Christmas Press

Not to be all Debbie-Downer on you, but Tajikistan made it onto the front page of the New York Times today with this article. We hear about this kind of thing a lot from our friends here, the fear of how the financial crisis ultimately will affect migration to and employment in Russia, which together produce the remittances that seem to keep Tajikistan's population afloat.

In other news, the weather turned much warmer for Christmas Eve day and now on Christmas Day, too. The sun yesterday made it positively balmy, and a warm breeze wafted in as I rode the marshrutka (fixed-route taxi van) back to town after a morning of work at the Embassy. It was great, until I sat for too long and the marshrutka made an unexpected (for me) turn, and I had to backtrack to get to sadik in time to pick Anya up. (One thing Dushanbe really needs: transport maps!)

We have had a building-themed holiday week, with Legos and Intelligence Blocks (a lego-type toy that Anya received as 2nd prize in the 2-and-under coloring contest) coming our way, and the two most favored things to build are apparently: 1. towers, and 2. Christmas trees (sometimes expressed in Russian as "Yolochka!").

We (well, OK, I -- unfortunately Anya wasn't really in the mood to make cookies, just to sample them; and Dan was out doing our grocery shopping) made a big batch of oatmeal cookies for the two parties on our circuit last night. I need to get moving on whatever it is I'm making for the family Christmas dinner that some fellow expats in our neighborhood are organizing this afternoon -- I think it's going to be apple tart, for lack of much imagination or energy for anything else.

Happy Holidays!