in the area of Dentistry and only one person spoke any English. The first order of business was to ensure safety. Our medical officer recommended that we purchase single-use kits of dental tools for hygienic purposes so we did. But then there were several instruments that were not in the kit. The dentist explained that they had been auto-claved but we called the medical officer to confirm it was ok.


With that done, the check-up was more or less uneventful. The only really painful aspect was that the water pick used very cold water - which was less than comfortable. Neither of us felt that it met the standards we are used to in the U.S. but figure it's better than nothing. Not to mention, it only cost us about $25 altogether!


And so closes another three day weekend. I've decided I like three day weekends ending in Monday better because it's easier to come off a three day weekend to a four day week than a full week.

Winter Finally Caught Up to Us

Good old Murphy and his law apparently maintain a stronghold on the events of life even in Dushanbe. So of course, over the weekend after we learn our car is worthless, we get hit with the first real blast of winter weather so far this year. The weekend itself wasn’t too bad, mostly rain, but it was enough to keep us mostly homebound. On Sunday night, it started to snow.

Usually rain will change over to snow in the evening and then back to rain in the morning, but not this time. We were fortunate to have a friend who was willing to give us a ride to the Marine house on the compound to watch the superbowl at 3:30 am on Monday morning. We were also fortunate that we could watch the game there instead of at home because the snow blocked the signal on our satellite dish. (The Marines were able to go out on the roof to clean theirs off - we would have fallen off if we tried that). All in all, it was a great game, and we had a good breakfast while watching it. The only thing I really missed were buffalo wings and the commercials – we don’t get to see them on the Armed Forces Network.

The snow continued all day Monday and into Tuesday morning – making for very beautiful scenery and very treacherous commutes. First, when I tried to leave the house, I discovered that our large metal gate was frozen. Not having had a large metal gate previously, I was unprepared and had to run inside to get hot water to melt the lock so I could leave. Then I had to go back inside again for more hot water when I learned that I had to melt the outside of the lock too in order to close it behind me.

After a rather treacherous walk to the bazaar, I managed to catch a marshrutka relatively easy. It even had a pair of red fuzzy dice on the mirror. Alas, that wasn't the end of my adventure. About a kilometer or so from the embassy, the marshrutka gave up the ghost and ceased working. Any other time I probably would have just hoofed it, but the conditions were not conducive to walking so I caught another one and got to work almost an hour late.

Tuesday night, Stephanie and I had planned to go to another salsa lesson, but then we realized that we couldn't both go out or we'd be frozen out of our house when we came home.

Today (Wednesday, has still be quite cold, but things are improving. No issues with the commute this morning and the facilities team came to unfreeze our gate. We're getting ready to head out to dinner with some friends and tomorrow is supposed to be warmer. Almost Friday!

Dirty, Rotten, Blankety-blank

As of my last report on Sunday, I had received my car from the shop and everything was hunky-dory. That didn't last long. By the end of the day Monday, it was making a weird noise. Now, you may remember that I was paying our head mechanic to do the work outside of business hours. He's also the same guy who helped us purchase the car. Considering I'm his boss, I felt fairly comfortable working with him, but with all of the repairs, I'd been having my doubts.

I asked around and found another local mechanic who is used by many of the locals at the embassy and is widely considered to be reliable and trustworthy. I took the car in this morning to have the weird sound fixed but also to have him take a look at the car overall so that I can have a second opinion. As it turns out, my suspicions were EXTREMELY well founded, and the truth was much worse than I expected.

The mechanic called back about an hour after I dropped the car off to report that among other things, the welding job that our mechanic had done on the engine mount was shoddy and they had used a piece of wood to prop up the engine. WOOD! And not even a solid block of hardwood, but an 8" X 3" X 0.5" piece of particle board - I never would have seen it if I hadn't taken it to the other guy. Then there was a litany of other problems that would undoubtedly need repair before long. But still, the piece of wood was the most unbelievable thing. I don't know how to do much beyond filling the windshield washer fluid and changing a flat tire, but I defintely know that particle board will not support an engine.

What it comes down to is that we are probably better off selling the car and buying another one. But to add more insult to insult, (there hasn't been an injury - but that's probably only because I didn't see the embassy mechanic today, haha), I learned that the car we bought should probably only have cost $3000 vs the $4500 we paid. So on top of telling me the car was in good condition, our mechanic was most likely also involved in a scheme to overcharge us so he could pocket the money.

Now, knowing the local modus operandi, I expect a little over charging or even to have the mechanic suggest some repairs that might not be completely necessary. (I try not to generalize, but my growing impression of the locals is that while perhaps quite hospitable, they are generally not terribly honest or scrupulous. I think this bears that out.) But misleading me to this extent, where the problems with the car could have endangered the driver (I think of Stephanie), was just shocking. This guy lied through his teeth that the car was in good working condition.

The general consensus among the mechanics who worked on the car today is that it is probably better to sell the car and start over. Knowing what I know now, I agree. But we'll certainly lose money in the deal, not to mention the time and headache involved in the process. It's infuriating.

Of course, I plan to talk to the embassy mechanic about this - I just don't think it could have been done appropriately today. But there are really only two possible explanations. Either he screwed me over, or he knows absolutely nothing about cars. I'll be interested to see which one he chooses.

On the bright side, I finished first two times this week among our morning running group. Both times I was holding pretty close to a 7 minute mile for almost 5 miles. Also on the bright side, I have a wonderful wife who baked me brownies to cheer me up, and good friends at the embassy who are happy to let me vent.

We also have lots of great things to look forward to. We're planning to take a long weekend in March to go to Uzbekistan with some friends. And over the last week I've been working on the preliminary process of planning our R&R in Italy at the end of April through mid May! As always, we're setting an ambitious plan and half the fun will be planning it. As Stephanie so rightly reminded me, the important thing is not to let a few idiots, (That's the censored description. I can think of quite a few more appropriately severe words to describe these people and have used most of them at some point today), ruin an otherwise great experience.

A Happy Ending

The great thing about a week that starts bad is that it usually ends better. This one was no exception.

As it turned out, another benefit to not having a car was that I didn't have to drive in the heaviest snow we've had so far this year, which fell Wednesday night and Thursday. It only amounted to about 4-5 inches, but I saw enough people fishtailing on the roads to be glad I wasn't behind the wheel.

When I went out to go running Thursday morning it didn't look like it was snowing that hard or that it was sticking to the roads. But when I got to the place where I usually meet my running buddies, it was becoming a bit much. My running buddies, being more astute than I, stayed home. By the time I got back (moving much more slowly due to the increasingly slippery conditions), it was snowing so hard that a pile had accumulated on my head. Good times. As always, the snow was very pretty and Stephanie was nice enough to take some pictures for me since I can't do it from the embassy.

On Friday, we were invited over to the Ambassador's house for a night of poker with a couple of other folks from the embassy as well as the Russian Ambassador and one of the folks from his trade section. Aside from having a great time, it was interesting for several reasons. First and foremost, neither Stephanie or I really knew how to play poker so it was a learn-as-you-go sort of thing. Second was that I, along with the help of one of my colleagues had to try to figure out how to explain the rules of various games in Russian to the trade advisor as he didn't speak English and the Russian ambassador was at the other end of the table. It was great practice for my Russian skills.

As I said we had a great time. Stephanie lost all her money, (it wasn't a high buy-in as we were playing for somonis), but I ended up with the highest take for the night, beating out the Russian trade advisor by about 70 dirham (100 dirham per somoni). I won enough to almost make up for Stephanie's loss. I'm thinking I only did so well because the Ambassador (ours) went easy on us. Apparently he's quite good and has even played in tournaments. Regardless, I think we'd both enjoy doing it again.

On Saturday I went for a run with one of our security officers, who I'm friends with. It was a nice run and we went down along the river with great views of the snowy mountains in the distance. Coming back however, we had another first. We were finishing up our run through the big park near the President's palace when some police officers started blowing their whistles at us. Not knowing what infraction we were guilty of, we went over to talk to them. They were perfectly pleasant to us, and seemed impressed that we had been running. They asked where we worked and we told them we were with the embassy. The whole time, they were kind of sidling us over behind the park gate so we were out of plain view. This was apparently so they could make their request for a bribe more discreet. Again, they were very polite about it, and when we explained that we aren't allowed to pay bribes, (not to mention the fact that I don't run with money), they took it in good humor. And that's the story of my first shake-down in Dushanbe.

On Saturday evening, we met some friends for a show at the opera. It was Russian, but I had trouble hearing clearly so I only understood bits and pieces. Regardless, it was a nice show with the most elaborate set I've seen so far. Finally I was able to take some pictures...

After the opera we all went to the local Hispanic Restaurant for dinner. It's always a nice change of pace from the usual cuisine. We wrapped up the night at our friends house. They introduced us to a game called Frustration, which is a lot like 'Trouble' for those of you who are familiar with that one. We also got to sample some delicious brownies with candy bars baked into them.

Today, (Sunday), is shaping up to be a nice day around the house. The mechanic brought the car over and I'm going to wash it later after doing some work in the garden. I'm also planning on incorporating some significant R&R. All in all, it seems that the next week should be starting out much better than the last one!

Not the Most Stellar Week

I suppose all weeks can't be great. And this week has certainly taken advantage of that fact. In addition to being rainy and disgusting the whole time, on Monday I noticed that one of my tires was looking pretty low. So I decided to drive down to the motor pool on Tuesday to check on a few things and get some air in the tires while I was at it. And while I got to work OK on Tuesday, when I was driving to motor pool, the steering was suddenly very difficult to manage. Not as if the power steering was out but as if it was getting stuck on something. Needless to say it was a tricky drive.

Now, I've been waiting for some replacement parts for the steering and they were supposed to come in this week. So I assumed this was related to an existing problem and it was just that the car decided it couldn't wait a few more days. However, when I got to the motor pool the mechanic said that the engine mount was broken and needs to be welded back on. Nothing too major, but one more headache. Needless to say I was nonplussed to have to call for a car to pick me up and take me back to the work. Or about the fact that I'm taking a marshrutka to and from work for the rest of the week.

Other than that, it's just been a crazy week and I'll be well shut of it when it's over. On the bright side, (yes, there's a bright side), the parts came in today. And I've discovered that I can read quite comfortably in the marshrutka, which greatly improves the trip. We also have a fun weekend planned so that's something to look forward to.

Like I said, they can't all be good, but at least the prospects for near term improvement are good.

Heck of a Haggis

It was a good Friday. Relatively quiet and appropriately brief. The only minor hullabaloo at work is the upcoming change of our cafeteria contract, which will be final on Monday. For most of the American staff, it is a rather joyous occasion as we occasionally experience rocks in our plov or servings of meat that are mostly bone, fat and cartilage. The new contract will also feature a wider variety of cuisine.

The hullabaloo comes from a good portion of the local staff, who feel that the prices are too high, (they're the same for Tajik-style dishes, which is all we've had until now, and only slightly higher for foreign dishes.) There has also been some complaint about the fate of the now former cafeteria workers - which is also unfounded as the majority of them have been given jobs by the new management. But even if that weren't true, it's a good demonstration of the lingering soviet mentality here - that people are somehow entitled to their jobs whether they perform well or not. The process for choosing the cafeteria service provider was open and fair and conducted by a committee comprised of both American and local staff. There, I've said my piece. Now it only remains to be seen whether there will be picket lines outside the cafeteria tomorrow morning.

On Friday night, we went out to the local Ukrainian restaurant with a group of friends from the embassy. The food was great as usual, but we had an odd experience with the mojito that Stephanie ordered. As far as any of us could tell, there was no alcohol. So one of our friends asked the waiter if they could add a splash more. This brought the bartender out to defend his mojito - rather angrily explaining that it shouldn't taste like alcohol. He grudgingly sent out a small carafe of watered down rum and charged us extra. After dinner, we received our charges for the next several weeks - we're dog-sitting three dogs for friends who are out of town. It's nice having the additional company.

On Saturday we were out and about. We went to the gym and I stopped by the embassy to check on the new cafeteria crew, which was setting up. Then in the afternoon we babysat for some friends of ours for a bit and had a pretend picnic with their daughter. We also were introduced to some delicious cookies that are reminiscent of the Girlscout Samoa's. Of course, we had to pick some up on the way home and during that shopping trip we picked up some pickled herring so I can try to make my own version of a popular appetizer where you eat the fish with potatoes and onion. I'll be thrilled if I can make it at home as good as the restaurants.

Saturday night, of course, we attended the much talked about Robert Burns dinner.

This dinner is celebrated all over the world and is the quintessential Scottish culture event. The event was fun with readings of Burns' poetry, some limericks, and the presentation of the haggis.

The spread was great. We had haggis (of course), neeps & tatties (mashed turnips and potatoes), and scotch whiskey.

The evening was also a charity event with money going to support aid organizations in Tajikstan and Haiti.

After dinner, the disco lights came on -rather unexpectedly the ceiling started flashing different colors.

And then we got to show off our Scottish dancing skills, which you can see in the following pictures.

So far, Sunday is looking rather dreary, but if the sun comes out we may go for a hike or to the embassy for tennis. And so another week passes in Dushanbe.