First full day of work

Was in interesting day for a few reasons. When we were heading to meet with the director of the lab we were interviewing today my partner and I were discussing how we were going to go about asking our questions. Our tasks are not very similar so the questions probably would not overlap. She suggested that I go first and ask everything I had and then she would follow up with hers. 4 hours later when we finished we were driving back and I discovered that there was a communication gap somewhere at the office in Arlington. She had never received a copy of my questionnaire from the person I was supposed to send it to. She actually thought that I hadn't prepared anything and was not ready for the interview so in her mind by letting me go first and then her following she could protect me in a way. Needless to say she was surprised when I busted out a fairly lengthy 8 page list of questions on different topics relating to the operations of the center. It also worked out very well because a lot of the questions that I had, did end up overlapping with her work. She was able to observe the director and get a lot of her own questions answered based upon what I was asking. So what I've learned is that the person who is my project coordinator in DC isn't doing her job very well at all, and this isn't the first time that subject has come up.

Baku is like a mini version of Milan. There are tons of stores everywhere, and everything is extremely overpriced. There are all types of high-street stores and you could easily spend a few thousand dollars shopping and not have much to show for it.

We went out to dinner with the country director. He said we were going to a local restaurant that served traditional Azeri food. This local place was about 20 minutes away in a taxi and was hidden behind a few buildings in a place that you could never find on your own. He knows the waiters there - all of them - and so we had a private room. It wasn't a private room in the actual restaurant, but instead there are a set of 6 trailer like dinner rooms in the back. Literally a trailer with a table, TV, heater, AC, and 8 seats. There were three of us. The food was very good, the two of us had about half a bottle of vodka over a series of toasts through the night. There was also home made kampot from a local fruit that is apparently like a larger and harder version of a pear. Overall the food was really good. My best guess is that dinner was easilly $300 for the three of us, and he insisted on paying. We then headed out to a tea/desert place that was near our hotel. Besides tea the place was also a hookah bar. I learned that traditionally tea parlors in Baku are male only smokey bars - although this was not that type of place. Besides bringing us nuts, dried fruits, tea, the hookah and pastries, they had a list of jams. The country director recommended the walnut jam and rose petal jam. Yes, walnut jam and rose petal jam. The walnut jam was not a traditional jam, but instead actual walnuts that were soaked in something and were still tough but not crunchy. They were actually very good. However the rose petal jam was something else. It literally tasted like rose petals, smelled like roses, and was extremely sweet. It's considered a delicasy in the country and the roses are locally grown in Azerbaijan along the northern border with Georgia. Truely it was something I didn't expect to have, and didn't even know it existed. The total for all of this was 55 local currency, we left a tip that made the total 62. This is probably around 70 - 75 dollars so we insisted on picking up this bill.

I'm back at my hotelroom right now and it's somewhere around 1:30AM. It's strange to think that I am literally on the other side of the world as California right now since there is a 12 hour difference in time from there. I probably should go through my notes from the day and transcribe them into something more cohearant and usable but it's late and I'm tired. I will have to do it tomorrow in conjunction with the lab we visit in the morning.

Also, the lab we went to today was the complete opposite of the lab in Kiev. Whereas the center in Kiev had around 10% of their budget from commercial work (which was one of the key goals of this project I am working on), the lab here had around 90%. The director was amazingly pleasant and open. It certainly will be the benchmark I use as I visit the rest of the centers.

Below is a picture of the tea and the hookah. The tea was interesting in that the small kettle on top is a very concentrated solution of the tea, and the center silver/steel portion is filled with hot water and there is a small fire underneath it. There is also a picture of the rose pedal jam. I've also just realized that I don't know if it's petal or pedal. Both words come up with the same pictures on Google, and neither is technically incorrect. Obviously one you step on and one you don't (unless you don't like the person giving it to you), but I have no idea which is which right now. Also, I'm going to try to upload some pictures from around town to the place I've been putting them. http://s595.photobucket.com/albums/tt33/mmmba08/Azerbaijan/ Also, it's worth mentioning that the city really feels like a European city with some arabic flair. There are some pictures in a group that look like the city is a shanti town - it's not. I'm not sure if a fire came through that area, a highly concentrated earthquake, or something else. I certainly know there are some rougher areas in this town but I haven't gone to them other than walking through the back alleys and coming across a patch of them. Finally, I figured out there is a 'bulk uploader' so I'm just uploading everything I've taken in the last 2 days as opposed to selecting specific pictures and taking the time to pick and choose.