I have been spending as much time as possible with my family this week and balancing this with work. Yesterday afternoon we rented the VIP Room of the Compass Cinema for a showing of Avatar 2. This is James Cameron’s science fiction sequel to the 2009 release of Avatar. I can’t believe it was 13 years ago that the first one was released. We were told that you couldn’t watch movies in English when we first arrived to Tashkent, but you can call the Compass Cinema, located in the TC Compass mall here in Tashkent, and ask for the movie they are playing not to be dubbed if it is available. They only had the 2-D, Russian sub-title version instead of the 3-D version, but it was still great for the kids. The VIP room seats 26 people and each ticket costs 60,000 UZS ($5.30). All one needs to do is rent the room and then find enough friends interested in joining to cover most of your costs. We easily found 21 people to join in less than 24 hours. I was not in the mood for the movie and took a long nap in the comfortable chairs and then answered emails during the second half of the movie. It was a bit long at 3 hours and 15 minutes. I love doing nice things for my children and I enjoyed the experience by seeing them enjoy the film. Nadia and I thought it was a bit slow.
I held an open gym yesterday for my JV basketball team and 10 players showed up. Owen and his fellow alumnus Nico came and played with the boys. It was great to watch him play again and I was the referee and coached a bit from the side. I discovered to simulate a 7-game series of NBA teams instead of just playing games to a certain score. It resets the game often and the LA Lakers defeated the Golden State Warriors 4-3 so the kids played intensely for almost 2 hours. I had to leave a bit early for a meeting with the construction team and work concerns.
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