The Land of Enchantment: Part B

Last time I wrote about our adventure to New Mexico. This time, it's still about being in NM, but it's about the people we met, and they weren't New Mexicans. They were Kazakhs. Yes, that's right people from Kazakhstan https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/kz.html. I like this link because it's from the CIA. It makes me feel like I'm reporting on top secret military intiatives.

My dad is like a top secret government guy. He's a highly regarded, probably the best in the business trained fire arm specialist. He trains people over all the world on how to protect important things like nuclear war heads, nuclear waste, top secret facilities, etc. He runs simulations like war games to see how long and how hard it is for his team to breach security at a number of high security facilities. He's basically a bad ass and super smart. He was a special ops, Green Beret, if that tells how bad ass he really is. Anyway, he has been in NM for five weeks training 11 Kazakhs and Cole and I had the opportunity to meet some of them.

First, we met the "Colonel". And while I thought that the Kazakhs would look like Russians, they, in many cases, look Mongolian. But I didn't know this at first so when I met the "Colonel" I was a bit surprised. We met at breakfast, but he doesn't speak much English. We met up a couple hours later to go to the flea market and he brought all sorts of gifts for me, Cole and Emma. We only had said "Hi" hours earlier and now he bears gifts for us. Here is a shot of Cole with all is gifts. Amazing.

And here's a shot of us at the flea market.

Next was the "General". Yeah, that's right, basically the third guy in charge of Kazakhstan. He was so much fun and if given the chance, I think he would have eaten Cole right up. He just adored him - played "tom and jerry" with him with popcorn, wrestled, gave him chocolate, kissed, hugged. Cole LOVED him too. We sat outside for a few hours playing and talking and eating. The General doesn't speak English either so my dad played interpreter for me and Carol. The "General" was so animated when he spoke - big arms, detailed facial expressions, expressive voice tones - and it was so awesome to hear my dad interpret EVERYthing. The "General" brought out Lamb stew, pie and of course Vodka and we all ate on the lawn at the hotel. It was such a wonderful experience - laid back and informal. My dad told us alot about their customs, from eating horses and how they kill their animals (they hang them by their feet and slit the throats - it's much better for eating and cooking), to how important gifts and food are, and the does and don'ts of honoring their customs, like eating with forks, not your fingers.

Thank you for a wonderful opportunity to meet interesting people. We had a great time.