Visitors!!!

I had my first visitors from the States! Ron & Ruth. A very nice couple who also brought with them some items that my mom had mailed to them for me, as well as, some things they brought as well. It was like Christmas morning opening up that suitcase full of goodies!! A family size jar of peanut butter, a box of Cheerios, the makings of S’mores, a Frisbee, nerf football, my wiffle-ball bat (the wiffle balls had been mailed in an earlier package), and some scrapbooking and baking supplies! Yippie! I am not sure why, but it seems like any international flight in or out of Bishkek occurs before 7am. They arrived at 5:10am. We had a nice taxi bus that stopped at the store on the way home so we could pick up some food stuff. It had rained all day the day before their arrival, so I figured it would be nice the entire time they were here, but alas, it was cloudy and rainy almost the entire time they were here!! This is rather unusual for the weather here. But they are from the Pacific Northwest so they like that kind of weather. So I think it was made just for their stay! Regardless of the weather, I got show them around the city and took them on the trolley bus and marshruka. You can’t get the whole experience without riding on the public transportation! They even got to try ‘shoro’! The national drink that is like a Chuck Norris sidewinder kick in the mouth! We ate out at all the restaurants I knew (all two of them! There is a third but I could not find our way there both times I tried to take them!) It was a good thing we went out to eat with Tanya, she knew of a great little Italian restaurant! I assured them, at their next visit, I’ll know my way around the city much better, and we will be able to eat in places where the menus don’t have to be in English, (by then I should know Russian!) But I think for being here for just three months I did pretty good. The best was when we were meeting Tanya at the restaurant, we had to walk because all the taxis were busy because it had been raining all day. So here we were, the three of us walking in the rain with only our rain jackets, we didn’t have umbrellas, and it kept on pouring harder, and harder!!! Anything not covered by our rain coats was soaking wet, and as we get on the street of the restaurant, the rain lets up and even stops! It was really funny. But not. So they got to see a little bit of my life here in Kyrgyzstan, and experience some of the rainiest days we’ve had since I’ve arrived!