AA meetings in Uzbekistan?

davep12and12 · MIP Old Timer

AA meetings in Uzbekistan?

Pythonpappy · MIP Old Timer

Welcome to MIP Dave, ... you've done what I would have suggested already ... I'm clueless here ... sorry ... keep checking back, there's a good chance that if there are meetings available, someone will post it for you ...

davep12and12 · MIP Old Timer

Thanks! Finding meetings in crazy far-away places has always been a highlight of the traveling experience for me. Years ago, I used to sit on a bar stool in the crappy neighborhood beer bar and bore my drinking buddies with BS about all the places I was going to go, but I never even had gas money to get out of town. Since I got sober I've been to 40 countries, mostly the more exotic and adventurous types of places, and I've found meetings in nearly all of them, including the Peruvian Andes, Mozambique, Jerusalem, Zimbabwe, Turkey, and on a riverboat heading up the Mekong river in Cambodia....

Pythonpappy · MIP Old Timer

Wow, I'd love to see some pictures of those places ... I bet the food was equally exotic ...

Heads up with the 'State Department' WARNING about travel to certain areas ... warning is said to last thru August ... terrorist activity or somethin ...

davep12and12 · MIP Old Timer

Sure thing! Here's a link to my Flickr account that includes a few pictures from the last seven trips (I didn't have a digital camera before those trips, so it's not as simple to put the older pictures on line). These latest seven trips include various locations in China, Tibet, Cambodia, Viet Nam, Thailand, Namibia, India, Borneo, Hong Kong, Argentina, Uruguay, Israel and Jordan. Enjoy!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/18095676@N02/sets/

Speaking of exotic foods, check out the photo of the snacks offered by the street vendor in Cambodia - fried tarantulas in a spicy chili-honey glaze. I kid you not.

Jerry F · MIP Old Timer

Dave P...contact any hospital or mental health practicioner where you're going and have not found a meeting yet. See if they have info on where the meetings are and also...take AA PI info with you so you can drop it off with them. Never know what the consequences will be when they reach out for help HUH?....Good luck...good travels. smile

Pythonpappy · MIP Old Timer

Oh wow, ... I loved looking thru your photos ... thank you very much, very well done ... did you eat one of the fried tarantulas ???

davep12and12 · MIP Old Timer

I've eaten a lot of rather weird things in my travels, but for some reason I chickened out on those tarantulas. Too many legs, maybe.

davep12and12 · MIP Old Timer

That's a good tip about the hospitals, Jerry. In fact that's how I found a meeting in Istanbul several years ago, so I'll be sure to keep it in mind. And thanks for the reminder about bringing the literature. I once met a 'AA loner" in Zimbabwe who was working hard at doing 12 step work in the Victoria Falls area and he commented on how difficult it was for him to get literature, and I wished that I had brought some with me.

A similar story - on my first sober exotic travel trip about 20 years ago, I ended up at some meetings of the "Door to Life" group in Cuzco, Peru. A really great group of folks. For example, each person who was speaking during the meeting would pause and give their only bilingual member time to translate everything that was said, just for my benefit. They had only one tattered copy of the Big Book which they kept locked in a glass case in their meeting room. If you wanted to read it, you had to go to the meeting room with the secretary, who would unlock it, and then you had to read it there in the meeting room and lock it up again - you were not allowed to take it out of the meeting room. Since it was their only copy, they were concerned that someone might relapse while it was out of their possession and they might never get it back. When I returned home I stopped in at our local Central Office and bought a case of those small pocket-edition Big Books in Spanish and shipped them down to those guys.

Jerry F · MIP Old Timer

I like the "give it away" mentoring ESH Dave as it was always impressed upon me that if I didn't do that I wouldn't be able to keep it for myself. I have never disbelieved that up to and including this afternoon I also dropped off literature at a cultural Health Care non-profit; answered some questions and gave them my phone number to call as needed. "Having had a spiritual awakening as a result of these steps; we try to carry this message to alcoholics and practice these principles in all our affairs." "When anyone....anywhere reaches out for help...I want the hand of AA to always be there and for that...I am responsible. I won't be anywhere near Usbekistan Dave...thanks for walking the talk. smile

davep12and12 · MIP Old Timer

.....Just wanted to 'bump' this topic thread up to the top of the list (I hope that's not a breach of etiquette for this site). I'll be leaving for Uzbekistan in two weeks and I just wanted to try putting the question out there once more. Thanks!