March 30, 1999

The girls went to school for the first time yesterday and were happy with everything. Our day had a rough start at 5:30 AM when the embassy escort to take Ted to his 7:00 AM flight rang the doorbell. It seems that daylight savings time had changed in the night, a full week before we were expecting it to, and it really was 6:30 AM. Ted threw everything together, flew out of here, and made the flight. I woke the girls up and the school bus came at 7:15 AM our time. But when Lydia got to school, she found out that even her teacher wasn't aware that the time had changed and was late. When Ted phoned me that evening from the other side of Kazakhstan, about four hours away, he said that the time had not changed there. It might be specific to this city. Anyway, now we are caught up. I have not yet found the English version of the radio news, Voice of America that comes out of Washington. We were listening to it at 9 PM here, but now, with the time change, I will have to experiment. Maybe when the time changes in Washington DC, the program will return to 9 PM.

At school, the Almaty International School, Rose found that out of a class of about 14 children, she was only the second American. She remembers that 3 were from Korea, 1 from Japan, 1 from Canada, 3 Russians, 1 from India, 1 from New Zealand, 1 from Australia. Both girls are fascinated with what children bring to eat for lunch (most unusual: sushi) and Rose was offered a piece of dried seaweed for a snack. She made friends fast and enjoyed the day. She noticed that as they did a variety of writing assignments, everyone used different forms of paper. Notebook paper with lines is not available here; the notebooks in the stores have the graph paper squares. She was allowed to spend the noon break and recess in the art room, where they were working on a form of cloth dyeing called batik, a form of covering the cloth with wax and removing it in layers, using dye between layers. She said the cloth would be used to make a quilt. She began Russian lessons and learned the names of the colors. In all the subjects, the children are put in small groups that reflect their ability in that subject. She said that only 3 children were in her language class, which I call remedial Russian. Some children come to this school knowing no English, and with help, are caught up to the ability level of their age peers within four months.

Out of a classroom of about 14, Lydia was one of only four girls. She says they are very happy to have another girl. Her classmates also come from all over the world, although she remembered only where the girls came from. She found that they played basketball in physical education, which is usually held in a gymnasium that they are bused to. Yesterday, the gym was being cleaned, so they played outside on a concrete court. Lydia had homework in geometry that required a compass, so we designed one from pencils, points, rubber bands, and a crescent wrench. Our shipment of supplies has not arrived here yet, and it is a fun challenge to make do. Lydia has decided that she will use the gate key to let Rose and herself out to the school bus, because she is embarrassed that I wave to the kids on the bus if I escort them to the gate. It begins . . . . .

We have photos to share with you. We realized that if we embed them in the journals, only those of you with American Online will be able to see them. If we send them as attachments, some of you will not be able to download and view them. Ted designed a web site where we have put some photos. Over time we will change the photos. Today I seem unable to find the address of the site to give to you. Later this week, I will email you the site address, even if I have to wait until Ted returns to get it for you. These journal entries are also posted on the web site.

As I have mentioned before, we live in a neighborhood where many houses are under construction. Behind our house, there is an unusual one that is being built of wood, in a "Canadian style". This made the local news last weekend and many people have come out to see it and take pictures. Here it is very unusual for a house to be built of wood. They are made of concrete block with bricks on the outside for decoration. All the concrete is mixed by hand and carried for the construction. The walls of our house are fully 28 to 35 inches thick. At each window, there is an inner wooden windowsill of at least a foot deep and outside the glass, there is a sill of bricks at least another foot deep. Ted says it will be a wonderful place to fill with potted plants. All the windows have wooden sashes and are double paned to keep out the cold. To open a window, you unhook it and swing it into the house like a small door on hinges. We also have at least four small decks that have wooden doors with windows in them to access the decks.

The floors of our house are made of wood, like parquet floors. They remind me of American quilts, in particular the patterns called log cabin and Texas star. The wood is a series of light and dark colors of wood, placed in designs on the floor. I will include pictures of the floor in future editions of the web site. Another common building material on the interior of houses, ours included, is tile. Our bathrooms are tiled on all sides, including the ceilings. Our other walls are covered in plaster, with plaster designs worked into the ceilings. All the water heat radiators have a decorative wooden housing around them so each room looks like it has oak wainscoting on the lower part of the walls.

To the side of our house, a crew of 10 men works each day on what seems to be a yard. They are mostly digging and transporting the dirt to a nearby empty lot. They use two wheelbarrows and one wooden stretcher to carry the dirt. I wonder if they are laying a patio or something, it does not seem like they are landscaping.

As we begin our third week here, I think we are adjusting well. We missed in particular the Chrism Mass in Charleston this week. Rose and I have been attending that since the year she was two. Take care my friends. Brecken