I played tennis! & other news...

I came to Kyrgyzstan thinking that I would not pick up a tennis racket for two years. I also came here thinking that Peace Corps would surely not place me in a lakeside town with resort hotels in the middle of the summer! But you just never know. Sometimes you get lucky. I guess ‘resort’ hotels is stretching it a little but really, they’re nice. Of course, the meanings of words like nice and expensive and fancy have changed drastically for me lately. A building with running water is nice. Shoes with only a little bit of sheep shit caked to the bottom are fancy. A club with a $3.45 cover charge is ludicrously expensive. But anyways, a hotel across the street from me has two tennis courts so my host cousin invited me to play – he comes over for pre-dinner English lessons with my fam so I think he wanted to do something nice for me. It was fun – we said the score in Kyrgyz, Russian and English, for practice. Now imagine me trying to explain the concept of deuce and ad- scoring in Krygyz. Ha!

My town is entertaining and dichotomous. It really is a small village, but there are ten or so hotels on the lake that cater mostly to Russian and Kazakh tourists so the people-watching is abdan jaksheh (very good in Kyrgyz). If you’ve never seen a fashionable Russian woman all blinged out for her beach vacation then you’re missing out. EVERYONE speaks to me in Russian. I’m trying to learn but I’m having enough trouble with the Kyrgyz I allegedly speak. Sometimes I think I’ve mastered my Russian numbers but then I realize I’m saying Friday instead of fifty or fifteen. Pyat-nitza, peed-dee-syat, peed-naht-sit. I can’t keep it straight. My host cousin gives me a really hard time about it but then yesterday I was quizzing him in English and he said “Saturday” instead of “sixty.” Redemption!

My latest, greatest challenge has been getting water. There are three water spigots on my street but there’s no rhyme or reason for when they work and when they don’t. In the last two weeks they’ve worked for maybe a total of six hours. When they do work, people come out of the woodwork with their water tanks, wheelbarrows, buckets, etc., to replenish their supplies. Worry not, though, I will never actually go thirsty. The hotel where I played tennis has a steady stream of water at an outdoor tap so I carry my buckets down there pretty much every day. At first I was like uh, I have to walk ten minutes to a hotel with buckets and ask the guards at the gate if I can get water? Awkward! But it’s not that weird; lots of people do it. Sometimes my 8-year-old sister goes with me and carries a tiny pail with two hands, spilling half of her water by the time we get home. So cute. I’m like, wow there little whippersnapper, you are really keeping this family of seven afloat there, aren’t you. And she goes “Emne daysiz?” (what are you saying?) and I go “Ech nerce” (nothing).

As you can imagine, this process is not very conducive for bathing or doing laundry. I set aside an entire afternoon if I want to do laundry, especially if I want to double-rinse things. As for bathing, I strategically pack my toiletries and towel whenever I go visit another volunteer. E.g.: “Oh my gosh, I totally forgot that you have a shower, can I use it really quick with all my toiletries that I coincidentally brought over?”

Other interesting things:
-My school has sprinklers to water their flower gardens… and they work! But there’s usually no water on my street. Go figure.
-My family still cannot get over the fact that I don’t drink tea at every meal. I honestly just want to drink water, you know? My 10-year-old brother looked at me like I was crazy when I drank cold water while eating hot soup. He told me that if hot and cold things mix in my stomach like that, I will get sick.
-I had never hitchhiked before coming here. Now I do it every time I have to go somewhere. Considering there’s only one main road that hugs the lake it’s not that bad… my theory is that if anyone turns off the main road unexpectedly, I will just do a barrel roll out the door. Haven’t had to yet. I’ve met the funniest people while hitchhiking, including three Kazakh men during a freak hailstorm which they videotaped from the car, a woman who works at a bazaar in the capital who promised to give me a discount on clothes (very excited to meet me, she said, “No Kyrgyz no! Me only want speak English with you!”), two dudes driving a beer delivery truck, and a man named Bazarbek who knew all about me though I regrettably could not remember ever meeting him before. And lots of Russian speakers. No matter how many times I say “Ya nee gavaryoo pa Ruski” (I don’t speak Russian), people keep speaking to me in Russian, slower and more emphatically each time. And all I can do is look at them and say: pyat-nitza? (Friday?)

There has been a bit of excitement this week. For President Bakiyev’s 60th birthday party and an informal summit, six heads of state came through my town in a caravan en route to his posh beach property in Cholpon Ata, on the north shore of the lake. People are really excited. There were maybe 50 soldiers in my village alone to supervise the road as they drove past. Two helicopters kept circling overhead, which was really thrilling for my ten-year-old host brother. Depending on who you ask, it may be any combination of presidents from the following countries: Russia, Armenia, Tajikistan, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, China, Ukraine. (It’s actually the first six.) I started asking other random ones just for laughs. Paraguay? Togo? Obama!

I definitely have my work cut out for me as far as teaching English goes. It’s hard to have a very consistent work schedule right now, seeing as it’s summer, but that’s okay. I have so many people approach me about learning English, all the time. Our postal worker? Wants English lessons. The guard at the hotel? Wants English lessons. The handy man at my school? Wants English lessons. Seems there will be an adult class in my future.

As always, I love hearing from home or wherever you may be… email me or write me a letter! It’s been hard to not be in touch with people as much as I’d like. If you don’t hear from me for a while, it’s not because you’re not in my thoughts.

Some pics below…

My host cousin Marat. Notice the barefeet! Marat Safin he is definitely not. But it was a lot of fun to be on the court again, even for just an hour or so.





My host mom makes jam from black currants, raspberries, cherries, and apricots. Here you see cherries with just a pinch of sugar.


My host sister Noorbuhbuh making manty – little steamed dumplings. These are filled with mutton, onions and potatoes. I helped pinch them shut. We dipped them in tomato sauce mixed with vinegar.







My host sister Noorjan making pirozhki. She fills them with potatoes and onions, flattens them, and fries them. Um, yes, they’re delicious. I accidentally ate four.







Here’s our water spigot, next to our street. I get all my water from here (on a good day).