Extreme Hospitality or Thank You! Thank You! Thank You!

Today, I had a very, very Uzbekistan experience – the very best of the country.  On Tuesdays I take the boys to a playgroup at a house with a wonderful yard and tons of fun but a bit off a main road.  Craig is working hard to figure out our transportation system, but this is not settled yet.  I am still taking “gypsy cabs”, anybody driving by that wants some extra money.  I always negotiate for a drop-off and a pick-up since I can’t get a taxi directly from the playgroup location.  In my cave woman Russian, I thought we negotiated before I got in the car today.  However, once in, I realized that he was a professional scientist, and he was on his way to work.  I understood his situation and he understood mine.  Instead of being like, “Too bad American lady.  If your Russian was better you wouldn’t be in a pickle”, he found a solution.  He decided to go to work and then leave work to pick us up and take us back home at the end of playgroup.  When I walked out of playgroup he was there waiting.  He had a colleague with him, so they could work while he drove.  He was so kind, asked me not to pay (I did anyway), gave me his business card, and asked me to please call any Sunday so he could take our family and show us the city.   That is hospitality at its best and most extreme.  I often feel like I don’t have much of a safety net here, since I do things that I otherwise wouldn’t, like get into strangers' cars, but this makes me so immensely more grateful and aware of the extra kindness of others.