Wait a minute, that's my tractor!

Traveling for two weeks in central Asia, even in mostly urban areas, produces a lot of interesting moments and stories. I made friends with Kazakh uncles, consumed several pounds of meat pockets, saw a sleep getting slaughtered,

tasted horse meat for the first time, visited a park that featured miniature versions of all famous Kazakh landmarks and buildings, sweated and rinsed in a Kazakh bathhouse, swam in the world's second largest alpine lake, sang Russian karaoke with my friend Maya, and performed the chicken dance, aka "Little Duckling." One story that stands out in particular is Maya and I's journey back from the alpine lake in Kyrgyzstan, Issyk Kul, which means "warm waters" in Kyrgyz. Maya and I stayed an extra day at the lake to chill out and swim while Ellen's family went further around the lake for more sights. After a morning at the beach and a swim in the lake (which isn't quite "warm", but isn't really cold either, come to think of it) Maya and I tried to find a shared taxi back to Bishkek, which we heard was about 4 hours away. We were approached by a taxi driver who offered to take us back with 2 other people that she was going to find. I would describe our driver's outfit as urban sailor. After wandering around the bus station for 30 minutes without finding anyone, I offered to pay for the rest of the taxi to be on our way. Now, a disclaimer: I have been in many, many taxis in Ukraine with fairly crazy drivers, some of whom frightened me considerably. However, Captain Crazy wins the prize. Please see my one picture with Captain Crazy and Maya, watching as local authorities pushed a rock off the mountain highway.

Captain Crazy managed to reach past 140 km, approximately 90 mph, on the straightaways, and consistently tried to pass 4 cars in a row on curves on the mountain highway. My buckled seat belt didn't give me much comfort. And I didn't feel much better even as we cleared the mountains and traveled on a straight, flat road to Bishkek. Captain Crazy passed most cars from the left, driving in the center of the highway, and frequently going head to head with approaching cars, swerving at the last minute back to the right lane. About 20 minutes from the static heaven that Bishkek now represented, our lady Captain swerved to the side of the road, exclaiming, "Wait, that's my tractor!" Apparently some tractor that she owned was parked on the side of the road, having been driven there by a male associate, who proceeded to cross the road and give a big smooch to Captain Crazy. We left the tractor and associate and sped the rest of the way, swerving in and out of city traffic until pulling up mercifully back to our apartment building.