Working and eating

Monday and Tuesday were very productive days at the lab. I’m very impressed with how quickly the project collaborators are picking up on how to use a GIS and the various analysis tools. On Tuesday, we reviewed in the morning and then I gave them their practical exam. I was pleased with the progress and decided to go out for lunch with everyone.  We went to a local restaurant that was in a really cool setting. It was an open air restaurant with tables scattered amongst trees and two waterfalls flowing through the middle. We ordered several different types of soups, but I don’t know how to spell them. My soup was a creamy mixture (similar to potato soup) that included tomatoes, parsley, and corn.
We finished at the lab around 4:30ish, then I went back to the hotel to prepare the workflow for the next day. In between all of that, I walked down one of the streets near the hotel to the supermarket. Supermarkets in foreign countries are always fun to explore. It’s fun to see all of the different breads, meats, snacks, drinks, and other local food items. One of the oddest things that I discovered in this particular supermarket was the lack of peanut butter – oh well, I guess no PB&J snacks for me.
Wednesday and Thursday were filled with setting up databases with Bolat and Talgat, but tonight I decided to walk back to the supermarket I had visited a few days ago. I was going to just stay in the hotel because it has been raining off and on, but it cleared up before dark. Anyway, the supermarket is actually located at the front of a mall called the Promenade so I explored the mall. It’s similar to a small mall built in the ‘80s that you would find in the US. I went to the food court and there were 5 restaurants – all owned by a “chain” called King Burger – seems interestingly similar to Burger King, but after checking out the menus at each food stand I decided that this was definitely not Burger King. One stand had pizza…..topped with horse sausage and another had a hamburger that looked like a normal burger king hamburger in the picture, but after looking at the burger I’m not too sure that it was made entirely of beef (but likewise, the US version probably isn’t made entirely of beef either). I finally decided on Manty (fast food style). It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t the best I had ever eaten either. On the way back to the hotel, I spotted a restaurant across the street called “Happy Burger” – hmm – maybe the Kazakh version of McDonalds. Anyway, I’m back in my hotel room now after my night of discovering Kazakh fast food.