One Peace Corps Volunteer’s chronicle of life in Kazakhstan

Today marks my first full day of independent living in Kazakhstan. I’m pretty excited about it. I have my own place. I have high-speed Internet. I have food. All in all, life is good. Interestingly enough, I feel that I’ve really turned a page in my service because of it. Granted, I’m sure I’ll be completely worthless for a few days while I get reacquainted with the Internet, but overall this is a really good thing for me. Maybe not the same for every volunteer, but I think it’s good for me.

I’ve taken to calling the place the Pink Palace. Mostly because the exterior of the building is painted, well, pink. A lovely shade of sun-faded Pepto-Bismol pink. There’s also grey, but it’s mostly pink. I briefly toyed with the idea of calling it the Pink Pony as a nod to the importance of horses in Kazakh culture. Then I decided it sounded too much like a strip club. And in fact there is a strip club in Atlanta called the pink pony (learned this from a volunteer from Atlanta).

Speaking of horses, I had my first kumys a few days ago. What the heck is that? I’m so glad you asked. It’s fermented horse milk. My host mom said it wasn’t a very good example of kumys, though. A little sour, she said…I think. My Russian isn’t so great, but I’m pretty sure that’s what she said. Perhaps you’re wondering what kumys is like? Well, I thought it would be thicker, but it’s pretty thin and runny. It’s fizzy, which I also hadn’t really anticipated. Had a bit of a funky albeit indescribable flavor, too. All in all, not bad. Though I think I’ll hold out for the good stuff next time. Shubat, the camel equivalent of kumys, is thicker according to the host fam. Don’t know that I’m up for that just yet.

A lot has happened lately, but I don’t really even know where to start. I’m just jazzed to be online again! So there you have it friends. The latest and greatest from my world. Also, I have Skype now. So hit me up if you’d like to chat!

Today was the big day. After weeks in the making, we had the community project meeting with all the town’s English teachers. Also on hand were several people from our local education department as well as someone from Pavlodar. It was a really incredible thing to be in a room full of English teachers. These are all people I probably should have met much sooner, but I hope now that this will help to propel my service in a new and exciting direction.

I put together a few PowerPoint presentations for the conference today. One was about me and my experiences in Kazakhstan so far. The other was about the community project. A final presentation I used was a Russian language presentation about Peace Corps. Don’t be too impressed, I didn’t put that one together. Peace Corps gave it to us. Also, they gave us an English version of the same thing, so my translation work was minimal.

It was a fairly surreal day for me. Before the conference started, I was working the room getting everyone’s name and welcoming them all to the conference. And when it was show time I hopped up to the podium and did my thing. I couldn’t help but laugh at the thought that I was suddenly catapulted back into my PR role. Guess my previous work experience paid off, because I felt like things went really well. I think I flubbed maybe three words in the presentation. Made up lots of time that had been lost by folks going over their scheduled speaking times. It was cool.

Now all that remains is to see how this all turns out.

There were definitely some hurdles to overcome on the lead up to this day. I think I was able to help head off some potential problems early on. Unfortunately, I also didn’t anticipate a few things that might still lead to difficulties later. However, there’s no need to worry about them until they actually become issues.

I did have what I would call a Peace Corps moment yesterday during the final prep for the meeting. My counterpart likes to have control of situations in which she’s involved. In regards to wanting to have control of things, she and I are very similar. Our approaches to regaining that control are very different, though. When I don’t have control I tend to take a very systematic, one step at a time approach to solving the problems. When my counterpart doesn’t have control, it tends to stress her out, and when she’s frazzled she runs all over the place trying to address all the problems at once. She’s tough to keep up with, too. The woman has some kind of energy when she’s under stress!

At one point yesterday afternoon we had finished almost every detail related to our conference. All that remained was to finish the speech outline for our director in Kazakh and Russian. The Russian was spot on because my counterpart did it and all her schooling was in Russian. She knows Kazakh, but she usually asks students to help with the translation of that. As she sat looking at that translation with our two zavuches (vice-principals), all three realized that things were not quite right. They all quickly began to correct the speech. And I just sat there. At first, I was a little annoyed that I was just sitting around watching other people work on aspects of this community project without including me. Then I realized that’s exactly what we’re trying to get our communities to do as Peace Corps Volunteers. We want them to take ownership of the projects. We want them to be able to repeat the steps laid out in this project to accomplish other future projects after the Volunteer has left the site forever.

That’s when I had my Peace Corps moment. I realized that everything I was working to achieve by the time I left was already happening. And it was happening much sooner than I would have ever imagined! Not a bad way to end a long day.

And the ending to today’s long day? I made a presentation on Peace Corps to every English teacher in this community. I took steps that will hopefully involve the entire community in my project. Hard for the end of the day to top that mid-day capstone.

I took a trip to the post office today during a break between classes. On my walk back I realized that I was, for the first time since arriving, finally seeing my town. At this point I feel like I know the main features of the place fairly well, but there were so many details I had been missing.

Whether this was caused by physically or metaphorically having my head down for the past several months, I don’t know. It’s safe to wager that I may have missed a few details with my head down, body leaning into the often fierce, frigid winds that punctuated winter. It could also be that the overwhelming shock of all the rapid, continual changes of my life here blocked out all but the most critical features of the world here.

But today things were clearer. The weather may have played a part as well. It was a bright, sunny day with a beautiful pale blue sky mottled by cottony white clouds. The trees aren’t in bloom or even bud, but the first green shoots of grass are making their way skyward.

Today I finally noticed details of buildings that I’ve walked past for months and not realized. Several of the apartment buildings and schools are quite beautiful in their own plain, utilitarian way. Another building that I always saw as being a solid, bulky structure is in fact nothing more than a shell. There are no windows in the frames, frames which have a substantial patina of rust, and the whole thing is open and empty.

I still struggle daily with the challenges of living in this place, but I feel like the general trend of life is an upward one. After the lows of the last few months it’s certainly nice to be heading back up.

There’s still much work to do. And though the Peace Corps stresses flexibility, I think I’ve been confusing flexibility with malaise for some time. To accomplish anything here I’ll need to be persistent and dedicated. It’s still possible to be flexible while doing that. What flexibility isn’t is sitting back and waiting for a better time or opportunity to start something. Flexibility is working voraciously towards a goal from as many different angles as possible. It’s also knowing when it’s time to adjust the goal.

During our training in Almaty we did an exercise about what “hat” we wear in the teamwork process. My primary hat seemed to be the control one. With this knowledge firmly in mind, the previous paragraph is mildly amusing and hardly surprising.

If you’ve made it this far, thanks for hanging in there. I’ll catch you next time around!

I can see the ground again. After the longest and coldest winter of my life, signs of spring are in abundance in Aksu. My mood has improved greatly and I’m just enjoying life. It’s amazing what warm weather and sunshine can do to make things better.

At the end of March the students have a break from classes. A break for the students means it’s a good time for training for PCVs. So I had a date with destiny in Almaty. But before going to Almaty for a week, I decided to join several other volunteers in Shymkent to celebrate Nauryz, the traditional Kazakh and Muslim New Year.

Getting to Shymkent was accomplished by spending three days and two nights on a train. For the first time, I rode platzcart instead of coupe. Platzcart is the cheapest way to travel by train. It’s an open car that houses quite a few people. One side of the car has two sets of bunks that flank a table. These beds are perpendicular to the train. On the other side of aisle is one set of bunks that runs parallel to the train. The bottom bunk converts into two chairs and a table. This configuration continues for the duration of the car, except for the ends, which have toilets and conductor cabins. Coupe, on the other hand, has cabins with locking doors that contain two sets of bunks. Each has its advantages and disadvantages, but I felt like platz would be an adventure.

When my trainmates and I arrived in Shymkent, we took our bags to the apartments the local volunteers had rented for the visitors to share over the weekend. After dropping the bags, we caught a taxi to Turkestan to meet with the other volunteers on the cultural tour. We wanted to go to Otrar, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, but our cabbie didn’t know how to get there, so we just ended up in Turkestan. Unfortunately, the bus went to Otrar first…so we waited. But we had shashlik so it was OK.

Once the rest of the group caught up with us we toured the mausoleum in Turkestan. It’s supposed to be the holiest Islamic site in the country, and it also has one of the largest domes, I believe. We weren’t allowed to take photos inside, but I tried to get plenty of exterior shots. Some were pretty decent. It was an amazing structure and a great cultural experience. Check out my flickr photostream for the goods.

Before entering, I went to a toilet building that was nearby. Inside I noticed that it was set up for the ritual washing that Muslims are required to do before prayer. I’ve learned how to do the ablutions, and I thought that it would be respectful to do them before entering this holy site. I wasn’t alone in the building, though. You should have seen the looks I got! At first the men were confused, then many of them started asking me questions in English. Later I realized that they must have thought I was Muslim and wanted to know how long I had been studying Islam. I told them since December, which was when I had first been to our local mosque with a co-worker. Technically, I suppose I have been studying the practices of the religion, though I haven’t actually converted. It’s a fascinating religion with myriad tradition and ritual, and the more I learn about it the more I learn about the Kazakh people.

When we returned to Shymkent we all went out for the evening. It was a good time, though there were several fights at the club. Fortunately the fights were all between locals. Usually one of us would grin and say “Texas” after things cleared up. A lot of Kazakhs call Shymkent Texas because they say it’s like the Wild West.

The next day was Nauryz proper. I headed to the hippodrome to watch traditional Kazakh games. It rained, which was kind of a bummer, but it definitely made kokpar more interesting to watch! Kokpar, as I believe I may have mentioned in a previous post, is an equestrian game that might best be described as goat carcass polo. The kokpar, as I understand, is the game ball. The game ball is a goat carcass that has been relieved of its head and hooves. It’s violent, fast-paced and fascinating. The other games were fun to watch as well, but kokpar was something special.

After that, another volunteer and I took the overnight bus to Almaty. Some other volunteers booked seats on a sleeper bus. If I ever do an overnight bus again, I want the sleeper. Sitting in a cramped seat for 12 hours on a hot bus was one of the most miserable experiences of my life. The headrest wasn’t high enough for me to comfortable rest my head, so it was a long, brutal night. Not to mention that Kazakhstan’s roads aren’t always the best. There were times when I was fairly certain we were driving across a bombing range because the potholes were so numerous and deep. Trains are definitely better, even if they’re slower.  The tracks are much less bumpy than the washboards that seem to pass for roads here.

The payoff was that I got an extra day to go visit my PST host family. From the Peace Corps office, I got a minibus to Altyn Orda, one of the transfer points to Shemalgan. It was an adventure. There was a man passed out in the middle of the front seat. I had to push him over to sit down. The driver knew him and tried to get him up and out when his stop came, but the guy was just too far gone. He ended up going all the way to Altyn Orda with us. Toward the end he stopped leaning on the window and started leaning on me. I’m fairly certain everyone in the bus was having a good laugh about that. When we finally arrived and I stood up to get off, I had to do it carefully so the poor guy didn’t fall in the floor!

Then it was off to my first home in Kazakhstan. I’d told my host sister that I was coming to visit, but never gave her a time. I got off at the bazaar and bought some fruit and then took a taxi to the house. The driver took a turn I would have never taken, but it was a turn for the best. We drove right past my host dad! We stopped and he got in and rode back with me. When we got to the house he ran in and yelled to my host mom that Baurzhan was home. She came around the corner with her hands over her mouth and I swear I thought she was going to cry.

My host sister was visiting a friend, and my host brother was working. Although I got to see my sister, my host brother didn’t make it back before I left. I did, however, meet his new wife! She was super nice and absolutely beautiful. Erzat landed quite a catch! We sat around and chatted, ate dinner, showed pictures from Nauryz and just had a good time. Between Shymkent and the host family I was really feeling great about my Kazakh.

In Shymkent, Kazakh is spoken much more than Russian and we Kazakh speakers really got to show our stuff. My host family told me how great I was doing in Kazakh and how I wasn’t struggling for words as much and was much smoother in my speaking. In fact, I hardly spoke any English the whole time I was there.

Then it was back to Almaty for the Volunteer Action Committee and check-in to our hotel for training. The training was good, and it was great to catch up with all my friends from PST. Plus I got the chance to get some of the other 20s a little better. This time we were all a little bit more relaxed and most of us had a party every night. Good times, little sleep.

Now I’m back at site with renewed energy and elevated spirits. I don’t know what the future holds, but I think I can do some good while I’m here. I guess I’ve already been doing some good for seven months, but now maybe I can add some extra value to it.

This weekend I decided it was time to buy a dombura. I’ve been taking lessons for a while, but I haven’t had an instrument to practice with since I moved to my new host family. Hence, it’s difficult to make much progress.

Plus, I’m supposed to be playing at an upcoming concert. I can’t provide any further details right now, but I can say that’s it’s coming up soon and I’ll need to practice a lot between now and the big day so that I don’t make a fool of myself.

So, there are lots of domburas available here in Kazakhstan. The smallest ones available are non-functioning dombura statues that are sold in souvenir shops. There are also numerous souvenir domburas available. The playable souvenirs usually run about 5000 KZT or so. But my instructor told me their quality is pretty lousy. She said I could get one made by a master in Pavlodar for about 9000 KZT, though.

After a lot of thought on the matter, I finally decided to invest in a quality instrument. In converted dollars, the difference between souvenir and quality is not that great, so it wasn’t that difficult a decision.

I started asking my instructor where I could buy a quality dombura in Pavlodar. It took a long time to get an address from her, but I eventually got that and a few phone numbers for the shop.

Once in Pavlodar, I enlisted the help of my friend Jeffrey to help track down the store. None of us had heard of the street the store was on, so I needed help finding it. Between a cool computer program Jeffrey has that shows a map of the city and his excellent Russian skills we were able to locate the shop.

Off we went, looking for 153 Margulana Street. We walked right to it, but there wasn’t any prominent signage that said “domburas here” so it took us a minute to get our bearings.

Once inside we were greeted by the master himself, Baurzhan Kabulbekovich Barlukov. I guess I haven’t completely broken ties with my American cultural perceptions, because I envisioned that this place would be a neat little storefront with several options to choose from. Nope. This was the master’s workshop and he was getting ready to varnish several instruments when Jeffrey and I arrived.

My instructor had told him I was coming, so he was expecting me and I received a warm welcome. He showed us his shop as well as some of the instruments he was building at the time. It was a magical place for me. I was totally on cloud nine. Before I moved to Nashville, I built quite a bit of furniture with my Dad, and we both really enjoyed it. One of his uncles or great uncles owned a saw mill, and my Mom’s Dad was a fairly accomplished woodworker. I guess you could saw woodworking is just in my blood.

It was really interesting to see the different instruments in various stages of completion. He sells three different models: a children’s dombura that is about 5000 KZT, the dombura I purchased at 9000 KZT and the professional model for 30000 KZT. He told us that it takes about four days to finish an instrument.

After learning about his work, he opened a cabinet and pulled out my dombura. Not only does he build them, but he can also play them quite well. Before I bought the dombura Baurzhan Kabulbekovich gave us a quick concert on the instrument I would buy.

It’s really hard to even put into words what an amazing experience this was for me. I got to meet a master dombura maker and tour his shop. I saw his workspace and got to talk to him about his work. He also said I could come back and watch and learn sometime – an offer I definitely plan to take up! I also got a dombura. It will be a great way to share Kazakhstani culture with Americans when I go home. Plus, it was handcrafted by a local artisan. I didn’t buy some cheap, mass produced junk. It’s a master’s work that I own now. It was an incredible cultural experience, and one that I think will buoy me through some of the tough times I may face in the remainder of my time here.

Now that I think about it, chances are that he built that instrument specifically for me. I told my instructor early in the week that I wanted to buy a dombura, and she said she would have to call someone first. I thought she was calling to get the shop’s number from someone, but she may actually have been calling in the order for me!

Some days you just get really lucky. Yesterday was one of those days.

In stark contrast to the melancholy of yesterday, today was a really wonderful day. It continues to be a thing of amazement to me that the most insignificant things can serve as tipping points for both the good and bad here.

This morning I was dragging. Seriously dragging. I stumbled through the front door of the school with five minutes to spare before classes started. Normally not a problem…unless the director of the school has hall duty on the ground floor when one stumbles in late! She didn’t give me a harsh reprimand or anything like that, just a glance at the clock and then a “what gives?” glance back at me. Oops!

I had four straight classes today. Made it through them all. Struggled against my body which kept insisting strongly that I get some more sleep. Had lunch. Burned a few minutes and then had tea with the other English teachers. Sans Saniya today, though, as she was at a tea for a recently deceased relative. That all went well. Then I had to go to a concert.

Normally, there’s nothing in the universe that I despise more than having to go to a concert at the end of a Friday. But this one was fun. At first I thought it was an early celebration of Women’s Day. International Women’s Day. It’s March 8. The United States doesn’t celebrate it. Not sure really what to make of that. It’s interesting, though. At any rate, turns out it was a concert honoring veteran teachers. And by veteran, I think they meant retired teachers. There were two women who attended. I had met and had dinner several times with the relative of one of the women. Small world, right?

After that I came home and relaxed a little bit before Arman told me we were going to the Kindergarten to get Sultan, the host family’s 5-year-old grandson. He somehow didn’t notice me when he first came out to get ready to leave, but when he saw me it appeared to make his day. And THAT was my tipping point for the day. Had a great walk back. We all chatted – to the extent that my vocabulary and comprehension allowed – Arman and I joked a little about a really pretty woman that walked by. That joke carried on later with the host family. Too funny. I won’t bore you with the details, though.

Later on Sultan and I watched a few episodes of MTV’s “Pimp My Ride” with Russian overdubs. You can’t tell me that’s not entertaining!

Of course, being five means that Sultan’s mood can turn on a dime. At the moment he’s screaming bloody murder about something (and has been for a good 10 minutes). Still, I’m having a good day. Mostly because I’m listening to music and that’s covering the screaming to some extent.

I might buy a dombura this weekend. Maybe not. I will definitely buy train tickets for IST and Nauryz in Shymkent. Can’t wait for that. No matter what tomorrow throws at me, I’ll be able to relax with a large number of Americans a few hours later and decompress. All in all, not a bad day.

Plus, I started doing more language study on my own today. Small steps – just a list of all the infinitive forms of the verbs that I’ve written down in my notes. As I learn or recall more I’ll add them to the list. Use the list to study, etc. Next I’ll start a general vocabulary list. Perhaps I may start a grammar notebook, too. Who knows. I feel like I accomplished something, though, and that’s what matters.

It’s been a wilder ride than usual lately. I’m about to reach the end of the longest term of the school year, but it’s been a tough push for a while now. Some days I’ll be riding the biggest high of my life, and some days just the tiniest things can suck the life right out of me.

In any other situation, I’d say that I might be a prime candidate for a clinical depression diagnosis at this point, but I think all this craziness is just par for the course in the Peace Corps experience. Especially here in the northern part of Kazakhstan where winter is so harsh.

Motivation has been a stranger as of late. Occasionally he’ll drop in for a quick cup of tea, but then he’s off again. I think it will change soon, though. Like many other volunteers, I’m living for IST right now. We’ll all be back together to swap horror stories and things will get back on an even keel. I hope!

I know I can turn things around and really start making some progress, but right now it just seems to be slow going. Sometimes I feel like it might even be losing ground. Even thought I teach English classes in a Kazakh school, I’m hearing more Russian than any other language in class on a daily basis. It’s frustrating. Really frustrating. Some of the groups I have just seem to not care, and no amount of preparation seems to change that. At this point, my own attitude is starting to be an obstacle to progress, too (I’m sure that fact is quite evident at this point in the post).

My time in Kazakhstan is limited, so it’s important that I invest my time wisely. I need to spend more time in the areas where I am currently having an impact and have a good chance of accomplishing some great things. If the groups I am working with continue to show no interest in what I have to offer then I’m going to have to speak with my manager about the possibility of terminating my work with them. There are other groups at the school who would kill for the opportunity to learn with a native speaker, so I can’t continue to justify spending time with groups that don’t have an interest in learning.

It wouldn’t be a bad thing, either. I really do need to get out into the community more and start trying to develop a secondary project. I’m a volunteer for the entire community, not just for the school where I work.

Time to get to work on materials for class tomorrow. Hopefully tomorrow will be a good day. If not, I’m heading straight for Pavlodar after class on Saturday and that should help improve my mood. Especially after I have my tickets to Shymkent!

Hope you all like the blog design shift. One of my most avid readers (that would be my Mom) requested that I find something that made it easier to navigate my backlog ‘o posts. Hope this helps!

One of the things Peace Corps talks a lot about is third goal. There are three main goals of Peace Corps, and the third is the one that really never stops – helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans. And even though they switched taglines long ago, they never tell you that, in that respect, the toughest job you’ll ever love never ends.

I came across this story in the back of one of my seventh grade textbooks, and I thought it would definitely be a fantastic piece for third goal. It’s called “Bibi-Khanym and the origin of the Muslim Veil.”

If you recall, not long after September 11, there was a bit of an anti-Muslim backlash in the United States. One of the things that gained serious (negative) attention was the bhurka (spelling??), the garment that some Muslim women wear that completely covers their face and body.

Like all cultural things, there’s usually a story to explain it all. And so, without further ado, here’s one story that explains the Muslim Veil.

“Bibi-Khanym and the origin of the Muslim Veil.”

Almost seven centuries ago in Central Asia there lived a great king called Tamerlane. He was a very powerful soldier, and he wanted one day to rule a great empire stretching from the Atlantic Ocean in the West to the Pacific Ocean in the East.

He made his capital in the oasis city of Samarkand which he planned to make the most beautiful city on Earth. Many mosques were built with blue ceramic tiles outside and gold inside.

Tamerlane’s wife Bibi-Khanym was the most beautiful and the most important of all his wives.

She was deeply in love with him. In order to show her love to Tamerlane she decided to build a magnificent mosque to honour him when he was away fighting in a distant war. She found the best architect who designed the most magnificent mosque one could imagine. And then she found the best master builder who began the work immediately.

As the weeks and days passed by the master builder began to fall in love with her.

He threatened to leave the mosque unfinished unless she let him kiss her just once.

Bibi-Khanym wanted the mosque to be finished and at last she let him kiss her once.

But that was her terrible mistake because the master builder’s love was so big that when he kissed her he left a permanent mark on her face.

King Tamerlane returned and saw his wife’s face. So the master builder was executed immediately.

And then thinking that a woman’s beauty can be a dangerous thing, Tamerlane ordered that from that day all the women in the kingdom should never be seen in public without a veil that covers their face.

(Taken from the 7^th grade English book by Ayapova, 2007 edition. And edited significantly for grammar, but not content. Probably still some grammatical errors…. I’m too lazy to translate for a proper citation. Plus I’m not sure that I’d even be able to do a proper citation at this point. I’m a little out of practice)

So there you have it folks. The legend behind the veil.

Also, today is Soviet Army Day. It’s not an official holiday here – Kazakhstan celebrates a similar holiday in May – but it was celebrated in the Russian Federation today. And with those two intercultural tidbits I bid you farewell until next time!

It’s a grand Southern Christmas tradition. One that was immortalized in the short story by Truman Capote that many of us read at some point in school. It may be a tradition in other parts of the country as well, but I don’t know that any writers from other parts of the country have a celebrated short story about said confection.

Grandmother and Granddad Jones sent me a fruitcake just after Christmas this year, and it finally arrived today. I also had two other Christmas packages waiting for me at the Post Office so it was a good day.

Some people love fruitcake. Some people love to make fun of fruitcake. To all those who fall in the latter category, I would recommend that you try a fruitcake from Collin Street Bakery in Texas. That’s where my fruitcake came from, and it was one of the most delicious things I’ve eaten in a while.

This was no baby cake, either. So I decided I should share it with my host family. After all, cultural exchange is a big part of what I’m doing here. When we finished dinner this evening, the fruitcake was dessert. It was the first time any of them had eaten fruitcake, and they thought it was great. They all want me to pass along their thanks for it, too. Thanks, Grandmother and Granddad!

For some time now I’ve felt like there are a lot of similarities between Kazakh people and the people of Appalachia. There are so many things about people back home and the people here that are similar. Often Kazakh people remind me of people I’ve seen or known back home. In fact, I’ve often felt that the key to the Melungeon mystery might be right here in Kazakhstan.

While we were eating the fruitcake tonight I believe I got further confirmation of our similarities. Inside the cake tin was a brochure for other baked goods the Collin Street Bakery sells. When my host mom pointed at the deep dish pecan pie and joked that we should ask for someone to send us one of those I knew they were just as Southern as I am.

Next test: RC Cola and Moon Pies.

Cutting up the cake