28 August 2008

English Club- over

19:00 26 August 2008

Adding to last night’s drama, I found out this morning that my host sister had been sent over to the other family to tell them not to make me work any more and that I wouldn’t be eating over. I was a little offended that they spoke for me, but I get along well with them otherwise, so I won’t have a cow over it. I hope now family feuds start in my last weeks living in this village.

Today was an odd day schedule-wise. Normally, our language classes are in the morning and after lunch we travel somewhere for technical or cultural lessons. Today, we attended a conference for the English Teacher’s Association of Kyrgyzstan. It very interesting to meet teachers that will be similar to our counter-parts and it was interesting to see their levels of English knowledge. The Soviet system really affects the Kyrgyz educational system of language learning, and these teachers demonstrated that perfectly. Speaking and listening are not the focus of the Soviet learning, reading and translation combined with intensive grammar instruction were the mainstay of Soviet language learning. Therefore, despite decades of teaching experience and reasonably good writing and reading, many of these teachers struggled when trying to hold a basic conversation, even though the volunteers were asked to speak slowly and clearly.

While it’s a shame that many of these teacher’s didn’t have a great command of the language in its spoken form, it really makes it obvious how much of a help we volunteers can be. As native speakers, we have unparalleled ability to teach fluidity and demonstrate actual use of the language outside of formulaic artificial classroom situations. We were told that one of the biggest benefits we will have (and undoubtedly one of the more sustainable ones) is simply speaking consistently with our counterparts and other English faculty. Improving their conversational skills will allow them better to teach the most useful aspects of English to their students.
After lunch we had a short language class and then our last English club. Today, we had decided to make it a fun activity rather than a structured lesson. Well, we were successful in making it not structured, but our attempts at corralling the kids to play English themed games were relatively unsuccessful. Red-light/Green-light worked somewhat, but English word freeze tag didn’t and it ended up with just the trainees in my village just horsing around with the kids for an hour- not that this was at all bad. The kids were happy to play with us, and I think overall they enjoyed the club. Even if the only thing that they learned was that Americans can be cool and that English can be fun, I will leave that project believing it was a success

Drama...

21:30 25 August 2008

I just finished up my second instance of working with coal. As more and more people are worried about electricity and its lack, people are stocking up on coal to heat in the winter. This has caused the price to sky-rocket to a (Kyrygyz) expensive of about $70 per ton (I assume metric ton- but I am not sure what the conversion between that and English ton is, I assume it’s a lot though). Our neighbor, who also has a volunteer, just bought 6 (Metric?) tons of the stuff today, and being a strapping young lad, I was asked to help with its portage into storage (haha rhymes). This was more than I shoveled before, but there were also two other people (the volunteer and some random dude) so it went pretty fast. A few hours and a few pounds of coal dust in the lungs later, we had nearly finished and my host Babushka comes barging in demanding that I return home that instant. This was the beginning of what would prove to be one of the most frustrating and dramatic times in country.

I had had some volunteers over recently to watch Garden State, and we were using my laptop but decided to hook it up to the speakers of the computer my family owns. Apparently, somehow the monitor plug got knocked slightly ajar and was slightly unconnected. When my host brother tried to use the computer, it was missing the red signal and was all green and blue. So this made my mother upset and caused her to storm over and start yelling at me incomprehensibly to fix the computer and accusing my volunteer friends of breaking it intentionally . This monologue was filled with plenty of “понимаешь?”s-“ Do you understand?”s to which I replied an assertive “no!”. I reasoned with her in Russian and basically said “Look at me! I’m really dirty, let me finish, take a banya, and then I will fix it”. Finally she relented and I finished up the last of the task.

For those of you who don’t know, a banya is the traditional way of cleaning yourself, especial in the harsh winters. It pretty much consists of a low-ceilinged sauna with large tubs, one of cold water, and one of vociferously boiling water. There are also smaller pans and scoops for the tubs of water. The general idea is pretty simple, you sweat a lot, and then you scrub, and then you rinse, then you sit around for a while and repeat about seven times. I had only taken one before today (our house has a solar shower but not banya) and this was seriously hot. They were using the coal they had just bought to heat it (usually, trash is the main fuel) and the thing was cranking to the point that the other volunteer’s shampoo bottle melted and is now malformed. I didn’t realize quite how boiling the water was and scalded my self nicely with splashed water when I tried to get a scoop to mix. Nevertheless, the combination of sweating a lot, scrubbing a lot, and dousing myself in warm water did a pretty good job of getting the coal off of me.

Regardless, the other volunteer’s family was insistent that I banya, but their father was in there so I was sitting around waiting to take one for probably twenty minutes or so. I was getting frustrated because I knew how upset my host mother was and just wanted to get clean and get home. My repeated pleas to be let home to shower were shot down, and finally I was able to take the banya. The family tried to insist that I eat dinner with them, but I was firmer this time and ended up (perhaps culturally inappropriate, but necessarily) just leaving. As I got home (mind you- dressed only in my towel) my host mother tried to usher me into the computer room but I insisted on dressing first.

As soon as I saw the situation, I quickly fixed the aforementioned plug and my mother was relieved. She was seriously concerned that one of the volunteers had maliciously broken the mystical thing in her house known as a computer. Then she lectured me on not working for other families, despite the fact that she has asked the other volunteer to help out at our house on a different occasion (her explanation for this was that he was a lazy worker and that therefore, my work was more valuable). This was about my breaking point, after about a solid hour of being yelled at in rapid fire Russian and I finally yelled back, which mind you in my family is completely culturally appropriate. I said something along the lines of “Please! I am not a baby and I can think for myself! I can work when I want to and for whom I want!” The baby comment amused her enough that everyone calmed down and my stress level was left to slowly reside. Oh well, I suppose all’s well that ends well.

Whipped Cream and Other Delights... Like $8 P.B.

14:00 24 August 2008

After a several weeks long pleasant respite from G.I. problems, it appears as if I am back in the fray. Stomach cramps and less than pleasant outhouse visits have again become the norm. I hope that I am better by the time of our site visits, I would hate to be a bad guest because I felt ill. Anyhow, onto more pleasant topics, all the trainees went into Bishkek yesterday to visit the Peace Corps office and have a day on the town. The office is really nice, from the outside of the compound, it looks kind of crappy and run-down (it is in a really bad part of town, which doesn’t help). Once you enter the compound, however, you realize the American influence, it has nice offices, running water, consistent electricity, climate control, and even a garden with a pond. There is also a resource center for us once we become volunteers for us to use the internet for free and a library where we can borrow books. I brought home “Thud” by Terry Pratchett and so far have found it an entertaining diversion.

After touring the office, we were left on our own to get lunch and do whatever we wanted to in the city. I actually ended up returning to the same Chinese restaurant I had been to before, and it was even better this time! I think that will be a regular feature of my visits to Bishkek, it’s really good and not even that expensive by Kyrgyz standards (I paid 150 soms for a big plate of tofu and veggies, rice, and a bottle of Sprite- that’s about $4). I spent the hanging out with some trainees I didn’t really know well before (I’m making a concerted effort to get to know the people I will be posted near- so far I have been very impressed by them and consider myself fortunate in my nearby volunteers).

Afterwards, having not spent too much at lunch, I decided a splurge was in order. I had heard that certain American foods were only available at one place in the entire country- namely the Beta Foods store in Bishkek. Beta Foods is an eerily American-looking grocery/department store that is Turkish owned and considered very posh. I was amazed at the variety there, all sorts of world-cheeses, salad dressing, cold cereal, and most things that could be found in an American grocery were there. Of course, despite the fact that everything was Shop-Rite brand, it was exorbitantly expensive. My big purchase was a small jar of peanut-butter, something that will hopefully be an effective homesickness-antidote, but cost the equivalent of over $8. Considering I am currently receiving about $40 a month, this cannot be a regular purchase of mine, I had to restrain myself from picking up delicacies such as Ranch dressing and hot sauce, that really would have broken the bank.

Perm-site!

07:45 23 August 2008

I haven’t written since I found out about my permanent site placement. On Hub Day Wednesday we had our permanent site placement announcements. This was a very exciting time as it determined where we will be living, who we will be working with, and who we will be seeing the next two years of our service. There had been an enormous amount of speculation to where we were all going, and it was nice to finally figure things out.

I am extraordinarily happy with my site placement. I am going to be in a village called Kyzyl-Suu or Pokrovka, depending on whether you talk to a Kyrgyz or a Russian. Regardless of the name, it is apparently a beautiful village on the South side of enormous Lake Issyk-Kul nearby to Karakol, a resort city on the Eastern side of the lake. It is supposed to be really nice and warm and comfortable there in the summers and extremely cold in the winters (just what I wanted). The other nice thing about the south side of the lake is the proximity of the mountains. There is very little area between the lake edge and the stunning 5,000+ m. high mountain peaks. Less than five miles (as the crow flies) from my village is the peak of a mountain that is over 14,000 ft.! I can’t wait to get there for my site visit, I am sure it is stunningly gorgeous.

In addition to the site being a physically attractive area, I have heard a lot of really positive things about my job and the other people around me. There is a decent amount of volunteers in the area, so I won’t be wanting for American interaction, and I was happy that some of my closer friends were placed in the same oblast (Kyrgyzstan is not a big country, but poor roads and unreliable transportation combined with the rugged terrain make cross-country travel difficult and really lengthy). The school is also one of the better secondary schools in the area so hopefully I will have motivated students. I also found out recently that JICA, the Japanese equivalent of Peace Corps has two people in my village, so I can establish even more cross-cultural connections with other ex-pats.

Our site visits, a five day long sojourn to check out our host family, school, and get to know the community somewhat, begin next week. I am very excited to make the six hour long trip.

20 August 2008

Explanation of Culture Day Photos

So I couldn't caption the Culture Day photos correctly with the formating. In general, these pictures are of demonstrations of Kyrgyz cultural customs. They include a Russian wedding, a bride kidnapping (in this case a consensual kidnapping was shown- but the bride is still supposed to act as if it is nonconsenual), a first step ceremony where men run to the child and the first one there gets to snip a rope tying the legs together and take the child on his first steps, and a Turkish wedding complete with a man with knives- this is supposed to be a humorous symbol both threatening the bride if she should run, and hoping for a quiet wife (lest her tongue be cut out).

If you have any questions, feel free to email me or comment.

Rest of the pictures from Culture Day















Pickin' the Orange, Juicin' the Orange...


22:00 17 August 2008

Today I went to Bishkek. There are these people that own electronic scales and charge two som (about five cents) to measure your weight. I had noticed that I had lost a good amount since I got here six weeks ago and was curious to what I would clock in at. I weighed in just over 100 kg., or 220 lbs. That means I have lost about 20 pounds in country so far. I was told to expect to lose a lot of weight and brought clothing accordingly, but I didn’t really to expect it to happen so fast. It’s nice, but I hope I don’t become scrawny.

Regardless, it was really nice to hang out with some current volunteers (including one that is leaving in less than two weeks after her service is over) and other trainees. We went to a Chinese restaurant and while it was, by American standards, nothing special, it was wonderful to get a different kind of food. I also realized that I have to adjust my standards when it comes to purchasing food. I was judging the amount of food I would get by its prices (even though I realized later it had the portion sizes listed on the menu) and this was a mistake. I ordered a tofu soup and then a spicy tofu dish and a side of rice. The total came out to the equivalent of about five or six dollars and so I assumed that it wouldn’t be a tremendous amount of food. Boy was I wrong. The plate of tofu was large, not huge, but definitely sufficient as a meal by itself. The soup wasn’t so much a bowl as a vat. Though it cost only about two dollars, it was a huge pot full of soup. I was so full when I left the restaurant (I figured I may as well eat it all because where else can I get a tofu fix in this country). Despite being full, an hour later I was hungry again (sorry, I couldn’t resist the joke, it isn’t true; I was full for hours).

I haven’t yet mentioned the outcome of Culture Day. It took place yesterday and was a lot of fun. The story is better told through the photographs so I will keep myself short here. As I mentioned before, our group was incredibly disorganized, but this was overshadowed by our pyrotechnics and dancing. Other groups did events that ran from a Kyrgyz ceremony about the first steps babies take to Russian, Turkish, and Kyrgyz weddings and a Kyrgyz cradle ceremony. We all broke at around midday for lunch (of course we had plov) and then the remainder of the day was a big dance party. It was hilarious as the music jumped from American (often from the 80’s- which was awesome) to Turkish to Russian and everyone, Peace Corps staff included, got in the spirit and danced their hearts out. I don’t think I mentioned it before, but at Malika’s birthday, some other trainees and I started the dance move that could storm the world. It has spread through the trainees and is relatively well known (half as a joke, half as an awesome move). At culture day, we even spread it to some Kyrgyz kids that will hopefully show it to their friends. The move is essentially a pantomime of picking an orange from a tree, juicing an orange, pouring the juice, and then drinking the juice. As one reaches out and goes through the moves, it is generally appropriate to introduce the uninformed of your motions with a: “Pickin’ the orange, juicin’ tha orange (repeat 2x) pourin’ the juice, drinkin’ tha juice (repeat 2x)”. So my faithful readers, I encourage you to spread this dance move stateside. Maybe someday we’ll look back and be able to say: “Remember that stupid ‘juicing it’ dance move we did years ago? That was fun in a dorky way, kind of like the Macarena”. Good night and remember, Juice It!
So these pictures are mostly self explanatory. The top one is the males in my village and I doing the Russian dance. Then follows the burning scarecrow. After that is me accompanying Shawn in a Russian song. Finally is a scene from a Kyrgyz cradle ceremony where a baby is outfitted with a nomadic cradle and becomes a member of the tribe.

Tasty?

12:30 18 August 2008

I was eating lunch today and was reminded of several things that I wanted to address in my third sensory article. So here goes it:

Taste

Kyrgyz food is certainly not bad. The summer produce here is better and fresher than most of the stuff in America and the prepared dishes definitely hold their charm. I feel that a Kyrgyz restaurant could do all right in the States. Having said that, food is probably the number one thing I miss about America. Primarily, I miss the diversity of dishes in America. Even ignoring eating out, American home cooked cuisine draws from all sorts of influences and includes all sorts of foods from burritos to pasta to ramen. My experience in Kyrgyzstan has been, so far, that most dishes are variations on a theme and that most Kyrgyz (or in my case Russian/Kyrgyz) food can be fairly confidently stereotyped. The food is nearly always greasy (they put oil on everything included vegetables) and salt is the primary/only seasoning. In terms of types of dishes, soup is an omnipresent staple, potatoes and onions are in nearly everything, and much like the tea, everything is always steaming hot regardless of the weather.

An interesting cultural phenomenon in Kyrgyzstan is an almost endemic phobia of all things cold. Perhaps it comes from fear from the bitter winters, but there are widely held myths about the negative powers of cold things. Therefore, there is never anything remotely cold at most dinners even in the summer. These myths mean that girls are told never to sit on the floor without a mat lest their ovaries freeze and I was told not to drink kompote (nectar drink) that had been in the freezer and had chunks of ice in it because they thought it would give me a sore throat. So far, I have found condolence only in the ice-cream here, which, by the way, is quite good, even though it’s not American-cold.

Before I elaborate further on my personal opinions of the food here, let me discuss what many of my meals comprise of. The main component of most meals is some kind of soup, I have had innumerable servings of borsht (beet soup), lagman (noodle soup), barley soup, potato soup, onion and potato soup, and glupkie (dumpling soup and my favorite kind). If not soup, the main course is usually plov (the national dish which is a variant of rice pilaf), this fried potatoes and onions dish (kind of like homefries without the seasoning), a noodle dish, a vegetable stew (yummy especially when it has eggplant), or some kind of meat (invariably the meat is extremely fatty, lean meat here is an alien concept for both practical and taste preferences). In addition to the main course, every meal has bread, some kind of salad, often includes a side meat such as cold sausage or occasionally some type of oil-soaked perogie or pancake. The bread is always a white loaf that is either bought or baked in the house and is always accompanied with butter; I like the bread a lot but miss wheat. Salad is an all-inclusive term but is by no means an American salad (oh my goodness, I would love a blue-cheese salad right now, this entry is making me so hungry for food from home). Usually, salad is vegetables picked from the garden (most frequently tomatoes and cucumbers) and doused with salt and oil or mayonnaise- I’d prefer the vegetables alone, but this is the Kyrgyz way. As you can probably see, basically everything that they eat here is drenched in some kind of oil, butter, or fat.

As many of you know, I was a vegetarian for about twelve years in the States. When I found out that I was headed to Kyrgyzstan and read about the cuisine there, I decided to suspend my vegetarianism for my service. In order to prepare myself, I started eating meat slowly a few weeks before I left. I realized that while I did miss being a vegetarian, it was true that meat could indeed taste really good. Despite it being my major impetus for abandoning my lifestyle, Kyrgyz meat has under whelmed me. Like I said before, Kyrgyz food is as a rule extremely greasy, and the meat that is prepared here is no exception. Pieces of meat tend to have very little “meat” on them, and I have gotten used to accidentally chomping down on a piece of fat or cartilage. I’ve learned to just close my eyes and swallow. It’s interesting because my I have told my family that I was a vegetarian for so long in the states and they were impressed, confused, and shocked (they said it wasn’t healthy and that I would be taller if I had eaten it, to which I replied that I was glad that I stopped eating it then). Since I told them that, and they noticed that while I will indeed try everything, I really do prefer dishes with less or no meat in them, they have served me less.

As I said before, I really don’t mind Kyrgyz food much. I’m not a terribly picky eater, and I will enjoy the produce in the summer. Mostly, I will just be tired of the food, and I am worried about the even more decreased diversity in eating during winter time. While I doubt Americans will be making pilgrimages for the plov of Kyrgyzstan any time soon, I highly doubt I will be starving in this country for lack of want.

Kyrgyz Kitties



A note on my cats.

My kitten has grown a lot since the last picture I put up of her. As you can see, she is as cute as ever. However, she has entered the “annoying as heck adolescent” phase and constantly tries to attack my foot, meows incessantly for food from the table, and loves fighting her mom. I really like her mother, while she obviously wants food from the table, she is calm and friendly rather than annoying and insistent about it. Usually I try to give it to the mom to teach the other cat a lesson. I feel momma cat is similarly annoyed with her daughter’s behavior. I would be too if my daughter constantly stuck up on me, jumped on me from behind, and sunk her claws into my back. It’s these behaviors that elicit scenes like the picture below.

LPI 4 Lyfe

21:00 14 August 2008

I just returned from rehearsal for Culture Day. We had an accordionist today and I am going to be playing along with some of the songs on guitar. He is a family friend that was born in Kyrgyzstan but now lives in Siberia but has a son that lives nearby. It’s really cool how music really is the universal language sometimes. I met with him before the rehearsal and we played together some, he had an awesome rendition of Mozart’s “Rondo a la Turk”. The rehearsal again was chaotic, but had some semblance of order to it today. Also a good sign is that my legs aren’t killing me nearly as much today, though I have realized just how awesome of a dancer my host Grandfather is.

Today we had our first of several language proficiency interviews (LPI). The interviews are made to asses our level in the language and they are used throughout the government to determine fluency. In order to swear in, we were told we would need to score at least a “Novice-High” by the end of our training. I am happy to report that I met this requirement today; the interviewer said I was a strong Novice-High bordering on Intermediate-Low. Yay language proficiency!

I’ve been meaning to mention these two little Kyrgyz girls. They are absolutely adorable and live next door to the house my LCF is living in. I met them with Laura one day and they were extraordinarily friendly and now whenever we see them, they come out and greet us and chat for a while. Their Russian is amazingly clear and easy to understand, which is part of the reason that I love speaking with them. They are also just incredibly cute, today they came out and immediately attached onto Laura and remained hugging her for the entire conversation. How adorable, I will have to take their picture someday.

13 August 2008

Second Sense

19:45 12 August 2008

I’d been wanting to do this for a while but hadn’t the time. I should be studying Russian, but I would rather write this:

Touch

Initially, I felt that touch was going to be the most difficult of the senses to write about. Thinking about the differences between touch sensations in one part of the world vice another is a very difficult and convoluted thing to discuss. The more I thought about it, however, the more I realized that the subtle differences in our habitual actions and the way we touch and interact with each other are often highly showing of the culture as a whole.

In a book about cultural adjustment, Peace Corps told us that we would be expected to do new actions and perform old actions in different ways. These actions are difficult for us at first, but are regarded as natural and fluid for people raised in the host culture. Probably the first among these actions I noticed and then became accustomed to, was the shoes-off rule. I was aware of this before I arrived in country and brought slippers, but I was amazed with the fluidity and nonchalance with which my host family took them off when going inside. They hardly even stop walking to kick them off, and have done it so many times that their shoes always land neatly by the frame of the door. The design of the house, with the eating and cooking areas outside and two separate sleeping areas means that I am constantly taking on an off my shoes.

At first, this was an awkward ordeal where I would come to a complete stop, remove my shoes one by one and then proceed forward. While I wouldn’t say that I do it thoughtlessly yet, I have now achieved the muscle memory and grace with which to be able to both remove my shoes effortlessly in motion with my walking and also to be able to step backwards and into them when leaving the house without stopping my forward momentum. I find it fascinating simultaneously how easy and how difficult this transition was.

There are a lot of little things like that that required adjustment. The first night I arrived, I was given tea (of course) and offered the sugar bowl. I took the spoon from the sugar bowl, ladled the sugar into my mug, and then after replacing the spoon to the sugar dish, noticed I had no spoon of my own with which to stir. Instead, I elected to use the fork that was in front of me thinking this would be the appropriate thing to do. This elicited a host of “What are you doing, crazy American?” looks from my family. I quickly learned that it was entirely appropriate and expected to use the spoon from the sugar bowl to stir your tea, and then replace it. In America, this would be criticized for contaminating the sugar with tea, but here the attitude is that the sugar is used at every meal for tea and why waste effort to clean extra spoons for everyone.

The collectivist culture here also shows through in many ways. There are always serving dishes heaped with food, but rarely are there serving utensils, the way to get the food onto your individual plate is to use your fork, whether or not you have used it yet. Similarly, it is perfectly acceptable to pick at the serving dish; nobody minds that your fork travels from your mouth and to the communal food and back again. The same applies to your plate, what is yours is not necessarily yours and sampling each others food is the normal way of life. It’s very different from the individualistic, contaminant free, ultra-personalized, way of life stateside.

Personal space here is also different. I remember the Seinfeld episode about “close-talkers” and while it’s never been uncomfortable to me (outside of the necessity of marshrutkas), there definitely are different concepts about your bubble of personal space or its absence, especially in same-sex interactions. Male or female friends touching each other or holding hands in ways that would be regarded as intimate in America are seen as completely normal here- though the topic of homosexuality is extremely taboo. Also, while not directly tactile, the personal questions that are asked here reflect the difference in both physical and emotional personal space. It is normal for complete strangers to ask “What’s your income?”, “Who are your parents?”, “Exactly where do you live?”, “Are you married?”, and this one is followed inevitably by the “Why are you not married?”, “When are you getting married?”, and of course, “Would you like to meet my daughter?”

Tactile sensation differences are not wildly different in Kyrgyzstan, but many reflect on the differences in cultures. Collectivist culture and the sense of shared versus individual space along with other cultural norms and their expectations have led to a lot of differences in action on my part. These are often the most subtle, but also most important differences to notice about culture.

English Clubbin'

19:30 12 August 2008

Today I had one of the best successes for my service. We had our weekly English Club and for the first time, we used a lesson plan I created. I had designed it a while ago as a way to teach the fruits and vegetables that are common in Kyrgyzstan. Also for the first time, we had planned to divide the class but it was smaller this time (only 15 instead of the 20-25 we have had). In the past, we had all taught the class together in a sort of haphazard way, but this time I was the primary teacher with another volunteer and the other volunteers played a support role working with individual students. This proved a much more organized classroom and I believe a more effective lesson.

I believe my lesson was well-designed and I think it came out well. We got evaluated on our English club today and all received high marks, so that was an encouraging sign. The highlight of the lesson was when we divided the class into teams and I had a “garden” of pictures of fruit laid in a row in the middle of the class. One individual from each team took turns and I would say that I wanted a vegetable or fruit or English and they raced to identify and retrieve the chosen one. The kids seemed to enjoy the activity a lot, and by the end of the them, most could ask what each other was eating with some degree of accuracy and answer “I am eating a(n) ___”. Designing a plan on such a simple topic really showed me how difficult of a language English is though. The grammatical rules (a/an), plurals and singulars, and the presence of being verb (am/are/is) is difficult for Russian speakers (there is no to be in the present tense, you say I (am) boy or that (is) car).

This was a successful day, but boy am I exhausted. Last night we had our first rehearsal for Culture Day on Saturday where each village prepares a cultural presentation. We are doing Russian culture and our meeting consisted of the various host families yelling at each other unintelligibly to me (they speak so fast!). I had also brought my guitar and may be playing a Russian song, I was able to figure out the chords to what they were singing and they were impressed. Probably the funniest part was, completely unrelated to the purpose of the meeting, they asked me to play an American song, so the volunteers broke out into Hotel California. We are also going to do the Russian dance with the kicking. It is sooo hard. My legs are killing me today and I am seriously worried that I will sprain something Saturday. Oh well, we’ll deal with that if it happens.

11 August 2008

A Note On Marshrutkas

14:00 10 August 2008

Marshrutkas can be a range of adjectives; the first that come to mind are terrifying, comical, uncomfortable, and strangely efficient. In essence a marshrutka is a mini-bus used in Kyrgyzstan and other Russian-speaking countries. It is the primary/only form of public transportation here. They range from Soviet era van-like vehicles to relatively nice Mercedes Benz made minibuses. They are usually set up with five to six rows of seats, two on one side and one on the other with an aisle in between. The seats are laughably small, while I usually prefer the aisle seats, on a marshrutka, it’s not a preference, it’s a physical necessity, I simply will not fit in a seat sitting forward. However, I only know this from the few times I have had the opportunity to sit. In addition to the 15-20ish seated passenger room, there is about room for 10 to stand single file in the aisle. Regardless of the fact that there is only truly room for about 25 in a marshrutka, they are often packed with upwards of forty five or fifty people.

Their overcrowding is largely the reason for the aforementioned adjectives. These things are like clown cars, at the end of a line, people just keep getting out for a seemingly impossibly long time. A few days ago I had what I hope will be the penultimate experience with this method of transport. I was on a marshrutka so full, that there was not room in the aisles to stand. Consequently, I did an awkward wall sit against the side of the marshrutka about two inches above a Kyrygz man’s lap. I ended the ten minute ride with my quadriceps screaming in agony and I had seriously considered just plopping into this man’s lap. I didn’t because, though our proximity was certainly nothing unusual (he barely even looked up when I assumed my position), I felt that would almost certainly be considered culturally inappropriate.
Despite the ridiculousness of marshrutkas, they are a commonplace element of every Kyrgyz person’s life. This "everyone deals with it" status has led to a lot of nice habits, like offering seats to those who need them most (new mothers, older people, and children), passing back and forth the fare and change (with no one skimming as far as I can tell), letting the driver know if you hear someone ask for a stop (he certainly won’t unless he is sure), and most remarkably to me, seated passengers unquestioningly taking the held objects of standing passengers until they debark. While a marshrutka ride is cramped, uncomfortable, boiling hot, and often smells bad, it also is often an opportunity to see the best sides of people. I heard rumor that the U.S. Embassy doesn’t allow it’s employees to ride them (presumably because of the frequency of pick-pocketing) but that isn’t an option on Peace Corps salary, and anyway, I’m glad I get to have that cultural experience.

One-month Anniversery

11:45 10 August 2008

I’ve officially been in Kyrgyzstan for over a month now. It seems like such a bizarre state of being. Some days, when language is going well and I’m in a good mood, it feels like I’m completely at home and have been here for years and the time has flown. Other days, if I am frustrated or can’t get my point across, I feel the newness of my being here and can’t imagine another twenty-seven months of the same. Fortunately enough, I have had more of the former kind of days and was kind of astonished when I realized that I had only been here a month.
Pre-Service Training overall is full of up-and-downs. The Volunteers we come across are constantly letting us know that it gets better at site, and at first I didn’t realize what they meant. I understand to a better degree now, PST has a lot of elements that add to the frustration, and your attempts to integrate are only just getting started. Our days are usually filled with some activity or another. Biweekly three-hour long technical educations are obviously necessary to teach us how to teach but can be tedious. We were recently evaluated and it has a lot of people upset, they believe that our teachers hardly know us an have little right to give us performance evaluations. I’m ambivalent on the matter (possibly because I received a favorable one) but I understand the confusion and hurt that could accompany seemingly arbitrary adjudication. These combined with homework that seems more busy-work than practical, again have upset some people. When people are frustrated, tired, and fed-up, stress levels raise and people take out their frustrations on one another. Peace Corps told us to expect this and realize the underlying factors when we found ourselves in fowl moods, but that doesn’t stop me from regretting it later if I snap at someone out of frustration at some beyond their control.

Wow! I just found out that there is a secret hiding place/storeroom beneath the floor in the house! My Baba was making tomato juice to jar for the winter months and Papa Kolya just came in, lifted up the carpet and went into the secret hiding place! Cool!

06 August 2008

Family Pictures

Max and Aliona
(From left to right- my Papa's sister, Mama (Grandmother) Lubov, Mama Ira, Aliona, Papa (Grandfather) Kolya, Max, and some cousin at Papa Kolya's birthday bash.)

It was a hard days night

07:45 6 August 2008

Yesterday I gained a lot of respect for coal miners. My host siblings and their mother went on a trip to visit their father in Russia a few days ago. That means that I am left alone in the house with Mama Luba, my host Babushka, and Papa Kolya, my host grandfather. Papa Kolya bought a huge load of coal yesterday and I helped assist him move it from the place where it was dumped to the storage house, a difficult and dusty task. I took the precaution of wearing a wet kerchief over my face, but even still, it was black when I blew my nose for quite a while. It really made me think about how difficult and unhealthy it must be to work in a mine surrounded by the dust everywhere. It seriously got everywhere outside, the kitchen table 40 feet away had a thin layer of black powder on it. It can’t be healthy stuff.

In other news, I nearly got scared to death. There is one dog that lives in the back yard that hates me and wants me to die (I will post photos later). It always strained at its chain and barked ferociously and growled at me whenever I went out to use the outhouse. A few days ago, his straining came to fruition and he actually broke a link on his chain. I had been discussing this possibility and decided that if he did so, it would be best to either try and kick him if he tried to attack or grab his muzzle if he lunged. The thing I knew I had to do was avoid turning my back, because as soon as I did I felt certain he would attack. Well, as soon as he broke loose, he seemed as confused and bewildered as I was at the occurrence. He ended up just standing there as I slowly retreated backwards from towards the house ready to let loose a kick if need be. Scary stuff.

At last, a tubular guitar!

20:30 4 August 2008

Several exciting thins have happened over the past few days. To me, the most exciting is that I bought a guitar! I had previously looked for one at this big department-like store in Bishkek but found that the wares they had there was of very poor quality and extraordinarily expensive. So I held off buying one there because I heard of a rumor of an underground passage that had a market where guitars where sold. Luckily, this rumor was correct and when I went into Bishkek this past Sunday I was successful.

We were really put on a wild goose-chase finding this place. I was told it was in an underground near the Osh Bazaar, one of the larger bazaars in the city. When we got there (I went with 3 other people from my village and the host sister of one them who speaks excellent English). From the Osh bazaar, we were directed to go about 15 blocks down and I had a bad feeling that it wouldn’t be the right place. These feelings were confirmed as we got there and they looked confused and told us to turn around. Luckily, once we got back to Osh bazaar, we found the sellers relatively easily. I was also impressed with the price. While the guitar I bought is by no means a nice guitar, it has a flat tone, tinny treble, and not terribly high quality construction, but it is a guitar, and it is acceptable. The guitar says that it is an Alvarez, a brand I recognized, but somehow I doubt it because it is labeled an “Alvarez Acustic”. I’m not sure what an acustic guitar is, but I paid equivalent of about 70 USD for it, so I’m not complaining too much.

During the same trip into the city, my friends picked up things, had some Italian food (or at least the Kyrgyz take on it), and wandered around the city for a while. Anyhow, I have to get lesson planning for my English club tomorrow. All the best!

01 August 2008

Krunk Kyrgyzstan

13:20 1 August 2008

It continues to be really hot. Today it has reached a new high of 88.7 degrees Fahrenheit in my room. I can’t even imagine how hot it is outside, it must be well over 105 because of how cool my room feels compared to outside. Despite the heat, last night was one of the most wild experiences I have had in Kyrgyzstan so far. It was my host father’s (or grandfather, whichever you want to call him) birthday and the family through a big party. There were relatives that came into town from all over the country for the celebration and I would guess there were over 40 people there.

It started off, as most Kyrgyz parties, with lots of eating and toasting. Kyrgyz parties, I have found so far, tend to go in waves of eating and dancing. Chris, the volunteer that lived with my family during last year’s PST, even came, and it was nice to have someone to speak with in English there. He is a really nice guy and the level of his Russian is superb. Of course, we were both asked to make toasts, and after his eloquent speech, I got up, and made a basic, though I thought clever toast (of course in Russian). I said “I want to tell you, Papa, in German- Viel Gluck zum Geburtstag, in Spanish, Feliz Cumpleaños, in English, Happy Birthday, and of course, in Russian HAPPY BIRTHDAY!” So after the first round of eating and toasting, people got up to dance for awhile but then settled down for another round of eating. This is where the party turned away from what I imagine is the norm for Kyrgyz parties.

Papa Kolya (my host Papa) came out of the house dressed in a diaper, a bonnet, a pacifier, and was carrying a baby bottle filled with vodka (Why oh why didn’t I have my camera out!?!?). Of course this was greeted by a host of cheers and laughs, and it was certainly something I had never expected. He played the role for a while, talking about how he was new to this world and didn’t understand anything, and it was all a huge joke. If that wasn’t enough, his niece filled a hat with different actions, and everyone went around the table drawing and doing what they said. I was lucky that the one I drew was merely to sing a song, of course I chose “Happy Birthday”. Others weren’t so lucky and I saw two other babushkas (grandmothers) made to kiss each other, an older gentleman fill a plate with vodka and drink it, my host sister get up on a chair and crow like a rooster, and to top it off, another babushka down vodka from the bottle (the grimace on her face was painful even to me).

After this silly game, the dancing resumed, and I was thrust into the most awkward dance since middle school. This middle age lady grabbed me and started slow dancing with me and jabbering machine-gun fire fast Russian in my ear. Thankfully the song was only about 15 minutes long (I jest, it was only about 6) but it was incredibly funny and awkward and embarrassing as we became the center of attention (I think my host sister took a picture so I will show you when I get it). I eventually went to bed at the same time as Chris, around 11:30 or so, but the party was still going strong and I woke up around 2:00 when it had finally died down somewhat. All in all, a memorable and unique experience.

Kyrgyzstan is HOT HOT HOT!

18:30 31 July 2008

As I mentioned in my email, I got my official Peace Corps ID. This is a very exciting for a variety of reasons. During Pre Service Training, PCTs are on a fairly short leash, and our mobility is severely restricted. This is because of safety and security concerns and because we are still learning the language and they want us to err on the side of overbearing. There is a law in Kyrgyzstan that allows any policeman (militiaman here) to stop you and check your documents. Peace Corps still has our passports so for the past three weeks we have been walking around relatively undocumented (we were given a copy of our passport in case we were stopped but it wasn’t a problem). Now that we have our PCIDs, which are issued in conjunction with the government, we shouldn’t have any problems if we are stopped arbitrarily. They are also cool because of the way they look. It’s a wallet fold reminiscent of an FBI or KGB adgent badge. Who knew that Peace Corps could be so B.A.?

The last two days (today especially) have been hot. Really hot. It was over 40 degrees Celsius today (over 105 Fahrenheit) and my room, a cool spot for me, was a balmy 87 degrees Fahrenheit. Sheesh! While it certainly nice that the heat here is dry, the sun is extraordinarily strong (very few clouds) and when it is over 40 degrees, dry heat is still REALLY hot. For some reason which I may never understand, the Kyrgyz drink hot beverages regardless of the weather. This is one of the largest cultural differences I have had to deal with. Drinking a thousand cups of tea a day, despite the fact that I am sweating and could fry an egg on a car hood, is a big difference for Americans accustomed to ice in their water (even in the middle of winter).