Does it rain in Kazakhstan?

On my way home yesterday, I was caught in the torrential downpour and it was so uncomfortable trying to navigate the city in my flippin high heels, that I was absolutely willing to sell out the bus and grab a cab.

After leaving my appointment during rush hour, I crossed the river (formerly known as K Street), and waited up against a building for the bus…it was taking so long and I was so cranky, that I ran back across the street to the ATM, so I could take a cab home –completely soaked at this point. But there were no cabs to be found. So I started walking, found a bus before I found a cab, got on even though it didn’t really go where I needed it to, walked the rest of the way to the next stop, then got on the 16th Street bus, which parallels the 54. Everyone was wet, cold and cranky; and traffic was horrible.

Not that the bus was moving that quickly in all the traffic anyway, but the driver was forced to pull over when we heard sirens and saw a rather long motorcade pulling on to 16th just behind us. The four police cars, numerous black town cars, SUVs and stretch limousine, zipped around us and pulled into the Marriott’s circular drive. HOWEVER, the last police car, stopped perpendicular in front of our bus where there was no way the driver could get around him. All eyes were glued to the window, and I heard someone say maybe it was Chavez and someone else reply, “No, he’ll probably never be allowed to come back to the States.”

When the cop wouldn’t move, the bus driver started huffing (he’s got a schedule to keep and tired passengers to answer to!) Finally, the cop let us pass.

Per Adaeze’s suggestion, I did a little research, and I think it was probably the President of Kazakhstan, Mr. Nursultan Nazarbayev. Who I’d just like to point out has suffered NO diplomatic consequences though his election was highly contested by UN observers and has recently cracked down on human rights and squashed other political freedoms in his country. Nor is Mr. Nazarbayev a subscriber of democracy, which our president holds so dear, but rather an authoritarian strongman, who our govt. continues to supports and is being feted as a valued ally because his government is supportive of U.S. military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, and because Kazakhstan recently agreed to pump some of its rapidly growing supplies of oil through a U.S.-backed pipeline to the West. Even the fact that Mr. Nazarbayev has been accused by U.S. federal prosecutors of accepting the bulk of $78 million in bribes -- a small part of the fortune his family has amassed -- has been ignored by the White House.

But hell, he certainly didn’t call the president “El Diablo” in front of the United Nations General Assembly, so I guess I just consider myself lucky to have gotten a peek at his prestigious motorcade.