blog post 3

Last week was pretty quiet.  I did not get the chance to meet with my conversation partner because she was off studying for her exams.  I did however, return once more to the international center to help out with global café.  This past week students from the Kazakhstan student association came to present about the arts of their country.  For those of you who don’t know where Kazakhstan is…look at a map!  I admittedly learned a great deal about their country and the people that live there.  Immediately I noticed that a few of the students looked, to me at least, as though they, if not their parents, could have been from China or Japan or one of those countries.  Looking back if you had asked me to predict what they looked like I would probably have said like Russians or simply I don’t know.  From the images they showed us I was fascinated by the landscape of the steppes and mountains which were contrasted by cities and modern buildings.  I thought to myself, it looks like someone put a city in the middle of nowhere.  Aside from the beautiful landscape their country has many horses that roam its terrain although supposedly none of them are wild.  They are all owned by someone.  Another interesting fact they told us that blew my mind was that their government gives scholarships to about 3,000 students each year to go and study abroad.  All expenses are paid for and the only catch is that you must come back home and work for 5 years.  I instantly thought this was amazing.  Out of the 62 students at Purdue from Kazakhstan 60 of them are on scholarships.  For a country with a population just over that of New York City, this seems like a great way to promote education and growth.  Hearing this almost made me wish I was from Kazakhstan.  After the presentation the very talented students whipped out their cool two stringed guitars, called Dombyras, and played us a few songs which I can honestly say I enjoyed.  In any event global café is a wonderful event.  Some weeks are better than others, but if you are interested in coming its every Friday at 5:30 (it usually starts later like around six I think) at the international center which is right next to Delta Chi on Russell street.