Picture Day

When we arrived at the baby house this morning we were told to go get Nikolai and that we were leaving immediately to get his passport picture taken. The class was running a little late on its normal schedule and none of the babies had eaten yet. So one of Nik's favorite caregiver fed him really quick while everyone else quickly dished out food for the rest of the babies – most of whom were crying by this point. I cannot believe how hard the caregivers work and how calm they stay despite the insistent little ones all around.

The car ride to the photo place was an adventure. I am not sure if he has been in a car that he can remember. He was not really worried but watched everything, turning his head quickly as if trying to follow the things as they went by; I am surprised he did not get car sick. In the passport photo, the baby is supposed to have their mouth closed – which took several tries to get, once we got him to stop staring at the mirrored ceiling.

Back at the baby house we went for a walk since he was already dressed for outside. By the time we got inside to play, Nikolai was exhausted. He just wanted to be carried around, with occasional banging of the cups together and watching the singing caterpillar. His cold/ bronchitis is so bad that it seemed he could barely breathe. I really hope he is ok. He does not feel warm or seem to have a fever, so that is good at least.

Life in Astana
The landlady called yesterday morning to tell us the cable installer would be here either before or after 12 – we did not quite catch which. I cannot imagine not speaking any Russian here and trying to do things like this. When I picked up the phone the landlady spoke Russian and I quickly handed the phone to Chris, who could at least determine the reason for the call and the person calling.

We have gone for lots of walks, shopped at the grocery store, and bought pizza at the place down the street (very good pizza!) but otherwise we have not really ventured out much. We have only seen one small café nearby and are mostly cooking at home, which is fine. Since the grocery store does not have much produce we had asked earlier in the week to go somewhere to buy vegetables. They said this kind of trip had to be planned, and they would take us to the bazaar on Friday. So today we went to buy fruits and vegetables in a big building that has lots of little stands inside, each one of which is like a farmer’s produce stand. We got some great tomatoes, cucumbers, cauliflower, scallions, garlic, grapes, and apples. We definitely will have to go back to this market in the coming weeks.

Last night one of our neighbors stopped us in the hall to ask if we had a key to the stairs. Apparently we were not the only ones worried about the stairwell being locked. If we ever lost power we would not be able to go visit our baby as we would be stuck on the 7th floor! I was hoping one of the neighbors would contact someone to unlock the door since it seemed to be a task best handled by someone who can actually speak Russian. And this morning the doors were unlocked! There are actually three doors with key locks between us and the stairwell. Currently the doors are open and the keys are there – I hope it stays that way.