Todd and I were bored on a certain Thursday night before we left for the summer. We flipped through the channels, but couldn't really find anything that we both wanted to watch. Then I noticed that the 2-hour season finale of Grey's Anatomy was about to come on. We've never seen a single episode of the show, but have friends who love it and know that season finales are always good. So, we decided to watch it and see if it was a show we could maybe get into.
Well, we go into it! Since we've been in Baku, we have bought the 1st and 2nd seasons and are almost done with both! You can only buy "illegal" copies of movies here. There is no Blockbuster or video store where you can buy videos. Instead, they have stores of DVD's and you ask if it is a "good copy" (not one that is shaky & you can tell they were taping in the theater). I'm not sure they have any laws against this business...so that makes it legal here?
Anyway, although the DVDs are much cheaper, they don't always work on regular DVD players. Like our seasons of Grey's Anatomy. But it does work on our computer! So Todd and I usually become unsociable at some point every night and crawl in the bed to watch Grey's on our laptop. DVD set seasons of any show can be very addicting!
This past Saturday, we attended a 4th of July party put on by the American Chamber of Commerce. I was pretty excited to go (even though Todd wasn't going to be there...he was out of town with work) because the 4th is my absolute favorite holiday (of course, Christmas is close behind). It was held at the Crescent Beach Club and my aunt said there would be hot dogs, hamburgers and music & fireworks. What more could you want?
Well, I should've known to never expect certain things in another country, because you really never know what you will get. We arrived and there were already a ton of people there, but , strangely, almost more Azeris than Americans. First thing I saw were 3 American flags. Good start. We ventured out to look at the "beach". It was pretty rocky and contained tons of sea shells (obviously not a thing to collect here). And again, the Caspian Sea showed her true colors up close....dirty water...but we still touched it just to say we've touched the Caspian Sea! We went to find a table (that we had to fight for because of the number of people there) and then set off for food. Guess what? They ran out of food! Completely out! They kept putting some out little by little, but every time we made it over to the food table, it would all be gone! Craziness.
But the band was good. My aunt finally got us (Kim & me) to dance when they played YMCA. After that, we had fun people watching.
So, no food, no real beach, no patriotic music and no fireworks (they weren't doing them til 11:30 & we were ready to go by 9). Not my favorite 4th of July, but definitely an experience.
On Sunday, we did a little more sight seeing. We went to the top of the Maiden's Tower. The tower was built sometime between the 7th and 12th century AD. There are lots of stories behind why it was built. I like the one that says a father wanted to marry his daughter, and she said she would if he built her a tower. He started building, but she didn't really want to marry him, so she kept saying it needed to be higher and higher. Finally, she said it was high enough. She climbed to the top of it and jumped off so she wouldn't have to marry him. Kinda morbid and probably not the true story behind it, but oh well.
The Tower has 8 floors inside, and just a short 124 steps to the top. Once at the top, there are great views all around. Well worth our 2 manat we paid to go up!
Kim left this morning. Yes, she is my uncle's niece and not really related to me, but I refer to her as my cousin (it made things less confusing when we are being introduced to people over here). She is going to be a sophomore in college this year. And a print journalism major. It's really cool that she got to be here this summer. Like I mentioned before, she interned with a magazine here- In Baku Magazine- really, it's equal to our People Magazine. :) She is just 19, and already has been published worldwide. That's quite a thing to get to put on your resume!
She even extended her stay for 2 weeks when her boss offered to pay to change the flight and get her another visa.
All that to say... I'm glad she was here. We had fun.
Check out our latest pics:
Maiden's Tower & Azeri Dinner- http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2025283&l=624f2&id=61700300
Todd's work trip to Quba- http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2025285&l=a685e&id=61700300
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