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We first went to the Zhania Aubakirova Music School for Young Talented Children to give a master class and play for them.
(Joe teaching young student at the Zhania Aubakirova Music School in Almaty, Kazakhstan)
Three students performed for us. The first was a girl who played Siciliana and Rigadon by Fritz Kreisler. Michelle worked with her about getting dance into her body and her musical phrases. The next performer was a boy who played Bartók's Romanian Folk Dances. Joe worked with him to keep a sound through the whole bow. I liked this kid because he was so triumphant; he looked like he had great conviction. The next player was a girl who played a Kazakh folk tune, and Michelle worked with her. I was very impressed at the high level.
We then played for the young students. They went crazy for the Orange Blossom Special. The reception they gave us was very exciting, and they presented us plaques with their national instruments on them.
Later we went to an amazing Korean restaurant where we were joined by Renate Kenney, Marie Guice, and Marie's daughter Elise. The food was out of this world. We ate for two hours. Marie then took us to a shopping center (city center market) to look and shop. It was crazy; everybody was running around pushing people out of the way, even though the venders sold the same thing.
After our trip to the market we took a gondola up the hill to have a look at the city. It wasn't expensive—only 100 Tenge for a one-way trip. The gondola was a little old, but I had no fear. At the top we wanted to get a drink but didn't have enough time, so we admired the unbelievable view instead. The city is bigger than I thought it was. After about 20 minutes we decided to go back down because it was six and because we had to leave at seven for our flight to Tashkent. Going down in the gondola was much harder than going up.
After getting back to the hotel, we sat around for about 30 minutes drinking coffee. We said our goodbyes to Marie, which was sad because she did so much for us and because we liked her so much. Her husband was the funniest man I have ever met. We then left for the airport to fly to Uzbekistan.
My first impression of Tashkent was that it was so much cleaner than all the other big cities that we have been to. There was also no one on the streets after 11 o'clock at night. It was very beautiful.
- Ryan
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