The government, as a rule, discourages specialization: Military officers and diplomats are constantly transferred from one post to another, from one region to the next. Still, specialists do emerge.

Left Bank Astana was beautiful at night, each building, it seemed, with its own nighttime color scheme and the street lamps all going full blast.

While I was in Astana, a ballet master from St. Petersburg's Mariinsky Theatre staged a performance of 'Giselle' in the opera hall. It was one of only a few performances to grace Astana's concert spaces in many weeks, and tickets were impossible to come by.

In truth, I was desperate to leave New York. And Moscow was a special place for me. It was the city where my parents had grown up, where they had met; it was the city where I was born.

People have posted my personal information on the Internet. This has resulted in additional emails, calls, and threats. My family and I were forced to move out of our home.

I like how collaborative and cult-like filmmaking is. It's really family-oriented, tribe-oriented.

Work is important, no doubt, but one can end up neglecting family and friends in the bargain. So I have resolved not to let that happen and maintain work-life balance by taking time out for the people who matter the most to me.

The rest of my family are obsessed by 'The X Factor:' I'm intrigued by it, although its musical values are far away from mine, like a cup of tea with 400 lumps of sugar in it. There's something very strange about Simon Cowell's lips, isn't there?