08 December, 2014

In A Stranger's Land: Part II

(This is a continuation to my previous post "In A Stranger's Land: Part I")

Kitchen Conversations

        The hostel common kitchen was one of my fav. spots in the hostel, other than my room of course. May be that's why I had taken to cooking so much. Apart from my new found fascination for cooking, it was the anticipation of meeting someone new that dragged me to the kitchen everyday.

       Once while I was cooking, I met these 3 guys- Tim, Ruslam (Rus, as he said his friends called him) and 'the 3rd guy' (i'm very bad at remembering names). They were so friendly! We talked about Almaty, India, Bollywood...Rus and Tim sang 'I am a disco dancer' for me and asked me when was I cooking an Indian meal for them (I never got a chance to do that, though I had promised).  Rus was particularly interested in knowing about Mumbai as he had read 'Shantaram' (I hope he didn't have the Shantaram's version of Mumbai in his head- full of filth and crime). After that night's kitchen conversation, I hadn't met Rus again. But then once, a week before I was leaving for India, I saw him walking on the street. He said he was leaving the hotel and looking for a flat. He said perhaps one day he'd come to Mumbai "the Shantaram way" and moved his head from side to side like a Bharatnatyam dancer while saying that. :p

        I kept bumping into Tim quite often. He was Russian and looked like one of the Backstreet Boys. He always wore beach shorts with nothing on top and on rare occasions, when he thought it was too cold to go around bare chested, he teamed it with a beach shirt. Whenever the matrons had something to tell me, they would call him to translate, as the matrons didn't know English. My replies would invariably be "ya ya ya" cuz, how on earth can you concentrate on the conversation when a Backstreet Boy with hazelnut eyes is staring right at you and talking!! :p
       There was this guy in the hostel who would always greet me. But I could never recognize him. May be it was 'the 3rd guy'. May be with his name, I had also forgotten his face. :p All I knew was that he was Russian and good looking. It is very easy to tell the Russians from the Kazakhs. The Kazakhs have those 'Chinee eyes'.

        Our common kitchen also had an ironing table, opposite the kitchen slab. The men would come there, take off their shirts, iron it, wear it back on and be off to the college. The short strip tease made up for my morning dose of entertainment. :P Thankfully, the women didn't take short cuts at ironing. So once, this guy came to the ironing table while I was cooking. We had the usual conversation- "Oh, so you are from India?" "How do you like Almaty?". Then he asked me if I'd liked to come to his room (No. 16- I still remember that) and stripped off his shirt to iron it. I saw the tattoo on his chest and thought how well timed his offer and his stripping was. But I wasn't going to change my mind looking at his tattoo and politely said I was busy that night. Then he asked me if I understood Russian, and I replied "chut chut", which means 'little little' in Russian. And thought how well timed even my reply was. Though he didn't get the irony in that line. :p

The Park

         Almaty is known for its scenic views and its landscape gardens. Surrounded by 5 majestic mountains, Almaty sat at its lap. It is bountifully blessed with God's best gift to the humankind- Nature. Almaty is so green that if a cartographer would accurately color code its street view map, it'd be entirely painted emerald.
The park right next to my hostel street was my fav. hangout spot there. I'd spend most of lunch hours basking in the sun and taking in the breeze of that park. It had this magnificent canal flowing right in middle of the park, stretching for kilometers. When the sparkling waters reflected the hues of the sunrise and sunset, I'd be compelled to pause my thoughts and my movements, and just silently take in the beauty.
         The streets everywhere were pedestrian friendly, thanks to proper traffic rules and street planning. The pavements and the main roads there are separated by a row of shrubs and trees, making it convenient for pedestrians to walk and cycle along the lane carefree. At places where there are no pedestrian crossings, the zebra markings work just as efficient. If a pedestrian even steps on the zebra crossing, the vehicles are compelled to wait for them to cross. The mortality rate due to road mishaps would've dipped in India if only we added sense in city planning.
       One evening, Samal, her friend and I went out for a stroll in the park. Our conversation took many directions as wound through the green lanes, chocolate ice cream dripping over our fingers.
"So you watch Bollywood! Ahh...tell me about your favs!", I mused.
"Oh..who's that guy..Shah Rukh Khan. So handsome! But we all are huge fans of Mithun..Mithun Chakroborty..what was that song...", Samal tried recollecting.
And just then her friend started singing and dancing, "Jimmi Jimmi Jimmi, Aja aja aja....Jimmi Jimmi Jimmi, Aja aja aja.."
I couldn't contain my joy at seeing an overseas lady doing a Hindi Bollywood item, complete with the actual steps. Samal and I joined in to her groove..."Aja re mere saath, O kaali kaali raat....Jimmi...Ajaa....Jimmi..O Ajaa" We laughed and sang all the way...
          The world was getting smaller for me. I was discovering that people are all the same in their own unique way, no matter which part of the world you go. The stranger's land was beginning to feel like my own... :)  

17 March, 2014

In A Stranger's Land: Part I

"I'll spread my wings and i'll learn how to fly,
I'll do what it takes till I touch the sky.
I'll make a wish, take a chance, make a change
and breakaway..
Out of the darkness and into the sun
but I won't forget all the ones that I love
I'll take a risk, take a chance, make a change
and breakaway..."

         This was the song and the emotion with which I left from Mumbai...and was on my way to Almaty, Kazakhstan. Well, it all started months back- the search, the applications, the acceptance and then the final arrival of my visa. But for and.therefore.i.am it will start from the day I got my very first jitters of going to Almaty for my 1 month internship in Almaty Institute of Power Engineering and Telecommunication (AIPET). It was when I turned my head to give a final look at my mom and sis through the taxi window, their figures diminishing with every jerk of the cab. Dad was coming with me till Delhi. Then from Terminal 3 to the Almaty airport and further on, it was a journey I had to make on my own.

Impressions

        Almaty came to me as a surprise. Nothing like what I had imagined or heard of. Most people after hearing Kazakhstan think of burkha clad ladies and men with AK47. Dude! Every "-istan" is not Afghanistan or Pakistan. Kazakhstan is a blend of the European and the Asian culture.


      Kazakhstan, then a part of the USSR has Russian and Kazakh as its major languages. Though they are taught English in schools, no one here seems to speak much of it due to lack of practice. Youngsters can still manage a bit of broken English.

       I was picked up from the airport by 3 beautiful women and an awesome car. Samal was the first friend I had made there. She smiled and laughed whenever she got stuck with some word. We both carried Russian-to-English dictionaries. My first impression about the city was formed while sitting in Samal's car (on my way to the hostel from the airport) listening to the radio. It played all the top US charts- Katty Perry, Adel, Pitbull, Ludacris, Rihana and so on.

       It's surprising how one can listen to songs without knowing what they mean. I had once asked a girl if she gets what they sing or rap in English. She said she doesn't bother figuring it out. She just loves the way it sounds. I had also heard Kazakh pop music and Russian rap. The plumber in our hostel would often play it on his mp3 player in such a loud volume that irrespective of my choice, I had to listen to it. And I 'loved the way it sounded.' ;) Youngsters here are huge fans of heavy metal and Indipop. Also many (esp the old) are big time fans of Bollywood music and dancing. Will tell you more about that in just some time.


The Women
       A friend of mine in India had told me that the male to female ratio in Kazakhstan is very poor. This place is every bachelor's paradise! The women here are smoking hot! Every other girl looks like a super model. Slim, fashion obsessed and dolled up. What I really liked is that even though being a Muslim dominated country you will never get that feeling while you're here. It is one of the most liberal countries I have ever been to. There are absolutely no restrictions on eating or dressing on its people and no rules that make it compulsory for you to pray 5 times a day. Many don't even go to the Mosque or Mishet, as they call it. There was hardly anyone in Almaty who wore just a plain tee and jeans let alone wear a burqa/ hijab. You will find the ladies here in mini skirts, shorts, tunics, woolen nets over bikinis (yea, you read it right. Once I spotted a lady in this outfit carrying an office bag. Was she really going to turn up for work in that?!), high heels, matching bags and all things a Vogue- literate girl would wear. Even my Univ professors were in tunics. For the first time, being fully covered up made me feel awkward and stared at. I wish I had carried some short skirts along! The devuchki(Russian for girls) also had poker straight long hair. How do they do that?! I mean c'mon, not every girl in Almaty can decide on getting her hair straightened! Was it an epidemic I was unaware of or were they born this way?! I wish I hadn't cut my hair short before coming to Almaty. And how can they possibly manage to walk everywhere in those stilettos! So I decided to figure it out. I bought myself a pair of pretty blue heels (honestly, it was just a platform. But still higher than the heels of my daily sports shoes) and set off to give it a trial run (read: stroll). All determined to act like one of those pretty Kazakhi devuchki. Only to be back home with a sprained ankle. :(