April Showers...

I turned 24 in Kyrgyzstan, on the 14th of April. I’ve always felt older than my age, but 24 seems like a good year. It rained all day, but it was productive nonetheless. I cleaned my entire apartment – since my friend from Talas was coming down for the week, and worked a bit. I got 2 packages from the post office. In the evening I made pizzas with the other volunteers at Meg and Theo’s place. I splurged on canned olives to add to the fresh basil, spinach, and sun-dried tomato toppings. So gourmet! Karen made brownies – my favorite. It was a great night, concluded with a few competitive rounds of catch phrase.

On Tuesday of last week, one of my NGOs had a project writing training from 9-5. It was in Russian and I understood most of what was going on. After lunch my brain was fried, but I stuck it out. When I got home I was so exhausted. But – since I fixed my oven I decided to christen it, so I made green bean casserole! Yummy!!

So my friend from Talas hung out for the week, which was fun. She gave a presentation for the leadership workshops.

I got a fridge finally, on Thursday! My landlord was pretty resistant to my pleas, so I busted out some Russian to negotiate. I think he was impressed/entertained so he finally gave in. He said his family was getting bigger so he needed to buy a new one; I got his old one. It’s so nice to be able to refrigerate my milk, cheese, and eggs and have cold beverages. How did I live 5 months without one?!

My good friend Karen left Kyrgyzstan (again) on Saturday. Her farmer-to-farmer project with Winrock International ended, so she said goodbye and packed up. It’s going to be strange not having her and her baked goods around.

Hopefully all these April showers will bring lots of fruits and veggies in the months to come.