16th March 2000

Dear All

Well I had not intended writing such frequent newsletters but life is so full that we want to share it with you in as up to date way as possible. 

SCENE:  ExPat home on the hill

USA:     Welcome Suzanne, how are you managing in Baku.
NZ:        Fine thanks.
USA:    Do you have a microwave?
NZ:      No, I do not.
USA:     Then how do you defrost your bread for toast?
NZ:        We do not have a toaster either.
USA:    Are you one of those pioneer women who start from scratch?
NZ:        Scratch, what do you mean?
USA:    You know, using flour and stuff.............

As you can see from this dialogue, the foreigners here are at all sorts of levels of the financial spectrum........I was amused to be seen as a pioneer, Connie uses cake mixes, cookie mixes, etc, etc!!  and her husband brings back at least 2 suitcases of American food on his frequent visits to the States, how else would she know what to put in the kids lunches without Muslei bars and chippies etc!!??

Our washing machine continues to be a wonderful asset.........when the power is on......when the water is running...........it is only able to do hot washes though and all our clothes are showing signs of shrinkage and wear and tear......especially Murdoch's satin boxers!!  Our power has been off a bit lately as they are doing repairs to the whole building, this isn't too bad during the day but our freezer is useless until repairs are finished. 

Language learning continues for Ian and I, at least twice a week, we have finished nouns and verbs and are now memorising dialogues...today we cancelled our lesson and Elmarn did some translation work for us from English to Azeri for our trip to Barda tomorrow.  Kids are picking up some language incidentally, especially with the badly dubbed Television. 

Correspondence School is going well for the kids and they have received the first parcel successfully from NZ. We have not used the Azeri mail system for returning but find people going out of the country are happy to post a parcel for us.  Letters here seem to be few and far between, parcels we have heard of being posted in NZ have not arrived here!!! We are very thankful for the E Mail system for regular communication.  Thomas is faithfully working out at the gym and feeling strong.  I have begun teaching at School No 41, two classes of 15 yr old Azeri children, only 15 per class so not too daunting but I am having stuttering problems trying  to come to grips with all the different names they have!

Ian's dental project is progressing amazingly in most respects.  Tomorrow we are going down to Barda to lecture on Thursday to 15 doctor/trainers.  We are piloting our flip charts on dental disease with them so have a pretest and post test and an evaluation sheet.  We then submit all these statistics with a report we have already written and.........we are very hopeful of getting a generous funding from UNHCR.  You will hear the shouting from NZ when we hear officially that we have the funding.....it is the accumulation of hours of door knocking! and endless appointments, phonecalls and blanks!  Ian is passionate about this preventive message and buzzes about it when he is talking.........quite neat really, he is also making some contacts with lots of other NGO's which may be able to use his expertise and our flip charts.......the funding grant should be able to print 500 copies......

The Barda Clinic is now open 5 days a week and treating significantly more patients after a few tactical changes. (Click here for CLinic Photos) ....communication with the dentist is very difficult and our company seem unable to understand that or make a translator available for our use!!  The mobile dental unit is arriving in May, it is exciting but has lots of responsibility too.......we are having serious problems with our boss and how to use this unit........consequently it has been taken out of our hands!!! Just think of us...lots....as we negotiate a very tricky path.......the K. factor is a very tricky one and others before us have also had similar problems so we find out now!!!

Last night we went out as a family to the Hyatt Hotel for a Commonwealth celebration.....quite awesome standing hearing a message from the Queen to us read in a real Brit accent!.....lots of alcohol and marvellous food!! We met the last NZers we had heard about so now know the total of 9 here in Baku at the moment.  In fact the NZers were very exclusive and sat around gossiping and consuming vast quantities of food!! 

We have made friends also with an Australian family here, he is in charge of demining the Armenian/Azerbaijan border, dodgey stuff, fascinating how they train local dogs, etc, etc.  They are very kindly having the kids for a meal while Ian and I are at Barda this week.  They live in another suburb which we get to most easily on the Metro. 

Metro probably deserves a mention. Ian hasn't braved it yet but kids and I have been down a few times.  Very shady.  Fastest,steepest escalators we have seen.  You buy a token for 250m (12c ) then put it in a machine and go through, quite similar to Singapore.......except very steep......lighting is pretty dim, crowded.  Signage is OK to follow and as long as you push assertively to get on or off in time it is an efficient way to travel but certainly not relaxed!!! OUr Nizami Metro Station is the most beautiful, many 12foot mosaics on the walls telling the stories of Nizami a famous writer here.  Unfortunately we cannot take photos as it is considered a military secret in case of war......lots of police presence everywhere....but they haven't ruffled us up yet. 

Well I seem to have woffled on enough.  We love to hear from anyone, it is neat to hear just the everyday things of NZ., nothing here is similar sometimes........it is difficult to make many comparisons.  Thankyou for your continuing support, some days we really feel it. 

Love Suzanne, Ian, Thomas, Murdoch and Morag