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Published: November 20th 2008
It's not all work you know!!
We have been getting out and about on the social scene a little. Most Friday nights we try to meet up with a few fellow ex-pat English teachers in a bar or two in Baku. Happy Hour certainly helps, and it goes on for 2 or 3 hours in some places!
A couple of weeks ago we went to join in the Diwali celebrations with Baku's Indian community. It was a colourful, noisy night with wonderful Indian food. After a chaotic beginning it turned into a great night. We even bumped into some people we had met at another teacher's leaving party a while back.
The following week we accepted an invitation to go to the latino community Hallowe'en party. It was fancy dress but we didn't have costumes to wear. It turned out we were 2 of only 6 people who didn't make the effort and we really wished we had. We were asked to help judge the competition and that was really difficult as the costumes were amazing. It was great fun but practicing our Spanish was tough because of the volume of the music. It was fantastic to hear
Diwali
The Indian community kids acting out the story of Diwalithe latino music again and we would love to be invited to something by this incredibly warm community again.
The next morning we went to church!! It was Remembrance Sunday so we thought we would go along. Royal British Legion poppies have been on sale here for a while and we have been wearing ours with pride and explaining it to all of our students. After the short service (bagpipes should only be played outside!!) we were all invited up to the British Ambassador's residence. Despite the early hour we had a nice lunch platter and drank some wonderful wine. Russ also latched on to the Ambassador's whiskey trolley!!! The people there were so friendly and we were introduced by Carolyne (first name terms now!!) to the Norwegian and Israeli Ambassadors who were happy to chat with us. We didn't outstay our welcome though, and the Bushmills stocks were running low!
The British Council recently organised an evening with Mark Elliott. He's the guy who wrote the guide to Azerbaijan we all think so much of. It was great to hear his stories about when he was writing the book. It seems the government and the police gave
Live Music
Very Bollywood but very good! him a lot of hassle as he travelled around what was then a totally unkown country. He was a bit crazy, but I guess that's what you need to do what he did!
So, work hard, play hard, as they say! We are certainly doing our best!
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