Safe in Olgii

I landed on the dirt airstrip in Bayan Olgii province last night around 8pm. Max and Alex picked me up and drove me to Alex's apartment. The building is concrete, needing serious patchwork, with exposed rebar on the stairway. The apartment is small, but Max and I will share the living room until some guests leave her mother's ger. My first day in Olgii was one of laughter and embarrassment. Alex's apartment does not have a bathtub, so we all packed up and went to the bathhouse. I'm still traumatized from my experience in Turkey, but there was no other choice. Actually you pay 1000 for a good douche, and you're set for a few days. (That's the equivalent of $1 and douche is the Kazakh word for shower.) I used extra soap, knowing it would be a few days before returning. Following the showers, Max and I visited the market. It is an outdoor maze of wood and aluminum stalls filled with clothes, shoes, dry goods, dairy products, fruits/veggies and lots of meat parts. At noon we met her mom at Altai Crafts (www.altaicraft.com), her women's project. From there we went to a Russian restaurant, where I had borsch (beet juice soup with cabbage, carrots, beets, potatoes, and mutton balls) and a peroshky (deep fried dough stuffed with mutton, rice and onions). It was delicious. Max and I returned to the market after lunch. We ventured to the food area. There was a pungent smell that turned my head. I realized I was looking at hugs blocks of cheese bigger than basketballs. They also had large blocks of butter, from which they cut what you need.

On the way out of the market, Max bought an "ice cream" cone. I tried to talk her out of it, but she insisted. When the vendor opened the cooler, there 30-40 cones, like the swirled ones at Dairy Queen, stacked up. I'm convinced it was not a dairy product. It did not melt, and it really wasn't that cold. Max said it was terrible. I didn't try it. Eating petroleum is off the chart for me.

As I was taking a photo of the ice cream, two men volunteered for a picture. I took it and remembered Max told me she always gives people a little change in exchange for the photo. So I gave them the equivalent of two cents and started quite a ruckus. We had Max's mom's interpreter, who said they didn't want my money. They were totally insulted. "Max, you told me that was the protocol!" Max explained you only pay little kids, not old men. Oh well.

By the way, 5 people were killed and 300 seriously injured in the UB riots. Crazy.Baca selengkapnya