My favorite blogs about Peace Corps in Kazakhstan

For volunteers, blogging in Kazakhstan can be tough because of infrequent power and internet access (if you live in a village) and logging on to the internet can be expensive. Also, the blogger.com website is blocked in Kazakhstan. While all of these obstacles make email and blogging hard for volunteers, many volunteers do have blogs. My blog is wrapping up (I have only 2 more posts left), if you are looking for more blogs about Kazakhstan Peace Corps volunteers in Kazakhstan, I'd recommend these:

• The Adventures of Hotard. This is a blog of a fellow Kaz 20 OCAP volunteer. The majority of our group left when our 27 month contract ended but he decided to stay on for a third year. Regarding his blog, I enjoy it because he tends to not to focus solely on his work (work, while important, can get boring to blog about), but he also has many hilarious adventures and blogs about the cultural things in Kazakhstani life that are different from American life. One of my favorite recent blog posts from him is an interesting and odd story about beauty pageants in Kazakhstan.
  

  
   

• Becca's Blog: Peace Corps in Kazakhstan A Kaz 21 whose blog tends to focus on her projects. She is an OCAP (NGO assistance) volunteer, and while this program was replaced with the Youth Development program, I think her work is a good example of the work and the potential that a future Youth Development volunteer can do if they are paired with a stable NGO with dedicated and reliable people. Check out her most recent project, which took her outside of Kazakhstan to Bulgaria to a training on HIV/AIDS.
  

  
   

  
   

• Wide Open Spaces, also written by a Kaz 21. I've found her blog to be very truthful and thought provoking. She does a great job explaining about the world around her and the little things that make life great (or difficult) for volunteers. She has a great posting about my favorite summer drink in Kazakhstan.
  

  
   

• Pure Crop Beaches A blog jointly written by a Peace Corps married couple that is both English teachers. They too, are in my group but have decided to stay a third year. They write jointly about their work and lives and they have great pictures. Check out their post about their work at Camp GLOW, a program that teaches Kazakhstani girls about sexual health, empowerment and self confidence. It is a very inspiring project, and I'd strongly recommend for female Kaz 21's and Kaz 22's to get involved.
  

  
   

• The blog Kzblog.net. It's not written by a Peace Corps volunteer but by an expat. Although the author is not a volunteer, I still wanted to include it because it still mentions living in Kazakhstan. While this blog is very well written and occasionally focuses on topics that Peace Corps volunteers don't touch on, I still found it to be a very interesting read. What I like best are the pictures, which are just absolutely amazing! If you want to read more, check out a recent post about a complaint against Halloween.