A few weeks ago, I took a bunch of pictures of my one and a half year old host-baby Ayjemal dressed up in her mom’s prayer scarf. Turkmen are big fans of looking at pictures, and pictures of babies in prayer scarves seem to be very high on the “love-it” list. My host-family has been hounding me constantly to get them copies of the Ayjemal pictures, so today was officially the day to get it done. After I swept my carpet. Damn.
My oldest sister Tylla, and my youngest sister Gurbangul accompanied me to the Russian bazaar in Ashgabat to make sure the mission was successfully accomplished. Ayjemal came along to supervise her big pictoral debut. There’s a really big difference between the Talkuchga bazaar and the bazaars in Ashgabat. The in-city bazaars are a little more controlled, a little less insane. While we waited for the Kodak store at the bazaar to print my pictures, I did a little people watching. There is definitely a sizable Russian population here, and it is pretty obvious when you are looking at crowds as to who is Russian and who is Turkmen (Besides the fact that Russians also wear sunglasses). Russians seem to be extraordinarily averse to their natural hair color here, with artificial shades of orange hair that I hadn’t imagined were possible. They are also big fans of tight jeans, short skirts, and fake fur. I felt so boring in comparison. My American flip-flops and long skirt just couldn’t stack up.
In the midst of my people watching, I happened to look over at a vendor who was selling cookies. All of his cookies were sitting in big piles on a table, and as people came up to purchase a kilo or half kilo of them, he would scoop a pile of cookies into a bag for them. While I was watching, a pigeon flew over and perched ON TOP of a pile of cookies and POOPED on them. I swear, I saw it with my own two eyes. The vendor saw it too, so he reached over and stirred around the cookie pile so that the bird turd wouldn’t be noticeable to his upcoming customers. That’s gross. Even grosser, a mom and her three screaming children walked up to him no more than thirty seconds later and bought some of the defecated-upon confections. Scoop. Bag. Pass out to children. Her kids all shut up as soon as they had mouths filled with cookies, I wonder if it had anything to do with the secret ingredient…
After we got our pictures, Tylla told me we were going somewhere really really fun. I was hoping that a Wal-Mart had magically sprung up in downtown Ashgabat, but alas, that was not the type of fun to which she was referring. No more than half an hour later, I was once again standing in line at Disneyland, getting elbowed in the kidneys by a mob of impatient Turkmen. Definitely fun.
Sunday, October 28, 2007
Saturday, October 27, 2007
October 27th
So today was a really big party around here, it was Turkmen Independence Day. You just think people in the states get excited about our independence, imagine how much celebrating goes on when you are still celebrating your years of independence in numerals smaller than 20. It was pretty rad.
Ashgabat was all sorts of decked out, with flags and banners and balloons everywhere. The city looked absolutely amazing with all of the white marble buildings contrasting with the bright colors of the decorations. On top of that, it was bright sunshine and somewhere in the low eighties all day (eat your heart out Alaska!) so there wasn’t any of that annoying worrying about the weather ruining our plans.
My sister Mahrie and I woke up early and went in to the city to participate in the merry-making with the rest of Turkmenistan. I wore my new dress (yay!!) and when we got there, we watched a huge parade with all sorts of floats and costumed dancers and confetti. I got to go to my first restaurant since I’ve been here, it was pretty sweet. I had lamb grilled on a stick with a huuuuge pile of onions. My breath was rank, but the meal was well worth it. It was so strange to be sitting there and realize that no one around us was speaking English. There was a couple next to us trying to deal with their badly behaved baby who was throwing food on the floor and across from us there was the cutest older couple who were eating out of the same bowl. I guess sometimes you don’t have to understand what people are saying to know what’s going on.
We spent the rest of the day wandering around Ashgabat looking at fountains and monuments and people. And Turkmen Disneyland. They actually call it Disneyland, this isn’t just my little nickname for the place. It’s nothing like the real thing of course, just a few rides and food stands- similar to a low budget state fair really. To most Americans, it wouldn’t be anything, but to Turkmen, this place is the be all and end all in fun and excitement. There are only 3 “scary” rides in the whole park. One is a (very small) roller coaster, one is the Turkmen equivalent to the Sizzler, and one is a platform with seats that’s attatched to an arm that spins around. The lines for the three rides are always ridiculously long, and Turkmen don’t really appreciate standing in line, so they’re also in chaos while everyone in line tries to cut in front of everyone else in line. When it comes down to it, the best part about Disneyland wasn’t Disneyland itself; it was the people-watching at Disneyland. Good stuff. Where else can you see a woman in her mid fifties screaming in Russian and hitting a teenage boy with her purse while she tries to get in front of him in a line to ride the Sizzler?
While we were in the city, I saw a couple of Peace Corps volunteers; it’s pretty easy to spot Americans in a sea of Turkmen. Usually it’s the sunglasses. Turkmen don’t wear sunglasses. I have no idea why. Americans here all seem to where those ridiculously huge “hiding from the paparazzi glasses”, no guesses on who they think they are being ‘inconspiculous’ for.
We met up with Kelly and her host sisters later in the evening and stood around waiting for fireworks. The great thing about Turkmenistan is that no one actually shows up for the event, they show up for the other people who will be at the event. The fireworks were supposed to start at 8pm, and the five of us showed up to the designated fireworks watching area at 5:30. So did the rest of the city. Everyone just kept walking around and around this tiny little area looking at eachother’s dresses and pretending that they just happened to show up that early because they had nothing better to be doing. Very nonchalant. Really. Mahrie had really sore feet because of her heels, but she kept walking around.
We wound up leaving before the fireworks even started and found a minivan cab (they call them marshrutkas here) to take us home. I cracked up because as soon as the cab driver saw that he had some Americans in his car, he turned up the CD he was listening to. It was Celine Dion’s greatest hits and I could actually feel my butt vibrate to every word Ms. Dion uttered. He kept trying to carry on a conversation over his blasting stereo, so I just kept nodding and smiling. I’ve become very good at that lately. I got home just in time to see the last burst of fireworks off in the distance, and I crawled into bed with sore feet and “My Heart Will Go On” playing over and over in my head.
Ashgabat was all sorts of decked out, with flags and banners and balloons everywhere. The city looked absolutely amazing with all of the white marble buildings contrasting with the bright colors of the decorations. On top of that, it was bright sunshine and somewhere in the low eighties all day (eat your heart out Alaska!) so there wasn’t any of that annoying worrying about the weather ruining our plans.
My sister Mahrie and I woke up early and went in to the city to participate in the merry-making with the rest of Turkmenistan. I wore my new dress (yay!!) and when we got there, we watched a huge parade with all sorts of floats and costumed dancers and confetti. I got to go to my first restaurant since I’ve been here, it was pretty sweet. I had lamb grilled on a stick with a huuuuge pile of onions. My breath was rank, but the meal was well worth it. It was so strange to be sitting there and realize that no one around us was speaking English. There was a couple next to us trying to deal with their badly behaved baby who was throwing food on the floor and across from us there was the cutest older couple who were eating out of the same bowl. I guess sometimes you don’t have to understand what people are saying to know what’s going on.
We spent the rest of the day wandering around Ashgabat looking at fountains and monuments and people. And Turkmen Disneyland. They actually call it Disneyland, this isn’t just my little nickname for the place. It’s nothing like the real thing of course, just a few rides and food stands- similar to a low budget state fair really. To most Americans, it wouldn’t be anything, but to Turkmen, this place is the be all and end all in fun and excitement. There are only 3 “scary” rides in the whole park. One is a (very small) roller coaster, one is the Turkmen equivalent to the Sizzler, and one is a platform with seats that’s attatched to an arm that spins around. The lines for the three rides are always ridiculously long, and Turkmen don’t really appreciate standing in line, so they’re also in chaos while everyone in line tries to cut in front of everyone else in line. When it comes down to it, the best part about Disneyland wasn’t Disneyland itself; it was the people-watching at Disneyland. Good stuff. Where else can you see a woman in her mid fifties screaming in Russian and hitting a teenage boy with her purse while she tries to get in front of him in a line to ride the Sizzler?
While we were in the city, I saw a couple of Peace Corps volunteers; it’s pretty easy to spot Americans in a sea of Turkmen. Usually it’s the sunglasses. Turkmen don’t wear sunglasses. I have no idea why. Americans here all seem to where those ridiculously huge “hiding from the paparazzi glasses”, no guesses on who they think they are being ‘inconspiculous’ for.
We met up with Kelly and her host sisters later in the evening and stood around waiting for fireworks. The great thing about Turkmenistan is that no one actually shows up for the event, they show up for the other people who will be at the event. The fireworks were supposed to start at 8pm, and the five of us showed up to the designated fireworks watching area at 5:30. So did the rest of the city. Everyone just kept walking around and around this tiny little area looking at eachother’s dresses and pretending that they just happened to show up that early because they had nothing better to be doing. Very nonchalant. Really. Mahrie had really sore feet because of her heels, but she kept walking around.
We wound up leaving before the fireworks even started and found a minivan cab (they call them marshrutkas here) to take us home. I cracked up because as soon as the cab driver saw that he had some Americans in his car, he turned up the CD he was listening to. It was Celine Dion’s greatest hits and I could actually feel my butt vibrate to every word Ms. Dion uttered. He kept trying to carry on a conversation over his blasting stereo, so I just kept nodding and smiling. I’ve become very good at that lately. I got home just in time to see the last burst of fireworks off in the distance, and I crawled into bed with sore feet and “My Heart Will Go On” playing over and over in my head.
Friday, October 26, 2007
Life So Far...
Fri October 12, 2007
Today was great, I got to get on the internet for the first time and it was such an American feeling to post a blog and check some e-mails, I felt like I was in heaven. It was super super good to hear from all of you, I am a total dork and I keep all of your emails on my flash drive to read over again later, so keep the warm fuzzies coming!
I’ve found that my mindset has had to change since I have gotten in country. I find it’s really been for the better. In America, I had a lot of negative things to say about situations that seemed unpleasant to me. For example, that person who cut me off in traffic was a “jerk”, that super-slow service I had at that restaurant was “lousy”, and that mysterious smell coming from somewhere in my car was “disgusting”.
It was really tempting when I first got in country to apply a lot of the same terms to things that were unfamiliar and Turkmen. I have tried to tell myself that using negative terms isn’t going to help me, and no one likes a whiner, so I have decided that my new favorite word is different. Instead of things being problematic, they are simply “different”. Examples of this new favorite word’s use would be: “Young boys that throw rocks at me are… different.” “Burning trash at 6am smells… different.” “Forgetting my flashlight for my midnight outhouse run is totally… different.” And most importantly, “When my baby shares her dinner with me via saliva and dirt-encrusted hands it is very very… different.”
So now you know, there is no such thing as a bad day here. Only one that is… different.
Sat October 13, 2007
Today was the last day of Ramadan. I’ve known this would be the last day of Ramadan for quite awhile, but I never really figured out whether that means people are fasting today, or are not fasting today. Normally I would just ask, but my language skills aren’t quite efficient enough yet to get my point across, and my family just thinks I am asking if they fast during Ramadan in general. Oh well.
As far as my host family goes, they are very “dini” (religious) and they have all been observing “oraza” (fasting) from sun up til sun down. This is actually quite the experience since the sun comes up at an ungodly hour here. I hear all of them get up for breakfast time somewhere in the neighborhood of 4am. They all eat a very hearty (and loud) breakfast since it is all they’re getting until around 8pm that evening, then they go back to sleep for a few hours until the day is ready to get off to its real start.
I feel like such a slacker getting out of bed at 7, and wandering in to the breakfast that is laid out for me and the baby (who isn’t quite ready to take on oraza this year). I’m really impressed with their self-control and willpower. It takes a lot to go without food for the whole day, but to also go without water when it is at least 80 degrees outside all day is what truly seems like it would be too much for me.
From what I can tell, my family’s high level of religion also extends into other areas. For one thing, there is a lot of belief about certain superstitions and good and bad luck. We aren’t allowed to bathe or do laundry on Thursdays because it is some sort of holy day. We also can’t eat anything with our left hands because apparently the left hand is considered to be evil. My pillow on my bed can only face two of the four walls in my bedroom, something about not facing a cemetery… It just seems like there are a lot of rules to remember.
I also have to get used to the idea of praying after dinner instead of before. They all come to the collective decision that we are done eating, then everyone at the table, me included, assumes “the position”. We all hold our hands open in the shape of a book in front of us, wait for a little bit, then we take our hands and “wash” the words from said “book” over our faces. It’s actually really neat looking when everyone does it together. I think it’s supposed to signify the Koran and our receiving knowledge/ blessings from it.
Oh, I almost forgot one of the better rules, we have to sit straight while we are eating, because if we sit with our legs to one side or the other, all of our food will go to only one side of our body. I would hate to be fat on only one side, so I am always sure to be diligent about proper dinnertime posture.
Dorothy, I am definitely not in Kansas anymore.
Sun October 14, 2007
Today we went to the Talkuchga (I’m pretty sure that I butchered that spelling badly) bazaar. It’s the biggest bazaar in Turkmenistan and it is insane. There are so many people, noises, smells, and strange things to see. It would be like if you took a Walmart on the day before Christmas, added produce, raw meat, and price negotiation, then put the whole experience outdoors and on steroids. Really.
It was super hot, with the sun beating down on all of the stands, and everything had sort of a funky smell to it. I think I would really enjoy shopping there if I wasn’t constantly afraid of getting lost. I think of myself as a reasonably resourceful person, but if I hadn’t had Maya with me, I can’t honestly say I would have even been able to find my way out of the bazaar, much less to the area where you catch a cab home. I was so thankful that I was a good 6 inches taller than most people in the crowded little aisles, that was probably my only saving grace in keeping track of our group as we all pushed and shoved our way from one stall to another.
I emerged somewhat victorious from the experience, although still paying full price for everything I bought. I got myself a surge protector, hangars, some beautiful fabric to get a dress made out of, and most importantly, a green bucket. The bucket, as ridiculous as it sounds, was probably my most valuable purchase of the day.
I have realized, after almost two weeks in country, that these people don’t really have garbage cans anywhere in their homes. There is a pile out by the outhouse where you put all of your garbage, and that’s about it. I had been keeping a small pile of trash in the corner of my bedroom, and it really just wasn’t doing the trick. I almost wet myself with excitement when I saw the little trash-can shaped green bucket at the bazaar. Not only was it the closest thing I had seen to a trashcan since we’d left Ashgabat, it even had a lid! (Little things make you really happy here, trust me.)
Me and my bucket went straight home for a little R&R (aka a five hour nap), and then I woke up and walked the two blocks over to Kelly’s house for a little dress making. Kelly’s host sister is a seamstress, and had agreed to make dresses for us four girls with the fabric we had bought at the bazaar.
We all got our measurements taken and drank a little bit (actually a lot) of tea. I giggled a little at the fact that I seemed to be the only one whose booty got its own measurement, but was incredibly relieved to see that she was going to make my dress long enough. It’s so nice to have clothes made for you when you’re tall, I get so sick of nothing ever being long enough.
With the measuring tape put away, and our bladders filled, we set off for our individual family-filled evenings. And I went home to take a bath and play with my new bucket.
Mon October 15, 2007
In the states, there are a few basic needs that give me an immense amount of pleasure. At the top of the list would most definitely be sleeping and eating. Combine the two and you have officially got a winning combination. In Turkmenistan, the two experiences seem to somehow have been lost in translation.
Sleeping here seems a lot more like using the bathroom. You and everyone else have to do it, but you don’t spend any longer than you have to, and sometimes you can’t do it, even when you really really want to.
I am typically ready to hit my flat little mat bed at the late hour of nine thirty (yes, pm) and after waking up every two or three hours all night, I am ready to crawl right back out of my humble little nest no later than 6:30 in the morning. It actually kind of hurts to sleep much longer than that, what with the whole sleeping on the floor thing. Sleeping in is definitely a thing of my American past. People here don’t know why you would want to stay in bed when you could be up sweeping the floor, or drinking tea. It seems like the biggest waste of time ever to them, and they look at you like you’re crazy if you try to explain to them that many Americans list sleeping as a fond pastime and hobby.
As for the eating, food here is so… different.
Turkmen don’t really like a lot of spice in their food, they think adding dill or parsley is pretty wild and crazy as far as flavoring is concerned. Where they lack in zing, they most definitely make up for in “yag” (oil). There is probably four or five times the amount of oil that I would consider excessive in the United States, and I used to think I was pretty liberal with my oil use. It’s honestly dripping off of everything. To make matters more fascinating, they don’t use vegetable oil here, it’s cotton oil, which I have been told is one of those really hearty, stick-to-your-arteries varieties. Awesome.
As for what they actually prepare in aforementioned oil, they have a few favorites. Most of them involve some variety of sheep meat.
Number one thing you will hear about eating in Turkmenistan is choreck. It’s their very dense bread, and it’s kind of shaped like a thick, elongated Frisbee. After seeing it made, I have a huge respect for it. The women make it in these clay ovens that have a really hot fire going in the bottom of them, and they actually reach into the oven with a slab of dough, slap it on to the side of the oven (it sticks there), then reach in and peel it off of the side when it is done. It looks really hot and uncomfortable, and I can only imagine how much more so it is in the height of summer. We met a woman who makes choreck for a living, and she typically makes about 300 loaves daily. What impresses me is that in a village where they refuse to waste anything, they totally manage to eat that much choreck without any sort of major effort.
As far as actual meals, the first one I ate when I came to my host family was palaw (comes out sounding more like plov). I think it might actually be their national dish. It’s basically fried rice with lots of carrots, lots of oil, and a few pieces of meat for decoration on top. I wasn’t super fond of it at first, but after a few weeks of eating it, I am honestly a little obsessed with it. It’s become somehow equated with macaroni and cheese in my mind, and who doesn’t like macaroni and cheese?
The next most popular has to be the chorba. This is the stand-by meal that you can count on eating any time that no one knows what to make for dinner. It’s pretty much any kind of soup. They just throw whatever veggies are around, along with a hearty dollop of –you guessed it- cotton oil into a pot. On good days, there might be meat chunks, lentils, or noodles added to it. After they have sautéed it for a bit, they fill the pan up with water and let it boil for an hour or two. Dinner is served.
There are also a few different things that they like to stuff. Manty is the Turkmen potsticker. It is basically a thin noodly-dough that they fill with ground meat and onions, then fold into a cute little pouch. They usually steam them, but my very health conscious family prefers to fry them in oil. Don’t tell anyone, but I kind of like them fried better than steamed. I know, I’m bad. What can you do?
Also in the “stuffed stuff” family are somsa. Our group has reverted to calling them hot pockets. They are basically little calzones, that most Turkmen prefer to see filled with ground sheep meat and onions. Instead of baking, you can probably guess how somsas are cooked. Nothing like a little yag to make the somsa really tasty. Yum.
One of my weakness while in country (besides the palaw) is the dograma. It is the Turkmen version of stuffing, and it is sinfully addictive. If you like that soggy bread sort of thing…. Mmmmmm. It’s ripped up pieces of stale choreck, that are then soaked in some sort of brothy-substance (I don’t want to know how they get the broth, because I’m pretty sure it involves boiling the bones of some neighbor’s livestock). For the final touch to the dograma, they throw in finely diced raw onions. You would think this would really mess up the overall texture, with the random crunchy part, but it is actually really tasty, I swear.
I’m going to have to start a 12-step program to wean off this stuff.
Tues October 16, 2007
It’s been really hoooooot here. I don’t mean to whine, I do realize I’m in a desert, but it’s October, should it really be in the high 80s every day? I’m melting! I realize my body temperature seems to be in direct relation to my temper. I have absolutely no patience when I am hot, and trust me, there are plenty of things that require quite a bit of my patience right now.
The children here are something else entirely. One of the first Turkmen words I learned was somsek (stupid) and it certainly wasn’t because the other Peace Corps volunteers were yelling it at me. There always seem to be these unruly hordes of children in the streets, and I don’t know what I have more of a problem with, the name calling, or the stone throwing. Seriously, they throw a lot of rocks, like in the bible. And they have pretty good aim.
I am frequently tempted to run after them screaming obscenities, but to be quite frank, it’s way too hot for running. Little boys are the devil. Grrr.
The only reprieve from my heat/child-induced crankiness is the ice cream. I am absolutely in love with it. Turkmen have a significant fondness for ice cream and as a result, there is a market with ice cream bars and cones on just about every corner. The best part is the price, I’m paying a whopping $0.04 for a pretty good sized cone filled with the most fabulous chocolate ice cream. I’m drooling a little just thinking about it…
So who wants to come visit me now that you know you can eat all the ice cream you want for less than fifty cents a day??
Weds October 17, 2007
I woke up at midnight. I couldn’t figure out what could have disturbed me (aside from the barking dogs, the insomniac cow next-door, and the roosters who constantly seem to be on Tokyo time). It was as I lay there, pondering my suddenly conscious status that I realized I had a stomachache that went far beyond your typical case of too-much-manti indigestion.
In a rare fit of excellent judgment, I dumped my entire garbage bucket out, and brought it over to my mat… just in case. At 2 o’clock that same morning, “just in case” became a very unpleasant reality and I began making a rather intimate acquaintance of my bucket’s interior. This unpleasant rendezvous continued at two-hour intervals until it finally got late enough in the day (7:30 am) for me to call someone and beg for medicine.
While waiting for my medical savior to arrive, and hating how hot it already was at only 8 in the morning, I hit my absolute lowest point of the day. Really, it was probably one of the lower morale moments in recent memory. Maybe in my life.
I was losing mass out of both ends of my digestive tract. I had gotten no sleep for the night. I was delirious. Most importantly, I was in immediate need of a visit to the family outhouse, aka narrow hole in the ground with a wooden shack surrounding it. After I staggered in and took care of business, while trying to keep from throwing-up again, I realized I had missed. Like missed the hole. Like the worst-case scenario for any outhouse trip, but especially this one. I could have cried. Instead, I prayed no one in my family was going to use the outhouse for the thirty seconds it took me to run into my room, grab my water bottle, and run back out to the structure in question. I took care of it, thankfully without spectators, but it was a bad moment in the annals of Shannon’s bathroom memories. I promise never to bring it up again.
At ten-thirty the same morning, I received a shot in my rear-end that promised to kill my nausea, and from 11am until 10pm, I slept like a baby. I woke up in regular intervals for the rest of the night and watched my temperature flutter between 100.5 and 101.2 degrees. Sort of like a fickle FM radio, but much more uncomfortable. I finally drifted off to sleep near dawn, strangely looking forward to getting out of bed in a few short hours. It couldn’t have anything to do with having spent more than twenty of the past twenty-four hours on my back, on my very box-spring-free mat on the floor.
Thurs October 18, 2007
Today was so strange. First of all, I woke up and felt no immediate urge to use my trusty bedside bucket. Second of all, I could see my breath on the way to pick up Kelly. No joke, it was totally and unexpectedly cold-ish this morning. It was kind of a nice relief initially; especially after the unpleasant heat waves I had been experiencing the past few days, both in and out of fevered delirium.
I was, unfortunately, so busy being relieved that I decided to roll out of the house with no jacket to speak of, and a light skirt and short-sleeved shirt as my only textile companions for the day. By three in the afternoon, I found myself convinced that the temperature dropping to below sixty degrees Fahrenheit was surely a sign of an impending apocalypse. While walking home in the cold rain at 6 pm, I thought I would seriously lose some bodily appendage to frostbite if I was exposed for another second. I have become a cold weather wimp in the course of a little more than two weeks in this country. For shame Shannon, shaaaame.
In other exciting news, I was given free cucumbers by a neighbor boy on the last stretch of my walk home, and I even remembered to thank him in Turkmen while still keeping my peripheral vision open for incoming rocks. I tried to take a bath tonight, but my family informed me that devout Muslims (and their host-children) don’t bathe on Thursdays. With that, my four-day-no-bathing-streak jumped to five days. I am so gross. I spent the evening wallowing in American television (aka Sex and the City DVDs) to keep my mind off of my building stench. It was fabulous.
Fri October 19, 2007
Today was our second trip to Ashgabat for more shots. I actually didn’t spend too much time on the internet. There were 11 of us who really wanted to use it, and the connection at the Peace Corps office, although lightening speed for Turkmenistan, is still fairly slow, and I felt bad spending more than a few minutes on it while others were waiting.
Today was also my first day of significant clinic activity. Up until now, our technical training has consisted mostly of Lex and myself spending a lot of quality time in our clinic’s conference room looking up useful Turkmen medical phrases in our dictionaries such as “your breath stinks” and my personal favorite, “please don’t put that in your mouth.”
Today we showed up at the clinic at 8:30 in the morning (no small feat when you have to fit in hair, makeup, chorek, cookies, four cups of tea, and a bathroom trip before work). We got to ride along with our doctors as they made house calls to our local citizens in need, and we got to observe one of the doctors as she consulted a few patients who came into the clinic. I’d be lying if I said that I understood the bulk of Turkmen that was being exchanged during these events, however the invaluable part of the day was having the opportunity to experience Turkmen medical culture firsthand. What a difference from American medicine. A really big difference. HIPPA would have a heart attack.
People are pretty comfortable here with the idea of leaving the door open while you medically consult. The door open, and two extra Americans in the room didn’t seem to be much of a stretch in their vision of propriety. People are so willing to immediately welcome you into this personal part of their lives, it doesn’t even enter their minds to tell you they would rather be alone with the doctor. The two home visits we did were for super different reasons, one was a baby with a cold that wouldn’t go away, and one was for a middle-aged man whose kidney stones were so bad he couldn’t even move. Both visits resulted in shots (Turkmen prefer needle medicines over pills, they feel like they’re more effective).
Tonight I took my longest and most luxurious bucket bath to date. I figured that whole business of not bathing from Sunday night, until Friday night, sort of entitled me to a little extra banya time. I used three whole buckets, all fairly warm, and(!) I shaved my legs! It was as close as I could get to heaven crawling onto my mat bed tonight with a warm blanket, clean hair, and smooth legs. Pure. Turkmen. Bliss.
Sat October 20, 2007
Today we went to the big bazaar in Ashgabat for the second time. The first time we went, it was sort of amateur hour for us Americans. We went in the middle of the day, which is the busiest time for the market, on a Sunday, which is the busiest day for the market, and none of us knew exactly what we doing, or how to get anywhere to get anything accomplished. Needless to say, we spent a lot more money than we should have, and had very little to show for it. The good news was, we learned exactly how NOT to have a successful day of bazaar action.
This time, we were ready for some serious combat shopping. We left Dan at home because let’s be real, boys just aren’t usually very motivated to look through twenty four fabric stands before they settle on the perfect pattern for their skirt. Secondly, we four girls (plus Maya) decided to go on Saturday since the bazaar tends to be a little less busy that day. For the pièce de résistance, we actually got up early on said Saturday and were at the bazaar by the wee hour of 8 am.
With the recently colder weather (sixty five is cold, right?), we were all shocked to be able to see our breath while going through the first stalls. Maybe there really will be a winter in Turkmenistan. Doubtful, but looking more possible.
My biggest excitemet at the bazaar came from a scarf purchase. I had wandered down a side aisle by myself and to my delight, I found a stand that was selling Pakistani scarves. On a side note, they are absolutely beautiful, and you are all getting one for Christmas, but most importantly, I BARGAINED FOR ONE IN TURKMEN! It was my first negotiation since I had been in country and even though it was only a seventy-five cent discount, I walked away from there on a total high, with a super pretty scarf. Yay for me!
I bought some more pretty fabric, ate some exciting meaty-sandwhich thing, and then the unimaginable happened, I got lost. I was so freaked out, one minute I knew exactly where all of the girls were, then I got distracted by a skinned goat’s head, and the next thing I knew, I had no idea where anybody was. It was like being a little kid in the grocery store, except I didn’t even posses enough language skills to do anything besides ask people if they had seen Americans. It was a bad feeling.
After about 10 minutes of feeling a little nauseous, and staying in pretty much the same place I had last seen them, I finally spotted my girls looking for me. I was so happy to see them. It was almost as good as the cheap scarf feeling. Almost.
I went home and had some fabulous preserved apricots, apples, and pears. I really like the preserved fruit here. Probably because it’s mainly sugar. My family grows all of the fruits in our yard, then they can it themselves and it’s really tasty. Too bad I’m pretty sure that that makes it lose all of its nutritional value…. Oh well.
I spent the evening playing “checkers” (and I use the term loosely) with my sister Mahrie and my brother Mohammet. They use a checkers board, but chess pieces and they basically move the pieces like you would move checkers, but every now and then they throw in a few chess-like moves with certain pieces. I kinda think they were making up some rules as they went, but it was entertaining to watch, so I didn’t say anything.
Who am I to tell Turkmen how to play checkers when I still can’t form complete sentences?
Sun October 21, 2007
We decided to celebrate our American-ness today. Carrie had the extraordinary foresight to bring cayenne pepper and chilli powder with her, so yesterday at the bazaar we bought ingredients to make vegetarian chilli today. It was awesome. We didn’t add any oil to it, and added lots of spice. My taste buds hardly knew what to do with themselves. After our super awesome lunch (that included freshly baked choreck!), we watched The Devil Wears Prada (in English!) and pretended to be home for just a few hours. It was a nice little escape from reality.
Before I was allowed to attend American day, I had to participate in the Turkmen ritual of house cleaning. They do your normal dusting, dish washing, and laundering, but then there’s an extra step for added fun and excitement: carpet sweeping! I’m not joking, I have seen a vacuum cleaner in our house, so I don’t understand why we use this broom that has a handle less than two feet long. You literally have to bend in half and move back and forth in tiny rows across the huge carpets that cover all of the floors in our house. I was so sore from being hunched over, that I almost bailed on American day in favor of laying down with some aspirin. I will never again complain about having to vacuum at home.
Mon October 22, 2007
Today we started what the Peace Corps calls ECAs. I think that might stand for extra curricular activities, but basically its like day camp for the Turkmen kids in our village. They have a few days off from school, and we were supposed to give them something to do in the mornings. This sounds like it would be pretty low-key, I mean how hard can it really be to entertain a bunch of kids for four hours?
I will never again utter that last statement. After running out of planned activities after only three hours had passed, I found myself obligated to play freeze tag for the remaining hour of our time today. Turkmen kids are merciless when it comes to freeze tag, and I seriously thought I was going to fall down dead when it was finally time for them to go home. I still have to do this for another two days?
Fortunately, I think my host-family sensed my delicate state and made me the best dinner ever. We each had our OWN plate, and there were actually four different things on each plate! It was super exciting! We had mashed potatoes, cooked barley, sautéed tomatoes and onions, and this really finely diced meat that was also fried with onions. It was so good, and none of it was swimming in grease. I fell asleep a very happy human being.
Tues October 23, 2007
Round two of ECAs went surprisingly better. After staying up for the majority of last night drawing a huge batch of bingo boards (they don’t do photocopying in our village), I felt more than prepared to kill time without the assistance of freeze tag. The kids had a really good time, and more showed up today than had come yesterday. I was shocked to see that a lot of our boys brought friends with them. I was convinced after yesterday that they weren’t going to come back at all. I guess sometimes kids surprise you.
All of them were really well behaved, and I actually left the ECA today (almost) wishing that we had longer than three days to spend with these kids. It’s funny how fast they start to grow on you, and here I thought I didn’t deal well with children all these years. Maybe there’s something in the water here.
After going home and taking a mostly-fabulous bucket bath, I was surprised to find my family ushering me towards their car. I guess they had plans for guesting that they had failed to mention to me, so I simply jumped in and hoped for the really good cookies at our final (and still unknown) destination.
It turned out that my host mom’s brother (my host-uncle?) and his family really wanted to meet the new American, and I was more than happy to oblige. They had a house full of daughters and they were all so sweet and so cute, I seriously could have stayed visiting forever. (This also could have something to do with the fact that they did indeed have the “good cookies”)
The best part was as I was getting ready to leave their house. A couple of the daughters came running up to me with a plastic shopping bag full of something in their hands. I assumed it was something I was supposed to bring home to my host-mom, so I took it, thanked them, and got in the car. It was only once I was home that I realized they had given me a present! (Don’t worry, this was confirmed by my sisters, I wasn’t stealing something that really was supposed to go to my host mom).
They had given me a big new flannel sheet with flowers on it, and as ordinary as that may sound, it was one of the cooler things they could have possibly given me. I have been getting cold at night in my little mat-bed, and this sheet was exactly what I needed to add a little extra heat. Not to mention it was incredibly soft. Yay for random Turkmen presents! I fell asleep clean, warm, and full of expensive cookies. I don’t think life can get much better.
Weds October 24, 2007
The last day of ECAs was bitter-sweet. On one hand I genuinely enjoyed spending time with the kids, and it was sort of a releif to be judged soley on the basis of how well you can do the hokey-pokey and play blob-tag. On the other hand, I was getting to the point where my feet were in serious danger of going on strike from the rest of my body. I never knew you could get blisters on top of blisters. Yowch.
It was Kelly’s host sister’s birthday today. It was the same sister who is working on making my dress, and on the way home from school, I felt it was only appropriate to drop in and wish her a happy birthday. Fortunately (for me) there was a big pot of Palaw and an even bigger birthday cake waiting there when I arrived. Turkmen are notorious for forcing their guests to eat, so I was more than happy to oblige as Kelly’s host mom started in with her familiar cry of “iyt, iyt!” (it actually sounds just like eat, eat when they say it, crazy, huh?) the cake totally rocked, and I don’t think there is really any doubts as to my feelings about the palaw. That stuff is just too dang tasty.
All in all, it was definitely the best birthday party I have been to since I have been in Turkmenistan (never mind that it is the only one I have been to so far). You’ve gotta love any reason to bust out a cake.
Fri October 26, 2007
Today involved some well-deserved heartburn on my part. I was feeling especially lonely for American culture, so to cheer myself up, I walked to the “dukan” (kinda like a 7-11 for Turkmen) with Lex and bought an especially tasty looking bag of peanut M&Ms. In addition to the candy, we bought two different kinds of cookies, something that looked like a Russian Twinkie, and also a bag of potato chips.
After munching our way through this particularly heinous concoction of processed carbohydrates, something neither of us had eaten in quite a few weeks, we realized things might be looking a little grim for our digestive tracts. Both of us spent the afternoon experiencing phenomenal stomachaches that (for once) had absolutely nothing to do with the microbial contents of Turkmenistan’s water. Oops.
I came home tonight and found to my delight that Kelly’s sister had finished my dress. Even better, it still fit me after my afternoon of binge eating! Life is lookin pretty good right about now.
The dress is absolutely gorgeous, and I promise to post pics of me in it as soon as I can. Yay for Kelly’s sister!
--Sorry guys, I ran out of time to post the rest of this month’s blogs. I really do have one for every day though, so I promise to put the rest up next Sunday! Enjoy for now, and look forward to hearing all about how I got to seen a super bloody leg injury, drink beer on Halloween, and go to “Disneyland” twice in one weekend! (Please try to contain your jealousy!)
Today was great, I got to get on the internet for the first time and it was such an American feeling to post a blog and check some e-mails, I felt like I was in heaven. It was super super good to hear from all of you, I am a total dork and I keep all of your emails on my flash drive to read over again later, so keep the warm fuzzies coming!
I’ve found that my mindset has had to change since I have gotten in country. I find it’s really been for the better. In America, I had a lot of negative things to say about situations that seemed unpleasant to me. For example, that person who cut me off in traffic was a “jerk”, that super-slow service I had at that restaurant was “lousy”, and that mysterious smell coming from somewhere in my car was “disgusting”.
It was really tempting when I first got in country to apply a lot of the same terms to things that were unfamiliar and Turkmen. I have tried to tell myself that using negative terms isn’t going to help me, and no one likes a whiner, so I have decided that my new favorite word is different. Instead of things being problematic, they are simply “different”. Examples of this new favorite word’s use would be: “Young boys that throw rocks at me are… different.” “Burning trash at 6am smells… different.” “Forgetting my flashlight for my midnight outhouse run is totally… different.” And most importantly, “When my baby shares her dinner with me via saliva and dirt-encrusted hands it is very very… different.”
So now you know, there is no such thing as a bad day here. Only one that is… different.
Sat October 13, 2007
Today was the last day of Ramadan. I’ve known this would be the last day of Ramadan for quite awhile, but I never really figured out whether that means people are fasting today, or are not fasting today. Normally I would just ask, but my language skills aren’t quite efficient enough yet to get my point across, and my family just thinks I am asking if they fast during Ramadan in general. Oh well.
As far as my host family goes, they are very “dini” (religious) and they have all been observing “oraza” (fasting) from sun up til sun down. This is actually quite the experience since the sun comes up at an ungodly hour here. I hear all of them get up for breakfast time somewhere in the neighborhood of 4am. They all eat a very hearty (and loud) breakfast since it is all they’re getting until around 8pm that evening, then they go back to sleep for a few hours until the day is ready to get off to its real start.
I feel like such a slacker getting out of bed at 7, and wandering in to the breakfast that is laid out for me and the baby (who isn’t quite ready to take on oraza this year). I’m really impressed with their self-control and willpower. It takes a lot to go without food for the whole day, but to also go without water when it is at least 80 degrees outside all day is what truly seems like it would be too much for me.
From what I can tell, my family’s high level of religion also extends into other areas. For one thing, there is a lot of belief about certain superstitions and good and bad luck. We aren’t allowed to bathe or do laundry on Thursdays because it is some sort of holy day. We also can’t eat anything with our left hands because apparently the left hand is considered to be evil. My pillow on my bed can only face two of the four walls in my bedroom, something about not facing a cemetery… It just seems like there are a lot of rules to remember.
I also have to get used to the idea of praying after dinner instead of before. They all come to the collective decision that we are done eating, then everyone at the table, me included, assumes “the position”. We all hold our hands open in the shape of a book in front of us, wait for a little bit, then we take our hands and “wash” the words from said “book” over our faces. It’s actually really neat looking when everyone does it together. I think it’s supposed to signify the Koran and our receiving knowledge/ blessings from it.
Oh, I almost forgot one of the better rules, we have to sit straight while we are eating, because if we sit with our legs to one side or the other, all of our food will go to only one side of our body. I would hate to be fat on only one side, so I am always sure to be diligent about proper dinnertime posture.
Dorothy, I am definitely not in Kansas anymore.
Sun October 14, 2007
Today we went to the Talkuchga (I’m pretty sure that I butchered that spelling badly) bazaar. It’s the biggest bazaar in Turkmenistan and it is insane. There are so many people, noises, smells, and strange things to see. It would be like if you took a Walmart on the day before Christmas, added produce, raw meat, and price negotiation, then put the whole experience outdoors and on steroids. Really.
It was super hot, with the sun beating down on all of the stands, and everything had sort of a funky smell to it. I think I would really enjoy shopping there if I wasn’t constantly afraid of getting lost. I think of myself as a reasonably resourceful person, but if I hadn’t had Maya with me, I can’t honestly say I would have even been able to find my way out of the bazaar, much less to the area where you catch a cab home. I was so thankful that I was a good 6 inches taller than most people in the crowded little aisles, that was probably my only saving grace in keeping track of our group as we all pushed and shoved our way from one stall to another.
I emerged somewhat victorious from the experience, although still paying full price for everything I bought. I got myself a surge protector, hangars, some beautiful fabric to get a dress made out of, and most importantly, a green bucket. The bucket, as ridiculous as it sounds, was probably my most valuable purchase of the day.
I have realized, after almost two weeks in country, that these people don’t really have garbage cans anywhere in their homes. There is a pile out by the outhouse where you put all of your garbage, and that’s about it. I had been keeping a small pile of trash in the corner of my bedroom, and it really just wasn’t doing the trick. I almost wet myself with excitement when I saw the little trash-can shaped green bucket at the bazaar. Not only was it the closest thing I had seen to a trashcan since we’d left Ashgabat, it even had a lid! (Little things make you really happy here, trust me.)
Me and my bucket went straight home for a little R&R (aka a five hour nap), and then I woke up and walked the two blocks over to Kelly’s house for a little dress making. Kelly’s host sister is a seamstress, and had agreed to make dresses for us four girls with the fabric we had bought at the bazaar.
We all got our measurements taken and drank a little bit (actually a lot) of tea. I giggled a little at the fact that I seemed to be the only one whose booty got its own measurement, but was incredibly relieved to see that she was going to make my dress long enough. It’s so nice to have clothes made for you when you’re tall, I get so sick of nothing ever being long enough.
With the measuring tape put away, and our bladders filled, we set off for our individual family-filled evenings. And I went home to take a bath and play with my new bucket.
Mon October 15, 2007
In the states, there are a few basic needs that give me an immense amount of pleasure. At the top of the list would most definitely be sleeping and eating. Combine the two and you have officially got a winning combination. In Turkmenistan, the two experiences seem to somehow have been lost in translation.
Sleeping here seems a lot more like using the bathroom. You and everyone else have to do it, but you don’t spend any longer than you have to, and sometimes you can’t do it, even when you really really want to.
I am typically ready to hit my flat little mat bed at the late hour of nine thirty (yes, pm) and after waking up every two or three hours all night, I am ready to crawl right back out of my humble little nest no later than 6:30 in the morning. It actually kind of hurts to sleep much longer than that, what with the whole sleeping on the floor thing. Sleeping in is definitely a thing of my American past. People here don’t know why you would want to stay in bed when you could be up sweeping the floor, or drinking tea. It seems like the biggest waste of time ever to them, and they look at you like you’re crazy if you try to explain to them that many Americans list sleeping as a fond pastime and hobby.
As for the eating, food here is so… different.
Turkmen don’t really like a lot of spice in their food, they think adding dill or parsley is pretty wild and crazy as far as flavoring is concerned. Where they lack in zing, they most definitely make up for in “yag” (oil). There is probably four or five times the amount of oil that I would consider excessive in the United States, and I used to think I was pretty liberal with my oil use. It’s honestly dripping off of everything. To make matters more fascinating, they don’t use vegetable oil here, it’s cotton oil, which I have been told is one of those really hearty, stick-to-your-arteries varieties. Awesome.
As for what they actually prepare in aforementioned oil, they have a few favorites. Most of them involve some variety of sheep meat.
Number one thing you will hear about eating in Turkmenistan is choreck. It’s their very dense bread, and it’s kind of shaped like a thick, elongated Frisbee. After seeing it made, I have a huge respect for it. The women make it in these clay ovens that have a really hot fire going in the bottom of them, and they actually reach into the oven with a slab of dough, slap it on to the side of the oven (it sticks there), then reach in and peel it off of the side when it is done. It looks really hot and uncomfortable, and I can only imagine how much more so it is in the height of summer. We met a woman who makes choreck for a living, and she typically makes about 300 loaves daily. What impresses me is that in a village where they refuse to waste anything, they totally manage to eat that much choreck without any sort of major effort.
As far as actual meals, the first one I ate when I came to my host family was palaw (comes out sounding more like plov). I think it might actually be their national dish. It’s basically fried rice with lots of carrots, lots of oil, and a few pieces of meat for decoration on top. I wasn’t super fond of it at first, but after a few weeks of eating it, I am honestly a little obsessed with it. It’s become somehow equated with macaroni and cheese in my mind, and who doesn’t like macaroni and cheese?
The next most popular has to be the chorba. This is the stand-by meal that you can count on eating any time that no one knows what to make for dinner. It’s pretty much any kind of soup. They just throw whatever veggies are around, along with a hearty dollop of –you guessed it- cotton oil into a pot. On good days, there might be meat chunks, lentils, or noodles added to it. After they have sautéed it for a bit, they fill the pan up with water and let it boil for an hour or two. Dinner is served.
There are also a few different things that they like to stuff. Manty is the Turkmen potsticker. It is basically a thin noodly-dough that they fill with ground meat and onions, then fold into a cute little pouch. They usually steam them, but my very health conscious family prefers to fry them in oil. Don’t tell anyone, but I kind of like them fried better than steamed. I know, I’m bad. What can you do?
Also in the “stuffed stuff” family are somsa. Our group has reverted to calling them hot pockets. They are basically little calzones, that most Turkmen prefer to see filled with ground sheep meat and onions. Instead of baking, you can probably guess how somsas are cooked. Nothing like a little yag to make the somsa really tasty. Yum.
One of my weakness while in country (besides the palaw) is the dograma. It is the Turkmen version of stuffing, and it is sinfully addictive. If you like that soggy bread sort of thing…. Mmmmmm. It’s ripped up pieces of stale choreck, that are then soaked in some sort of brothy-substance (I don’t want to know how they get the broth, because I’m pretty sure it involves boiling the bones of some neighbor’s livestock). For the final touch to the dograma, they throw in finely diced raw onions. You would think this would really mess up the overall texture, with the random crunchy part, but it is actually really tasty, I swear.
I’m going to have to start a 12-step program to wean off this stuff.
Tues October 16, 2007
It’s been really hoooooot here. I don’t mean to whine, I do realize I’m in a desert, but it’s October, should it really be in the high 80s every day? I’m melting! I realize my body temperature seems to be in direct relation to my temper. I have absolutely no patience when I am hot, and trust me, there are plenty of things that require quite a bit of my patience right now.
The children here are something else entirely. One of the first Turkmen words I learned was somsek (stupid) and it certainly wasn’t because the other Peace Corps volunteers were yelling it at me. There always seem to be these unruly hordes of children in the streets, and I don’t know what I have more of a problem with, the name calling, or the stone throwing. Seriously, they throw a lot of rocks, like in the bible. And they have pretty good aim.
I am frequently tempted to run after them screaming obscenities, but to be quite frank, it’s way too hot for running. Little boys are the devil. Grrr.
The only reprieve from my heat/child-induced crankiness is the ice cream. I am absolutely in love with it. Turkmen have a significant fondness for ice cream and as a result, there is a market with ice cream bars and cones on just about every corner. The best part is the price, I’m paying a whopping $0.04 for a pretty good sized cone filled with the most fabulous chocolate ice cream. I’m drooling a little just thinking about it…
So who wants to come visit me now that you know you can eat all the ice cream you want for less than fifty cents a day??
Weds October 17, 2007
I woke up at midnight. I couldn’t figure out what could have disturbed me (aside from the barking dogs, the insomniac cow next-door, and the roosters who constantly seem to be on Tokyo time). It was as I lay there, pondering my suddenly conscious status that I realized I had a stomachache that went far beyond your typical case of too-much-manti indigestion.
In a rare fit of excellent judgment, I dumped my entire garbage bucket out, and brought it over to my mat… just in case. At 2 o’clock that same morning, “just in case” became a very unpleasant reality and I began making a rather intimate acquaintance of my bucket’s interior. This unpleasant rendezvous continued at two-hour intervals until it finally got late enough in the day (7:30 am) for me to call someone and beg for medicine.
While waiting for my medical savior to arrive, and hating how hot it already was at only 8 in the morning, I hit my absolute lowest point of the day. Really, it was probably one of the lower morale moments in recent memory. Maybe in my life.
I was losing mass out of both ends of my digestive tract. I had gotten no sleep for the night. I was delirious. Most importantly, I was in immediate need of a visit to the family outhouse, aka narrow hole in the ground with a wooden shack surrounding it. After I staggered in and took care of business, while trying to keep from throwing-up again, I realized I had missed. Like missed the hole. Like the worst-case scenario for any outhouse trip, but especially this one. I could have cried. Instead, I prayed no one in my family was going to use the outhouse for the thirty seconds it took me to run into my room, grab my water bottle, and run back out to the structure in question. I took care of it, thankfully without spectators, but it was a bad moment in the annals of Shannon’s bathroom memories. I promise never to bring it up again.
At ten-thirty the same morning, I received a shot in my rear-end that promised to kill my nausea, and from 11am until 10pm, I slept like a baby. I woke up in regular intervals for the rest of the night and watched my temperature flutter between 100.5 and 101.2 degrees. Sort of like a fickle FM radio, but much more uncomfortable. I finally drifted off to sleep near dawn, strangely looking forward to getting out of bed in a few short hours. It couldn’t have anything to do with having spent more than twenty of the past twenty-four hours on my back, on my very box-spring-free mat on the floor.
Thurs October 18, 2007
Today was so strange. First of all, I woke up and felt no immediate urge to use my trusty bedside bucket. Second of all, I could see my breath on the way to pick up Kelly. No joke, it was totally and unexpectedly cold-ish this morning. It was kind of a nice relief initially; especially after the unpleasant heat waves I had been experiencing the past few days, both in and out of fevered delirium.
I was, unfortunately, so busy being relieved that I decided to roll out of the house with no jacket to speak of, and a light skirt and short-sleeved shirt as my only textile companions for the day. By three in the afternoon, I found myself convinced that the temperature dropping to below sixty degrees Fahrenheit was surely a sign of an impending apocalypse. While walking home in the cold rain at 6 pm, I thought I would seriously lose some bodily appendage to frostbite if I was exposed for another second. I have become a cold weather wimp in the course of a little more than two weeks in this country. For shame Shannon, shaaaame.
In other exciting news, I was given free cucumbers by a neighbor boy on the last stretch of my walk home, and I even remembered to thank him in Turkmen while still keeping my peripheral vision open for incoming rocks. I tried to take a bath tonight, but my family informed me that devout Muslims (and their host-children) don’t bathe on Thursdays. With that, my four-day-no-bathing-streak jumped to five days. I am so gross. I spent the evening wallowing in American television (aka Sex and the City DVDs) to keep my mind off of my building stench. It was fabulous.
Fri October 19, 2007
Today was our second trip to Ashgabat for more shots. I actually didn’t spend too much time on the internet. There were 11 of us who really wanted to use it, and the connection at the Peace Corps office, although lightening speed for Turkmenistan, is still fairly slow, and I felt bad spending more than a few minutes on it while others were waiting.
Today was also my first day of significant clinic activity. Up until now, our technical training has consisted mostly of Lex and myself spending a lot of quality time in our clinic’s conference room looking up useful Turkmen medical phrases in our dictionaries such as “your breath stinks” and my personal favorite, “please don’t put that in your mouth.”
Today we showed up at the clinic at 8:30 in the morning (no small feat when you have to fit in hair, makeup, chorek, cookies, four cups of tea, and a bathroom trip before work). We got to ride along with our doctors as they made house calls to our local citizens in need, and we got to observe one of the doctors as she consulted a few patients who came into the clinic. I’d be lying if I said that I understood the bulk of Turkmen that was being exchanged during these events, however the invaluable part of the day was having the opportunity to experience Turkmen medical culture firsthand. What a difference from American medicine. A really big difference. HIPPA would have a heart attack.
People are pretty comfortable here with the idea of leaving the door open while you medically consult. The door open, and two extra Americans in the room didn’t seem to be much of a stretch in their vision of propriety. People are so willing to immediately welcome you into this personal part of their lives, it doesn’t even enter their minds to tell you they would rather be alone with the doctor. The two home visits we did were for super different reasons, one was a baby with a cold that wouldn’t go away, and one was for a middle-aged man whose kidney stones were so bad he couldn’t even move. Both visits resulted in shots (Turkmen prefer needle medicines over pills, they feel like they’re more effective).
Tonight I took my longest and most luxurious bucket bath to date. I figured that whole business of not bathing from Sunday night, until Friday night, sort of entitled me to a little extra banya time. I used three whole buckets, all fairly warm, and(!) I shaved my legs! It was as close as I could get to heaven crawling onto my mat bed tonight with a warm blanket, clean hair, and smooth legs. Pure. Turkmen. Bliss.
Sat October 20, 2007
Today we went to the big bazaar in Ashgabat for the second time. The first time we went, it was sort of amateur hour for us Americans. We went in the middle of the day, which is the busiest time for the market, on a Sunday, which is the busiest day for the market, and none of us knew exactly what we doing, or how to get anywhere to get anything accomplished. Needless to say, we spent a lot more money than we should have, and had very little to show for it. The good news was, we learned exactly how NOT to have a successful day of bazaar action.
This time, we were ready for some serious combat shopping. We left Dan at home because let’s be real, boys just aren’t usually very motivated to look through twenty four fabric stands before they settle on the perfect pattern for their skirt. Secondly, we four girls (plus Maya) decided to go on Saturday since the bazaar tends to be a little less busy that day. For the pièce de résistance, we actually got up early on said Saturday and were at the bazaar by the wee hour of 8 am.
With the recently colder weather (sixty five is cold, right?), we were all shocked to be able to see our breath while going through the first stalls. Maybe there really will be a winter in Turkmenistan. Doubtful, but looking more possible.
My biggest excitemet at the bazaar came from a scarf purchase. I had wandered down a side aisle by myself and to my delight, I found a stand that was selling Pakistani scarves. On a side note, they are absolutely beautiful, and you are all getting one for Christmas, but most importantly, I BARGAINED FOR ONE IN TURKMEN! It was my first negotiation since I had been in country and even though it was only a seventy-five cent discount, I walked away from there on a total high, with a super pretty scarf. Yay for me!
I bought some more pretty fabric, ate some exciting meaty-sandwhich thing, and then the unimaginable happened, I got lost. I was so freaked out, one minute I knew exactly where all of the girls were, then I got distracted by a skinned goat’s head, and the next thing I knew, I had no idea where anybody was. It was like being a little kid in the grocery store, except I didn’t even posses enough language skills to do anything besides ask people if they had seen Americans. It was a bad feeling.
After about 10 minutes of feeling a little nauseous, and staying in pretty much the same place I had last seen them, I finally spotted my girls looking for me. I was so happy to see them. It was almost as good as the cheap scarf feeling. Almost.
I went home and had some fabulous preserved apricots, apples, and pears. I really like the preserved fruit here. Probably because it’s mainly sugar. My family grows all of the fruits in our yard, then they can it themselves and it’s really tasty. Too bad I’m pretty sure that that makes it lose all of its nutritional value…. Oh well.
I spent the evening playing “checkers” (and I use the term loosely) with my sister Mahrie and my brother Mohammet. They use a checkers board, but chess pieces and they basically move the pieces like you would move checkers, but every now and then they throw in a few chess-like moves with certain pieces. I kinda think they were making up some rules as they went, but it was entertaining to watch, so I didn’t say anything.
Who am I to tell Turkmen how to play checkers when I still can’t form complete sentences?
Sun October 21, 2007
We decided to celebrate our American-ness today. Carrie had the extraordinary foresight to bring cayenne pepper and chilli powder with her, so yesterday at the bazaar we bought ingredients to make vegetarian chilli today. It was awesome. We didn’t add any oil to it, and added lots of spice. My taste buds hardly knew what to do with themselves. After our super awesome lunch (that included freshly baked choreck!), we watched The Devil Wears Prada (in English!) and pretended to be home for just a few hours. It was a nice little escape from reality.
Before I was allowed to attend American day, I had to participate in the Turkmen ritual of house cleaning. They do your normal dusting, dish washing, and laundering, but then there’s an extra step for added fun and excitement: carpet sweeping! I’m not joking, I have seen a vacuum cleaner in our house, so I don’t understand why we use this broom that has a handle less than two feet long. You literally have to bend in half and move back and forth in tiny rows across the huge carpets that cover all of the floors in our house. I was so sore from being hunched over, that I almost bailed on American day in favor of laying down with some aspirin. I will never again complain about having to vacuum at home.
Mon October 22, 2007
Today we started what the Peace Corps calls ECAs. I think that might stand for extra curricular activities, but basically its like day camp for the Turkmen kids in our village. They have a few days off from school, and we were supposed to give them something to do in the mornings. This sounds like it would be pretty low-key, I mean how hard can it really be to entertain a bunch of kids for four hours?
I will never again utter that last statement. After running out of planned activities after only three hours had passed, I found myself obligated to play freeze tag for the remaining hour of our time today. Turkmen kids are merciless when it comes to freeze tag, and I seriously thought I was going to fall down dead when it was finally time for them to go home. I still have to do this for another two days?
Fortunately, I think my host-family sensed my delicate state and made me the best dinner ever. We each had our OWN plate, and there were actually four different things on each plate! It was super exciting! We had mashed potatoes, cooked barley, sautéed tomatoes and onions, and this really finely diced meat that was also fried with onions. It was so good, and none of it was swimming in grease. I fell asleep a very happy human being.
Tues October 23, 2007
Round two of ECAs went surprisingly better. After staying up for the majority of last night drawing a huge batch of bingo boards (they don’t do photocopying in our village), I felt more than prepared to kill time without the assistance of freeze tag. The kids had a really good time, and more showed up today than had come yesterday. I was shocked to see that a lot of our boys brought friends with them. I was convinced after yesterday that they weren’t going to come back at all. I guess sometimes kids surprise you.
All of them were really well behaved, and I actually left the ECA today (almost) wishing that we had longer than three days to spend with these kids. It’s funny how fast they start to grow on you, and here I thought I didn’t deal well with children all these years. Maybe there’s something in the water here.
After going home and taking a mostly-fabulous bucket bath, I was surprised to find my family ushering me towards their car. I guess they had plans for guesting that they had failed to mention to me, so I simply jumped in and hoped for the really good cookies at our final (and still unknown) destination.
It turned out that my host mom’s brother (my host-uncle?) and his family really wanted to meet the new American, and I was more than happy to oblige. They had a house full of daughters and they were all so sweet and so cute, I seriously could have stayed visiting forever. (This also could have something to do with the fact that they did indeed have the “good cookies”)
The best part was as I was getting ready to leave their house. A couple of the daughters came running up to me with a plastic shopping bag full of something in their hands. I assumed it was something I was supposed to bring home to my host-mom, so I took it, thanked them, and got in the car. It was only once I was home that I realized they had given me a present! (Don’t worry, this was confirmed by my sisters, I wasn’t stealing something that really was supposed to go to my host mom).
They had given me a big new flannel sheet with flowers on it, and as ordinary as that may sound, it was one of the cooler things they could have possibly given me. I have been getting cold at night in my little mat-bed, and this sheet was exactly what I needed to add a little extra heat. Not to mention it was incredibly soft. Yay for random Turkmen presents! I fell asleep clean, warm, and full of expensive cookies. I don’t think life can get much better.
Weds October 24, 2007
The last day of ECAs was bitter-sweet. On one hand I genuinely enjoyed spending time with the kids, and it was sort of a releif to be judged soley on the basis of how well you can do the hokey-pokey and play blob-tag. On the other hand, I was getting to the point where my feet were in serious danger of going on strike from the rest of my body. I never knew you could get blisters on top of blisters. Yowch.
It was Kelly’s host sister’s birthday today. It was the same sister who is working on making my dress, and on the way home from school, I felt it was only appropriate to drop in and wish her a happy birthday. Fortunately (for me) there was a big pot of Palaw and an even bigger birthday cake waiting there when I arrived. Turkmen are notorious for forcing their guests to eat, so I was more than happy to oblige as Kelly’s host mom started in with her familiar cry of “iyt, iyt!” (it actually sounds just like eat, eat when they say it, crazy, huh?) the cake totally rocked, and I don’t think there is really any doubts as to my feelings about the palaw. That stuff is just too dang tasty.
All in all, it was definitely the best birthday party I have been to since I have been in Turkmenistan (never mind that it is the only one I have been to so far). You’ve gotta love any reason to bust out a cake.
Fri October 26, 2007
Today involved some well-deserved heartburn on my part. I was feeling especially lonely for American culture, so to cheer myself up, I walked to the “dukan” (kinda like a 7-11 for Turkmen) with Lex and bought an especially tasty looking bag of peanut M&Ms. In addition to the candy, we bought two different kinds of cookies, something that looked like a Russian Twinkie, and also a bag of potato chips.
After munching our way through this particularly heinous concoction of processed carbohydrates, something neither of us had eaten in quite a few weeks, we realized things might be looking a little grim for our digestive tracts. Both of us spent the afternoon experiencing phenomenal stomachaches that (for once) had absolutely nothing to do with the microbial contents of Turkmenistan’s water. Oops.
I came home tonight and found to my delight that Kelly’s sister had finished my dress. Even better, it still fit me after my afternoon of binge eating! Life is lookin pretty good right about now.
The dress is absolutely gorgeous, and I promise to post pics of me in it as soon as I can. Yay for Kelly’s sister!
--Sorry guys, I ran out of time to post the rest of this month’s blogs. I really do have one for every day though, so I promise to put the rest up next Sunday! Enjoy for now, and look forward to hearing all about how I got to seen a super bloody leg injury, drink beer on Halloween, and go to “Disneyland” twice in one weekend! (Please try to contain your jealousy!)
Friday, October 12, 2007
So I guess they weren’t kidding…
I am so excited to get my rabies shot today!! We have to come in to Ashgabat to get our shots, and that means that I get internet time in the Peace Corps office for ten minutes, yippee skipee!
Turkmenistan is a-maaaaazing. I have done so many things that I didn’t even think possible of myself. This is hands-down the coolest and most challenging experience ever. I even went to services at the metjit (mosque) by our house a couple of nights this week. It was about the time that I was kneeling down in prayer along with hundreds of other women that I realized this is the real deal. I am really in the Peace Corps and it kind of makes my head spin with how intense that is. As a disclaimer, I miss and love all of you soooo much, but I am trying to avoid making reference to it, because that only makes it worse. The best cure for homesickness around here is to just ignore it. The less we acknowledge it, the easier it is to keep going.
So to update…. I am now living in a village that is approximately 15 minutes outside of Ashgabat. Herrikgala has about 12,000 human residents and around 20,000 residents of the barnyard variety. My host family is composed of a mom (eje), a dad (kaka), 3 brothers, 3 sisters, a sister in law, and 2 grandbabies. No animals, but there are cows, goats, and camels that live near us. We live in a compound that has a big gate around it and a couple of different buildings inside of it. The main house is where I live, and my bedroom is really big.
I was shocked to walk in my huge room and see only carpets from wall to wall, along with a wardrobe and a dressing table. No bed. Anywhere. Oh surprise, they sleep on these roll-up mat things, not beds. Seriously, they’re maybe an inch and a half thick. How I missed that memo is beyond me, but after a week of sleeping sans-mattress, I think I am finally beginning to get used to it.
We have 5 volunteers that live in our village. There are 4 girls (Carrie, Kelly, Lex, and me) and 1 guy (Dan). We all go to language school with our teacher Maya. Maya is like superwoman. She’s 18 years old, and is not only responsible for teaching us Turkmen, but also for babysitting all 5 of us twenty-somethings constantly. She basically rocks.
There were a lot of things I heard about serving in the Peace Corps in Turkmenistan.
I heard that there weren’t any toilet seats, only a hole in the ground with a little shack around it. I heard that you had to squat while going to the bathroom, like for the whole time. I heard that there wasn’t any toilet paper, only magazine pages. I also heard that you had to have a flashlight to go to the bathroom any time after dark, otherwise you might accidentally pee on your shoes. I assumed that it was all a half-truth, like some sort of urban myth about how “real volunteers” operate. I was wrong. It’s all completely accurate. I will leave the details to your imagination for the time being.
I heard that they drink a lot of tea. By “a lot” I figured they meant maybe 2 teatimes a day. Um no. Try maybe 5 or 6 teatimes a day. Each teatime typically finds my glass being refilled upwards of 6 times. I want you to imagine how strong my thighs are after a week of constant tea drinking, with squat toilets. I am going to have the most incredibly muscular legs by the end of 27 months.
I also heard that our host families wouldn’t speak any English. Yeah sure, whatever you say Peace Corps. No English probably meant the parents don’t speak English, but the kids would have to, right? I mean, who doesn’t speak English? Wrong again. The only people in Herrikgala who speak English with me are the other Peace Corps volunteers and our teacher Maya. Seriously, that is it.
I have never realized how entirely possible it is to function without any common language. The first day I got to my host family’s house, I was so nervous about this whole communication thing. Literally, I knew maybe ten words in Turkmen, and all of those revolved around how old I was, where I was from, and the fact that I was a volunteer. No knowledge of “I’m hungry”, “I’m tired”, or “I’m totally freaked out and want to go home”.
I realized after about an hour of politely drinking my fifth cup of tea that there were very few important concepts that could not be conveyed with a variety of noises, motions, and pointing in my Turkmen-English dictionary. Don’t get me wrong, I will not be discussing the problems of the world or my life’s goals with them any time soon, but I think we’ve got a basic understanding going, and now that I know the words for apple, and tomato, I really think we are going to have a long and happy three months together.
I have to go, but enjoy the pictures and look forward to next time’s installment entitled “Dogs, Bucket-baths, and other things I don’t like very much….”
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