Kyrgyzstan

So I blew it.  I waited over a month before trying to write my Kyrgyzstan post and now it just wont be as good as it would have if I had written it sooner.  On the plus side, I have a lot of pictures and now no one has to read my drivel to just look at some photos!

 Nyle and Azat taking measurements.

 A stable.

A rural cemetery.

 Champagne for Nyle's birthday.

 "Let's go Communism!"

The shores of Issyk-Kul

The thirty day trip was a lot of things: long, uncomfortable, challenging, lonely . . . but it was it was also an amazing experience.  I have never traveled outside the country as an adult, so finding myself in a foreign place full of unfamiliar languages was entirely new for me.  The language barrier was one of the bigger challenges; even our translator had very limited english speaking abilities.  My favorite anecdote from the trip was when Nyle and I found ourselves trying to buy Imodium from the local pharmacy.  In order to get it, we needed our student assistant, Azat, to ask the pharmacist in Kyrgyz.  We came to an unfortunate roadblock when trying to explain what it was and why we needed it.  Diarrhea.  It all comes down to diarrhea, and he did not understand.  When more eloquent and polite words failed us, we resorted to caveman speak, "have bad liquid poop . . . Need hard poop . . . Solid poop."  This was accompanied by an obscene display of charades, all to the embarrassment of poor Azat.  He got it . . . eventually.

 The broken heart

 Jetty-Oguz- "Seven Bulls"

 A sliver of fault!

 Lake Issyk-Kul, large saltwater lake.

 Slot canyon

 A well-deserved cocktail in Bishkek.

 Real beer!

Everyone told me I would get sick when I went to Asia.  They were right.  I'll spare you the details, but one night looked a lot like this:

 After returning home, I learned that I had a parasite.  Whoops.