Good Bye, Kazakhstan!

Leaving Kazakhstan took some time and effort in times of pandemic. Our flights kept getting canceled, and we were never sure of the day of our departure. We were booked on Lufthansa flights on July 1st which was canceled and then rebooked for July 3rd. That flight was also canceled, and we were finally rebooked for Turkish Airlines flight leaving on July 2nd. And even then we weren't 100% sure the flight will happen. It was going to be the very first international flight out of Nur-Sultan (Astana) since they were stopped at the end of March due to closing the borders because of the pandemic. 

Our major problem was our dog Yuki. Turkish Airlines, as it turns out, was the only airline allowing pets in the cargo area during the pandemic, so we were very grateful when they announced that they would open the flights out of Kazakhstan and to America in July. To get Yuki ready, though, we had to get her travel passport (a bunch of paperwork stamped by certain government agencies allowing her to leave the country). It had to be done within 3 days of her leaving Kazakhstan. Thankfully the government agencies responsible for that paperwork opened up again just a couple of weeks earlier. It took us a few hours of running around spread over two days but we got it done! Yay! Our dog was legal to leave!

Another problem was to pack our 6 years of life in Kazakhstan into twelve 50 lb bags (two per person), we ended up with 13 bags after getting rid of a lot of things. Not too bad!

The night of our departure (which was around 2 am) we went to the mall across the street from our campus to have our last dinner in Kazakhstan. We all got different Kazakh dishes like plov, fried pelmeni and others that we came to love so much.

Then it was time to gather our stuff and to say good-bye to our apartment that was our home for the past 6 years.

This was our master bedroom. The biggest bedroom I have ever had!

Our master bedroom from the window.

This was the twins' bedroom. It was the smallest one of the three bedrooms in our apartment and the smallest one I had ever had!

This was Nika and Lina's bedroom.

Our living room and the smallest kitchen ever!

Getting ready to leave.

Our life packed into 13 bags!

We were quite a sight arriving at the airport with all of our luggage and a dog! Yuki was a celebrity as always, and a few Kazakhs wanted to take a picture with her. Even though she was a Shiba Inu and not an Akita, a lot of people in Kazakhstan thought she was like Hachiko and always wanted to pet her.

 

Spencer is at the counter in his red hat checking us in and us taking the entire space.

We checked in without any trouble, just had to pay extra for our dog. Then we took Yuki to the cargo area and went trough the passport control and to our gate where we met up with our friends, the Thomas family, who were also leaving Kazakhstan and onto their next assignment in Washington D.C. area.

Girls playing card games with April Thomas, entertaining themselves while waiting for the flight way past their bedtime!

With the Thomas family.

Flying with friends is fun!

Our plan was to fly to Istanbul and then after a short layover to fly to Los Angeles. From Los Angeles the kids and I would fly on Delta to Salt Lake City, and Spencer would rent a van and drive Yuki and our luggage to Utah (pets were still not allowed on domestic flights due to the pandemic). However, our plan came to a stop when we arrived to Istanbul and discovered that our flight to Los Angeles was CANCELED!  

We spent the next few hours figuring out our next move, mostly just waiting for the officials to decide what to do with us. They finally offered to put us on the flight to Washington D.C. the next day which we decided to take even though it would put us on the wrong end of the country. We did have to spend the night in Istanbul though. The airport arranged for us to stay at a hotel in Istanbul but we needed to get visas to exit the airport. After another hour of walking around we finally got our visas (they wouldn't take any cards just cash, so our kids came to the rescue and let us borrow cash from them. Of course, if they didn't let us, they would be spending a night at the airport instead of having an adventure!). 

Not happy! Ours was the only flight canceled that day.

We picked up our dog from the pet holding area (which also took an hour, and they almost gave us a cat instead of our dog due to some miscommunication) and then an airport shuttle took us to the Hampton Inn Istanbul Zeytinburno Hotel (very close to the Old Town) and paid for our stay there including our three very good meals. The hotel was pretty empty, just with a few customers from around the world, mostly stuck like us due to canceled flights. The staff was extremely nice and took good care of us.

Our 3 course lunch at the hotel.

Kids enjoying their meals.

After dinner we decided to walk around a bit to see the area. We were very close to the Sea of Marmara (part of the Mediterranean Sea) and we ran into some ancient fort. Not very many people were out, things were still pretty closed down all around us but the evening was very nice and it felt good to get out for a bit. Now we can add Turkey to the countries we visited even though it was not our plan at all. At least not at this time.

On a walk in Istanbul. Lina fell asleep at the hotel and missed our little adventure.

Ancient fort is behind us.

It looked like those wall were stretching for miles

Yuki zoned out at the hotel.

Yuki was a trooper. She was very happy to be with us and was acting like a world class traveler! That dog is a great travel companion!

The next morning an airport shuttle took us back to the airport where we had to go through some additional steps to check our dog back in but things went pretty smoothly. We were all checked in, booked our hotel in D.C., and on our way to America! Finally!

Istanbul International Airport was the busiest airport we've seen during our travel during pandemic, and as you can see there was plenty of space.

In D.C. it took forever to get though customs. Spencer was flagged and was interrogated about why he was coming back to America. Never mind that it is his country. We waited for him and when he was done, we were allowed to pick up our luggage and our dog. They didn't even check any of Yuki's paperwork. Spencer rented a van, loaded it with our luggage and Yuki, and took us to the Hyatt Place hotel nearby. He got up in the middle of the night to start his long drive to Utah which he made in just 2 days! That man rocks! The rest of us went to Ronald Reagan Airport in the morning and took a Delta flight to Utah. We got to Utah on the 4th of July, and it was good to be finally home.

Waiting with our luggage outside of Dulles Airport for Spencer to get back with the van.

Breakfast at the Ronald Reagan Airport at the only place that was open and serving food.

Empty airport, nice but so strange. 

After a crazy 2 days of travel Spencer made it to Payson, Utah. And Yuki made it with him!

We certainly felt blessed making it across the world in the midst of a pandemic. We made it on one of the only flights that went out of Kazakhstan, we were able to get our dog out with us (a lot of others didn't get their pets out), and even though we had some extra adventures (kind of our thing at this point in our lives) we made it safely. NU was great to re-book our flights, and Turkish offered great service. We will always remember moving across the world at the height of COVID-19!

Spring Break Trip to India Part VI

Thursday was another travel day - it was time to complete the Golden Triangle.  We got up early, ate breakfast, packed, and climbed back into the van for a long day of driving.  We drove through the same area we'd gone through when we went to the Amber Fort and to the Elefantastic.  It was nice to drive through the hills.  The road from Jaipur to Delhi was much more crowded with trucks.

The fun of the day was that we had a lot of monkeys along the side of the road, which was a lot of fun to see through the windows.  The day itself was probably the hardest day of travel - it had just been a long week, and so we were ready to be done.  We had one more period of negotiating when the driver brought us to a roadside tourist trap place.  The girls weren't hungry.  We bought everyone a soda, but everyone (at the restaurant and the driver) was unhappy that we didn't want to spend enough money.

When we got into Delhi, the traffic was very bad.  It took us a long time to get to our hotel.  We drove past the airport, but it took us over an hour from there to where our hotel was.  We had to have someone come and help guide us to the hotel from the back way because of the traffic.

Our hotel was a small micro hotel, homestay place called "The Estate."  It was terrific.  The area was very nice - when we drove to the airport the next morning we discovered we were in an area with a bunch of embassies and residences and other nice homes.

While we checked in, we were given drinks, and sandwiches.  The girls went out and played in the backyard, which had a nice playground and a trampoline.  There were also nice areas for sitting, which Yulia and I took advantage of later in the evening.  The girls had a nice movie night as part of the stay.  At five, we had dinner - they arranged for us to eat early.  The food was superb.  We had a good experience with food throughout our trip, and this was no exception.

Relaxing after a long drive

Our villa. We were on the first floor, and the girls were on the second.

One of the best dinners we had in India. They kept bringing food until everybody was full.

The living room of our villa

It was really nice and peaceful even though we were in the middle of a city chaos

These tall walls with the vines really kept the noise down

We had planned to just spend a quiet night, which is what we did, and we loved it.

The Estate was also the only place on our trip that had great Internet service!

They came in to get our beds ready for the night and left this little gift for us. Apparently they sponsor a nonprofit organization called SShrishti that reaches out to children that come from the city's so many impoverished slums and gives them care and education. It also reaches out to women from the most impoverishing communities in Delhi and rural areas of India and gives them a chance to educate themselves so they can live a better life.

Friday morning we were up and packed and ate breakfast and were out the door by 8:15.  The drive to the airport was nice.  The taxi drivers (we took two) went on the back roads and we missed major traffic jams.  We had a good check in, but the passport and security lines were quite long.  We had about an hour and a half before boarding and Yulia went to a store to use up all of the Rupees we had left over - she bought Indian candy and treats to bring back to Kazakhstan with us.

Waiting for our ride to the airport. Taraz decided to get ready for Astana's weather well in advance! :)

Goodbye, Estate! We absolutely loved our stay here!

The flight from India to Almaty was pretty bumpy, but we made it okay.  When we landed in Almaty we learned that our flight had been delayed.  I had left a book in my seat, so being delayed made it possible to get it back.  The girls were pretty tired, but they entertained themselves by dancing, practicing figure skating moves, and in general just being kids.

Mimi spent probably good two hours coaching Nika on the proper figure skating technics.

They also entertained a few little kids. This little boy tried to copy them for quite some time. 

The kids did a bit of this too.

And then they lost their minds a bit... but hey, one more hour and us, the adults would be reaching the same state of mind!

We arrived in Astana at about 10:00, and once we finished getting our bags, we ran and just missed a bus, so we had to wait for the next one.  We were home by just after 11:00.  7 days worth of India. We were home, and happy.

And of course, Astana is greeting us back with this awesome weather. But we do love to be back!

******

India was a good experience.  We loved the things we saw.  We really had a great time.  However, we also were very stressed out by the constant negotiation, the crushing poverty, and the other difficulties we encountered.  We are glad we went, but are not sure if we'll plan on going back again.

Spring Break Trip to India - Part III - Taj Mahal

On Monday morning, we woke up at 5:30 and our guide and driver picked us up at the hotel at 6:00.  We could have done without the driver, because it is illegal to drive to the Taj - Mahal in a normal vehicle, you have to use one of the provided electric vehicles or donkey or camel carts (really!)  The pick up point was only about two blocks away.

Waiting at 6:00 am outside of our hotel to be picked up to go see Taj Mahal

By the time we bought tickets, missed the first bus, started walking, and got picked up by a second bus - it was about 6:20.  We had to stand in line.  Men in one line, women in another.  Each of the men's and women's lines was further divided into local and non-locals.  The local line was mostly tour guides.  I was lonely in my line, but only had to stand for about twenty minutes.  The security procedures went pretty quickly for me and I waited for the ladies to get through their line.  That line took longer because most of the women had purses or bags that had to be inspected. Yulia had to throw out our big bucket of gum that we take with us when we travel (air pressure on airplanes....), but that was our only casualty.

Waiting in line to go through the entrance. Ladies on the left (a much longer line) and gentlemen on the right.

Waiting in line.

The grounds for the Taj Mahal are very impressive.  The building itself even more so.  The attention to detail is amazing.  The designs on the stones were made by inlaying semi-precious stones into the marble.  The marble was brought from another part of India that was over 250 kilometers away - so the labor involved in the entire endeavor was massive.  The building itself was built by Turks (the dome) and Arabs (the minarets) and Persians (the marble inlaying) and it took 22 years to build.

Darwaza-i Rauza (the Great Gate) is the main entrance to Taj Mahal.

About to go through. If you look hard, you can see Taj Mahal right through the opened gate.

Here it is!

The view was breathtaking!

One of modern 7 wonders of the world is right behind us!

It is massive and so beautiful! The minaret on the right has scaffolding around because it is currently undergoing cleaning using "mud-pack therapy" to remove yellowness from the white marble.

Gorgeous! Taj Mahal was commissioned by Shah Jahan in 1631 to be built in the memory of his second and wife Mumtaz Mahal (her name translates as "crown of the palace"), a Persian Princess and a love of his life since his childhood who died at age 39 giving birth to their 14th child. Taj Mahal carries her name (Taj is short for Mumtaz)

The Great Gate

Listening to our guide (on the right)

Just can't get enough of it.

World class travelers!

The details of the work are amazing!

Detail of jali inlay, made out of precious and semiprecious gemstones.

A view of the Yamuna River from Taj Mahal. In the distance you can see Agra Fort that we visited the day before.

Nika and her Indian pants :)

Yulia

One of the other gates

Saying goodbye to a beautiful masterpiece! 

One last photo.

Our guide took us to all the places to get good pictures and we enjoyed looking at the whole complex.  In the Taj Mahal itself we had to wear feet covers (or go barefoot) to preserve it.

Overall we spent about 2 hours on the grounds.  When we were done, we caught the bus back to the beginning of the trail and walked back to our hotel.  We packed up, ate breakfast, checked out, and then got back into the van for a long day of travel to Jaipur.

A monkey climbing up the Great Gate. We saw a lot more monkeys in Jaipur.

Our trip to Jaipur was just as long as our trip to Agra had been.  We actually had to take a detour because there was some sort of pilgrimage going on along the road that we were taking.  The farmland was pretty similar to what we had seen up until then, until we got closer to Jaipur and went through the mountains and hills.

We stopped about halfway and it was a real tourist trap.  We bought some cookies, crackers, and soda - and paid over $25.00 for just that.  It was enough to get us by, though.

Saying goodbye to Aman Homestead, the best B&B in Agra!

Busy, busy roads!

People are going to some sort of event, so we had to take a detour.

And we saw a lot of these on our detour - buffalo chips! We even saw how women were making them!

Water buffalo

Six hour drive will do it to you!

On our way to Jaipur we were going to stop at Fatehpur Sikri, the abandoned city which was founded in 1569 abandoned shortly after in 1585 due the the exhaustion of the lake supplying the city with water. However when we got there we were "attacked" by guides one of which was very persistent and kept rising the price for his services. We finally got tired of arguing with him and decided to continue unto Jaipur. This was our very short 2 minute ride in a tuk-tuk which we had to take to the entrance of the city right before we decided that enough was enough.

Getting closer to Jaipur. Hills!

We arrived at our hotel in Jaipur at about 5:00 p.m.  The hotel was amazing - and had a small pool [which was unheated, so still quite cool] and the girls were excited to swim.  After checking in, they swam, and we went to dinner at the rooftop restaurant at about 7:00 p.m.  The food at the restaurant was really good.  We ordered a bit of everything.  I ordered a mutton dish that was the most tender, most delicious mutton I've ever eaten.  The exciting part of dinner was that there was live entertainment - music and two women dancing.  They invited the girls to come and dance, and they did.  It was a fun time for everyone.

Girls' room at the Umaid Bhawan - Heritage-Style Hotel. They were in heaven!

They had this net over the pool. We suspected it was protection from birds and ... monkeys. We saw one jumping from one side of the wall to the other over the pool.

A beautiful hotel with a great attention to detail!

Lina watching the life performance at dinner. Little did she know that soon she will be the entertainer herself!

One of the dancers.

And here we go, learning the Indian dance

These guys provided the music and singing.

After dinner we hit the hay - we had to get ready for a long day of sightseeing in the morning.