Republic of Tatarstan

Yesterday I noticed a small but surprisingly meaningful moment in my blog’s metrics—something I forgot to mention at the time. It honestly caught me off guard in the best way and even made me smile. I hadn’t really expected that someone from another city would be reading my posts in Russian. That felt different. Of course, I’ve seen readers from other countries engaging with my English posts before, but this was the first time I became aware of a local reader. The metrics didn’t reveal anything more about this mystery visitor, but even that tiny hint was enough to make my day. It felt like a quiet confirmation that I’m on the right path and that what I’m writing actually reaches someone.

Since I got back, the weather in my city has been gloomy, and next week doesn’t look any better — just clouds and rain, almost like autumn showed up uninvited. I was really hoping to get back into riding my bike around the city, maybe even take a few routes through the forest, but that didn’t happen. Instead, I ended up spending the evening at home in front of my laptop, watching YouTube. It’s ironic, because during my trip I barely had time for screens, and now I’m right back to it. To be honest, that’s the last thing I want — I’d much rather be outside, walking, breathing fresh air, and enjoying warm, sunny days.

My trip to Seoul, South Korea turned out to be surprisingly smooth—maybe even easier than my experience in Japan. From the moment I arrived at the airport to getting into the city, everything just felt convenient and intuitive. Taking the bus was simple, paying with my debit card worked everywhere without any friction, and the metro system was easy to navigate without overthinking anything. I never found myself confused or making mistakes, which made the whole experience feel very comfortable. In some ways, it even reminded me of the best moments I’ve had traveling around Europe, where things just work the way you expect them to.

Today’s trip to Kazan turned out to be one of the most stressful travel days I’ve had in a while—two flights, tight timing, and a bit too much optimism on my part. I flew from Seoul to Tashkent and then onward to Kazan with Qanat Sharq (HH822) and Uzbekistan Airways (HY649). In hindsight, not researching the airlines—especially Qanat Sharq—and giving myself only a two-hour layover in Tashkent was a mistake. I’ve taken similar risks before and gotten away with it, so I guess I trusted the pattern a bit too much. This time, though, it nearly cost me my second flight and added unnecessary stress (and expenses) along the way.

My vacation honestly couldn’t have started better. I already managed to explore the city a bit and now I’m mentally ready for my next destination—Tokyo. I’ll write about Tokyo tomorrow though. For now, I just want to capture how fascinating and surprisingly smooth today turned out. When I booked my flight, Turkish Airlines included a free Istanbul tour program, so from 4 pm until 9:30 pm I joined this really well-organized excursion—with dinner included. And not just any dinner, but proper Turkish cuisine. What made it even more interesting was the company: I ended up at a table with a family from California, so I got to hear real, natural American English in conversation.

Today, I began my day with cloudy and foggy weather. I especially noticed the fog during my trip to the tire service, as the road was covered in it and visibility was quite low. Honestly, it didn’t bother me; I arrived safely at the tire service, where the work feels familiar to my people. There, I changed my winter tires to summer ones because the weather was already warm and the roads were no longer icy. Even though there are still some patches of snow in certain places, I decided it was time. 

The process went smoothly without any issues. It took around thirty minutes, maybe even less, as three workers operated quickly and in good coordination. For the service, I paid 2000 rubles (about $24.90) for my 16-inch radial tires.

I started the day with a cloudy and foggy morning. The fog was extremely heavy and completely covered the city. From the window, I couldn’t see the hill at all — it was fully hidden and seemed to vanish into the fog. The last time I experienced something similar was during a winter blizzard and a few times in autumn, but today the fog felt much heavier than usual. Around the river, it was especially dense and almost perfectly white. I first noticed it from the window, but when I observed it from a distance, it looked even more beautiful. It felt as if a thick layer of fog was floating above the river, while other parts slowly spread across the hills and trees.

In this post I already mentioned my work results, but today during the monthly meeting there was another discussion about our productivity. The CEO talked about the most important things that happened during the first quarter and said that the quarter was unsuccessful for the company. Honestly, I don’t remember that the main plan was not completed successfully during January, February, and March. In fact, the company achieved about 97% of the plan. Of course, it’s not 100%, but I don’t think it’s that bad. They also reported revenue of more than 110 million rubles.

I got completely stuck on a task and didn’t manage to finish anything. This was already my third full day working on it, and I’m starting to feel a bit unsure about my situation with my team lead. He might ask me, “Where are your results?”, and although I do have some progress, I’m not confident in it. The task itself is quite specific and involves working with a Google API, which makes it more challenging. Honestly, it made me feel a bit down. Just yesterday, our CEO was talking about productivity, and today mine was extremely low. That didn’t make me feel good at all—if anything, it made me stressed and annoyed.

Today I spent around two hours in a meeting where our CEO said he’s not satisfied with our results and overall productivity. He actually mentioned this at the beginning of the year, and today he brought it up again. The first half hour of the meeting was calm, and we were just discussing our tasks, but after that he shifted the focus completely and spent the rest of the time talking about productivity.

Today was my mom’s anniversary, so everyone spent the day preparing the table. When I woke up and walked into the kitchen, I saw a bit of chaos—everyone was rushing around trying to finish their tasks. Some close relatives had already arrived in the morning to help. So my morning wasn’t calm at all—it was busy and quite loud. Still, there was plenty of food, so I had no problem finding something for breakfast.

Today I spent the weekend at home. My relative arrived early in the morning, which made the start of my day a bit noisy and unusual. The weather was cloudy but warm, around +10 degrees. I’m used to seeing the sun every morning, so it felt strange when I woke up and noticed the sky was grey. I was still lying in bed when I heard someone talking loudly in the other room. At first I didn’t understand what was happening, but then I realized it was my relative. Even though I didn’t get up, it woke me up completely.