When I leave Egypt I will bring... some things to do.

08:00 22 September 2008

Well, the last two days have been very interesting for me in terms of what my service is going to be like. My classes got cancelled on Saturday so I didn’t have anything officially to do that day- this was a warning sign to me that I need to have other projects to do to keep myself occupied. I still have a lot of unpacking to do, and I want to start studying Russian solitary, but having just come out of PST I found my motivation low. Also, it was one of the worst days in terms of power, we only had electricity for a total of three hours during the day. That ruled out movies, computer games, or writing emails to pass the time. I ended up just sitting around far more than I would have liked to do, the highlight of my day was an hour and a half walk to the bazaar and the park to get some fresh air. All things told though, I was really bored and I realize how difficult the winter, depending on whether or not we will have classes, will be. As I said before, in order to ward off the inevitable boredom that will come with not-working and unpleasant outdoor conditions, I will need to have a variety of things that don’t depend on electricity to do. Of course, continuing my work on Russian and picking up Kyrgyz will be a goal of mine, but I think I need to have other more creative projects I can work on that won’t tax my patience. If anybody has any experience in this department, I’d love to hear what kind of ideas you have that would help me- guesting is okay but until I become fluent in the languages (which is a ways off) I can’t properly entertain myself with mere conversation. 

Yesterday, on the other hand, was an example of how relaxing and entertaining village life could be. It also showed how the language and cultural barrier makes a huge difference in your interactions. I organized a lunch at a café in my village so one volunteer who is more remote than I am could meet other volunteers from our area. Everyone was on Kyrgyz time (half an hour to an hour late) but it was an enjoyable event and it was nice to be able to converse fluently in English. We stayed a long time at the café chatting and then after most of the volunteers had left, I hung out with the two JICA volunteers that live in my village until another volunteer who was returning from Bishkek stopped by. While obviously my goals here aren’t about having a good time with other volunteers, and my budget wouldn’t support that on a daily basis, I will certainly need to see other expatriates at least a few times a month in order to keep my mental health intact. It’s wonderful to interact with my host family, and I had a long two hour conversation with them when I got home, but there’s something about the shared experience of being a long way from home that creates an uncommon bond across volunteers, regardless of their nationality. Even with the Japanese volunteer that speaks less English, we all are in a very different culture from home learning to adapt to a new culture, missing home, a different climate, and new food (or perhaps the more difficult adaptation is to the lack of variety) and we can understand each other in a way that host country nationals can not. 

Anyhow, this wasn’t supposed to be a downer entry, I’m actually in a really good mood after yesterday and I’m really looking forward to getting my classes today. No doubt the village life with its often isolating moments- internet here is going to be much more difficult to procure- will be difficult at times, but I also anticipate it having a fair number of rewards as well. And with that, I need to get ready.