Woke up much more on time, about 8, and got right to work on finishing the budget for the proposal. Went to the office around 10:30 to work with MJ for a while on the revised narrative and budget notes, then came back to Serena for lunch with a big Network crew, at the invitation of the head of Focus Tajikistan. Pretty good, nice conversation, blah blah. Back to the office and finished the budget and the technical narrative while MJ toiled away on the budget notes.
We finished and then MJ, OM and I took a nice long walk from the hotel up the main drag here, Rudaki Avenue, to Rudaki Park. I'd passed the part and its neighboring monument on the way to and from the office. Seeing a city at walking pace and outside the confines of a car is quite a different experience from driving around. I guess that's obvious. Anyway, the evening was warm and lovely. I took some photos of the monument and then ran up to the top of the base to take some other photos, which is apparently not allowed -- a cop came over and said I had to get down! OM talked to him and apparently you can only climb the stairs if accompanied by, well, a cop. Stupid. It was okay, no big deal. The monument, I should say, is to Tajikistan's greatest leader, Somoni. I have pictures, words are not going to do it justice. There's a large arch and some gold involved.
There was a concert going on in the park so we walked over to watch. Lots of families around, little kids with ice cream and a girl on roller blades so heavy for her that she was knock-kneed with her feet out to the sides. The music was evidently Uzbek, and then Tajik, but I can't tell the difference. There was a woman singing and some men behind her playing instruments. Or, I should say, "playing." It was comically obvious that they weren't actually playing them; they weren't even doing an especially good job syncing with the music. The stage was under a pretty monument to Rudaki himself, who is apparently Tajikistan's greatest writer.
We meandered back to the hotel and I took my leave, the better to get a little exercise and chat with C.
We finished and then MJ, OM and I took a nice long walk from the hotel up the main drag here, Rudaki Avenue, to Rudaki Park. I'd passed the part and its neighboring monument on the way to and from the office. Seeing a city at walking pace and outside the confines of a car is quite a different experience from driving around. I guess that's obvious. Anyway, the evening was warm and lovely. I took some photos of the monument and then ran up to the top of the base to take some other photos, which is apparently not allowed -- a cop came over and said I had to get down! OM talked to him and apparently you can only climb the stairs if accompanied by, well, a cop. Stupid. It was okay, no big deal. The monument, I should say, is to Tajikistan's greatest leader, Somoni. I have pictures, words are not going to do it justice. There's a large arch and some gold involved.
There was a concert going on in the park so we walked over to watch. Lots of families around, little kids with ice cream and a girl on roller blades so heavy for her that she was knock-kneed with her feet out to the sides. The music was evidently Uzbek, and then Tajik, but I can't tell the difference. There was a woman singing and some men behind her playing instruments. Or, I should say, "playing." It was comically obvious that they weren't actually playing them; they weren't even doing an especially good job syncing with the music. The stage was under a pretty monument to Rudaki himself, who is apparently Tajikistan's greatest writer.
We meandered back to the hotel and I took my leave, the better to get a little exercise and chat with C.
No comments:
Post a Comment