Training Again

Hello all! Well, it's been a few years since my last post (though hopefully not as long since we've last spoken), and you may be wondering at the sudden revival. But it's official: I'm going back overseas, this time to St. Petersburg Russia!

I'm currently in Pasadena, California, attending ESI training once again... or as some of you may remember it- boot camp. Training is a time to prepare new teachers to teach and cope with life in a different culture, as well as for learning about our new teammates (and ourselves). It's a very stressful but also a very rewarding time.

It was quite a shock when I found out that they were sending me to St. Petersburg instead of another Central Asian country as I'd expected, but now I am so excited. I absolutely love my new roommate, Erica, and the rest of our country team (Jeffrey in St. Pete, and Andy and Timon in Vologda). We're already forming bonds and inside jokes, and our morning getting-to-know-each-other discussions are usually filled with laughter.

The Russia team (minus Jeffrey)- Timon, Molly, Erica, Andy

We just found out our flight information, and I will be flying out on September 7th. I should have my cell phone with me until that last day if you want to call me, and I'll try to check my email regularly once I'm in Russia. If anything else noteworthy happens before then, I'll be sure to keep you posted. And then off to Russia! Stay tuned!

The Bazaar

One of my favorite things about spring here is walking everywhere, and one of my favorite things about walking is walking to the bazaar. It’s the only way to shop, in my opinion. I have certain vendors that I go to for each thing and they treat me well. When I ask for a kilo of apples, or half a kilo of strawberries, she goes through and picks each one. So if an apple has a bruise, or if a strawberry looks over-ripe, she passes it over. It’s awesome.

It’s also nice to be able to get exactly the right amount of whatever I need. If I need 2 eggs for a certain recipe, I just order 2 eggs. I go to my favorite grain vendor and get 300 grams of white beans for chili, or get 200 grams of gouda from the cheese lady, as I affectionately call her. Then across the street to the meat bazaar, which is fortunately inside (I don’t think I could ever bring myself to buy meat from an outside vendor!), to buy a chicken. I tell them about how big I need it and they go and find one just the right size. If you know how much I hate to waste things, particularly food, you’ll understand why I love this so much!

All in all, it’s just a great experience. I get to practice my somewhat limited Russian, they get to practice their even more limited English, and it’s just a good time all around. I tried to post some pictures but it's not working out. Cross your fingers and check back later.

By the way, here’s a fun little bit of our ESI Spring retreat two weekends ago. I hope you find these even half as amusing as we did.

Things You Would Never Hear at a Resort in America:

• Oh look, we have a trash can. That's exciting!
• They have a pool? What color is it?
• Do you think the guard will let us out?
• Did anyone notice if we have lights in our living room?
• Does the bathroom have toilet paper?
• Just so you guys know, the water is still on (said at 12:30 am).
• The water here is not brown, not black, but actually purple.

And some fun things from a game of Catchphrase:

• “It’s on the ground in the morning.” “Trash!” (actual answer: dew)
• “This is a common cheese” “Gouda” (actual answer: chedder, something that doesn’t exist in K-stan)

Easter in Central Asia

(Sorry this Easter entry is so late... internet troubles)

Apparently Easter in this part of the world starts the night before. Since Cat and I are fortunate enough to live just across the street from the Russian Orthodox church, most of the ESI teachers came over before the buses stopped running to hang out with us until the midnight service.

It started, as all evenings should, with us watching an Audrey Hepburn movie (Sabrina) badly dubbed in Russian. Then, around 11:30 the girls all doffed our head coverings and we walked down to the church. We could hear the music from our apartment. It was beautiful, alternating between the choir and the priests chanting. There were so many people there that not even half could fit inside the church. So they had set up cameras and microphones and projected everything on the outside wall. At midnight the bells rang and most of the crowd lit small candles they had brought with them. Then the priests came out carrying several things (I believe they were the icons of Jesus and the cross) and the crowd followed them as they circled the church once, chanting all the way. As limited as my Russian is, I only caught a few key words, but I trust I got the general idea. We left soon after, but apparently their Easter service began after that and continued until six in the morning. I must say, I’m glad I’m a Protestant and our service wasn’t until 10 am!

The next morning we had our Easter service, which was interesting, involving a pretty elaborate skit in Russian that I only partially understood. But I definitely enjoyed watching Kostya play the devil. After church there was a tea and everyone was milling around talking and wishing each other happy Easter in Russian. I actually really like the way they do it. They say , which means Christ is risen!, and the response is , which means He is risen in you. I really like that, though I could never quite remember the response on the spot. The solution to this, of course is to always be the one who says it first! It almost felt like a race sometimes.

The next day all our Russian students were wishing us a happy Easter and bringing us Easter bread and cards. The thing is, neither Cat or I really liked the bread, and so now we have three just sitting on our counter until we finally decide to just throw them away. Oh well. All in all, it was a fun and different way to celebrate the holiday. Good times.

Kazakh New Year

I love a country where you can celebrate the New Year three or four times a year. Thursday was the Kazakh New Year, and it was awesome. We met three of our students and they took us downtown where all the cool stuff was happening. They had blocked off the main road downtown so that people could walk there, and there were so many cool things going on. Apparently they have a competition every year to see who can build the best yurta. Yurtas are the traditional dwellings of the Kazakhs, who were nomads. So there were dozens of full-sized yurtas all the way down the street, each one erected by a different company or organization. Outside of one they were actually having a traditional Kazakh wedding ceremony, complete with dancers and musicians playing the dumbra (the national instrument). In front of the Abzal (one of the major stores downtown) they had a stage set up and there was a full Kazakh orchestra, playing all the traditional instruments. It was amazing. Cat got videos of it all.

It was just a big street carnival. Old men were wandering around in their traditional dress, and people were selling shashlik, samsa, and plof (local dishes) on the streets. Cat and I kept trying to get to see the inside of one of the yurtas, but they weren’t letting the white people in. But finally one of them figured out that we were Americans, which apparently made all the difference. They invited us in, but Mary and Taya, both Russians, had to wait outside. It was so cool! They had beautiful Persian looking rugs all over the floor and hanging from the walls, and Kazakh artifacts everywhere. There were three tables (the low kind that you kneel around) and they invited us to sit down and eat! We couldn’t stay too long, since the girls were waiting for us outside, but we had a few bites of the dish they put in front of us, and we both tried the kumis (mare’s milk) which, by the way, is absolutely disgusting. It tastes like sour milk mixed with vinegar.

That night we went to Marzhan’s apartment for dinner. She’s the only Kazakh English teacher at ASSOL, and she invited us and two other teachers with their husbands. It was the most fun evening I’ve had in a while. She made us Bes Par Mak, the national dish, which included horsemeat. It actually tasted good, but there was more of a mental block than I had expected going in. I took about three bites and then focused on the beef, noodles, and potatoes. Then we just sat around talking for hours. The conversation alternated between English, with Mila and Yana translating for their husbands, Russian, with them translating (somewhat) for us, and Cat and I trying to have a conversation with Vitaly, which is always hysterical. He speaks maybe as much English as I speak Russian (not much), but he is so expressive that we can usually figure it out. It was such a fun night.

Happy New Year!!!
С новым годом!!!

My Birthday in Central Asia

I’m beginning to wish all my birthdays could be in Central Asia. Today was the best day! It started out with an unusual amount of communication from back home. I got a fabulously long email from Kate, a phone call from Jamie B., and a card from my mother, all before noon!

This afternoon when I arrived at Alter for my first class Andrew was waiting outside to keep me from walking in too soon and spoiling the surprise. When I finally did go into the classroom, five of my girl students sang Happy Birthday to me. Behind them they had pushed four desks together to make a table with chairs all around. There were mugs enough for everyone and we had coffee (the first time I ever liked coffee- look at me, I’m growing) and they had set out two little cakes. We sat around and talked for the first half-hour of class. They asked me to tell about my best birthday (besides this one, of course) and then they went around the class and each one offered a blessing for me.

Since class was shorter than usual because of the party I didn’t do the song cloze I had intended to do. For those who don’t know, a song cloze is where I give them the lyrics with blanks where the vocabulary words are and they have to listen to the song and fill them in. Instead I just told them so they could write them in, explaining words as we went. Then we discussed what the song meant and watched that scene. It was really cozy and relaxed, sitting around the table and drinking coffee. It obviously can’t happen often, but it was great for a change of pace.

When Sascha and Larissa picked me up from Alter, Sascha gave me a bunch of red carnations, and when we got back to ASSOL, Larissa called me into the front office. There, she and the Tatianas had two more bouquets for me, and a present. They sang Happy Birthday for me, though Larissa subsided into “da da da’s” after the first line. Then I went upstairs and Cat’s 4 o’clock class had a gift for me!

All in all, I came out of today with three bouquets of flowers (roses, chrysanthemums, and carnations), two boxes of chocolate, two cakes, a wall clock, a watch, a new wallet with 100 tenge inside, a plastic cat-shaped piggy bank, and a felt potted flower that dances and sings “You Are My Sunshine.” My favorite was the watch. My watch broke and so lately I’ve had to borrow a student’s cell phone every class to keep an eye on the time. So my 6 o’clock advanced class tonight gave me a watch! Between that and the beautiful clock Larissa gave me, I’m all set.

After classes tonight the whole ESI team went out for dinner, which was great fun. About halfway through (fortunately after our food had arrived) the electricity went out! The waitress brought each table a candle, and we actually liked it better that way! We bonded with the Kazakhs at the next table over shadow puppets on the wall. They got a kick out of my dog impression. After about 10-15 minutes it came back on, though.

The thing is, it’s not over yet. Mary’s birthday is tomorrow, so on Friday we’re having a joint birthday party. That’s when we’ll exchange gifts, and the girls are making a cake. And then on Saturday Cat and I are having a bunch of our girl students over to watch a movie. I’m really looking forward to it.

I think I can safely say that this is one of the best birthdays I’ve ever had. I’m so happy.

Molly's Book Club

For the past few weeks, the sermons at church have been on relationships, primarily marriage, but also touching on parent-child and other relationships. This week and next week’s sermons are on the text Ephesians 5:33, which tells husbands to love their wives and wives to respect their husbands. The entire service yesterday, Michelle and I were convinced that what he was saying was taken from two books that we’ve read, “For Women Only” and “For Men Only.” Since the sermon reminded me of them, I thought I’d take the opportunity to tell everyone back home about them.

I discovered these books at training in July. Michelle brought them and was passing them around to everyone. The first book, “For Women Only” is by Shaunti Feldhahn. She began interviewing men as research for a novel she was writing, but the things she discovered were so amazing to her that she expanded her research methods and eventually wrote this book with her findings. She created a survey with the help of a US Census Department survey writer. They surveyed thousands of men of every age, race, religion, marital status, and economic status. She also conducted personal interviews with 400 men. The book explores 7 or 8 basic truths that she found most men had in common, but of which most women are completely clueless.

It was eye opening, to say the least. Several different guys at training read the book and they all commented on how accurate it was. Some even said that it explained things that they themselves were unable to put into words. Even though I am not married, I was able to apply most of it to my relationships with other men in my life, like my father and my male friends. After reading it, I began to see a lot of things in a different light, including some mistakes that I had unwittingly made.

A few years after “For Women Only” was published, the author’s husband, Jeff, decided to write the companion book, “For Men Only.” He used the same research techniques as his wife, this time focusing on women. It is incredible. There was one paragraph that said, in so many words, exactly what I had often wished I could tell guys. It is so insightful.

I really think that everyone should read these books. Those of you who have been married for many years may already know much of what is in them, but it would still be worth checking out. And even single people could benefit from reading them. Because it’s really just about men and women, period.

Okay, that’s my shameless plug. Read them. They’re awesome.

The Second Flood (well, actually it's our third)

Well, I can check off one more experience they warned us about at training. Cat and I woke up this morning at 7:37 to a very angry neighbor pounding on our door. Our kitchen was flooding and the water had made its way into the apartment below us. A bit of background for those who don’t know: the cold water turns off every night at 11 and doesn’t come on again until 6 AM. Knowing this, we don’t usually even try the faucet at night, or we immediately turn it off again when no water comes out. But it only takes one time forgetting!

Back to the angry neighbor. He was just screaming at us in Russian, which we might have understood more of if we weren’t still half asleep and feeling seriously disoriented. But we got all our towels, the sheets from our beds, and the tubs we wash clothes in and started mopping it all up. It was clearly not good enough for him, though. He just kept making wringing motions and yelling the Russian word for ‘fast’. After a little while of this we got fed up and just kicked him out.

About 10 minutes later Giyanna, the maintenance man from ASSOL, showed up to check it out and help us. I had just let him in and the doors were still unlocked and our pissed off neighbor stormed back in. He just stood for a minute in our hallway watching us work and then starts shouting ‘fast’ at us again. When Cat stood up to try to talk to him he got even more worked up and started yelling “Work, work! Fast! Work!” (all in Russian, of course). We kept saying “We know, we work. Yes. Fast” but he was really starting to piss us off. Finally I just opened the door and gestured for him to leave, but he wouldn’t budge. I just kept telling him to get out. In the meantime, I had been using our handheld broom and dustbin to scoop up the lake in our kitchen. As I was trying to make him leave I gestured with my left hand and accidentally flung some water from the broom in his face! I can’t even describe the look of death he gave me, but I didn’t know how to explain that it was an accident. Something tells me it wouldn’t have made much of a difference at that moment anyway, but still.

So he finally left and we finished cleaning it all up. Alevtina is going down to check out the damage in the apartment and we have to figure out how to pay for it. And I’m thinking I’m going to have one of the English teachers write a note for me in Russian, apologizing and explaining that it was an accident, for what it’s worth. This is just the biggest pain ever. But it sure makes an effective wake-up call!

Excerpts of Life in Kazakhstan

I don’t have anything in particular to write about, so this entry is just going to be a bunch of random anecdotes and incidents that I think are worth sharing. I realize that much of the humor is lost in the writing, but I’ll do my best.

• I love the occasional hilarity that springs from our pastor, who is from Americus, Georgia, and Victor, his translator. But the best incident by far was the day that Scott got so caught up in his topic that he let a “fixin’ to” slip out. All the Americans were cracking up as Scott quickly rephrased. Victor’s face was priceless.
• Mary, Michelle, and I are all teaching our units on the different regions right now, and Mary had her students read their reports to the class. One boy wrote about Pennsylvania. The first half was fine, until he started talking about how Pennsylvania is famous because that’s where Dracula was from.
• It’s finally getting cold here! All last week it was hovering around 0° Fahrenheit, but this week it’s gotten even colder. Last night it was -10°, with the wind chill taking it down at least another 10°. The wind here is fit to take your skin off- it’s unbelievable. Michelle and I had a snowball fight with some students Friday night (only the third since we’ve been here) and I thought my fingers were going to fall off by the time we went inside. It was great.
• My random Russian vocabulary of the week: hedgehog- еж, crutch- гипс, and barrel-бочка.… useful, huh?

And last but certainly not least…..

Top Ten Reasons I Know I’ve Been Living in Kazakhstan Too Long:

#10 I automatically look for a light switch outside the bathroom door.
#9 I carry tissues and hand sanitizer with me everywhere ‘just in case’
#8 When I hear twenty car horns blaring my first thought isn’t ‘accident’ but ‘wedding’
#7 I’ve begun to say ‘oy’ instead of ‘oh’
#6 I get Russian rap songs stuck in my head
#5 My “soviet game face” (aka. The blank, I-could-care-less stare everyone adopts in public) has become second nature on buses and marshrutkas
#4 I have stored ice cream in the snow on my balcony.
#3 The phrase “I haven’t heard this song in forever!” comes out of my mouth at least twice a week
#2 I actually ended a phone conversation this week with “Ok, bye” click. (the abruptness with which
they end their phone conversations is ridiculous)
#1 I’m happy to hear the toilet running, because it means the water is on
Some of these may require actual experience living in a formerly soviet country to fully understand, but I would be more than happy to explain to anyone who’s curious.

So there you go. A brief glimpse into life in my world lately. I hope you enjoyed it.

Love,
Molly

Americans in Karaganda

I love the American community we have here in Karaganda. It’s a pretty decent size, but still small enough that we all know one another. And we’ve got a good mix of people, of all ages and stages of life. There are the younger teachers, my age and a bit older, who are only here for a year or two, and there are young families who are staying here indefinitely, with children ranging from 3 to 16. Then there are a few older couples who go to our church, though I don’t see them much except for church and big group functions like Christmas.

This past Sunday one of the locals whose daughter works at Friendship School (where a lot of the other Americans work) invited us all over for the last day of маслэница (mahs-leh-NEE-tsah), otherwise known as blini week. If you’ve ever had a crepe, it’s basically the same thing. Anyway, she had apparently been cooking blini for 6 days (!), so there was quite a spread, with all kinds of toppings. True to form, I dripped the blueberry filling all down my shirt, but it was totally worth it. It was delicious. It was so much fun. We were all sitting around her living room talking and laughing and just enjoying each other’s company. It is times like that that make me sad that I’m not coming back next year. I’m really going to miss these people.

Loving the Sacred Raisin Cakes

Team meetings on Friday mornings are always fun, especially because we have lunch and sit around talking for hours afterwards. But it was especially fun last Friday. Hillary was leading the study and we were talking about our relationship with God being like that of a marriage. To support this she asked someone to read Hosea 3:1 “The Lord said to me ‘Go show your love to your wife again, though she is loved by another and is an adulteress. Love her as the Lord loves the Israelites, though they turn to other gods and love the sacred raisin cakes.’”

Somehow the bit about loving the sacred raisin cakes was just too much for us. We were laughing hysterically for a good minute and it was at least five minutes before we could get back on topic. And even then all someone had to do was mention the sacred raisin cakes again, and we were gone. It was so much fun. And now I’m creating a group on facebook: English Teachers Against the Sacred Raisin Cakes. It probably sounds stupid to anyone who was not there, but we were rolling on the floor. I love our team!

American Culture

That would be the name of the class I’m teaching this semester. Since it’s a bit of a broad topic, I was thinking of turning it into something of a pop culture class. At training they gave us a list of the elements of conversation that make it difficult for non-native speakers to follow. It included things like accent and speed. It also mentioned background knowledge. There are so many things that we say that come from a common cultural knowledge that we may not even be conscious of. So, while I obviously won’t be able to cover even close to everything, I’m going to try to introduce them to a lot of things that (almost) every American knows.

I’m going to be showing movies like “The Sound of Music” and “ET” and TV shows like “I Love Lucy” and “Friends.” I might show the soup Nazi episode of “Seinfeld” if I can get my hands on it. I’m going to teach lessons on Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn, Archie comics, and Dr. Seuss. There will be a whole unit on baseball. When you really stop to think about how many of our expressions have their origins in baseball it’s unbelievable.

The problem is that, as many ideas as I’ve had, I still don’t have a whole semester’s worth. So I’m putting this out there hoping that people back home might have some good thoughts. If you do, please leave me a comment or email me. And here’s a note especially for all the teachers who might be reading this: I’m also struggling with how to keep this from becoming a lecture series. I need to find activities I can do with the students to get them involved and using their English. I am open to any and all suggestions.

Thanks!

A Very Long Week

This has been a very up and down week. Parts of it were awesome, and then there were the times I just wanted to sit down on a curb (however culturally inappropriate) and cry. Huh. Like I said in the last entry (which you may or may not have been able to read- I had some difficulties posting it) I was put in charge of decorating the church for Christmas. In the beginning it followed the usual course of events. My imagination goes crazy and dreams up an absolutely exquisite and absolutely impossible plan. Then I let reality step in and pare it down to something feasible. Then I start working on it and realize that even that is too much, and so I cut it down again. I’m used to it. But it didn’t stop there this time… the trouble is that my idea of reality doesn’t quite match up with K-stan reality yet. All the things I needed, which I could easily find within a 10-minute drive of Shorter, don’t even exist here. Awesome. But it took me three days and several fruitless and frustrating shopping trips to figure out that it was hopeless. All in all, my plan for the decorations changed about 5 or 6 times by the time everyone got together Saturday to work.

Wednesday and Thursday were my cultural-frustration days. So many of the things they warned us about at training happened. On Wednesday I got spent an hour wandering around an unfamiliar part of downtown looking for a store Alya told me about. I stopped several people for directions, but they didn’t use any of the direction words I knew, so I didn’t understand what they were telling me. In the course of my wandering I managed to lose the bag I had been carrying, along with almost 1000 tenge (app. $10) worth of paint. I made it to school with only a few minutes to spare, so I didn’t have time to go to my apartment for my schoolbag. So while the students were taking their final exam I didn’t have a book to read or my journal, or even a pen to begin grading. After class at Alter, Sascha didn’t come to pick me up (again) so I walked to the bus stop with Julia. Since I didn’t have my bag I was carrying all the test papers and the wind came and snatched them out of my hands! Julia and I ended up chasing them down the street for a good 5 minutes.

On Thursday Alya drove me downtown to that store I couldn’t find. But because of a surprise meeting she couldn’t do more than drop me off. They didn’t have what I needed (sigh) so I found the nearest bus stop to go back. On my way to school, the marshrutka I was on broke down. All went well in my four o’clock class, and then I went downstairs to make more copies of the test for my last class. The printer was out of ink and there were no replacement cartridges to be found (of course). By taking it out and shaking it every few pages, we could get a few more copies out of it, so I printed as many of the first two pages as I thought I’d need and decided to dictate the last page of directions to the students. Then I got upstairs and discovered that two students who hadn’t been there in two or three weeks had shown up for the test and I still didn’t have enough. Aaaaahhhhhh! I just told them to go home and come to Cat’s class the next day to take it.

Friday was fun. Mary and I went to Astana to get our visas to go to the other K-stan. It was a fun day for the most part, but travelling is always a bit stressful. And it was bitterly cold. I think the temperature was somewhere around 0°F, but the wind took it down at least 10 or 15 degrees.

Cool/Interesting/Weird things about our Astana trip:

• Mary saw the Statue of Liberty for the first time
• We found a Baskin Robbins! And I took a cup that has the logo in Russian!
• On the same note- green tea ice cream tastes like fish food
• I learned what it is to not be able to write because your fingers are stiff with the cold
• We rode down a huge ice slide at the ice sculpture display. It was fabulous.
• A group of Russian children asked to take my picture… not to take a picture with me, but just a picture of me. I wonder what it’ll be like to go back to the States where I’m not a celebrity just because I’m an American.
• I decided to learn and memorize all possible variations of direction-giving phrases in Russian
• I found a potato in the backseat of a taxi

But the coolest thing by far was coming back to Karaganda… and realizing that Karaganda is home. Astana is beautiful and kept up much better. But it was good to get back to where I know where I am and where I’m going and what buses will take me there. Ah, home strange home.

Saturday I spent the whole day at the church. We got there around 9AM and I stayed until 7:30. It was awesome. I love big group projects. People were scattered around the room working on different things, asking each other to pass the scissors or tape, or looking for something to do. The worship band was playing in the background and a bunch of the MK’s were kicking a soccer ball around or playing with some of the extra balloons. It was exactly the kind of environment I thrive in. Most people stayed until lunchtime, but a Hillary, Douglas, Shelly, and Kostya stayed later with me. The five of us went to lunch and then worked until almost 6:30 painting and hanging signs. I had so much fun. I’m just a social person by nature. I even enjoy work and stressful situations if I’m around people. And it gave me the opportunity to get to know some people I had only briefly spoken to before. The decorations turned out pretty well, too. Nothing even remotely close to what I had originally planned, but good. And the stable scene turned out so much better than I expected it to. Lacking any actual figures, we made the shapes out of random objects and draped them in sheets. Mary was a plastic shelving unit, two buckets, two pillows, and a soccer ball. Joseph was a Kazakh urn, some foam padding, a comforter and a tennis racket. And the baby was two balloons wrapped in a blanket.

Sunday’s service was awesome! Some of the carols were just so delightfully Russian! We were clapping and swaying and just having a grand old time. They prepared a performance of the Christmas story (fortunately not a hard one to follow), and then they had the ‘American Choir’ (basically all the Americans that wanted to) come up to the stage and sing a few carols in English, which everyone loved. Afterwards there was a tea and everyone just mingled and talked for a while. Our team exchanged gifts that night and then had the Student Life people over for dinner. We ate, talked, played speed-scrabble, and ate some more. It was especially nice because we hardly ever see them outside of church. It was good to just hang out.

Christmas morning didn’t feel like Christmas to me. I woke up pretty early, but there was no tree or stockings, no Christmas breakfast, no presents, and no roommate until after noon at least. I just watched a few episodes of Lost and then woke Cat up on my way out the door. But once we all got to the Lackey’s apartment it got a lot better. Almost all the Americans in the city were there (maybe 35 or so) and the place was almost overrun with us. Michelle accompanied some carol singing on the piano and then the MK’s read the Christmas story. Dinner was great. Everyone brought something. And I had broccoli for the first time since I’ve been here (and green bean casserole- ::contented sigh::). After dinner a group of us went caroling. My favorite part of the evening was when Michelle and I got into a full-fledged snowball fight with the kids. I had to be thoroughly brushed off before I was allowed in the van again. Then I went to the girl’s apartment to watch “Spanglish” and fall asleep on their couch. All in all not a bad Christmas, though very different from what I’m used to. Actually, I think that is why it was okay… it was so different from everything that I associate with the holiday that it didn’t really feel like Christmas- just a full, fun day with lots of food and socializing. And since it didn’t really feel like Christmas, it didn’t feel like I was missing Christmas at home.

And now it’s back to the daily grind, at least for one more day. Cat and I are teaching really easy lessons on Christmas traditions and songs these last two days. And then… Bishkek! And at least a week with no obligations at all! Yay!

Well, this entry is quite long enough for now, so I’ll just leave you with one last thought…

Merry Christmas!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Snow, Christmas... good times

So I was walking to church from the bus stop this morning, wading through almost knee-deep snow, and I actually laughed aloud. I was thinking “I wish all my friends from Georgia, California, Nevada, Florida, etc. could see me now!” I’m really glad there weren’t any nationals around to wonder at the crazy American stumbling up the sidewalk and laughing through mouthfuls of snow. It was beautiful.

Two weeks ago they asked for people to help with the church’s Christmas Eve festivities, and I volunteered. Today we had a meeting and I was put in charge of decorating the church! And I’m not talking a few garlands and wreaths scattered about. They were talking about an entire stable scene set up in the back and huge painted murals on the wall… I’m so excited! Once again, I am in my element. So I got phone numbers of various people who have supplies or can take me shopping and we have a whole group meeting Saturday morning to work on it. I’m going to spend the week brainstorming, painting, and shopping. It works out perfectly, actually. I’ve been quite desperate for a project of some sort, to occupy some of my free time and get me out of the house and around people. And it’s a great artistic outlet. Yay! Good news all around. I will definitely be posting pictures at some point, but it may not be until after New Years.

Speaking of New Years, I’m going to be going to the other K-stan with Mary (another teacher in my city) to visit two of our teachers who are down there. We’re going to be taking the train down, which is apparently an experience like none other. I can’t wait! I have heard so much about the New Years celebrations in this part of the world that I hardly know what to expect. But it is sure to be incredible. People have been setting off fireworks for a week already. We actually stopped class for a few minutes last week to watch some fireworks out the window. I’ve heard that people even fire them off of their balconies. And it’s not just about midnight, like it is in the States. The party continues the whole next day and sometimes even longer, from what I’ve heard. But I think the four of us are planning on taking a break at around 11:00 AM the next morning to celebrate the East Coast New Years too.

Because of all this travelling and the packing and final-grade-calculating that will come immediately beforehand, I probably won’t be able to get online much in the two weeks after Christmas. But after that I will make every effort to log on and post some updates and pictures. But until then, Merry Christmas to all (and to all a good night! – sorry… I just can’t resist a musical or poetical cue that obvious).

The Old-Fashioned Way

I’ve always loved doing things the old-fashioned way, and there are certainly plenty of opportunities for it here. For instance: our entire apartment is carpeted with oriental rugs, but we have no vacuum. And last Sunday we had invited all the Americans over for game night. So I got down on my hands and knees with a bristle brush about 4 inches long and ‘vacuumed’ our living room rug. It took me about an hour and a half, but it was totally worth it. It looked awesome. Then, the other night, I went over it again with a Comet-like detergent to brighten up the colors. It’s incredible the difference it made! I tried to take pictures, but it didn’t show up very well.

And two nights ago I did my laundry by hand for the first time. I can’t believe I managed to put it off this long. Cat’s been doing it since we got here, but I’ve always managed to take a load or two over to one of the other American’s apartments (everyone seems to have washing machines but us). But I always felt a bit guilty about it, like I was shirking part of the experience. So I finally did it on Wednesday night, and it was all I ever expected it to be. I’m still going to take my jeans to someone’s house, but I’ll probably start doing the rest at home. It was so cool.

I’m not even being sarcastic when I rave about doing all this stuff the hard way. I seriously love it. First of all, I’ve always loved old-fashioned things. I feel like I could be a character in one of my favorite books. I could be Jane Eyre or Jo March when I’m hanging my clothes out to dry. Plus, there is so much more satisfaction in something done like that. The sight of a handwritten letter is worth more than an email of twice the length. And never, since the invention of the vacuum, has anyone taken greater pleasure in the sight of a clean rug. I seriously kept sneaking peaks at it the whole evening while people were here.

And just to give you a visual...

Our washing machine, broom, mop, and vacuum. Yay

PS. Joel, this is for you... I wouldn't want to make your job too easy.

I'm still here, I swear!

Family and friends,

I am so sorry that I seem to have dropped off the face of the earth in the last month, but it really couldn't be helped. The internet situation here has been scetchy at best. But things are looking up and I'm going to write a decent length entry sometime soon. So keep checking and bear with me!

Just know that I love and miss you all, and that I am doing just fine here. Ups and downs, as usual, but that is just life, be it in Kazakhstan or America.

Love,
Molly

Our students

My other teammates may disagree, but I really believe that Cat and I have the best students ever. I simply adore them all. Every night we come home and compare stories about classes that day and talk, once again, about how freaking amazing they are. And they really seem to enjoy our classes, too (yay!!!!!). The first lesson, I taught them ways to greet and say goodbye to people beyond simply “hello,” “hi,” “goodbye,” and “bye”. And now every time they see me, whether in school or not, they call out “yo” or “what’s up” and then start laughing... it’s fabulous.

On Saturday we met a group of students to go downtown to the new Ramstore (a great, though very expensive store/mall that sells a lot of American brands you can’t find anywhere else). Once we got there we split up into groups, and about five of them went with me. I felt like I had an entourage! They just followed me around the store. Even when I told them that I was done shopping and just wanted to walk around with them while they shopped, they kept taking cues from me. One girl wanted to go into a store to buy makeup (it was very Sephora-like... makeup, perfumes, etc.) but we ended up walking the store trying to find lotion for me because I’d mentioned earlier that I wanted some. As soon as we walked in the door they swooped down on a saleswoman en masse, told her what I was looking for, and then led me all over the store, telling me which brands were better, cheaper, smelled good, etc. It was like having a whole team of personal shoppers! It was amazing.

They are so considerate and helpful. It’s a cultural thing, I think. They will do just about anything to help you out and be friendly. If you invite someone to something, they will go. It doesn’t matter if it’s not something they are particularly interested in or not. They will go. If you need help with something, they will bend over backwards. It’s unbelievable.

When we left the store we went to a cafe nearby for dinner. Cat dropped one of her bags and a huge bottle of hot sauce she had bought broke in the bag. Some spilled on the floor, and I got some napkins to clean it up. Apparently that was not okay! Dias, a friend of one our students, yelled “No!” at me. He wasn’t being mean or trying to startle me, but he was just apparently horrified by the thought of me cleaning it up myself. So I just let it go and chalked it up to a cultural discovery. All in all, it was pretty humorous. We were still chuckling about it ten minutes into the meal.

The group got smaller as the afternoon progressed, until finally it was just me, Cat, Asem (Asyem), Julia, and Dias on the marshrutka home. And the two drunk German guys hitting on Cat. If we had been alone, it would have been pretty awkward, but Julia and Asem were running interference via language, and Dias was there just as a male presence. We invited the three of them up to our apartment for coffee. We mutually amused each other (Cat’s dancing, Julia and Cat singing Shakira songs, me asking them how to say things in Russian and then trying to write them down using the Cyrillic alphabet, Cat and I trying to communicate with Dias using our extremely limited Russian, his slightly better English, and our handy Russian-English dictionary, etc), and they finally left around 9pm. All in all, it was a great day.

And tonight after my 4 o’clock class, they all swarmed me, asking what words I knew in Russian. It was so funny. I counted to 100 for them, and then started recounting random phrases and food names that I knew. They just thought that was the funniest thing ever. Then they started teaching me new words and telling me how to spell them in Russian. I’m not sure why it is so funny to them when I try to write things in Russian, but it seems to be pretty universal.

Have I mentioned that I love our students?

(Written Tuesday, September 19)

PS. Thank you to everyone at First Baptist! I just recieved four CD's of the August services in the mail today (Friday). I almost cried. I loved every bit of it... the sermon, the children recieving their Bibles, hearing our beautiful choir. I loved just hearing the familiar voices. Thank you to everyone, both the people who took part in the service and the people responsible for recording and sending it to me. It was only the second sermon I've heard in English since I've been here! Thank you!

Water, water, everywhere!

And I do mean that quite literally. Apparently they are shutting off the water to the entire city of Karaganda for the next few days. They said at least two days, which could mean anywhere from three days to a week. Yay. And the water shuts off every night at 11. So Cat and I have spent the last hour frantically filling every container we could lay our hands on. We have numerous bottles we’ve saved from cokes and such, all four of our wash tubs, our teakettle, three giant pots from our kitchen that we don’t use, a random 5 gallon bin in our bathroom, and a bucket. It’s awesome. I sure hope that we won’t need this much, but you never can tell. And if we run out, there’s not a whole lot we can do about it. So we have water everywhere! Good times.

(Written Monday, September 18)

A good day

Since I can’t afford to spend a lot of time online, I am writing all emails and blog entries on Cat’s computer and saving them to a flash disk to take to the internet cafe. There may be occasions when I won’t get to answer an email for a week or more, and I will probably end up sending multiple emails and posting several blog entries at one time. The moral of the story is, please don’t be put off if updates seem to come in spurts. If you desperately need to contact me, you would be better off calling. If you would like my number or my address here, you can either email me (but we’ve already determined that that’s not the best option in a hurry) or you can get it from my parents, Nikki Hardeman at FBC, Kate O’Rourke, Jamie Barton, or Luda Kwon.

It’s all about the little things in life. I know I’ve already written that once since I’ve been here, and I’m sure that I will write it many more times before June. But that’s just because it’s true. It is not meant to imply that it’s horrible here (because it’s not), but that there are so many little things we take for granted that are unusual here.

A sermon in English, for example. Today a fellow American, Scott Tucker, preached at Living Vine church, translated into Russian by another church member. Until now, the only things I’ve been able to understand are the scriptures, because we can usually discern what book they mean and look it up in our own Bibles. Then the Tuckers invited all the ESI teachers over to their apartment for lunch. We had sweet tea, chicken salad, sandwiches, ICE!!! It was great. Their sons showed us their UGA memorabilia and all their Braves baseball cards (yay for Georgians... they lived in Columbus before they moved here), and I played a very exciting game of chess with the younger one.

Now Cat and I are preparing to go back with laundry... they have a washing machine! I have thus far managed to avoid doing my laundry by hand, but it’s only delaying the inevitable. I actually wouldn’t want to avoid it the entire year even if I could. It’s all a part of the experience. Somehow this even feels like cheating a little bit. But I’ll get over that for right now. I have to teach tomorrow, I don’t have anything but t-shirts left, and it’s raining, which puts a damper in the whole clothes-line plan (quite literally. Oh wow, what a bad pun. Eric Lowery would be so proud... someone should tell him).

It's all in the details

I love that, though the whole picture is very different from what we’re used to, the details make up for it, at least for me. There are tiny bits of beauty in things that we usually don’t bother with in America. No matter where we eat, even in the school cafeteria, it is on nice china, painted with beautiful scrollwork or floral patterns. The doorframes and doors in our apartment are downright ornate! They are all carved wood and latticework. Every light fixture is a chandelier, even if not very expensive looking.

And if they do one thing well here, it is curtains! They are gorgeous! In our apartment, our director’s apartment, the reception hall at the wedding, every room in our school, including our classrooms… they all have beautiful, floor-to-ceiling, sheer curtains, often embroidered with small patterns or flowers. I love it. It makes me happy.

First Impressions of Kazakhstan

Well, now that I’ve been here a week, it’s about time I filled you in on what’s going on over here in K-stan.

Cat and I arrived early Friday morning, around 3am here, after about 31 hours of traveling. Having slept on all three planes as well as the 3-hour car ride from Astana, we both stayed up to unpack and check out our new apartment. Then we got about 4 hours of sleep before one of the English teachers from ASSOL, a beautiful Kazakh woman named Saltana, came to take us to the school for lunch. Larissa, the school director, had a typical Russian meal prepared for us, including salad (really just cucumbers, parsley, tomatoes and mayonnaise… lettuce is not common there), palmeni, and borscht. I promptly declared borscht to be my new favorite, which amused Saltana to no end. During the course of the meal, Larissa invited us to a wedding the next day! Another English teacher, Mila, was getting married, and Larissa got us invited to the whole thing. And I mean the whole thing… we showed up at 1pm, gift in hand, and the bride was still getting her nails done. But more about that later.

After lunch another English teacher, Luciana, took us to the supermarket to show us around. I was so relieved that we wouldn’t have to do all our shopping at the magazine (Russian for ‘store’- a place where everything is behind the counter and you have to ask for it… that requires much more Russian than I’m comfortable with as yet!) Be prepared to hear a lot about Luciana, or Yana. She is without a doubt the most beautiful girl I have ever known in real life, and she’s one of the sweetest, too. She has especially taken to Cat. I suspect that she will figure in a lot of entries and emails to come.

The next morning there was an orientation meeting for all the new Americans in the city, and then we went to Larissa’s apartment for the first part of the wedding. Since Mila’s parents died when she was young, Larissa was acting as her mother and giving her away. When we got there, Mila was still getting ready, so we helped set up the apartment for the bride-buying ceremony. It was truly amazing, really, how many cool traditions they have. When the groom showed up all the girls but the bride and the one giving her away went downstairs to meet him. Then he had to go through all these obstacles and tests to get to her. First, they handed his best man a guitar and made the groom come up with a song about Mila on the spot. Then, on almost every step going up to the apartment, there were little cards with questions about Mila that he had to answer. Once he had to pick her lip-print out of a sheet of them (all the girls at the wedding has kissed the paper, including me and Cat). Anytime he guessed wrong, or answered a question wrong, he had to pay more money. Then, in order to get the key to the apartment he had to drink an entire bowl of salt water (I think there was some symbolism in that, but I didn’t catch it). Once inside he had to pick her hand print out of about 6, and then get through the last obstacle to the room in which she was waiting. There were 10 strings taped across the door, and he had to call out sweet things to her. Anytime she heard one she liked, he got to cut one string. When he finally got in, there were glasses of wine for everyone, numerous toasts, and a few other traditions that I didn’t quite get.

Then we all piled into cars decorated for the occasion and drove to the courthouse for the signing of the papers. It was packed. I have never seen so many brides in one place! Apparently it’s like this every weekend, but I can’t imagine how there can be that many people in the city to get married! Waiting outside in the parking lot, we saw about 6 different wedding parties. And every few minutes another couple would come out the door. They stood at the top of the steps, the wedding march played, everyone cheered, and family and friends threw rice, rose petals, or small coins. Then everyone would go back to talking and 3 minutes later it started all over again. When it was finally our turn we went upstairs, they had a very small ceremony, and they gave us about 30 seconds to congratulate them before kicking us out for the next group. Then there were group pictures taken in a various decorated rooms (they actually included Cat and I in the official wedding pictures!), and we drove around town for a while getting pictures in various locations. There were brides everywhere! I found out later that that one courthouse had had 80 weddings that day! I seriously thought of naming this entry “Look, it’s another wedding; First impressions of Kazakhstan”

Then to the restaurant for the reception. They had a veritable feast spread out for us. It greatly resembled many American receptions, with a lot of food, dancing, and fun little games for the couple to play to determine who would be the breadwinner, who would do the most household chores, etc. We had so much fun. At one point in the evening, they had various people get up and make toasts and gifts to the bride and groom. All the English teachers from ASSOL got up there, and they took us with them. Someone translated for us so that we could make a toast too, and then we sang “Going to the Chapel” for them. It was amazing. Russian weddings are full participation events. Unfortunately, we had to leave early. By about 10pm we were exhausted, so Luciana’s husband came to pick the three of us up and dropped me and Cat off at our apartment. I heard afterward that the reception continued until almost 2am!

After church on Sunday was the first down-time we had had since we got here, so I’m not ashamed to say that we slept most of it away. And then we watched movies on Cat’s laptop. It was good. The last two days have pretty much been getting settled in to life here. Cat did her first load of laundry by hand yesterday (I still have that joy to look forward to). Luciana took us shopping and showed us how to cook a very simple but delicious Russian meal Monday night. And we have officially had our first faulty plumbing incident (besides the usual no hot water/no water at all). It was an amazing experience, involving multiple attempted home-solutions, a handful of decidedly unsuccessful phone calls in Russian, and an absolutely brilliant conversation of hand gestures and drawings with Giayana, ASSOL’s maintenance man. But we got it all worked out in the end.

Wow, this is a long entry! But hopefully the updates from now on will be more regular and therefore a little shorter. I love and miss you all! Please leave me comments, send emails, etc. I would love to hear from you.

Love,
Molly