Boyfriend

In case you haven't noticed on facebook, or deduced it from the fact that I don't mention doing anything in my blog without him, I have a boyfriend. It's Mike. He teaches here, he's from Manchester England, and he has an adorable accent :) Since we've gotten to the point of being in a facebook relationship, I figured I might as well mention it here.

Freezing

It is SO COLD. State heat hasn't been turned on yet, and I'm slowly freezing to death. In my classroom it's so cold that I teach in a scarf, hat, mittens, and a jacket. It's hard to sleep since it's very cold, and even harder to get out of bed in the morning! It doesn't feel that cold during the day, but at night it gets pretty chilly. My students tell me that the heat will get turned on on November 1st, but I'll believe it when I feel it. We'll see. I can't last much longer than a week though, it's miserable being anywhere since there's no heat.

Mike, Evan, Nicola, Andy, and I are going away this weekend. We booked a homestay at CBT in Bokonbaevo, where we were for the eagle festival, but this time, it's a horse festival. We'll leave Friday night after classes and come back to Bishkek on Sunday evening sometime. It will be interesting since none of us speak Russian. I'd say that I know the most, but it's not even close to being conversational.

We went to the circus on Saturday. I was expecting to feel sad at some points because I knew there were animals involved, but I didn't think it would be as bad as it was. There were cats, poodles, rats, a kangaroo, and some bears. Check out facebook for some videos. I cried. The acrobats weren't that bad, and the circus would have been even better if the animals weren't involved and allowed to be free and happy in the wild where they belong. After the circus, we went to a Chinese restaurant, the same one we were at the night I fell in the ditch, and I got a picture of the ditch to forever remember the place where I fucked myself up.

On Sunday, Mike and I went to Orto-Sai bazaar, another market/bazaar in Bishkek. This one is pretty close to our apartment, so we walked there because it was a beautiful sunny fall day. It is smaller and less confusing than the other bazaars, and it was a very successful shopping trip! I got a kilo of wonderful small plums like they have in Austria for 25 som (about 60 cents!) I also got some knitting needles and a bunch of yarn. I'm going to make myself some teal mittens, and I'm knitting Mike a green and brown scarf. I got a pig potholder, a nail file, a loofah, and we finally found rolling papers! We'd looked EVERYWHERE in Bishkek and they were nowhere to be found, and we'd finally given up. But then there they were! At Orto-Sai bazaar! The locals even say that they don't have rolling papers in Kyrgyzstan. So we've proven everyone wrong :)

After the market, I went to dinner at my friend/student's house. He hadn't told me that it was his wife's birthday party, so I was pretty surprised to see 8 people at their house! He lives about 30 minutes by marshrutka away from my house, close the mountains and on a dirt road. His wife was an amazing cook- there were 6 kinds of different salads as the first course, and a really great Georgian dish with beans and meat. She had also made compot/juice out of what I think were dates, and mulled red wine which was actually really tasty.We had our first course, and then took an hour and a half break because the plov wasn't done yet. We (and by we I mean they) sang karaoke- they had a DVD and microphone with a huge selection of mostly Russian songs! They forced me to sing Yellow Submarine and Hotel California, neither which I even know! But it was good Russian practice to read the Cyrillic song lyrics. His wife and all her friends spoke very good English, but didn't talk much to me. I tired very quickly listening to all the Russian they were speaking- I'm not used to so much of it! After our karaoke break, we finally ate plov. It was wonderful. It's just meat, rice, peppers, and carrots, but it tasted so much better than what you get in a restaurant. She ordered the rice all the way from Uzbekistan; the "real" plov rice comes from there. I got a ride home from one of their friends. It was nice to get out from the city and away from native English speakers, even though of course I enjoy every minute I spend with my friends.

I found a second hand shop just half a block from my apartment and bought a sexy, Marimekko-esque colored dress! I will start going there much more often.

Think warm thoughts for me, it's a long time until Saturday when the heat comes on. I'm off to curl up under 2 duvets and try to stay warm. No class tomorrow so I'm off to another bazaar/market, and I hope to meet up with my favorite Turkish student in the evening.

Dog meat

We went to a Soviet Korean restaurant last night and ate dog. It was goooooood.

The exchange rate is up to 39 som to the dollar! That's 4.5 som more than when I got here. Maybe I really will buy an orange Lada this year!!

Circus this afternoon. It involves kangaroo boxing and ice skating bears. Should be amusing, and also horribly sad and wrong. Afterwards we're meeting up with a Canadian couchsurfer who's staying with our Kyrgyz friend Mirlan. Mirlan and his friends are cooking dinner tonight, so we might go there after the circus.

My student and friend Seitek and his Uzbek wife invited me over for dinner tomorrow, and she will cook plov (my most favorite Central Asian food!) for me. It should be wonderful! Seitek is studying hard for the TEOFL and the GRE, so everyday he asks me some long obscure English word that I don't know. He also really wants to help me learn Russian, so it's great fun to hang out with him- I get to learn 2 languages! Uzbekistan is the home of plov, so I'm sure that his wife is an AMAZING cook.

Weather is freezing here. I'm wearing my winter boots already, and mittens, a scarf, and jacket, and a hat. I can see my breath. I'm not ready for it to be winter yet, I was just starting to enjoy the cool crispness of fall. The internet cafe reinstalled all their operating systems to get rid of the many viruses, but Skype is no longer installed and I can't install it. So everyone should get google chat, that seems to be the only working chat service- facebook chat quits every few seconds. The internet cafe stupidly also has the heat on right now, even though it's nearly freezing outside. Idiots.

Yesterday and today have both been dismal and rainy, but we have a generator now at school and one working light in each classroom, so we no longer have to read and write by candlelight in class! The first month of classes ended. I am keeping 3 of the same classes which is great, but my 2 favorite students aren't returning next month because of scheduling conflicts, and my highest level class was cancelled because there weren't enough students. I gave my email address to the students leaving and said I would love to meet up with them if they ever want to practice their English. Next month I have classes 9:00-10:20, then 14:30-18:50. I don't have the last class of the day, so I get to mock the other teachers while I'm relaxing in the warmth of my apartment with hot chocolate (if I can find it at the store) and a movie that they'll be teaching for 80 minutes :). But unfortunately again I got shafted with Russian lessons- the only available time I can get is Wed 9-11! I don't want that at ALL, I requested 4 times and week and I would have gotten it if the office staff hadn't stupidly scheduled it right in the middle of when I teach class in the morning! (It's not that hard, there are only about 15 Russian learners to schedule...). So I'm very angry and I might join Mike and Evan's class, even though they aren't as far along as I am, once a week is no good, especially since it means I can't sleep in on Wednesdays! I'm going to look into actually taking classes somewhere else. Mike and Evan only have 2 classes a week, and I'd prefer something a bit more intensive. Ugh. How annoying.

One thing I forgot to mention- I bought a DVD at Osh Bazaar with 10 Russian movies on it- it's of course a black market DVD, but 10 movies for 50 som- what a deal! It has Night Watch and Day Watch, without English subtitles. It'll be a good way to practice my Russian! I'll have to watch the other 8 movies too, even though I'll know even less of what's going on there.

A weekend of eagles

The exchange rate is getting better, yet again. Now it's up to 38.3 som to the dollar! Pretty soon I'll really be rolling in dough. Tomorrow is payday too, which is wonderful. I spent about 100$ last weekend with food, eagle hunting, transport, and the homestay, so it will be nice to have money again.

I thought that we were going away this weekend to our boss's village near Issyk-Kul, but it turns out it was a misunderstanding. We were invited for last weekend, but we already had eagle festival plans, so we thought it would just be this weekend instead. Our boss thought that since we were already going, we wouldn't want to go again so soon, so it's been postponed to a future date. We were planning on going away, so we have no weekend plans yet. I'm sure we'll find something to do.

The first month of teaching ends tomorrow. Today was test day, so I just got to sit in class for 6 hours listening to music and reading Anna Karenina. I got it from Derek, an NSEP scholarship student here from Arizona, and this time I'm going to read the whole thing. Sophomore year of high school I got most of the way through when I had to bring it back to the library, and then I never got around to renewing it or starting it again.

Mike and I went to Osh Bazaar yesterday, and I got a traditional Kyrgyz felt winter hat and some boots. Boots were 750 som (20$), which isn't that cheap, but they're black and just the right height where I can still walk normally and comfortably. My ankle finally healed enough for me to be able to walk in heels. I was worried my ankle would hurt me forever! I also tried a new fruit. It's called hurma in Russian, and I just discovered that in English it's a persimmon . It looks sort of like a tomato/apple, but doesn't taste anything like either. None of the English teachers knew the English name for this fruit, and my students didn't even know if there was an English name since it's an Asian fruit. But it's great to have found something that I've never seen or really heard of anywhere before! The word persimmon is familiar to me, but I wouldn't even have know that it was a fruit, it sounds more like a spice name.

So- eagle hunting. Friday night after classes ended, 8 teachers took 2 taxis to Kadji-Sai, located near the town of Bokonbaevo on Lake Issyk-Kul. Our friend Josh had arranged the taxis and the homestay, and he'd gone down a day earlier. So we met him there. Our homestay was with one of the eagle hunters. We arrived around 23:00 and went straight to bed- 7 of us were staying in one big room. Electricity was out and there was NO heat, so it was really really cold. Most people slept in their coats and hats.

In the morning, we had porridge for breakfast at the homestay, and then took a marshrutka to the eagle festival. It was WONDERFUL. The festival was situated a little bit in the mountains within walking distance of "downtown" Bokonbaevo. We got there and we were the only foreigners there. There were lots of men in a big field with their eagles/hawks/horses/donkeys/wolfhounds. There were Kazakh eagle hunters with great hoods that resembled something out of Lord of the Rings. We just walked around for a few hours admiring all the birds and taking lots of pictures. Then the show started. There was a stage and there was an announcer speaking Kyrgyz, and then some Kyrgyz pop singers, an accordian player, and the best part, a Manaschi- a sort of bard type of man who sings/chants the epic story of Manas. When I get my videos on facebook, you can sort of hear the chant in the background. He got so emotional that he started crying and had to be escorted off the stage. Then there was an entrance parade with all the eagle hunters, horse racers, and hawk hunters. The festival began with hawk hunting. Men brought a rabbit out into the field and let it go, and then the hawk hunter let his hawk go and it flew out and got the rabbit. They reused each rabbit a few times. There was a hilarious moment when one of the rabbits escaped, and there were a few minutes where 3 men on foot and 2 men on horseback were chasing it all around the field. In the end, the rabbit got away. There was another rabbit that just did not run. It sat in one place, and the man even kicked it a few times to get it to run, but it just sat there until the hawk came and landed on it.
There were a few seats set up in front of the stage, but mostly people were just standing around or squatting, Asian style. We had a lunch break with some bread and cheese we'd brought from Bishkek, and walked a little ways up the mountain so we'd have a good view. There were a long-distane arrow shooting competition, as well as an archery target competition. There were some long long distance horse races all around the valley, which were pretty boring to watch, but there was one race of "Kiss the girl"- where a girl and a boy ride horses, and the boy tries to catch up to the girl and kiss her. Once they'd gotten most of the way around the track, one of them fell off the horse, and as the ambulance was driving to pick up the person, it almost crashed into a ditch. It seems so typical Kyrgyzstan. It was around this time that my camera battery died :(

The only other foreigners we met there were an American guy from Georgia who's been living here for a bit, and an Australian guy who's biking around India/China/Central Asia.

Even with all the animals in the festival, I was mostly amused by the mules. There were 4 or 5 that were ridden by little boys, and I wasted my camera battery taking many many pictures of them. I would love to have my own mule, they are sturdy and adorable!

The "climax" of the festival was the wolf-hunting portion. The men brought a big wooden crate out onto the field, and it took them a long long time to get the wolf out and situated. It was a six-month old wolf cub/adolescent, and it was chained to a large ball weight. We had assumed it would be a wolf let loose and chased by an eagle, but it was really disappointing. First, wolfhounds were let loose on the wolf three at a time. The wolf did a great job fending them off, but every time he got a good hit, some men held him down with a pitchfork-type tool and let the dogs rest. When the 3 dogs were done, 3 more were let loose. All in all, there were probably 12 dogs that had their chance at the wolf, but when it all ended, a few of the dogs were bleeding, and the wolf was still in one non-bloody piece, although I'm sure he was exhausted. But that wasn't the end! Then the men toyed with him for awhile, and tied him up and untied him and moved him to a different place on the field. Then it was the eagles' turn. He still was attached to the chain and the ball weight. The first eagle that was let loose, instead of flying from the mountaintop down to the wolf, turned around and flew into a crowd of people sitting on another mountain, and landed on a man's head. I wasn't close enough to really see what happened, but he clearly got some gashes from the talons. He was escorted down the mountain to the ambulance, and he wasn't walking straight because of the shock. The second eagle that was sent to get the wolf belonged to the man whose house we were staying in. His eagle, instead of attacking the wolf, started a fight with another eagle. People swarmed in and had to pull them apart. Third time's the charm, and the wolf finally was attacked. It wasn't much of a sight because the wolf was on a chain, but he put up a pretty good fight and the bird was injured a bit. The poor wolf was still alive and was put back into its wooden crate. A woman from the Kyrgyz Tourism Board told Derek that he would be released back into the wild, which I'm sure means taken out behind the stage and shot. I couldn't watch any of the wolf hunt, so all of this I know from Mike commentating it to me. It made me want to cry from the get-go because it wasn't a fair fight. Our homestay hunter said that he disagreed with it too, and said that the wolfhounds and the eagles were really unsure of what to do since they are trained to hunt animals that are in the wild and not tied up. The wolf situation sort of put a damper on the mood for the rest of the day, and we decided to leave the festival.

We walked down the mountain back to Bokonbaevo and passed a great cemetery on the mountainside. Cemeteries are really beautiful in Kyrgyzstan- almost all of the gravestones have a photograph or etching of the dead person, and there are many brick walls with the Islamic moon and star. We had dinner at a mediocre cafe and then went back to our homestay. We were all exhausted and wanted to go to bed at 19:30, but stayed up until around 22:00 talking- there was actually power!

The next day we went on a real-life eagle hunt. We had breakfast at our homestay again, and when we woke up at the bottom of the stairs, there was a shoebox of three TINY puppies! I played with them all, and then we learned that one of them was going to be traded for a fox for us to take on the hunt with us (we later found out that the fox we were getting had died overnight, so I don't know what happened to the puppies... I'd probably rather not know. I'm just glad we didn't use it as eagle food!) We took a marshrutka ride about an hour up into the mountains. It was strange and quite scary to be sitting just a few inches away from a giant scary eagle named Tuman. Once far enough into the mountains, we found the horses that we'd hired for the day. I got the smallest, most docile one, but he turned out to be stubborn as a rock and refused to walk for most of the day. I spent probably half the time leading him because when I sat on him he would not move. I was last the whole way up the mountain, and there was about half an hour where he just ate and ate and ate and I couldn't get him to move. Mike tried to lead him, but then Mike's horse wouldn't walk unless mine walked, so we were stranded and left behind as the rest of our group rode to the top of the mountain. We were rescued by our eagle hunter only coincidentally when he came down the mountain to pick up his eagle after the first hunt. He led my horse all the way up, and then Mike's followed. We rode all over the mountain to various peaks where Tuman would lauch from. We'd brought along a Kyrgyz guy from the village who ran around in the underbrush of the valley with a soda bottle full of rocks, shaking it and whistling to scare up some wildlife. Mountains (heights) and horses don't mix for me, and I had a fairly miserable time, especially since my horse was ornery. We rode across some really steep slopes through thorn bushes. At times it was so steep that we had to get off and lead the horses because they were slipping and falling down and it was dangerous to be on them. There came a point fairly early on where I lost interest in the actual hunt, because being on the horse and in the mountains was scary enough. But Mike was super wonderful and stuck close to me and kept me company, and it was a good experience regardless. Finally Tuman caught a fox on the 5th peak we'd climbed to, and then we headed down the mountain. We all got our picture taken holding Tuman- once he'd eaten he was docile and not so scary to be around. At that point it started snowing and hailing- we were stuck in the middle of a blizzard and we were a LONG way from "home". My horse refused to move, AGAIN, and the Kyrgyz guy who'd been scaring up wildlife offered to take my horse and lead Mike's. We walked the whole way down. It was really slippery in the mud on the road down the mountain, and walking was sort of difficult. Ben's horse slipped and landed on his leg, so he had to limp all the way down. The hail quickly turned to rain as we got more into the valley, and we were 1000% soaked through from head to toe. We walked all the way across a giant field, and then through the village basically from one end to the other in the pouring rain, past some miserable looking donkeys, cows, sheep, and goats who were seeking shelter under some measly trees. We finally got down to the marshrutka that was waiting for us. We were all soaked and FREEZING, and it was at least a 30 minute ride back to our homestay. We were all so cold, and some of us didn't have dry clothes to change into! I luckily had sweatpants and dry socks, but no top, and Mike, Evan, and Josh had no dry pants. We got back to our homestay, packed up our stuff, and dried off/warmed up as much as we could, and then we got a marshrutka back to Bishkek.

The marshrutka was much more high-tech than any other one I've been in, and it had a tv screen and a DVD player on board! Our driver put on Kyrgyz music videos, and it was great fun to watch/make fun of the videos here. There was one where there was a blind guy who had his pet canary killed, his girlfriend stolen, and then eventually was poisoned by the same guy- how morbid and politically incorrect! Poor blind teenager. There were other amusing ones where men were eating money, women were seducing pre-pubescent boys, but the best one was Salam Kyrgyzstan, which I mentioned in my last post.

It was a good weekend, and it was wonderful to get out of the city! We didn't really spend time at the Lake, but I saw it from the marshrutka window. There were lots of snowy mountains to admire, and there were strange red sandy mountainy things, which made it feel like we were in a desert.

I was sick most of the weekend, and I thought that being stuck in the rain would make things a million times worse, but I feel much better. My cold is mostly gone. But I used up half of my supply of Sudafed, so next time someone mails a package, include some!

I hosted my first couch surfer this week named Loh! He's from Singapore and is traveling by himself for the next few months. He's really fun and easy to hang out with. He's gone to Issyk-Kul for the week, but we're meeting him next weekend in Bokonbaevo (again!), this time for a horse festival. It involves "kiss the girl", wrestling on horseback, another Manaschi, AND DEAD GOAT POLO! We have to pay for our homestay tomorrow after we get paid, but then everything will be all set and we'll meet Loh there on Friday night after work.

I mailed my absentee ballot last night back to Connecticut, so my voice will count in this election! I just hope it will arrive in time.

Electricty is out more often now- I think it's up to 10 hours a day of no power. It doesn't match the outage schedule anymore, but it seems that twice a week power goes out around 18:00. Winter nights will be VERY dark if our apartment has no lights. Our classrooms all got new lights installed today that are attached the generator, so when we lose power in class, we'll have one measly lightbulb to see by. Better than nothing, I guess.

An incredible weekend

I had a wonderful weekend. I got to hold a golden eagle, watch eagles and hawks attack rabbits, foxes, pigeons, a teenage boy, other eagles, and a chained wolf. I went on a horse trek through the mountains and got stuck in a hail blizzard and walked for ages in pouring rain with soaked-through clothes. I played with a shoebox of puppies. I got stuck on the back of a stubborn gluttonous horse and had to be rescued by Mike and an eagle hunter. I discovered a new favorite Kyrgyz song- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sC-Ui0N6COQ. I decided I will start Kyrgyz lessons in December because it sounds so cool. I got my hand scratched up on one of the millions of thorn bushes we walked through while riding horses across a steep, brush-covered mountain. I saw many mules and decided that I want to buy one. I will write more when I've sorted out my thoughts more, and dried all my still-soaking-wet clothes from last night's trek. For now, you can read my friends' posts about this weekend:

http://janesdailyblah.blogspot.com
http://crossingturkestan.blogspot.com

Enjoy for now! I'll get pictures up as soon as possible, but my camera battery died midday through the first day, so I'll be stealing my pics from other people.

Exchange Rate and eagles!

I just changed $100 dollars into som, and the exchange rate is now 37.7! When I first got here, it was 35.5, so I'm getting a lot more som for the same amount of dollars!! Yippee!

Tonight right after work, 8 of us are getting into 2 taxis and driving to Bokonbaevo, a village on the South shore of Lake Issyk-Kul for the eagle festival! Depending on the weather, we'll also go on our own eagle hunt Sunday, but we'll wait and decide on that until we get there. So exciting! We'll be back sometime on Sunday.

I found out today that I'll have the same classes next month, which is great because I like having higher levels, and I really enjoy all of my students. I also will have morning class again, which I actually enjoy because it means I get out of bed and do things, rather than lying around until 14:25, which is probably what I'd do if I had no morning engagements. Teaching high levels means that we get to do a lot of speaking, and I don't have to teach grammar! It's fun :)

I'll write again when I'm back from Bokonbaevo! Happy weekend.

Autumn

Fall is in full-swing in Bishkek! We had a dark and dreary rainy day on Tuesday, but I enjoyed it because it really felt like Austria. We taught 2 classes by candlelight/headlamp on Tuesday when the power went out at 17:45. My students are all wonderful. Next Friday is the end of my first month of teaching, and I'll probably have new classes starting on Monday of Halloween week. I hope that I get to keep all my classes, because I love teaching high levels and I really like my classes, but it's not my decision- I find out on Thursday of next week what my new classes will be.

Tomorrow night 7 of us are leaving to Issyk-Kul lake to see the eagle hunting festival! It's about a 5 hour drive and we won't leave until after classes end at 20:20, so we will get in very late. Josh (an American here learning Russian) has arranged our taxis down and also the homestay and meals for the weekend. Saturday is a free festival where we see eagle hunters (and by this I mean men with their eagles, not men hunting eagles... like a falconer. eagler?) from all over Central Asia hunting wolves, foxes, and rabbits. The prey will be released on cue so it's not a real wild hunt, but on Sunday, we will go on horseback into the mountains with an eagler and hope to get some wild animals! We have to be back at school Sunday night, so I will try to get some lessons planned for next week today and tomorrow so that I am not working late late Sunday night.

Next week we're going to the circus! The Moscow Circus is in town and we'll get to see lots of drugged up performing animals, which is probably even sadder than wolves being killed by eagles, but in Kyrgyzstan I figure I might as well see all the local forms of acceptable animal abuse/death. Next week I'm also going to hang out with one of my students, Janna. She's very motivated to learn English and really wants to teach me Russian, and she's really easy to talk to and tons of fun to hang out with, so it will be great to see her more often than just 80 minutes in class.

Not much else is new- haven't heard much from home lately, so I assume not much is going on. I have to mail my absentee ballot tomorrow!

EAGLES HUNTING WOLVES

Next weekend will likely be the highlight of my time here thus far. There is an eagle-hunting festival by Lake Issyk-Kul on Saturday Oct 18, and Josh, an American here who's studying Russian, is going to organize the trip for us since he knows one of the hunters. We'll leave late next Friday night and get to Issyk-Kul around 2 am. There will be giant eagles that will hunt rabbits and wolves. It will be horrible and bloody but at the same time of course interesting because it's Kyrgyzstan, and eagles, and wolves! On Sunday there's a private hunt, where you go into the mountains on horseback and hunt for wild animals, rather than wolves and rabbits that were raised specifically to be hunted and killed. We all have to be back for classes on Monday, so I'm not sure how much hunting we'll be able to fit in, but we'll see!

Today is my first payday :)

My Russian schedule will change for the next two weeks and I have to go to class on Wednesdays, even though it's mini-weekend. There's no time during the regular school week to fit me in, there are too many Russian learners this month. But it means I'll have my teaching days much more open, and so I can spend more time lesson planning... or procrastinating and playing computer games.

There's a great new English-language magazine/newspaper in Bishkek that has restaurant reviews and current event listings. We've decided to try to frequent as many of the different restaurants as possible, since we're getting sick of the 3 or 4 places we usually go on our block. Taxis are cheap here (about a dollar a person), so getting to places farther away from the school isn't too difficult.

We went to a German restaurant Wednesday night- Steinbraeu. It's owned by a German-Kyrgyz guy, and they brew their own beer. They served lots of different sausages, and I didn't eat them, but the other teachers said they were great. I did have a "beer cocktail"- half beer, half Sprite. It tasted like a Radler and it reminded me so much of Austria!

My class was observed on Tuesday and the feedback I got was mostly positive with some constructive criticism. I'm starting to feel really confident in class and I have a lot of fun with my students- I'm learning SO much from them!

That's all. I uploaded a video of the Kyrgyz beatboxer to facebook, and I've finally gotten around to adding more pictures, so you should check them out.

Kyrgyzstan is ranked 166th out of 180 on the world list of most corrupt countries

My ankle has started to hurt me a lot again. It got better, but now I limp a little again. I haven't done anything to make it worse, like falling into any more ditches, so I'm not sure what's going on. I just hope that I won't have to go to a Kyrgyz doctor!

Last night the power went out around 19:00, so I got to teach my last class by candlelight. My headlamp came in handy there and provided much more light than 2 measly candles. Instead of doing the actual lesson I had planned, the students wanted to talk about what we feared. There was a spider crawling up the curtain, so they got to laugh at me being scared of spiders. But since they're scared of snakes, snails, leeches, slugs, and ticks, spiders aren't such a wimpy thing to fear.

Today I went to Osh Bazaar with Mike and Evan. It's smaller than Dordoi, and instead of selling out of giant shipping containers, it's more like a small-town market place. I bought a kilo of wonderful strawberries for 70 som ($2), a bath towel for 150 som ($4) and 2 maps of Kyrgyzstan- provinicial and topographical (30 som/less than a dollar each!) I also tried Kvas, a nonalcoholic drink made from bread, and Tan, basically milk with salt and carbonated water. Neither were really my thing.

I got 3 things in the mail on Monday! I got my absentee ballot which I'm going to take to the US Embassy to mail sometime in the next week, a package from my mom with some wonderfully warm wool mittens, and the cutest lovey letter from Aissa. I love mail so you all should write to me too!!

Fall is beautiful here and it's great fun to just walk around.

An American Cultural Experience

Last night I went to see a breakdancing performance. It was funded by the US Embassy, and they brought over a Christian breakdancing troupe called Havikoro from Houston, TX. They've been here all week and ran breakdancing workshops and had dance-offs against local Kyrgyz breakdancers. There were all sorts of people in the audience- Russians, many Kyrgyz children, some other foreigners, and our small group of London School Teachers. I went with Katy, Evan, Mike, a couchsurfer from Manhattan Jason, and some of their friends. It was 150 som (about 5 dollars) but it was WELL worth it. They rapped about religion ("I only sip wine when I'm taking communion" and some other equally ridiculous lyrics that I regret not recording). As dancers, they were mediocre at best, but they brought Kyrgyz children up on stage to show off their moves, and they were AMAZING. The Americans talked a LOT and spent the majority of the time cracking jokes, but they never gave enough space in the conversation for the translator to speak, so a lot of what they were saying wasn't understood. I sat with Katy from Oregon and Mike from England, and Mike felt very very proud NOT to be American. But they were entertaining and the Kyrgyz people really seemed to enjoy the show. I videotaped a Kyrgyz guy beatboxing, and I'm trying currently to upload it to facebook. I have only 40 minutes until I have to teach, so I'm not sure if it will finish in time. But someday I'll put all these pictures and videos on facebook!

Yesterday afternoon I went with Mike and Evan to the "fast" internet place, where supposedly uploading to facebook is a breeze. I couldn't get any pics to upload at all, and since they charged by the megabite instead of the hour, I paid 50 som for 5 minutes (rather than 40 som/hour). We won't be going back there again! But it was a beautiful, crisp fall afternoon, so it was a great walk. The leaves are changing here, but in Bishkek there aren't any red leaves yet- they go from green to yellow and then straight to brown.

My ankle is still bruised and tender from my fall into the rain gutter, but it doesn't hurt to walk anymore. It's just a nice battle wound to show off to my students, and to remind me to watch where I'm going.

Jane picked up ANOTHER cat off the street yesterday (she now has 5) and she can't take it back to the States with her next month. She offered it to me, and if I can convince my roommate that cats aren't so bad, I might have a cat of my own! She named her Minsk, and it would be so cozy to have a little furry body to snuggle up to all winter. Minsk had been bitten by a dog, so Jane took her to the vet this morning and got her sewed up and back to normal. It's crazy for me, as the #1 cat hater I know, to even be considering it, but all the cats I've met here are nice and cuddly and not psycho like our cat in Willington.

There apparently was an earthquake in Southern Kyrgyzstan yesterday night. http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/10/06/kyrgyzstan.quake.ap/index.html I didn't feel even a tremor, but it sounded like it was mildly serious. Please pass on to everyone that I'm alright!

I just learned that the internet cafe costs 80 som (about $2.50) ALL night from 23:00-06:00. So some night I will have a marathon internet session where I'll upload pics, talk to people on Skype (it will be a normal hour in the States). So I'll keep you posted on when that will be. I'll come with other teachers and we'll bring food and alcohol and make a party out of it!

First week of classes

The first week of classes is now over and it was wonderful. My students are all motivated and caring and so smart! I have already learned so many things from them. We've had interesting debates about globalization, fashion, and Muslims in Europe. Most of the students are in their twenties. They are all very interested in my life and seem to really enjoy coming to class. I'm really glad I brought "The Grammar Book," because there have already been times that I've had to explain grammar concepts and my own explanations weren't good enough.

Last night we went out to an Iranian restaurant and smoked grape hookah. This week we've gone out to dinner every night after work, because I'm so hungry by the time 20:30 rolls around and I'm just not in the mood to cook, especially since most nights the power goes out at 21:00.

Today Mike and I went to Dordoi Bazaar, which is the largest bazaar in Central Asia. There are rows and rows of shipping containers full of shoes, clothes, cosmetics, notebooks, toys, souveniers, etc. You can find everything there, but I was disappointed that the clothes were the same price as semi-expensive clothes at home (for my shopping tastes). There were LOTS of sexy teal boots though, so when winter gets closer we'll go back and I'll have to cave and buy some. Mike bought leather, fur-lined boots for winter. I got some cheap gloves and some Kyrgyz slippers which curl up at the toes like Aladdin! I love them and they were only 7 dollars. I will post pictures of them. I think that we are going to an internet cafe tomorrow that is much faster than the ones close to our apartment, so I will finally be able to put a lot of pictures online.

Tonight we are going to a breakdancing dance-off! There is a team from Texas performing, and their trip here was for some reason sponsored by the State Department. So it will be the US versus Kyrgyzstan. I'll be sure to take lots of pictures!

I'm officially an English teacher now!

Sorry it's been so long since I've updated-- the internet cafe has been down the past few days, and I've been busy with lesson planning and sleeping. But I finally have some time, and miraculously, the internet cafe is open and has power and is rather fast!

I have 4 classes- Upper Intermediate 1, Advanced 1, Upper-Intermediate 2, and Advanced 4. My students range from around 13 - 40. I have about 8 students in each class. The students are great! They all have very different backgrounds. There are a few Koreans, a Japanese, ethnic Kyrgyz, Turks, and ethnic Russians. They are all very willing to learn and they seem motivated to do their work and learn English. I feel still a little bit out of my element, but every day I feel more and more confident as I get to know my students and have a feel for their abilities. I have a Russian student who is a linguistics major! I really like it, and I'm glad to finally have something to occupy my time. I was getting bored of playing Snood for hours on end every afternoon while the other teachers were working.

Yesterday I went out to dinner with 2 British teachers, Mike and Evan, Evan's Turkmen girlfriend Selbi, and a group of Dutch artists who are in town doing a performance Saturday which involves changing a public space in downtown Bishkek. We went to a great Chinese restaurant and shared about 10 dishes of food. It was great and ended up costing less than $5 a person!

I spilled soup all over my cell phone and the buttons stopped working for a few hours, so I was dreading buying a new one and losing my 5 year old wonderful orange Finnish Nokia brick. Luckily the keys started working again and it's been fine ever since.

On the walk back home from the Chinese restaurant, I somehow wasn't watching where I was going and I stepped right into one of the water gutters that run down the side of all the roads. There were street lights around so I have NO idea how I didn't see it, but I really hurt my ankle and I scratched my purple boots and severly bruised my dignity. At least it wasn't an open manhole!

On Saturday Evan, Mike, and I are going to see the performance of the Dutch artists. They're keeping secret exactly what they'll be doing, but it involves changing public spaces at the fountains in Ala-Too Square downtown. It should be interesting! I may also venture out to a bazaar for the first time. Some teachers went yesterday and got winter clothes, but it was rainy and cold and was more a stay-in-bed-and-watch-movies kind of day.

We're also in the beginning stages of plannig a Halloween/drink Absinthe party, so that's something to look forward to!

Happy October! The weather is crisp and the leaves are falling and it rains more often- it's wonderful wonderful weather! I'm looking forward to winter.