Summer is here and we are back

We are back after three weeks of joy, sleepless nights, long walks and intensive growth. Take a look how Vincent has changed:

With daddy (about 1 week old)

little-little legs

6 days old

6 weeks old (6 kilo)

Slingomama

Wearing a sling and different kind of wraps is trendy here. I bought a sling and thought it was an easy thing to use. Well, after some failed attempts to put my baby in a comfortable position we both were exhausted and almost ready to give up. Luckily, there are so called "sling meets" for mums who use or want to use the sling and like us struggling with it.

Here you see some of the mums with there babies.Vince was the youngest participant among the babies, besides, he was eating when we took the pictures and his head is covered.

Russian "solyanka" under military sauce

I was among those who didn't watch the Eurovision song contest first semifinal. It was enough to watch the video how the the host country promotes itself in the show. It was a wierd mix of t.A.T.u "Don't gonna get us" with Alexandrov Red Army Choir (!), drummers, kalinka-malinka, Roma and Cossack dance in front of pink tank and blue jet. Was it a joke? If not, what message is Russia trying to get through?

Well, Swedish Tingeling is actually more about truth then sterotypes. The whole idea was anticipated in the Tingeling video.

Anyways, military messages contradict the whole idea of Eurovision and I really hope Russia will make a great peaceful show at the final on Saturday.

The Great Canyon... in Kazakhstan

Do you know that the Gran Colorado Canyon in the US has a real brother - The Great Charyn Canyon in Kazakhstan, 200 km far away from Almaty city? The place is also called Valley of the Castles.

Last weekend my husband and his colleagues made a trip to the canyon. Look at the scenery!

The trip took the whole day including walking up and down in the canyon area. We were considering going together with Vincent, but stayed away of this crazy idea taking a three-weeks old baby to a desert-like place.

Victory Day!

While different countries have different versions of the World War II history, the sacrifice of the Soviet people in defeating fascism should never be forgotten. 64 years have passed, but May 9 or Victory Day is remembered and celebrated in Kazakhstan.

Yesterday we took a walk at the Panfilov Park, where the main festivities took place. Vincent were sleeping despite the live concert at high volume.

In front of the war memorial in remembrance those who died during the second world war, people laid flowers at the site of the Eternal Flame. Thousands of flowers! Another park, just behind the "spaceship" house we live in. The park is so well groomed that the police station is placed there. I love yellow tulips, suddenly it reminds me of "Yellow tulips/Желтые тюльпаны" song by Natasha Koroleva. It was my first summer camp, I was 13.

Breastfeeding is a life-style

There are three reasons for breast-feeding:
the milk is always at the right temperature;
it comes in attractive containers;
and the cat can't get it.
Irena Chalmers

Having a baby makes your life different, I would say very different. Almost all time goes to breastfeeding Vincent. We are two employees with full-time and overtime job: Vince is responsible for eating and me for feeding him. He is always hungry my little boy, he also likes to combine sleeping and eating. In between I try to do some basic things such as taking a shower or grabbing some food for myself. No wonder there is almost no time for blogg update. I'll be back soon with some nice pictures.

Vincent Antonio's Grand Entrance!

Our baby boy, Vincent Antonio, was born last Monday, April 20 at 16.49 at "Keruen-Medicus" maternity clinic in Almaty. He weighed 3700 gr and is 55 cm long.

Our delivery story is short -- the whole delivery took less then 2,5 hours.

As I wrote before, I was laid at to the maternity clinic for observation on Monday, the 20Th of April. We arrived to the clinic and I didn't know what to expect and how long I would stay there.

My husband R and I speculated that our baby wanted to be born under the Taurus sign since it was the last day of the Aries. At the mid-day we were sure there were no chance to be born the same day.

The nurse checked me at 14.30 and at the same moment waters had broken .Almost immediately I went into labor with a lot of pain, contractions were strong and came every second minute. R arrived and helped me with massage, I tried to remember the breathe technique and it helped a lot in the beginning. After one hour of unbearable pain, shaking knees and sweating I called for epidural. I was told that labor usually takes between 12 and 18 hours for first-time mom. Just thinking about pain for another 10 or more hours was impossible. I got epidural and had to wait for another 20 minutes until there were no pain. Not long after it was time to push. I couldn't believe it. After another 20 minutes our baby was born. The whole delivery took 2 hours and 20 minutes. Vincent made a fast entrance into this world under the Aries sign. It was amazing and unrealistic to feel his body at my stomach. R helped to cut the birth cord.The clinic staff were surprised that everything went so smooth without even tearing. Who said that a 29-year old women is too old to be a first-time mom?

Too old, too tall

40 weeks and 4 days today. Yesterday I went to the clinic for a check control. Three doctors checked me up and concluded that there are two major reasons for my post-term pregnancy:
1.I'm too tall. So my hormone balance is somewhat out of balance.
2. I'm too old or rather old (29 years) to give birth for the first time

Both arguments are ridiculous since we know how many tall and much "older" women got their babies without any problems.

Anyhow I was told to grab my delivery bags and come to the maternity clinic on Monday for examinations and observations if not delivery itself. Usually women stay in the clinic 4-5 days after the delivery. Probably I won't be able update my blog in a week or so, but I'll be back!

Almaty is in the top of 50 most expensive cities

A bit old news, but i thought it would be interesting for you to know.
Mercer Human Resources Consulting included Almaty in top of 50 most expensive cities worldwide. Even if Almaty has jumped from 30th place in 2007 to 44th in 2008, it's still more expensive than Toronto, Los Angeles or Hamburg.

Stockholm as not far away and occupies 31st place in 2008 (23d in 2007).Moscow is still the most expensive city for expatriates; Asunción in Paraguay is the cheapest.

I wasn't surprised about Almaty. Some things are really costly here, especially when it comes to foreign and luxury products and services.

Here you can see an advertisement for such food items as yogurt, milk, cheese, juices, sausages made in EU. "The best from Europe"-- magic words! All things made in EU are per se better in post-soviet eyes. In addition to all preservatives with triple E-numbers, you pay three times more than for local, to me much tastier food.

One rainy day

Some pics from chilly and rainy Almaty... Spring is beautiful in any weather...

Expected date of birth yesterday and no baby yet...

My delivery date passed yesterday. Now it's the final countdown backwards.I know that a normal pregnancy is 38-42 weeks and only 5 % of babies are born on their exact date of delivery. As a saying goes: "when the apple's ripe, it will fall". But it's hard to pass the date imprinted in your head and calender.

My husband once was kidding that Peruvian babies need more time to get color in the oven )) Let's see when it's ready...

Happy Easter! Glad Påsk!

Happy Easter to everybody! Easter is celebrated in Kazakhstan by many Christians living in the country. Did you know that Kazakhstan is populated by 120 ethnic groups? The largest are Kazakhs (68%) and Russians (21%).

Orthodox Easter falls on the 19th of April, but you can already buy traditional Easter bread called "Paskha" or "Kulich". Actually Paskha is very similar to Panettone, Christmas bread popular in Italy and in Latin America. Each time we come to Peru during Christmas holidays, we eat Panettone with hot chocolate, mums. I like baking, but baking Paskha is too time-consuming ritual. Instead I've picked up a tasty, easy and healthy "Poppy cake" recipe made without flour. Here we go:

Ingredients:

200 g poppy seeds (vallmofrön/зерна мака)

200 g walnuts

200 g sugar

6 eggs

1 tsp vanilla sugar

50 g breadcrumbs (ströbröd/панировач сухари)

1. Blend poppy seeds and walnuts ti fine crumbs in the food processor. Mix with the breadcrumbs.

2. Wisp egg yolks with sugar.

3.Wisp egg whites separately with vanilla sugar.

4. Stir 1-2-3 (crumbs, egg yolks and egg whites)gently until blended . The mixture should be fluffy.

5. Put in the round form 26 sm. Bake for 25-30 minutes in the oven preheated to 200 C.

Enjoy! The cake baked yeasterday is already gone))))

Baby names-2: Top-10 in KZ

Baby names is the topic of the day. In the latest issue of a local magazine"My child" I found top-ten baby names in Kazakhstan.

Kazakh female: Aruzjan, Tomiris, Zere, Aulim, Ajazjan, Aidana, Aiim, Aisulu, Simbat, Amina.

Russian female: Alina, Maria, Arina, Milena, Polina, Evelina, Diana, Anastasia, Kseniya, Darya.

Kazakh male: Meirzjan, Miras, Sanzjar, Il'yas, Tamerlan, Alisher, Alihan, Ramazan, Askar, Abilai

Russian male: Egor, Il'ya, David, Nikita, Daniil, Daniel, Maksim, Yaroslav, Emil, Dmitrii.

Baby names

A man goes to the Birth Registration Office to register his newborn son.
The man behind the counter asks the name he wants to give to the boy, and the father replies, “Euro.”
The man says that such a name is not acceptable, because it’s a currency.
The man says: “What? There weren’t any objections when I called my first two sons Mark and Frank.”

A friend of ours proposed a special name to our baby I have to share with you.

Nursultan Sven-Olof Dormidont Joaquin

It goes really well with our international background ))))

Black & White

Yesterday kazavida blog got a record number of hits 33. Usually it's not more that 10 hits per day. I don't know what can generate more interest, probably some of you want to know if a new member has arrived. I wish I knew too))

I still try to use my spare time effectively before the day D. After reading different books about newborn psychology and perception of colors I was inspired to make a "black&white mobile" (thing you hang over a baby bed). It has been a while I did smth similar but it was worth a try. On the last picture it's a cylinder filled with beans so it can also make some noise.

Why Black & White? The answer is simple, newborns can see only high-contrast black and white patterns. Large black and white colors present the highest possible contrast (100%) to the eye and thus captivate and hold baby's attention, encouraging visual development.

Let's see what our baby will say about it ))))

12 days left... I hope...

Many people are wondering if I'm still pregnant. Yes, I am, as you can see on the picture. Seriously, I don't know if my belly will keep on growing for another 12 days. It's already on the edge of explosion. I can't really complain, all pregnancy period have been pure joy for me.


Some people are wondering how I spend all free days in Kazakhstan. As my friend said, it's great we have nine months to realize and get ready for parenthood. Just reading books how to take care of a newborn is time-consuming. Internet is still the worst time-killer for me so I force myself to go out for long walks. Training yoga is good both for body and soul

and I try to do it every day.

Few weeks ago I got obsessed with the idea to play piano after 15-year break (since I graduated from the music school). What a pregnant women wants... she gets. I've chosen keyboard, sounds and feels almost like piano plus hundreds of other functions, instruments sounds and possibility to create own music.

Green light for green city

Have you voted Earth tonight by switching off the lights for one hour? R and I have voted by falling asleep at 19.00 without having dinner. Now it's 04.00 in the morning, I'm awake and hungry.

I also read discussion forums what people say about the Earth Hour initiative. The positive ones make lists for "what you can do in the darkness", for example to paint the body of your partner in the darkness and then to take pictures of the result.

Many are not so positive. Some parts of the city were left today without electricity due to the electricity failure during several hours. People from this parts went furious about their "involuntary" voting. Electricity failure is still a common practice here. I remember it was even a common practice in old Soviet times and even more in post-Soviet. I remember when the electricity was suddenly off during Christmas and New Year celebrations. I remember one winter when the whole heating system AND electricity was off during several weeks. We slept in the fur coats with bottles with warm water and made fire in the garden to cook food.

I like the city turns green and here are the very first leaves:

First tulips

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! Наурыз кутты болсын!
Today is the third day people in Kazakhstan celebrate New Year called Nauriz, the greatest Kazakh holiday throughout the year. It's nice not to go to work on Monday!

Nauriz is also celebrated in Afghanistan, Iran, Central Asia, the Caucasus and Turkey on the spring equinox on 21-23 of March.Since Nauriz’s central theme is renewal and joy hence is the tradition on the eve of Nauriz to thoroughly clean you house, return all your debts, forgive all offences and resentments and to make peace with all with whom you were at odds.

Particularly in Kazakhstan they cook a special dish -- Nauriz Kozje (yogurt soup) -- prepared from 7 ingridients , that symbolize 7 elements of life:water, meat, salt, fat/oil, flour, cereals and milk. We tried it for the first time and it was ok, R was not exited so I ate the whole bowl.

Festivities on the main square, +20 degrees

Traditional sweets are very popular. Easy to put on some extra kilos after three days...

Me and my balloons... It was hard to find a parking place, but the police was implacableKazakh national carpets made from felt (войлок)

Felt brooch I bought at the festival:

Non-boring weather

Don't knock the weather;
nine-tenths of the people couldn't start
a conversation if it didn't change once in a while.
Kin Hubbard

Almaty three days ago, sunny, warm and outdoor seating, + 21 C.

Almaty yesterday, lots of snow, cold and refreshing, + 3-5 C.

Russia through Swedish eyes

This doesn't have anything to do with Kazakhstan, but I can't stop myself from commenting on the Eurovision song contest finals in Sweden.

Living abroad, I got used to the same old image of Russia based on stereotypes.
Russian gangsters, mafia, vodka, bear, matreshka (also called babushka), balalajka, girls in tight cloths, Russian dance just to name a few. All these things were ingredients in the comedy sketch about Russia during the Swedish contest. The sketch called "Tingeling" is a catchy mix of techno music with Russian military chorus and folk songs. The song got even reactions to make "Tingeling"Sweden's entry to the Eurovision contest in Moscow.

To me it's fine to make fun of stereotypes in the ironical way about both Sweden and Russia in this particular song. But I think it went too long making fun of Stalin in the context of satire. Stalin is not about fun. Among not so many real Russian words you can hear: "Na zdorovje, Stalin!", "Na zdorovje, Lenin!", "Do svidanya, Putin!" ("Cheers, Stalin!", "Cheers, Lenin!", "Bye-bye Putin!").

Yoga for moms-to-be

I didn't like yoga at all when I tried it for the first time in 2002. It was too slow, too boring and too cold. Today I'm addicted to yoga.

These are the girls including me from yoga classes for moms-to-be . Since almost all pregnant women in KZ take paid maternity leave 70 days before the delivery date, we have enough time to stay after the classes and talk about pregnancy in hours. Fabulous and pregnant!

Panfilov Park

Located right in the middle of the city Panfilov Park attracts all kind of people and animals. You can also see lots of couples kissing on the benches. My role as paparazzi is useless, I don't dare to disturb their privacy by taking pictures.

Women in politics with many children

How contradictory can be two statements made by the same president in the same speech?

Nursultan Nazarbayev talked about gender equality and role of women in business, politics and public life:

"We need to foster women's business activity...Kazakhstan women should participate in the political and public life of the country. In Kazakhstan over last five years the number of women among Parliament and Maslikhat deputies has not changed. Today they make only 17%. The number of women who hold executive positions in central authorities does not increase. Our country has plenty of leaders among women and they succeed. Employers must encourage women in building up their career."

At the same time he says that women should "take care of well-being of the family"( how would you say "хранительницы очага"?) and have many children.

"Families with many children should constitute the norm of a successful family, just as it was “at all times in all nations”".

Nonsense.

Мы должны и дальше расширять возможности женщин активно участвовать в политической и общественной жизни. В то же время в Казахстане за пять последних лет практически не изменилось количество женщин-депутатов в маслихатах и в Парламенте. Сегодня их доля составляет всего около 17%. Не увеличивается численность женщин, занимающих руководящие должности в центральных государственных органах и акиматах. В нашей стране достаточно женщин-лидеров. И они успешно справляются с поставленными перед ними задачами.Руководители должны смелее продвигать женщин по карьерной лестнице, способствовать тому, чтобы женщины реализовали себя как профессионалы.
***
Считаю, что нормой преуспевающей семьи должна быть многодетность. Так и было испокон веков у всех народов.Богатство человека измерялось наличием детей.

Another restaurant experience

Did you hear about the new restaurant on the moon?
Great food but no atmosphere.

"Alasha", an Uzbek restaurant, has be chosen by the public as the best restaurant in Almaty according to TimeOut Almaty. So we decided to test this place to celebrate R birthday there.

The entrance looked quite impressive reminding of famous palaces in Samarkand or Bukhara. We saw more foreigners than locals inside, the waiters were dressed in traditional Uzbek way, the service was good, live band played at a reasonable sound level so we could here each other.

The entertainment programme introduced different styles of traditional dance as you see on the pictures. The restaurant have a couple of traditional dresses for guests to put on and it's very well used by foreign guests. The only thing we were not satisfied with was the food. If you would like to have a dinner in a nice atmosphere, "Alasha" is a good choice. If you want to enjoy good food, it's better try other places.

What annoyes me most

Spitting on the streets! If you don't watch your step, you might step on one of the loogies.

I know it is not just exclusive to Kazakhstan, but i bet Kazakhstan can win a championship in spitting. It is smth only men do, probably it's their way to mark the territory similar to dogs. Do you have any idea what other reasons can be?

I think spitting is disgusting and rude. It's also dangerous for health in terms of disease transmission. Tuberculosis is still a problem in Kazakhstan and it can be transmitted by spitting.
People, if you don't spit on your health, quit spitting on the ground! You are not camels, aren't you?