"Shashlikando"

The number of people who will understand the title of this post is probably zero, as you'd have to understand Russian and Spanish to get it (I turned shashlik into a verb with a Spanish ending and then conjugated it ... never mind. It's not really worth explaining.). I'll summarize what we're up to for you, but you'll have to scroll down to the bottom for that (hint: there's some very good news included, so it's worth it).

Anyway, spring has arrived in Moscow. It's cold again at the moment, but for a couple of weeks we've actually had pretty decent weather. One of the best-kept secrets of some places famous for their awful winter weather is how nice the weather can be the rest of the year. Take Portland, OR for example. We lived there for a few years, and the winters and springs are justly famous for being gray and rainy all the time. However, the summers? 3 months of the most glorious weather you could possibly imagine, without the sticky heat that you get in the South.

Moscow is a bit the same, only it's the springs and falls that are nice. The summer is a bit warm (if you had air conditioning, it would be pretty decent as well), but this time of year is wonderful! And, as a result, people get outside. A lot.

So, when in Rome ...

Last weekend we went out to our local park to make shashlik. Shashlik is sort of a Russian version of barbecue, except instead of shredding the pork or just putting sauce on ribs, you make it into shishkebabs. The meat, which you can buy pre-cut and marinated, gets put on little skewers and cooked over the coals, and then you eat it with bread, potato salad, chips, and some grilled veggies. Mmmmmm!

This is the crew that came with us (minus one, who avoided the camera for this one). Yes, I know, they're all girls. It seems like most of my life these days is spent with ladies. For whatever reason, most of our closer Russian friends are all female, so I'm frequently the only guy when we hang out. Fortunately, next week our next coworker arrives, a single guy, which will be nice.

So, here's how it works. I bought this grill (only $8!) at the store; it's basically just four flimsy metal walls that slide into grooves on four chintzy legs, and a plate to hold the charcoal in the middle. Then, you light the charcoal and let it burn until it's all coals, and then you throw the shashlik on, turning and basting constantly.

Mmmmmm. You have to grill the veggies separately, of course, as they get done way faster than the meat, but they're worth doing. Grilled mushroom is one of the best foods ever!

Our friend Delia enjoying a bit of her shashlik.

Of course, by the time everything was cooked and we were eating, the boys were well past naptime, so they were a bit out of it. Still, they love being outside, of course, so it was a good experience overall.

Matthew finally succumbed to the tiredness and fell asleep in his stroller.

I wasn't thinking very clearly about the fact that this video was going on the blog, so I'm speaking Russian, but you get the idea, anyway.

In other news the past couple of weeks, we had to say goodbye for the summer to our friend Vanya. He came over for lunch before he left, and B made some tasty enchiladas to "celebrate" his leaving.

And I'll leave you with this shot of Steven playing on the slide in the middle of the shopping center walkway. When we went to pick up the grill, he was a bit bored, so I walked him over here to get some play out of his system. This is mostly for the grandparents, so enjoy Mom and Dad.

That should about do it. This week we'll be busy again, as B's parents arrive on Friday from the US for a visit. Saturday, as I mentioned, our new coworker gets into town finally, and we're also excited about that. As for our day-to-day lives, language learning is still the order of the day. It's weird what order you learn words in - every once in a while I'll discover a word that I don't know that I really should. Just today I finally learned the word источник (istochnik), which means "source, spring" and I'm not really sure how I missed that one before.

As for our good news, it's really outstanding! All of you (hopefully - if you haven't, shame on you!) have been lifting up our situation regarding our residency application. Well, just this week we received word from our coworkers in T-land that they heard that our application will be approved! Yes, that's right, will be approved!! Now, before you get too excited, it's not done yet, and we won't "count our chickens" until the stamp is in our passports, but it sounds like the important part is done. Hopefully, in June we'll get the word that everything is in order for us to move, which will allow us to move in early July, which was our original hope. Hurray for the one who is in charge of all of that (and no, I don't mean the immigration official)! ;-)

See you next week, probably with lots of pictures of B's parents and all the adventures we have with them.