All dressed up and nowhere to go...

Nikruz va Delbar raftand. I am happy I have gotten to know them over the last few months, and I look forward to seeing them in the future, but I was sad to see them off. I know they look forward to getting home, as do I, but it is hard now that the program is ending to watch small groups break off and leave. I think Nikruz leaving is especially difficult for me since he and I have been rolling buddies throughout the trip, and now it is just me and the fam. No one to ask translation questions, no one to laugh at my bad American jokes, and no one's iPad to steal to play video games. (I do still have Pokemon, so that's something.) Still, I think about what a great time we've all had here together, and how much I've learned, and I think it was worth it.

Last night Jill and I went to the Hotel Tajikistan and hung out for a while. Jill leaves tomorrow, but she's coming back to Dushanbe in a week, so I'm interested to see how that works out for her. The rest of us are leaving in a bigger group for Istanbul on Monday morning, which means I have today and tomorrow to figure out something to do with myself. Sharif wants to take the family to his father's house overnight and come back tomorrow. When we talked about it last night, he said we'd go after he finished work, meaning 5 or 6. Today, he showed up at 11:30 and said we should head out soon. I'd been planning to go to the bazaar for a gift for our professor, and then hitting up a hotel for WiFi, but now I'm rushing around Dushanbe to get everything done that I wanted before heading to the mountains with them. Not that I don't think a night in the mountains will be fun, but I do wonder what there will be for me to do there besides walk around and take pictures. His father is very religious, and I doubt there's any place to hang out anyway (coffee shop or whatnot), so my day of errands and leisurely blogging has become a hunt for filling time half an hour away from the city. I also know I really shouldn't complain, because they're allowing me to stay with them over the weekend (the program was designed to end this morning with Nikruz and Delbar's flight), but I can't help feeling like there are so many other things I want to do that I just won't get done. I guess that's part of being in a place you like for one month - it's never enough time.

But! I am excited about my travels with Katie this coming week. One, it will be great to be back with her. Two, I haven't been to Seattle, Vancouver, or Portland, so all of those sound amazing. Also (if she lets me) I will upload all of my pictures using her computer, and you can finally see all of the places I've been and things I've done! That is probably my biggest project over the next few weeks (outside of, you know, getting ready for my last year of the Masters program at WU).

Anyway, I should probably call Sharif and let him know I'm ready for the mountains. I wish I had known we're going earlier; I would have taken an immodium when I got up instead of after lunch like I planned. I just hope there's a Western toilet somewhere.