To site!

13:15 20 September 2008

As I said in the last entry, I was supposed to have my first classes tomorrow. Unfortunately, my counterpart was sick this morning and so she cancelled her classes today. Normally, I would be expected to fill in and teach by myself, but the first two weeks of my classes are supposed to be primarily observation-based and allow myself to ease into the classroom environment. With my classes cancelled, I had a free day with nothing in particular to do. I also realized how big a problem boredom will be during my service. I have been here less than a day and while I have plenty to do (my room is a mess and I haven’t finished unpacking yet) I find myself wanting for a direct purpose. I think I don’t do well being idle, and having mandatory classes to teach and attend really gives me direction. This will be a problem in the winter time as we will likely not have classes for up to two or three months and I will have to find projects to occupy my time. The lack of electricity is not going to make that any easier.

Following up on yesterday’s news, after the swearing in ceremony we had a reception at the Ambassador’s house. The house was beautiful, it was huge and I glimpsed the indoor pool and sauna while trying to find the restroom (flush toilets!). However, the highlight was not the architecture but the food. For the first time in country, I ate true, 100% real American food. Never mind that it was Doritos, microwave pizza, sandwiches with Kraft singles, salsa and tortilla chips- it tasted like heaven. The newly sworn in volunteers descended upon the food like locusts, it must have been a disgusting sight for the Embassy staff- we got asked when the last time we had eaten was and replied with “about an hour and a half ago” much to their bewilderment. Regardless, it was an intense food frenzy and the pizzas in particular didn’t last more than 10 seconds when they hit the table, sometimes they were gone before they could even reach their destination. Wow, we really must have been a sight and I wonder if the embassy employees could understand our situations fully. 

After the reception, we headed back to the Issyk-Kul hotel for the evening, of course being that it was the last night we would see each other for months, we celebrated and everyone including our oldest volunteers joined in the festivities. It was good times, but as they always do, they ended and we had to depart the next morning. Again, I rode with a Pat, a volunteer that is about 25 minutes away by taxi and the ride seemed faster this time. I am about 6 hours from Bishkek, but the drive is so pretty that it tends to fly by. I got to site in the early afternoon and was greeted by my eldest sister and her two youngest daughters, the eldest is back in Bishkek with my host brother-in-law. My host family seems more observant of Islam than most Kyrgyz- my host sister is fasting for Ramadan. I thought this would be slightly awkward if I ate, but she assured me wholeheartedly that it was okay if I ate. I was also happy because being home alone with just Cholpon and her daughters meant that I got to use my Russian a lot more. With the whole family there, Kyrgyz was spoken almost exclusively, but with my current situation it seems that I will be able to practice my Russian a lot. Cholpon said that she preferred Russian to Kyrgyz because it was a richer language. This is probably true because of the relative simplicity of Kyrgyz. There are a lot more words in Russian than Kyrgyz (to the point that there is no such thing as a Kyrgyz dictionary) and while complex, Russian constructions can be really beautiful (and famously vulgar- I was told by a PST staff member that Russian has over 15,000 words used exclusively for swearing). 

That evening my host mother returned late after a party at the school and was delighted to see me. We spent the evening conversing and relaxing and also watching the news. My language skills are developed enough at this point were I can watch the Russian news and get something out of it. It is definitely more difficult because of the pace of speech, but they generally speak clearly so I can usually at least get the general idea of the story. It is also interesting to see a different international perspective on the news. The viewpoint in the news I read in Newsweek and occasionally on CNN or BBC online comes from a very different vantage than that on the Russian news, especially when it comes to reporting on the war in Georgia. 

Perhaps the highlight of the evening was the developing of my relationship with my host niece, a two year old that is absolutely adorable. When I first got there, unlike her sister (who adored me but is now back in Bishkek) she was shy but curious. She would look at me but rarely respond to the silly faces I made at her. This habit changed adorably as she likes to hang out in the door frame of my room and just stand and watch me- about an hour after I had made faces at her, she mimicked them back at me absolutely deadpan, it was really hilarious.