I was just catching up with some of the Astana and Kazakhstan based pages over at Expat-Blog, when I realised I hadn’t yet checked out the Kazakh Nomad blog. Obviously this site, KZ Blog and also the Oyster one have been read, and in deed linked to from here in the past, but for some reason I’d not looked into the last entry on the Kazakhstan blogs page. The lady now lives in Astana, and teaches English, so I suspect she has/will cross paths with a few of our ex-pat English Language teachers. I’ll have to check around and see if anyone has met her in real life yet…
Apr 27 2010
Suggestions For Kazakhstan – Part IX
This one is pretty much a personal gripe, and not even totally aimed at the authorities/companies in Kazakhstan this time. As you may know, all of the flats in our area have simultaneously had their hot water and heating turned off before. Before Spring has even arrived! The reason was that other residents weren’t paying their bills on time, and so the company involved had apparently run out of money to pay for the diesel that powers boilers.
Other flats in Astana can apparently have the hot water and/or heating turned off individually, however in this area, the company simply shuts it off for everyone. There are different sides to this situation, as the company will point out that without the money, no one will sell them the diesel (surely non-paying of bills isn’t some sort of new situation for them though, were there no plans in place before?), some flat owners don’t live in the flat and so don’t see why they should pay money to heat a flat not used (again, paying bills for a property you own but don’t live in can’t really be a new concept?), but it boils down to plain injustice.
Why should a family with a small baby have no heating to warm the flat, or hot water to wash their child in, because some property speculator thinks buying a new car is more important than paying their debts? When we moved back to Kazakhstan, we had to get a boiler installed, as they had again cut off everyone, so this year we are at least ready prepared. We just need to remember to test it out properly before…
May the 15th will see the heating turned off (not a problem really, as the flat is already getting a little too warm since Spring arrived) and only cold water available from the pipes. (If it goes orange again, that’ll be a double whammy 🙂 ). If we didn’t have the boiler, that would mean putting kettles on just to ensure Anna didn’t have to go to bed without a wash. OK, I have finished venting for now; if any of this series seems like I’m moaning about trivial things, you may be right (on other posts at least), but I guess I just need to let off steam occasionally. Insert your own bad pun here…
Apr 27 2010
Family Friendly Taxis Of Interest?
Recently this blog has started to get a lot more traffic from people interested in life in Kazakhstan again, though I have not really been writing a lot more about Astana. One thought I had is to create a list of taxi companies that might be of interest to families living in the capital. One of the problems you find is that many cars either have the seat belts in the back hidden away, with the drivers not always wanting to pull up the seats to retrieve the anchor mechanisms. Worse than that, some cars have actually had the seat belts cut out off them, as people complain they “get in the way”. So, since Anna has been in Astana, we have tried to keep a list of drivers that own cars with working seatbelts – there isn’t a lot of point in using car seats otherwise. Would such a compilation interest anyone?
It is of course a generalization, but I’ve also found that the drivers that care enough to ensure their rear seatbelts are in good working order, also seem to drive a little more safely. One of the people we use the most definitely amends his driving style when there are children in the car.
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Apr 27 2010
Spring Lightly
With Spring looking like it may have finally decided to stick around here in Astana, even the locals have started dressing in less Winter like clothing. The snow has melted almost everywhere (except a few places where the sun is blocked out all day by tall buildings, and the river Ishim has just a few dodgy looking green patches of ice left floating). This means we can finally take off the winter sleeping bag attachment on Anna’s pushchair, making it a little lighter to carry up and down to our flat. At some point in the future, I wouldn’t mind checking around for an alternative for Anna, or something like the old fashioned lightweight frames with a simple fabric seat. Whatever the case, carting 10/11Kg up four floors isn’t fun, and although Anna is perfectly happy going up stairs, that sort of distance, with bannisters that don’t prevent small children from slipping through mean that our arms still get a good workout each time we take Anna out for some fresh air.
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Apr 27 2010
Suggestions For Kazakhstan – Part VII
As previously suggested by a friend over here in Astana, and obviously moaned about by me most times I cross a road, the pedestrian crossings at traffic lights (that is to say those that have an automated timetable for when people can cross, as opposed to the newer variety, found away from crossroads, where you press a button) REALLY should be timed so that cars are NOT allowed to drive past at the same time as you cross. Granted, almost all the drivers do stop, or swerve to a different lane, but especially when icy conditions prevail, trying to cross a six lane road, knowing that cars could (literally) come spinning round the corner at any moment isn’t great.
Combine this with the fact that drivers waiting for their light to go green normally wait on top of the crossing that pedestrians use, and you can end up in some strange places at a four ways crossroad, just hoping you can get across in time. Obviously if Anna is with us, we pretty much don’t cross unless we have been waiting since before the green man is lit up, but other times, if it is just adults involved, you tend to cross when everyone else does, meaning some of the drivers turning right, whose lights have just turned red, are particularly impatient and want to get down the road quickly, before traffic from a different direction starts trying to cut them up, and effectively queue jump.
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Apr 27 2010
Anna’s Birthday Bubbles
OK, I think I’ll skip my normal routine of providing the date that photos and videos were taken of Anna. The next few Anna’s Photos and Anna’s Videos posts are all based around her birthday, which is the 21st of February. If you’re reading this over on her blog, please assume the same date for future posts with Birthday in them 🙂
One of Anna’s presents was a bubble blowing machine. As she hadn’t seen proper bubbles before (ignoring bubble baths), we wanted to buy something that would produce a lot of them, with less mess than the normal setup would involve. Going outside, with Anna suitably covered from the cold (should any Kazakhs be reading this, the weather was a LOT warmer over in Britain than in Astana), we turned the machine on, and waited to see if it would catch Anna’s attention or not…
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Apr 27 2010
Photos And Videos From The Park To Come
Now that temperatures have swung from -20/-30C to +10/20C, more walks around Astana park are likely to be on the cards. I will try and remember to take the camera and snap a few shots, or at least use the mobile for some slightly low-res Qik videos. I just wish the makers were able to access the phone’s hardware directly, and take 640 x 480 videos instead. This would obviously take longer to stream/upload, but I think it would be worth it.
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Apr 25 2010
Suggestions For Kazakhstan – Part VI
Just a very quick one today. Upon arrival in Kazakhstan (at least in Astana airport), all visitors have to proceed through an x-ray machine, after collecting their luggage, just before they enter the arrivals area, and can hop into a car. However, this section is also useful for telling which foreigners have been to this glorious republic before… Anyone who has spent at least some time over here will often follow the lead of many locals, and simply elect to walk straight past the machines and out the door. Only once has a guy in uniform convinced me that I can not leave until I’ve waited in yet another queue and had my bags checked over again. A couple of times someone will make a small amount of noise, but if you just keep walking and assume they must be talking to someone else, nothing ever happens.
If this was on the way INTO the airport, before departing on a flight, I would be more concerned, and most likely follow the procedure, however, as I’ve most likely been through security checkpoints several times that day, and not about to get onto a plane, but into a private car, I can’t see the point. To have people in uniforms, with machines ready to scan your luggage, which most passengers then blatantly ignore does not do much for the security reassurance that I suppose these machines are there for. They certainly can’t be there as a real method of ensuring nothing dodgy enters the country.
So, airport security when leaving the airport… x-ray machines shouldn’t be voluntary, but thanks anyway…
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Apr 20 2010
TGI Friday in Astana,with Anna…
TGI Friday in Astana,with Anna,Irina&her Mum. Birthday meal is delicious so far. Custom cocktail slipped down well http://twitpic.com/1h1dha
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Apr 17 2010
Qik – Playing (losing at) Pool…
Qik – Playing (losing at) Pool With Dan In Highvill, Astana, Kazakhst by Chris Merriman http://qik.ly/BJCds
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