Sunday, February 6, 2011

Early Spring in Uzbekistan

We were in the 50s most of the week.  It cooled off on the weekend.  It is almost spring.  The fields have the beginning of green.  It rained once and cleared the air a bit.  I'd say we are about 3 weeks ahead of Kentucky.  Maybe even a week or so ahead of Louisiana.  There will be cotton growing along the silk road soon.  By the way, the traffic I hear out my window is actually on the Silk Road, connecting China and Europe.  Pretty cool stuff.

This week was another of solid work.  We did the usual breakfast at 6:30, cars at 7:15, work the morning, lunch at 12:30, work the afternoon, dinner at 18:30, catch the 19:00 bus back to the cottages, then read, watch a movie or whatever.  I stayed up too late all week.  I never got up to work out.  It is so easy to get into the habit of staying up and sleeping in.  It is not good for me.  I will get back to the morning workouts.

Friday we went out to eat instead of eating at the plant.  Uz Turk, as has been our place, was where we went.  This time we ate downstairs.  We had a bigger party than usual.  The Plant Manager, Supplier Quality Manager and a couple of drivers joined us.  The "pizza", which is actually a thin bread with cheese on it, was really quite good.  I also tried a pepper salad.  It was spicy yum delicious!  The Supplier Quality Manager and I split our entrées.  She got a chicken kabob and I of course got lamb chops.  The chicken was delish too.  The thing about the place, they don't have what is on the menu.  My boss love fries so he ordered 4 or 5 servings, for the table.  The waiter came back to tell him they had no fries.  One guy ordered something, the waiter came back because they were out, so he chose another thing.  Then the waiter came back because they were out of that.  He said I'll just have lamb chops too, figuring that would solve it.  Than the waiter came back to my boss and said they didn't have enough lamb chops for everyone who ordered them.  My boss lost it a bit and told the poor guy off.  He read him the riot act about how we work hard all week and expect good service when we come.  We all knew it wasn't his fault but so goes the life of a messenger.  That end of the table shared their chops with him so everyone ate fine.

The Supplier Quality Manager was not happy either.  What she had ordered was not in stock but the waiter did not get her to understand.  He was pointing to the chicken that was available on the menu.  She said no, I'll just have what I ordered.  He brought what they had and she was displeased.  I saw it coming from a mile away.  Imagine the barriers to communication.  The Plant Manager and one other guy are from India.  The Supplier Quality Manager is from China.  The two drivers and the waiter are Uzbek.  There were four English as a first language American at the table as well.  We are a diverse bunch, especially when you consider the Koreans, the Mexican and the Belgian, none of whom attended this meal.  Many of these folks have worked in overseas assignments for years and have traveled the globe.  Our moves to LA, VA and KY are pretty short, in comparrison.

Saturday we stayed too late to eat at the cottages.  My boss held to his promise not to return to Uz Turk, at least for a day.  We went to a place called Uz Antalia.  It was cool.  Next time I'll get a photo of the outside.  I'll upload some pictures of the inside and our HUGE shish kabobs (2 foot long I think) onto FB later.  It was the first place we've been that served alcohol.  Most had a beer, which we had sampled in the past so there was no risk.  I surprised them all when I asked for vino.  I had no idea what would come but the young lady brought a slightly sweetish dry Russian wine that I liked.  We had a really good time.

Today, you guessed it, we went to work.  If you haven't already figured it out, our department is actually the bottleneck of the plant.  At 16:00 the computer system went down, like it does every Sunday, to begin the Asia Pacific weekend batch.  It is a huge set of jobs that generates requirements and ship schedules for material required in all of the plants, in this part of the world.  We quit for the day and went to the Asaka Bizarre.  I got some apples and went in on some almonds for the office.  Then we went to Karzinga, which is a convenience store.  I bought a bottle of wine for 4000 UZS (~$2.00) and a can of Nescafe for work.  It was 17,500 UZS.  I didn't believe the clerk,  When he turned the calculator toward me, I pushed it back and shook my head.  They are kept behind the counter so I could not see the price but I saw that some had stickers.  I had the kid get me one with a sticker.  I was stunned, 17,500.  I paid it.

Well, that is it from here for now.  I'll get the next bunch of pictures up soon.  Don't forget to be grateful. 

2 comments:

  1. Knew you must have been working you butt off because your updates are slowing down. Sounds like its a lot of work and a lot of learning. My head would explode. But I'm a geezer and you're not. Thanks for taking time to share your life of Ooze.

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  2. Wow Jimmy! Quite an adventure with the earthquakes, etc. All you've been missing out here is snow snow and more snow!!!!

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