The Amazing Adventures of Kyrgyzstan and Col

Chapter Three: Christmas in Kyrgyzstan

We'll see how my first time away from a Marshall Family Christmas goes...

Oh, and I've been trying to upload pictures, but it hasn't been working. Maybe it will this time, maybe not.

Merry Christmas, guys.



22 December 2005

The Kyrgyz crack me up. It was a huge mistake to leave my journal home today. I just may have had my most entertaining day in country thus far. I’ll try my best to recap.

I woke up this morning, “brewed” myself some 8 O’clock coffee, and headed off to school to meet my counterpart, so that we could hop in a cab together and drive to Kyzyl Suu and get acquainted with the educational headquarters in my region. Half an hour ride down, ten minutes in the city and another thirty minutes back, I only missed teaching two of my classes. But on a Thursday, when my day seems like it will never end, that’s huge.

While the possibility excited for me to be back in time to teach 9A, I decided to take my time, go to the outhouse, and leisurely stroll back into school. After finishing my lesson plan for the day in the teacher’s lounge, I grabbed a cup of tea and some deep fried goodness in the cafeteria by myself. I don’t know what it is about seeing someone of authority in another setting, but when my students caught a glimpse of me sipping away, they all but ignored me and went on their merry way… until I decided to embarrass them and shout from across the room, “Good morning!” and then I waved, long and hard. You better believe they waved back.

I decided to teach myself some Russian between lessons. I got as far as counting to ten, hello, what is this?, and thank you. And one of the other teachers, instead of trying small talk with me, corrected my pronunciation. I tried to showoff my newfound education to my fourth graders. They got a kick out of it.

On my way back home I saw all a bunch of people, and it hit me how odd I must be for these guys. First of all, men and women don’t really make eye contact when passing one another on the road, so I try to follow cultural norms…for the most part. I know I stick out, so a part of me thinks I should just forget the norms and go all out, representing the overconfident American. As a common courtesy, I only do this sometimes, picking and choosing my subjects thoughtfully, mainly older women and students I recognize from school. These are the ones I look in the eye, making them just a little uneasy. Sometimes I bring out the big guns and get the friendly smile rocking too. This afternoon, however, I chucked the norms, approaching a group of 20-something guys head-on. Instead of looking down at my feet, careful not to slip on the ice, I held my head high, waiting for them to be the first to flinch and look away. I must have met my match because one of the dudes looked right at me, smiled, and then proceeded to ask me questions I couldn’t answer. It was glorious.

Approaching my house, I passed the neighbors and caught sight of the horse. It was just chilling, standing there, its head two inches from the door, waiting to be let in. I’d hate to be a horse.

Someone ticked me off today. When I got back to school and went up to my room to take a break, and you know, blow my nose, a teacher was conducting a lesson with about five of the advanced-speaking girls right there in my classroom. She actually had the nerve to use my own personal Post-It notes for things like explaining the difference between “who” and “whom.” I couldn’t believe it. I looked in, made my observations and quickly shut the door. I know I shouldn't let things like that get to me. I'm working on it. But if I hand-out any more pieces of chalk and Post-Its, I fear I'll be conducting lessons by writing on my students' backs with my fingers.

The other day I handed out candy to the students who participated in Identify Any English Words By Listening To This One Christmas Song game. Word spread like mono in a co-ed freshman college dorm, and next thing I knew I found myself giving the last of my Lifesavers to the same teacher for a “teaching activity” and her daughter. Call me crazy, but small objects in the mouth of an infant, regardess of name, are anything but a lifesaver.

In casual conversation the Kyrgyz on the south shore use the plural form of you when speaking to just one, solitary person. I didn’t catch on until this afternoon when my host brother ask me if I was going back to school for a lesson later. In translation he said, “So are you guys going back to school?” I looked at him, pointed to myself, looked over my shoulder, just in case there was someone else in the room I hadn’t noticed and said, “Me?” He nodded. So, “Just me?” “Yes, you guys.” I nodded and just said that I had a lesson later, and I just came home for an hour to get some things. I think that satisfied him because he just dipped his bread into some jam and started eating again.

Is it bad that I’m already on the fourth disc of Alias? I know I should pace myself, but it’s just too entertaining.

21 December 2005

I brought my iPod and speakers into class today for the purpose of sharing some American culture. I made all my students listen to Harry Connick Jr.’s version of “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” about 25 times in the span of 40 minutes. While I am fairly confident not one student understood a single word from the Christmas classic, I did come to the conclusion that I have failed 100% in my “attempt to flee the Man and his inevitable 9 to 5.”

I feel like I should be digging a ditch somewhere in Africa. Instead, I find myself waking up to my travel alarm clock everyday, getting dressed in business casual attire, and walking the 15 minutes to my current place of employment.

I realize this next statement will make me sound like a dude, but I’m going to say it anyway. Handy work, like fixing things or mowing a lawn or tuning a bike, makes me really happy. I always watched those Home Fixer-Upper shows and thought, “I could totally do that.” I mean, if a couple of Ty Pennington’s pink t-shirt wearing hunnies can hack it on a show like Trading Spaces, I know I could too.

It’s not that I don’t get satisfaction from teaching. Lord knows some of those kids are super cute and there’s something entirely amazing about watching a kid try his or her hardest to understand something. Or witnessing a kid shine above his classmates in an activity he didn’t grasp one day before. Or maybe just the feeling one can get from having a really crappy day with adults and then being walked all the way home with a pack of 9-year-olds. There’s also the moment when going around the room, checking homework, when the little runt that pissed you off a day earlier, slips a piece of hard candy into your coat pocket, a smile beaming from ear to ear, exposing the same cherry flavored piece you now have too. These are good things. These are the little things that can easily go undetected, but these are the things that make what I’m doing here worthwhile.

While I know this, I really can’t wait for summer and my secondary projects. Yes, I want to be the best teacher I can be while I’m here, but in the long run, I want to do a lot. “A lot” meaning, things that bring me joy while I’m doing it. Like ditching a ditch.

The other day I caught myself standing back, watching a couple of 11th grade boys hang up my world map and the one of the United States I brought from home. I lugged those babies all around Kyrgyzstan, only to be instructing a 17-year-old to move it “a little higher on the right.” I should have finished the job I started and hammed those suckers right in. Instead, I feigned helplessness and thanked my new friends. That could have been the start of something beautiful.

Kyrgyzstan has Married With Children and America’s Funniest Videos (AFV) playing nightly. While the dubbed Russian is comically satisfactory, quiet English can be detected if the volume is turned up high enough. But there’s some other dude hosting, and I don’t even think he was a casual acquaintance of Danny Tanner or Joey. How rude!

19 December 2005

Yesterday I was invited to my Ata’s youngest sister’s house for a lunch/early dinner. It’s on the outskirts of Karakol and the same home my host sister stays in during the week. The sister/aunt may be one of the prettiest Kyrgyz women I’ve seen. She was really nice too but gave me a really odd gift. Before she handed it over, she was rummaging through some drawers, and five minutes later she busted out two boxes. She gave one to me and one to her niece who was there with me. It’s an acrylic painted dog dressed like a woman, which serves the purposes of kitchen utensil holder and endless topic of conversation. The dog has a place, right in its back, holding a wooden spatula, fork and spoon, and an eggbeater. It just might be the most interesting/semi-frightening gift I have ever received.

Today after school one of the teachers told me that I had two packages waiting for me at the post office. My Apa rounded up Beknazar my host brother and made him walk there with me to help with the carrying. My mother managed to pay $80 in shipping and handling costs to send 5 tic-tac-toe boards, two decks of cards, some children’s books and Season 4 of Alias.

I pretty much almost burned my house down this afternoon. I had three things plugged into the outlet thingy when I was told on more than one occasion only to use two at a time. I was only heating water and keeping myself warm, but I guess that was asking for too much. I thought I smelled burning plastic, but it didn’t faze me as many a people burn it on a daily basis here anyway. Bekoo, as he’s known around this neck of the woods, knocked on my door and asked if I smelled anything funny. I nodded, and then to please his curiosity did a quick one-over. It didn’t kill the cat, but it was then that I noticed the wall outlet was fried. Oops. Needless to say, I quickly unplugged everything, lit a candle, opened the doors and sprayed some lemon air freshener throughout the house. My Apa was home before the stench wore off so I had some ‘splaing to do!

So I got this letter from my dad and a couple Christmas CDs. I haven’t really cried since I’ve left home, but today he managed to win some tears as I finished his letter and then as he instructed, listened to Track 2 off this one Irish Christmas album he sent. I know I’m a daddy’s girl, and I’m comfortable with it. He’s the best.

17 December 2005

It’s Saturday night and I have Season One of Scrubs.

Today at the Karakol Bazaar, I got made of for speaking Kyrgyz by two Russian women selling me floresant socks.

I waited an hour and a half for a marshrutka to take me three kilometers from where I needed to be.

I came home and did my laundry. The last time I did a load was in the Issyk Kul hotel bathtub. It took me two hours. My hands are starting to fall off.

Right now I am trimming my fingernails. I read this book yesterday called Letters From a Nut. In it, this guy named Ted L. Nancy writes all these random places and businesses and asks for absurd things, all of which are made-up. In this one letter, he wrote Cooperstown, the Baseball Hall of Fame, and said that one time he delivered room service to Mickey Mantle, and when he wasn’t looking, Nancy took the remnants of the toenails Mantle had clipped minutes before. He wanted to donate them to Cooperstown through Topps, one of the major trading card companies. Topps actually wrote back, saying that if he took a picture and documented the condition they were in, they’d look into it.

I just ate half a tube of paprika Pringles. Paprika Pringles make me think of Spain. I shared a tube with some cats this one time over a nice bottle of red wine. It was so classy, the bottle actually just said, “Vino Tinto.” No other name or anything. That’s like a can of pop just saying “Pop.” Every time I pop, I can’t stop.

posted by C @ 2:10 PM