We had to get up a little earlier today for our 1030 am flight on FlyArystan. We kept getting power surges throughout the night from the passing thunderstorm and it kept resetting the a/c which left the room quite hot during the night. A bit groggy, we shuffled out to the breakfast buffet to witness absolute chaos as multiple tour groups were criss-crossing in front of us like an army of ants. We grabbed a few baked goods and bananas and called it good.
It was a 12 minute Yandex to the airport where we immediately had an issue with check-in. Apparently I mistyped Nicole’s passport number when I booked it and we had to talk to someone at a different desk. While I was next in line, a Chinese man was making bold moves to cut us. I made my best linebacker pose to block him, but he snuck around. Having now spent well over a decade as a California resident, Nicole has mellowed considerably over the years, but every once in a while, the Jersey comes back out. “Hey HEY!,” she yelled while tapping the desk in front of him. “There’s a line behind us!” He yelled something back that we couldn’t understand and while the chaos unfolded, the kind worker behind the desk smiled at me and held out her hand for my passport. I half expected the other man’s passport to enter her hand, but he and his buddies simply crowded me for the remainder.
After checking in properly, we went through customs and security. Binding the world together, as always, are obnoxious security agents. We were separated by gender and Nicole was asked to remove every lens from her camera bag as well as THE LINER. Could the x-ray not see through the foam? They were really scrutinizing her flag pins, then accused her of having coins in her bag as well. Coins? One, she had no coins. Two, are coins not allowed? I wasn’t harassed nearly as much. Jersey Nicole was out in full force and wasn’t going to take this shit. All of this happening, mind you, while other women were walking through the security line with their bags still on their person and setting off the metal detector.
Finally through security, we spent about five minutes in a priority pass lounge where I grabbed a few snacks and some bottles of water. FlyArystan is one of those airlines that charges for everything including water, so we had to prepare accordingly. Boarding at gate 11B happened an hour ahead of schedule and we took seats 4A and B with a row to ourselves and were soon on our way. We touched down in a hazy Almaty where the temperature dropped another 15 degrees from where we had just been. We are staying at a sort of cabin up the hillside from central Almaty, so we decided to make some stops in the middle of town before going to our lodging. We picked up our rental car and were on our way.
I wasn’t sure what to expect from driving in Kazakhstan, but it’s mostly civilized with the exception of people abruptly stopping to “park” in the far right lane, thus clogging up an entire lane of traffic. Our first stop was Guardsmen Park, chosen by me because it had many communistical statues and memorials to the Great Patriotic War (which is what the Soviet Union called World War Two). In the middle of the park was a large Russian Orthodox Church. And as a fine contrast to the communist statues in the park, across the street from the park was a Starbucks.
Nicole and I have a few “You Are Here” collection mugs of some places like Casablanca, Dubai, or New Mexico. Unfortunately, Starbucks terminated this collection about five years ago. Nevertheless, Nicole wanted to see if she could add any Kazakhstan-branded merch in the store. They still had the old “You Are Here” mugs for both Almaty and Kazakhstan as a whole. I let Nicole get both because I’m a swell fellow like that.
Then we walked around the neighborhood by an area called the Green Bazaar. It too was from communist times, and still a bustling market area selling all kinds of things. It wasn’t as photogenic as I had hoped, however, so we went back to the car and ultimately the Qazaq Garden cabins. It was only about 330 or so, so we weren’t ready to settle in for the night. I took Nicole to the famous Kok Tobe, and I know it’s famous because it’s on the side of one of the Starbucks mugs.
We rode a gondola to the top of the hill which took about six minutes — giving us good (albeit hazy) views of the city of Almaty. There are restaurants, some shops, carnival games, and amusement park rides at the top. I convinced Nicole to do a ride called “Fast Coaster,” which was a sort of self-propelled small coaster where Nicole and I were effectively on a summer luge sled with a brake. After feeling we had adequately seen everything the hill had to offer, we went to Dostyk Plaza, which is a massive shopping center. We first went to Galmart to get some bottles of water and other provisions for our cabin. Then we had dinner at a restaurant inside the mall. I had beef stroganoff and after some deliberation over the menu, Nicole had a margherita pizza.
Finally we called it a night and headed back to the cabin. Ah, but wait! Our cabin comes with its own private sauna and no day would be complete on this vacation without a trip to sauna. After the sun went down, it actually got quite chilly here, so it felt nice to warm up a bit . . .or a lot. Tomorrow we plan to get outside the city more and explore a bit of nature.
passports & pepto bismol 