Sep 15 2010

Comparing Walkers

Category: Anna's PhotosChrisM @ 9:51 pm

This is (almost) it! Four more photo based posts and this site will be up to date with pictures taken during our last trip to the UK! All the videos have been published already, and if you check out this site’s YouTube channel, you’ll see I’ve already uploaded the last 4.5 months worth of videos recorded in Kazakhstan. This means there are now 538 videos there! I will try and increase the amount of posts written per week until we get close to real time publishing again. I still need to go through and title most of the recent videos, and select which photos to use and then process them.
Anyway, these photos were shot on the same day (15th of March 2010) as the A Promenade Around Cheltenham Promenade post. Since March, she is now happy (sometimes too eager and wants to go solo) climbing stairs, and can almost manage all of the four floors up to our flat!

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Sep 13 2010

Same here, no hot water & no h…

Category: TweetsChrisM @ 3:30 pm

Same here, no hot water & no heating this winter – RT @kzblog: Autumn has come2Astana.It is cold outside.Wish we had hot water. That is all.

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Sep 07 2010

Plane Tickets

Category: PersonalChrisM @ 10:41 pm

I am pretty sure that this post will end up working my anti-spam plugins overtime, but I was wondering if anybody knew of where to get good Astana <> Britain tickets – price wise? Back in 2006 ChrisD managed to find a return flight that was ridiculously cheap, something silly like two to three hundred pounds. Whenever we go back to the UK for Christmas/have family or friends over, we try to find the cheapest deals going, but never really get very far. We obviously try Travelocity, Expedia and LastMinute , and then once we’ve found the cheapest flights, check the airline’s own website, in case there are special offers on. For a short while, Air Astana had a great deal on return flights (but only from Kazakhstan and back again, not vice versa) but that offer expired. Anyway, does anyone have a tip of where to look, or alternative approaches to consider? Mum will be here in Astana in a little over two weeks, so it would be too late to save her money, but we are hoping to go back to Wales around Christmas/New Year time, so if we need to book well in advance for savings, now would probably be a good time to check, I’m assuming.

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Aug 29 2010

Just shot this clip (#qik) htt…

Category: Anna's Videos,TweetsChrisM @ 4:19 pm

Anna Raving At Vaqueros, Astana, Kazakhstan.

Just shot this clip (#qik) http://qik.ly/CJebu

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Aug 14 2010

NE1 know what is going on in A…

Category: TweetsChrisM @ 3:34 pm

NE1 know what is going on in Astana Park 2day?Will look on the way 2 the English lesson.Wonder if I can change time due 2 Galactica marathon

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Aug 11 2010

Kรคwap Restaurant For Another Birthday Celebration

Category: Anna's Photos,Eating Out,Friends,PicturesChrisM @ 7:00 pm

Another post where I’ve taken a few individual tweets and tidied them into one entry. 11th August was my mother-in-law’s birthday, the day after Ira and my wedding anniversary. We headed on downstairs to the new Azerbaijani restaurant located on the ground floor of our building. We hadn’t tried it before, and there was no one else there during our meal, so we were assured of their undivided attention ๐Ÿ™‚ Losha’s parents (Igor and Natalya) joined us, and over all Anna was pretty well behaved.

First up we have a quick picture of a salad that was ordered. It doesn’t come out so well with a wobbly camera phone shot, but in the middle of the plate is a radish carved into a rose shape. Very pretty. Personally I have no idea how it tasted, as I’m not a huge fan of rabbit food (meat, potatoes and pasta are my favourite core ingredients), but no one seemed to complain.

Radish Rose - Really!

Radish Rose - Really!

They didn’t have any highchairs, and after trying to get Anna to repeat her previous good behaviour in such situations, we gave up and grabbed the one from our kitchen.

There was in fact no turkey sashliq despite it being on menu. This has happened in a few places in Astana. If you have your hopes set on a certain dish before you arrive, best to phone ahead and speak to someone first. Otherwise a good selection of various sashliqs (kebabs). We asked for something without any bone or lots of gristle (I love the taste of meat, but hate thinking about the fact that it used to be an animal. If steak wasn’t so tasty, I might have been converted into a vegetarian in another life. That would mean eating vegetables though. Anyway, I digress…). When the kebab arrived, it was on the bone still. The waitress didn’t seem to understand why we were surprised to see bone in a dish she recommended for having no bone.

Considering that the dรฉcor and ambience of the place was reasonably up market, the vodka & beer was reasonably priced. The baursaki were tasty, but most definitely reheated to make them seem over fresh. Better than stone cold and greasy to be honest ๐Ÿ™‚ The chicken lyalya (spelling ?) shashliq was tasty. Basically minced chicken shaped into a sort of sausage shape.

Chicken Kebab - No Bones

Chicken Kebab - No Bones

At one point Anna seemed to get a bit bored, and decided to get the camera out. I’ve not yet checked the memory card to see the sort of shots achieved.

Anna In Her Highchair

Anna In Her Highchair

Finally, during a cigarette break outside, I took a quick picture of the restaurant name. I couldn’t step any further back, so had to take a diagonal shot. Luckily our WiFi signal just reaches downstairs to this point, so I was able to upload some pics without using up my KCell credit ๐Ÿ™‚

I'll Rewrite This Caption When I Know How To Spell The Name

I'll Rewrite This Caption When I Know How To Spell The Name

oh, I’m hoping someone can correct me on the correct spelling in latin characters for the restaurant?

[edit]
Thanks to Oleg and Walton for their help with the spelling, I’ve updated the post to reflect this.

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Aug 10 2010

At Assorti with for a meal wit…

Category: Anna's Photos,Eating Out,TweetsChrisM @ 7:36 pm

At Assorti with for a meal with Anna and Irina. Our anniversary today. Nine years! Ira’s Mum’s birthday tomorrow. http://twitpic.com/2debyp

Irina And Anna At Assorti - Anniversary Meal

The pizza was lovely, the portion size of the fluorescent green garlic bread was very generous, however it could have done with a bit more actual garlic flavour to it. They have a high chair there, and the service is very good. Here ends the compressed review of the Assorti restaurant in the top floor of Mega, Astana ๐Ÿ™‚

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Aug 07 2010

Petropavlovsk Photos

Category: Kazakhstan,Personal,PicturesChrisM @ 1:52 pm

This is the area around Aunty Sveta’s place in Petropavlovsk (I think the government now wants it to be called Petropavl, but most people I spoke to still add the ovsk. This area of Kazakhstan is very close to Russia, so it is possible that the renaming is an attempt to make it sound more Kazakh).


View Larger Map

The EDGE (think about GPRS v2.5 ๐Ÿ™‚ ) connection maxed out at 16kbit/sec (about three times slower than old fashioned dial up internet access on computers), consequently I unable to upload shots to twitpic until I returned to Astana.

Travelling From Petropavlovsk's Airport Into Town

Travelling From Petropavlovsk's Airport Into Town



Urban Area Of Petropavlovsk

Urban Area Of Petropavlovsk

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Aug 07 2010

Anna’s Airport Breakfast

Category: Anna's Videos,Eating Out,PersonalChrisM @ 8:05 am

Once again I’m combining a few posts into one, as they are on similar themes, and don’t really need to push the older posts off the front page so quickly.
This first post are of a couple of videos we shot whilst waiting for our flight in Astana airport

Ira’s Dad decided it was time for us all to go and check in, though we wanted to wait for Anna to finish her breakfast first. Anna saw him walking away and ripped her bib off, which sort of made our decision for us!

Oh, I realise that this isn’t really an “Eating Out” sort of post, but it gives you a quick glimpse of the cafe located on the second floor of Astana airport.

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Aug 07 2010

I’m at Astana Airport (Astana)…

Category: TweetsChrisM @ 7:32 am

I’m at Astana Airport (Astana). http://4sq.com/cCQfb5

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