Kazakhstani Extravaganza

4 of 7!

2007-07-03T04:51:00.000-04:00

ah, sweet graduation/good god, it's hot

2007-06-26T02:05:00.000-04:00

so, i promised i would tell you all about graduation, and here goes. . . .

i took the overnight bus from almaty to my village (wanna talk about fun times?. . . this is not it). as we're all aware, it's summertime in central asia which can only mean one thing -- it's hot as balls. especially when you're on an overnight bus that seems to have been built sometime during the ford administration, with windows that do not open, and an "air conditioner" that feels like a little man is perched up on the roof and is blowing his stinky breath onto you face. but, once it got to be about 2 in the morning it got really, really cold (any meteorologists out there that can explain that one?. . . i basically slept through 9th grade science and i don't understand the melting days/frosty nights concept). anyways, i got into my village at about 5:30 in the morning, stumbled to my counterpart's house, and slept the good sleep until noon.

when i got up it was unnecessarily hot -- again. (i'm not complaining, really. i'm just really complaining about the heat -- my swedish side can't handle this stuff!) then i ate lunch with the counterpart and her fam. (her husband mercifully bought a 6 pack of bottled water to satiate us -- and a bottle of shymkent beer (my fav!) that was only for miss ashli to drink!) after my beer, gulshat (my counterpart) lit up the banya so we could get all clean for graduation . . . keif! my first banya in over 2 months was truly beautiful. . . i was sooooo clean! then we got all dressed up and went to the school for graduation, which was to start promptly at 7 (in russian and kazakh, you pronounce this as "about quarter to eight").

we get to the school and all of my kids run up to me to shake my hand and wish me a happy b-day. the fact that they remembered my birthday made me want to cry, but i didn't -- my makeup would've run ;). so after the obligatory hour and a half of wishes from parents and presentations of more certificates than needed, the kids started their show. i've gotta say one thing for this country, they love to party down. even their graduation ceremony -- which in the america is a pretty austere event -- broke down into an all-singing, all-dancing spectacle. and true to their gentlemanly selves, almost all my boys asked me to dance with them; from "goodmorningteacher", to "badnurtas", to "nonicknamebecausehe'ssuchanicekid" misha. after the dancing i was asked to give a speech. i felt like a rockstar, they were all like, "and now, miss ashli, who came ALL THE WAY FROM ALMATY for your graduation, will give her wishes to you!" whhoooooooooooooooooooo! yeah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! if the kids had lighters, they would have lit them up, monster ballad style. so i gave my little speech wishing them success and a good journey in life. i was rewarded with a small, pyramidal snowglobe with a golden chicken inside it. hoot, hoot.

after the graduation, the kids and their parents had an all-night party at a nice cafe outside of the village and they invited me and some other teachers to come. so we did.

funny story number one: it was my birthday. it was also arman's birthday. arman's a boy in one of my 11th grade classes and he's the runt, so all the kids pick on him. but, because we were the birthday boy and girl, gulshat had arman escort me into the restaurant. but ernar (goodmorningteacher) wanted to escort me. arman said to ernar -- "she's with me, get back to your place in line"! take it to the hole, arman!

funny story number two: so, there's this kid in my class, bolat. i'm not sure if i've mentioned him by name before, but this kid is awesome. he loves to dance, and every time i go to a school disco, or a class party, i dance with bolat. graduation was not any different. not funny, huh? wait for it. . . i found out at the party that bolat is the youngest of 9 kids. wow. then i met his mom: she was about 4 and a half feet tall and looked to be about 55-60 years old. but after having known his mother only about 8 seconds, i figured out where bolat got his moves from. this lady physically pulls me onto the dance floor and proceeds to outdance me for 3 consecutive songs. when i finally sat down, one of my kids asked, "are you tired, miss ashli?" i go, "yeah, bolat's mom dances too good for me." they laughed. i was serious.

heartwarming/sappy story number one: so, the tradition with graduation parties here in the kz (or at least my part of the kz) is that you party -- literally -- until dawn on the night of your graduation, then you go with your class to watch the sun rise on your first morning as an adult. you're supposed to stand with your friends and make a wish on the sunrise.

heartwarming/sappy story number two: i wished that every birthday i have from now on ends with me being surrounded by people i love and care about. . . and maybe watching the sun rise.

love.

guess what i did!

2007-06-17T05:10:00.000-04:00

i bought a computer! that's right, folks, with the money i saved by living frugally in the village for two years has allowed me to buy a laptop! and it's not even goat-powered. . . i got the one with a battery and a power cord! hoot, hoot! now i can work from home and type up long, insightful, and intriguing blogposts for you all to ponder! YAY!

but, seriously, this should help make my job easier, and the quality of my work higher (this is, at least, the hope)

what else is going on in my life right now? oh yeah, my mail-order kailin arrived in the mail the other day! her name is dilorom. . . she cooks, she cleans, she is distracted by shiny objects! but seriously, she's michael's friend from his village and she's about to go with him for a little vaca in the america (visa difficulties non-withstanding). they're staying with me in my almaty flophouse for a few days. she's reading this right now, so what else can i say about her. . . she likes sugary popcorn, but not the salty kind. can you believe that? what kind of people am i letting in my house?!

something interesting will happen soon, and i'll let you all know about it the second it does. i'm going to my kids' graduation party in the village next week and will undoubtedly have many great stories from that (and my b-day with gulshat -- the best counterpart ever!).

love.

back to work!

2007-06-11T00:06:00.000-04:00

so, the first round of cos-ing 17s has left and i am once again alone in the city. it's not that bad, though, i'm uber busy with work stuff here, and i've started making some connections in the city. so, the fun volunteer times are on hiatus, at least until there are some other volunteers who need a place to stay in the city.

today, they tell me i get to go up to the attic and "organize files". . . i. can't. wait.

that's pretty much all that's going on here. i eventually want to scratch my consumerism itch by buying all kinds of kazakhstan crap. oh, and russian music cd's.

kaz17 cos

2007-06-04T23:51:00.000-04:00

if you know what the title of this post means, you're prolly a peace corps volunteer. this week my group of volunteers is going home (closing their service -- cos). but, like i said before, i'm staying here for another 6 months or so, i'm not going anywhere for a while. but anyways. . . now there are about a dozen peace corps volunteers in almaty getting ready to go home. and, because i now live in almaty, these guys are all staying at my apartment.

sweet!

i was sort of afraid that i wouldn't get to see everyone before they left. but now i'm living in super sweet almaty in my super sweet apartment. so my 17s are staying with me and it's really great to have a house full of people. not gonna lie -- i like my privacy, but occasionally, i just need to have 10 or 15 houseguests come and stay with me for about a week to help scare away the quiet times.

things have been rather standard for the past few days. no wild times with the pcvs. . . yet. everyone's super jazzed to go and it's making me really satrt to look at the kz with fresh eyes. you know, a lot of the volunteers who are leaving are never going to come back to kazakhstan and so they're tryig to grab all of the memories that they can before it's time to go back to the america. because, (un)fortunately, time fades memories -- which is good if the memories are bad, but bad if the memories are good. . . it's sort of an inverse relationship thing -- and we've really loved our time here, so forgetting anything seems like the worst thing that could ever happen. but, like i said, i'm not going anywhere for a while, so i wasn't feeling that way until i started talking to everyone who was going home.

i realize now that i should't wait until the last minute to grab my memories. i don't wanna forget the kz; it's been too good to me. but right now, i'm doing the slow goodbye thing with all of my groupmates -- it's amazing how much we've grown and how much i'm going to miss them. kazakhstan wouldn' t have been the same without them. so, the kazakhstan memory grab will have to wait at least until i'm finished with the 17 memory grab. . . .

and here's a good memory grab (please excuse the language):

this is a story that i've stolen from alex, a 17 who's leaving this week --

alex: so, i was joking around with one of my freinds and i said to her, "i'm going to f*cking kill you." and she says, "f*ck first, then kill, yes?" hilarious!!!!! alex says "f*cking kill", the friend hears "f*ck and kill"!! so our joke of the day has been to "f*ck and _____". for example: "alex, why don't you f*ck and do the dishes?" "ashli, go f*ck and eat lunch."

movin on up

2007-05-21T06:18:00.000-04:00

ok, so sorry about that, everyone. apparently, for some reason that is beyond my comprehension, i was only able to save the title of the post last time. odd. so, i'll try to recapture the essense of lost post.

-----------

movin on up: a tribute

so, i'm movin on up/ to the east side (of kz)/ to that delux apartment in the sky/ i'm movin on up/ to the east side (of kz)/ i finally got a piece of the pie!

that's right. i have moved to almaty. i wasn't supposed to move until august, but stuff happened and i left my village a little bit early. i'm not exactly thrilled about leaving the village, but the powers-that-be think it's best for me to be working in the largest (and therefore most modern and cosmopolitan) city in kazakhstan. so, i'll deal.

and where will i deal? lemme tell you -- in my sweet ass apartment!

you're getting warmer

2007-04-26T00:21:00.001-04:00

it's starting to be hot here now. rats. the nice weather of spring lasts for approximately 34.224 seconds here in the south of kz. now the dread summer is creeping in. don't get me wrong, it's not 115 degrees yet, but it's coming. i can smell it. in the mornings it's still kinda cool, but by 1, 2 o'clock, damn. it's like 85, 90 -- that's too hot for me.

ok, now that i've dispensed with my mid-western cultural duty of discussing the weather (c'mon, ohioans, you know it's true!), what else is up? aha. . .

the first of may (or the "day of international friendship" or the "day of intercultural cooperation and understanding" or the "day when i go to the town square to watch my students do a dance and i don't have to go to school") is coming up, and my kids have been practicing like mofos on this dance that they're gonna perform for the town. now, you know me, i love dancing, but this is boardering on silly. my kids have been practicing daily for 2 weeks. this wouldn't be so bad if they didn't have to practice RIGHT UNDERNEATH MY CLASSROOM DURING LESSONS. it's intense. i've heard the music for the dance so much, i swear, i dream about it. but, all will be back to (near) normal soon. after this celebration, i've been promised that there will be no more large-scale choreographical undertakings for the rest of the year.

anyway, that's pretty much me right now. i'm still stuck on summer plans. you see, i wanna travel, and i have time, but - unfortunately - it turns out that i'm a peace corps volunteer. so, i'm limited in the funds department.

(sidebar: i wrote my friend from college the other day. she's going to be working in south america this summer and asked for visitors in her blog. i was like -- damn! south america. i could totally go for some of that right now. so, i write that i'll look into visiting, right? wrong! apparently, they want you to PAY for plane tickets nowadays, which blows. but anyways. . . what are you gonna do -- besides bitch on your blog, of course :) )

so, that's it. i'll write more when it comes to me.

love.

got some news

2007-04-11T03:43:00.000-04:00

hey, remember when i said i would write more when more stuff happened here in the stan? well, guess what -- stuff happened! yay! so, it turns out that i'll be staying an extra six months here in the land of the (nearly) endless steppe!

hoot, hoot!

so, ashli -- you ask -- why are you staying an extra six months in the kz?

i'll tell you why -- i got something we in the business world call "a job." that's right, children. i'll be working for p.c. (and i'll still technically be a volunteer) but i'll be training the new group that comes in in august. apparently, it's gonna be a ton of work, but i'm really looking forward to meeting the new trainees and helping them to adjust to life in my little corner of the world. it looks like for most of the summer i'll be bumming around: working at various summer camps, going on vacation (lemme know if you can think of any good spots/wanna meet up somewhere), etc. then it's off to work, shaping the new volunteers like so much putty. . . mwah, hah, hah, hah! (hmmm. . . . i probably should have omitted that evil laugh. well, live and learn).

other than that, i've got no news. i'm in the city, working at a computer training for village teachers. talk about an experience! it's both inspiring and frustrating -- some of these teachers can't even use a mouse (frustrating) but they're all so willing and eager to learn and ask questions that it makes me (almost) want to be a teacher forever (inspiring)!

i'm going back to the village tomorrow morning and then it's back to the grind! after almost a month out of the classroom, due to vacations and then a string of conferences, i'm afraid i've forgotten to teach. but, it'll be ok, there's only about a month and a half left of school -- so it'll go quickly. and i can't wait for it to be over, pause, not! even though i'm here for an extra six months, i know i prolly won't be able to get back to the village after the summer. it's harder now because i realize how much i'm gonna miss these guys.

but, i promised before to refrain from too much sentimentality, so i'll stop that now.

see you (not quite so) soon (as i thought last month)!

love.

trouncers v. dodgers

2007-03-23T04:37:00.000-04:00

spring has sprung here in the south of kz, and with spring comes nauryz. we just had a little bit of a get together with some of the volunteers in country and it was pretty standard. we saw the games like last year but, unlike last year, it was totally warm and enjoyable at the stadium (last year was unnecessarily cold). and, i gotta give you the kok par scoop: my region (tulkibas) played the region of michael, another volunteer from the south (sairam). even though michael didn't feel it, there was a major rivalry between us during the game -- which means i basically made "booing" sounds when his region's team did something good (this was a lot)

i'd like to tell you it was a good game, but my boys (the tulkibas "trouncers" -- p.s. i made up the names of the teams. i think it makes it cooler. --) got seriously schooled by the bad guys (the sairam "dodgers"). it was an embarrassing defeat: 4-0. that's right. my boys got no points. which is also kinda crap because, while they didn't TECHNICALLY drop the headless goat carcass into the goal, one of the tulkibas "trouncers" did manage to fall into the damn thing on his horse. and the way i figure it, dropping a full-grown horse and rider into a goal is much more difficult than putting a 20 kilo carcass in there. so, the horse goal should have gotten them, like 5 points. which would have meant my team won and brought honor to the region. but, when it comes to kok par, at least, they play by "the rules" here. so,that means no honor to the "trouncers"; only shame was placed on their heads. in short, i'll never be able to live down the crushing defeat of the trouncers to the dodgers. somehow, life will have to go on.

but, there's my amusing anecdote. i'll give you more when it happens. later!

love.

she's done it again, folks!

2007-03-09T23:02:00.000-05:00

so, i managed to go another month and a half without posting. oops. not much has been going on, and that's prolly why i haven't gotten around to telling you anything of note.

winter's basically over here (as is my service. . . ), and i'm working like it's my job at school. other than that, i got nothing. i'll report more when i got it.

oh, my 11th graders got me an "i love you" coffee mug for international women's day on the 8th of march. it's super cute. i love it and i love my kids. i'm all about love!

and i love all of you. see you soon!

love.

it's still winter

2007-01-21T03:34:00.001-05:00

hey all.

i know it's been a few weeks since i've posted, but honestly. . . . nothing's happened.

so, what have i got to report? well, it's not been too cold here, but it's certainly not been warm. the streets are still covered with their winter "four inches of ice," so walking around is about fun and a half. however, i've been informed that there's only one more month of this to deal with, so, i can handle it.

so, here's some news. one day this week at school, there's gonna be a "switch day" that is, kids from the 10th and 11th grades will be teaching and administering the school and their teachers will be going to class. hoot hoot. come wednesday, i'll get to be a sullen, dispondant teenager again. except i can be even less active in class, because my russian skills are well below that of a normal 17 year old. wish me luck and promise to sign my yearbook in study hall!! :)

i know it might be kinda early to be thinking about this, but i've gotta start getting on top of things. who wants presents from the 'stan? but be warned that showing interest in a present also means that you're willing to host yours truly in your home so that i can hand deliver said gift. you've got a couple of months, and i'll prolly post something like this in the future, but i thought i'd give you all a heads up!

love.

merry christmas and a happy new year!!

2007-01-02T03:01:00.000-05:00

yay, you guys!! 2007!!! woo-freakin'-hoo!! let me just start off this post by wishing you all health, happiness, and whatever else you want for the new year. and, i hope you all had fun during you respective holiday celebrations!

so, what's up with me. . . . not much, really. but i do have a pretty decent "holiday story" for you all. but first i gotta give you a little cultural background. so, in the kz, christmas as we know it in the states is not celebrated. their big deal holiday is new year. this big deal holiday is thoroughly celebrated in all parts of the country. usually at schools, the children put on little shows for their parents and classmates and whoever else wants to come. my school was no exception. and my "homeroom class" was in charge of organizing the pageant for the 10 and 11 grades. so, they spent pretty much all week preparing for that whole deal.

and on new year, a nice old dude with a white beard and long robes comes to bring presents for the childrens of the former soviet world. this dude is known as "ded moroz" -- it means "grandpa frost". he doesn't have elves to help him either, he has a granddaughter, "snegurichka" -- it means "snow girl". anyways, no new year's celebration is complete without a visit from ded moroz and snegurichka. so, one of my students got all decked out as ole pappy frost, and guess who they asked to be snegurichka? that's right, friends. . . me! i got to stand up in front of all my students and half of the teachers in the school and speak russian and be the snow girl.

it was actually pretty cool. after every line i spoke, i got huge love (in applause form), so i felt pretty good. and, after the pageant, there was a disco. needless to say, i got down and rocked out hard to 6 month old american and turkish pop music with my students. while it was awkward at the time, i only have fun memories of it looking back. good times.

as for my new year's celebration with my american friends. . . let's just say it was also fun. and leave it at that! :)

i'll give you more when i get it.

love.

holy crap, i'm sorry!

2006-12-10T05:24:00.000-05:00

holy crap! i'm sorry it's been like, 2 months since i've posted. i am sorry. i will fully understand if none of you want to be my friend anymore -- seeing as how i've been so innatentive to you all. and it's not like nothing's been going on. i've got stories out the wazoo (quite literally), but i just have been too selfish to share them with you all. man, oh man. . .

well here goes, i will tell you the stories in they otder that they occur to me and not necissarily in the order that they happened. so first, on our fall break me and the sitemate went up to the capital of astana so my sitemate could visit her boyfriend and i could go to astana. so anyways we go up there in the beginning of november. . . and i tell you what i was some kinda sick. as my dear grampa used to say, "i had a case of the miseries." man, i never thought a human digestive tract could actively rebel against its owner, but now i know it's totally possible. so for about 3 quarters of my adventure in astana, i was laying on a mattress watching fashion tv on the satillite dish (because it was in english). what's worse for my sitemate ann was that her boyfriend was sick too (although he was spared the miseries and just had a bad head cold). so basically my vacation in the capital went like this -- my site mate sitting around bored/caring for her sick boyfriend and me. but. . . .

story #2, on the last day of the trip, i was feeling better, so ann and me went to her boyfriend's work. where? at a strip club, that's right, her boyfriend was a waiter at a strip club. oh yes. . . strip club! having never been to a strip club in the states, i don't know whether to tell you if it was a good or bad experience. . . but it was an experience. . . that's all i've got to say about that.

what else. . . . ok. so we had like, a shit ton of snow here a couple weeks back. so on the day after the blizzard, some of my older boys asked me (in russian), if i wanted to go swimming. i was confused. i was like, "swimming? what the hell?!" i figured they were joking or something so i said, "yeah, ok. sure." bad idea. by, "miss ashli, do you want to go swimming?" they meant, "miss ashli, can we throw your honky ass in the snow?" so after school that day, some of my 11th grade boys picked me up in the front hallway of the school, carried me outside and tossed me in a snowdrift. then one boy helped me up out of the drift so that another boy could throw me in the snow A SECOND TIME! so, if you're ever in the stan in winter and get asked to go swimming, just say no.

thankgiving. thanksgiving was a couple of weeks ago. so we've got a bunch of new volunteers now and the first time we all met was at thanksgiving. they're pretty cool. we just ate and talked and ate. but, just before we were gonna eat, the power went out in the apartment. you see the building hadn't turned on the heat yet so the girl whose apartment it was had bought a bunch of portable heaters to warm up the apartment. however, all that power running through the soviet-era wiring was too much, and it blew a fuse. luckily, we had some local people at the party, and they (a kazakh and a russian) immediately started to fix the problem. it sounds like the set up to a bad joke doesn't it? "so, a kazakh and a russian are trying to fix a blown fuse with a piece of telephone wire. the russian says to the kazakh. . . . " but they got it fixed and the rest of our dinner was very well lit.

i think that's about all there is for me now. i promise, i'll make more of an effort to post regularly from now on. i don't want you all to get mad. . . . i still need your friendship (and your care packages :) ).

love.

what's the deal?

2006-10-01T07:20:00.000-04:00

ok, i want to tell you all about the teachers' day celebration we had for the teachers at the school i work at. i want to tell you all about it. but, this being kazakhstan, there is a catch. the keyboard that i have now does not type the letter between "l" and "n". seriously, where do i live? anyways, teachers' day.

for the celebration, the school rented out a big cafe. we ate a ton of food. . . including several tasty salads (containing a generous deal of "nn"ayonaise), there of course was dancing, and obviously, everything that happened was worthy of a vodka toast. (for instance: "ashli, raushan apai just did a dance in front of everyone, let us drink to her dancing." "ashli, ganai ahai just said a funny joke. we will drink to his wit." and on and on) surprisingly though, i did not get drunk at the teachers' party, and i found that i was even able to leave gracefully before the party was over so i could arrive to the other social call i had to do that evening in the city.

there is a new foreigner in the big city, she is fro"nn" los angeles. anywho, her birthday was today and we decided to celebrate last night by dancing til dawn at a chic disco called "nn"axapaja (we think it's pronounced "nn"a - ha - ra - zha) but the letters on the sign are in both cerillic and latin characters. the disco was a blast, although it was quite overpriced, and i think i have gotten old, because i have got all wore out with all this dancing in the past few days.

well, that's all i will post now, this lack of the letter "nn" is really pissing this girl off. so, i''ll write again when i have all of the letters of the alphabet at "nn"y disposal.

love.

what a week

2006-09-10T05:30:00.000-04:00

gentle readers, this week has been one for the books. . . .

my second year of service just started and i'm back to work. because of the high rate of english teachers on maternity leave (about 25%, with another teacher out at a medical sanitorium trying to GET pregnant), our teaching schedule is in all kind of flux. the good thing is that i get to teach a bunch of little kids this year (2nd and 3rd graders) in addition to my big kids!! not that i don't love my big kids, it's just that the little ones pay attention and do what i say because i am the teacher. and little kids LOVE their teachers. huzzah!

speaking of my big kids. . . have i got a story for you! now *disclaimer*: i heard this news second hand -- from a teacher who talked to the kids that it happened to. and i'm sure that through this channel the information and facts have been sanitised and tweaked. but, here goes. some of my older boys got in a fight! what happened was, about 10 or so kids from another town caravaned to my village and approached my boys after school. they said that they wanted my boys to collect a certain amount of money from their classmates every week and give it to these other boys so that nothing bad will happen to the kids in my school (sort of like paying protection to the mob). my boys refused. then all of the boys from the other school jumped my boys! can you believe that?! one of my boys was STABBED IN THE ARM and another was HIT IN THE FACE WITH A METAL POLE AND GOT HIS JAW FRACTURED! what the duece!? those two boys will be ok, but the whole incident, understandable has got my school (and me) a little shaken up. from what i heard, my school's doing everything in it's power to find the boys that hurt my boys and to keep something like this from happening again.

also, this past week, my grampa passed away. now i make it a rule to not get all mushy and sentimental on this blog and i try to present the lighter/more interesting side of my service. but, rules were meant to be broken -- although i'll try to keep my sentimentality to a minimum and refrain from future touchy-feely postings.

for those of you that know me, you know my grampa had been ill for a long time, and we all knew that the end was near. i don't know what happens to us after we die. maybe there's a heaven, maybe there's not. but i do know that he's not in pain anymore, and i know that's best for him. but i do have to regrets concerning my grampa's passing. first, i'm sorry that i can't be there with the rest of my family to help put him to rest and share in the myriad of emotions that are spilled at a funeral. i want you all at home to know that my thoughts and heart have been only with you all since grampa passed away. and i wish more than anything that i could have been with you. second, i wish i would have been able to say goodbye properly to my grampa. he was such a huge part of my life growing up and i owe so much to him. after i left, his health started into a downward spiral, but i always thought he would get better, because, he's my grampa, and grampa's always been around. but i was wrong. so, for you, grampa --i hope you can check my blog from wherever you are. i won't say goodbye to you, because i will keep you always with me. i can't say goodbye, because you haven't left me.

love.

summer camp

2006-08-20T04:24:00.000-04:00

hey all

i know it's been a while since i've posted anything, but i've been busy (i promise). not much has been going on for me in the stan. . . school starts in a couple of weeks. i'm both dreading the loss of all of my free time and looking forward to having actual stuff to do. i hope that my last school year in the kz is a good one.

oh, the title of the post is "summer camp" so i guess i should tell you about my summer camp. like i've been saying for the past few months, i have been planning a summer camp for quite some time now --

(side bar - i want to see how many times i can type the words "summer camp" in this post. i'm aiming for about 15. can i do it? place your bets now!)

--the summer camp was last week. all and all it went pretty well. we had a total of 19 kids come from all over the region and they were given lessons in english and youth leadership -- youth leadership being the focus of the summer camp. the lessons weren't really the most interesting or funniest parts of the summer camp, but i figured i should tell you that there really was an educational purpose for the summer camp before i tell you all the funny/interesting stuff that happened.

summer camp highlights!:

1. i won first prize in the camp dance competition on the first night we were at the summer camp. here's how it happened: there were evening events planned everynight at the "camp disco" which was open to everyone, not just members of my group. my girls decided that they wanted to enter this dance competition. foolishly, i walked into their cabin as one of the girls was putting together a routine. "miss ashli," they said, "show us some american dance moves we can use for the competition." as you all know, i do enjoy a little dancing now and then, so i said, "ok, here ya go!" and i did a couple of what i thought were really lame dance moves. the girls were all, "that was the best dancing we've ever seen. you will dance for us at the competition." WHAT? "no, it's ok, miss ashli, valya will dance with you."

so there i was, a grown-ass, 23 year old woman, entered into a dance competition, competing against 15 and 16 year olds. i asked ann, who came with me to the camp, what i should do. "you CAN'T try," she said, "because if you try to beat a bunch of high schoolers, then that's sad." ok, i can't try. what exactly does that mean? but then, another student, nurtas said, "miss ashli, if you win, i will make you beshbarmak." well, hot damn. i guess my kids wanted me to win. that means i would have to try.

so, long story short, me and valya rocked out hard to shakira's "hips don't lie". we won. nurtas owes me beshbarmak.

2. there was a fight. apparently high schoolers are the same everywhere. one night at the disco, some of my boys tried to dance with some girls from another city. the boys from that city took exception to my boys dancing with their girls, so the next morning (now really, who fights in the morning?) those boys came and started a fight with my boys. the details are sketchy for me, as the story was related to me in russian by some rather frightened teenagers, but the other boys were bad, my boys did nothing wrong but they still managed to win the fight. as a teacher, i was officially appalled that my students would get into those kind of shenanigans. as a person, i'm glad my boys whomped some ass.

3. i climbed a mountain. the summer camp organizers offered an excursion -- a "nature walk" they called it. nature walk, my ass! we climbed straight up a freaking mountain. we didn't have ropes or anything, but there were points where i was definitely scaling rocks to get to the next rest stop. it took three hours. by the time everyone got back down off of that horrid mountain of doom, sveta (our school psychologist) and i had decided that there would be no lessons that day (not because we thought the kids were too worn out, but because we were tired as shit), and we would instead watch earnest goes to camp.

4. summer camp, summer camp, summer camp, summer camp. 15 times! i win again!!

so, that's all i got right now. more later.

love.

ps -- props to jason for entering the dc aids marathon. i've never been prouder, hon! kick that marathon's ass!!

summer!!! whoohoo!!!

2006-07-16T02:27:00.000-04:00

yay!! summer!!!

ok, so i promised an exciting, action-packed blog post once i finished my summer travels. and here i sit in almaty, freshly returned from turkey, so now i will fufill that promise.

well, technically, summer's really only about halfway over, but i think i've finished doing all of the fun traveling stuff that i'm gonna do. from here on out, it's just me, planning a summer camp, and that's about it. but i digress. . . .

i had two big travel experiences this summer, one inside the stan, one outside of it. in the interest of chronology, i'll talk about the intra-stan trip first. in the middle of june, i headed up north to work with an english language summer camp. i figured it was a good deal, get some of my required summer work done, see northern stan, visit with some friends that i hadn't seen in a long ass time, sweetness.

or so it seemed. after my 30 (that's right, 30) hour train ride up north, i met up with my friend charlene. we hung out for a day or 2 then we headed off to do our english-language related duty. or so it seemed. a simple endevour, really: we arrive at the institute we were told to go to, on the day we were told to go there, to meet with the person we were told to meet with, so we can work at the camp we agreed to work at. nope. nice try. here's how it went down: camp = cancelled, international students = not allowed to come to kazakhstan for some odd reason, my return train ticket = not good for 10 more days, me = screwed. or so it seemed. the director of the institute tells me and charlene that he knows of another camp going on at a different place that we can work at. there's just one catch -- it's not an english camp, it's a boyscout camp. boyscout camp? yeah, that's what i thought, but really, it was a camp for scouts. no one there is going to speak any english, the guy said, but you can go and teach them (because it only takes a week to learn english). the camp turned out to not be so bad though, charlene and i gave some VERY basic english lessons every morning, and in the afternoon we could do what we wanted. sometimes we hung out with the kids, did some activities, went to the nightly "camp disco", that kind of stuff. we also made friends with the staff at the camp's cafe/bar -- one of the guys was an azerbaijani named "gamlet" (like shakespeare, he said, prince gamlet from denmark -- in case i haven't mentioned it before, sometimes the english letter "h" changes into the sound "g" in russian. eg -- i am from "o-guy-yo").

after the camp i headed up to visit some other northern volunteers, and can i just throw it out there that the north of the stan is like an entirely different world than what i see in the south. just one of the more humerous examples of the differences between north and south that got me teased endlessly by my fellow volunteers: in the north, pedestrians have the right of way. no joke. cars stop at crosswalks, look both ways before making a turn, obey the speed limit, and stop at stop lights. of course the opposite is true where i live, so i have develop a self-preserving fear of cars. a few times charlene would cross the street and be on the other side before she noticed that instead of following her, i was standing as far back on the sidewalk as i could, because there were cars on the road. she laughed at me, i don't think i deserved that. maybe i did, i WAS hugging a tree and crying. . . .

ok, travel story number 2: TURKEY!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!! yay, turkey! i tell you what, for my money, it don't get better than turkey. holy crap, i had a blast. ann and i left the stan about 2 weeks ago for turkey. we met up with her folks and cousin for a few days in istanbul. her family was super cool, they are really nice people. but it was funny to watch ann interact with them. my normally ultra-laid back sitemate, who never lets anything get to her, was totally transformed when she was with her family. it was like she was a teenager again. i could just see her eyes rolling everytime that her parents said something akin to, "let's go into this museum/place of historical interest" or "you know, the story behind the *name of place of historical significance* is interesting in a long, drawn out way". hilarious. don't get me wrong, i probably would have been the exact same way had i met up with my folks in istanbul. i think that's why it was so funny to see ann, because i could picture myself reacting in the exact same way.

after a few days of chilling out in the city, seeing the sites and drinking the beer (let's be honest) ann and i left the city for the south of turkey and the beach!!! AAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!! BEACH!!!! we took an overnight bus, and in case you were wondering, the overnight buses in turkey kick the overnight buses in the stan's ass. no offence, but these buses were tricked out -- we rode in style. then i laid on the beach for a week, give or take a few minutes. super unfortunately, ann was under the weather for most of our trip, so we couldn't tear up the town as much as we had origanally anticipated. (but i tore it up just a little without her ;) )

that was the general idea of the trip, now i just want to add in some of the interesting things that happened on the trip. i'll try to give them sub-headings so you all don't get confused in my ramblings.
1. turkish guys: pastey white girls, get to turkey. literally, i was constantly getting hit on. i had a guy ask me out and give me his email and phone number BEFORE I GOT MY PASSPORT STAMPED TO ENTER THE COUNTRY. that's right, the dude at the customs counter asked yours truly on a date. (don't worry mom, i didn't go -- the phone number wouldn't work at the hotel). after a while, it just got old. i mean, damn, people, i know i'm hot; but you gotta let a sister breathe. i started to respond to unwanted flirtings in the time-tested "i don't speak english" fashion. but these guys were slick: "ah, tu hablas espanol, yo tambien lo hablo!" damn, they know spanish, it's ok. . . "ty gavaresh pa-ruskey? ny ladna, ya tozhe znayu na-ruskom!" shit! in fact, that's how one guy started hitting on me. in russian, he was all, "i heard you telling that other guy that you didn't understand english, but i noticed that you started speaking english to your friend once he left. i just wanna tell you that i think that was a cool way to get rid of a guy you don't want to talk to." unless the guy speaks russian. . .

my little language hat trick also got me nowhere when when it came to avoiding people hocking their restaurants/stores.

not that i'm complaining too much, turkish guys are hella fine and it's nice to feel attractive. i definitely have a lot more stories on this topic, but i'll not go into it too much. . . gotta preserve some of my mystique!

2. i don't speak turkish: as i implied in the previous section, in the touristy areas, sure, a lot of people speak pretty good english. however, in a less touristy environment. . . say the overland bus system, the percentage of english speakers diminishes dramatically (about 0% in my experience). not tht people should know english, i'm not saying that. i know that the transportation modes we chose are not tourist favorites. i'm just saying that it sucks when i have literally no idea what's going on and i'm trying to get around. for example: when we first get to the bus station, ann and i want to put our bags under the bus. if only. we give our bags to a guy, who was collecting bags to put under a bus. but not our bus. we have to chase the guy down to get our bags back. but we can't explain to him that we're not going on that bus, and he can't explain to us that we should get our crazy foriegn selves up out his face.

then on the way back to istanbul to make our flight, the driver pulls up to a bus station. we don't know where we are. so we ask, "istanbul?" the driver nods his head and says, "istanbul." great. so we get off the bus and get our bags, then we go to find the free shuttle back into the main part of the city so we can find a place to sleep (even though the turkish buses, like the turkish men, are pimp, it's still impossible to get a good night's sleep on a bus). we ask a guy standing by a shuttle if he's going to taksim where we need to go, "taksim?" the guy looks at us like we're crazy, "yok." (no.) then he points to a bus. the bus we were just on. he starts jibbering in turkish, but the gist was this, "this bus here is going to taksim, you have to get on it now or you're stuck at the bus station." i was too proud to get back on the bus i just got off of. i told ann we should just get a taxi, but before we could do anything, the guy we had asked about taksim was ushering us onto a bus (luckily, it was a different bus than the one i just got off of, thus saving my precious pride).

in retrospect, it's a good thing that we didn't take a taxi, because we were on the wrong continent when we got to the bus station. it took us 40 minutes to get to the place that actually had the shuttles to take us to taksim. the taxi ride would have been hella expensive.

3. this post is getting rediculously long: i'm gonna wrap this up. if you want to know more about my adventures, let me know and maybe i'll post more later. oh, and if anyone wants to go to turkey, ever, go! and take me with you!!

love.

martha stewart eat your heart out!

2006-05-31T02:01:00.000-04:00

so, maybe it's not too exciting, but i just hosted a dinner party for my fellow english teachers on memorial day. and, i am awesome. i MADE HAMBURGER BUNS FROM SCRATCH!! that's right. i took flour et al. and made them into delicious, edible hamburger buns. i'm pretty surprised about that too -- you're not the only ones. i also made salad, potato salad, pasta salad, gazpacho, and veggie burgers. from scratch as well. hot damn, i'm good. my teachers were amazed by the "exotic" cuisine i prepared for them. i had to teach them how to eat hamburgers -- "no, you put the patty on the bun with the tomato, onion, and lettuce, then you eat it all together, like a sandwich. . . " the teachers said i should open my own ethnic restaurant wherein i would prepare more "american delicacies" like the hamburgers.

maybe i've found a secondary project. . . master chef! yeah, right. i think i've only got about one of those parties in me and i've used it up. never again. but, it's good to know that i can do this stuff if i need to.

love.

not much to report

2006-05-20T06:51:00.000-04:00

hey all. as the title suggests, there's not much going on with me. i'm basically just planning for the summer and i think i blew my load on that topic in my last few posts -- so i won't be all redundant with that stuff.

in other news -- it is freaking hot here in southern kazakhstan. not just kinda hot. not "ooh, i'll wear my new capris today" hot. it's freaking hot. it's "sweat while you're peeing" hot. it's "i'm not having dinner because the physical act of moving to the kitchen is draining in this wretched heat and humidity" hot. it's hot. and, as i have been so joyously informed on several occasions, it's only gonna get hotter. HOTTER!! what the hell? it's going to be "i'd love to call home to my family, but i'm afraid if i put the phone to my head, my ear will melt to the phone" hot. joy.

in conclusion, i'm glad i'll be traveling for most of the hotted part of the summer.

ok, well, i'm gonna go. please wait patiently for lively and exciting updates about my travels in the coming weeks and months.

love.

happy easter!

2006-04-15T06:50:00.000-04:00

hey everyone, happy easter!!

i'm not really planning on doing anything for the holiday. . . but i thought i'd wish you all a happy one!

things in the stan are standard. . . hehe, it's kind of punny. the weather is warming up and it's gorgeous here in the south. tulips and other flowers are blooming like crazy here, it's rediculous! and, i'm sure you already knew this, but i just found out -- tulips originally come from central asia, they grow wild in the mountains i hear. i'm gonna try to get a couple of good pictures of them soon if i can find a patch near the mountains.

so, i'm trying to think of cool stuff that's going on with me, but i really don't have much. i'm trying to help my counterpart organize a youth leadership camp this summer and it's coming along pretty well. i also just bought my tickets to turkey! i'm gonna spend some time in istanbul (not constantinople! ;) ) and then i'm gonna visit . . . (drumrole please). . . santa claus's birthplace!!! that's right, saint nicholas, the historical personage and inspiration for our beloved modern day santa, is from the south western coast of turkey!! yay!! santa!! summer!! beaches!!! turkey!!

basically that's it. i hope you are all doing well. happy birthday jodee!

love.

ps -- sorry if the blog's gotten a little stale. . . but the kz is pretty much normal to me now, so i don't have as many witty encounters with local culture. c'mon, i can only write "i have an outdoor potty" so many times before it loses it's shock value.

back to life, back to reality. . .

2006-03-28T05:10:00.000-05:00

after nearly two weeks of nauryz and russian language camp, it is time for me to go back to the village. now, dont' get me wrong, it's not that i don't like my village -- it's just sort of anticlimactic to have to go back and go to work again. that's like any vacation, i suppose. you know you've left on time when you don't wanna go back home.

so here's a quick run down of the nauryz festiivities (i'll spare you the details on the russian language camp. but if you really really want the down low on that one too, email me and i'll send you my notes from the class and we can have the dorkiest conversation in the world wherein i will get very excited about the simplicity of the structure of reported speech in russian).

the night before nauryz, we rented out a small pub and all of the nearly 50 pcvs in town showed up for the occasion. oh man, talk about a hoot. i swear, this was a hoot and i half. but, because my grandma reads this blog. . . i'll stop the story here :)!

the day of nauryz itself was sweet! we went to the hippodrome, watched the traditional kazakh games (kokpar was everything i could have ever wanted and more. unfortunately, shymkent lost to sairam 2-0. i didn't see that one coming. not for a mile.) there were other games too. . . my favorite was the one where two topless oiled up men, chisled from stone tried to wrestle eachother on horseback! yum!! (sorry grandma!)

another great think about nauryz: street food! seriously, i had the best samsa i have ever eaten in my life. if you don't believe me you can ask anyone in shymkent, because i would NOT shut up about it for the rest of the week.

so, in conclusion -- come to nauryz next year. it'll be fun. . . . . c'mon. . . i'll buy you a samsa!

love.

Who wants my info?

2006-03-05T01:18:00.000-05:00

because i suck, i can't find everyone's email addresses to send out my new info to. so if you want my info, send me your emails. so send emails, i will reply, prolly within a week: my email -- ashligold@yahoo.com

love.

get off my lawn!!

2006-02-12T01:11:00.000-05:00

that's right, everyone! i have found a house. not an apartment, but an actual honest to shucks house that i will rent and live in for the remainder of my stay in the stan. i move in the last weekend of february and needless to say, i am super jazzed!! if any of you ever win the lottery and can afford a plane ticket over here, you can so totally stay at my house!! i'll make borsch!!

Needless to say, my address will be changing, so if you have any packages or other mail that you were gonna send, maybe hold out on that until i can get you my new address (which of course, i do not have on me because that would require forethought, which is a characteristic i do not possess). also, my new house will have a new phone number, which i also don't know off the top of my head. but email me if you want this information and i will get it out to you as soon as i have it.

so i know it's been an ass long time since i posted last but that's only because i'm lazy and don't like having to wade through thigh deep snow to get to an internet connection (no joke, we had a butt load of snow). but luckily, i live in the south of kazakhstan and the end of february -- fingers crossed -- means the end of winter. therefore, i should be able to more comfortably walk to the nearest internet connection. so, i'll post more often.

let's see. as far as interesting anecdotes about my life. . . a few weeks back, in the snowy/cold of winter, i actually went to a pool party outside!! even in america, in the summer, i am a rare sight in a bathing suit and in a swimming pool. but in shymkent there is actually a heated outdoor pool that is open to the public year-round for the small fee of 200 tenge per hour. it was boss. the water was so hot that it steamed in the january air. and my hair froze when my head was out of the water for too long. some of the guys even climbed up on the high dives and threw snowballs at us before they dove into the water. it was sweeeeeeet!

right now, i am trying to organize a language camp for some of my fellow 17s so that they can study up some russian and see the awesome spectacle that is nauryz, or kazakh new year. i tell you what, if anyone knows how to celebrate a new year, it's kazakhs. i don't want to give it all away, and because i'm getting good at this whole teaching thing, i'm giving you all an assignment: look up "kok bar" and write a short response to this traditional kazakh game that is played to celebrate the coming of the spring. post it in the comment section. it's due whenever i say it is. i'm the teacher, damn it!!

hey everybody!

2006-01-22T05:54:00.000-05:00

how's it going?

i'm back at site and everything's going well. i'm teaching a lot, which is ok. and i've started a club for my english teachers. i'm really excited about this because i think i can help out the school the most by working with the english teachers. i'm only here for another year and a half, so when i leave, it's important that english classes are as effective as possible. my teachers speak really well and they all seem really receptive to my ideas of how to make classes more exiting. i haven't really done anything exiting since getting back to site except try to get all of my ducks in a row at school. so this post is kinda low key.

ps -- i'm thinking about vacations now, and i think istanbul may be a possible destination. if you've got money to travel and wanna vacation in turkey with me this summer for a few weeks, shoot me an email and we can try to work something out.

love.

little girl in the big city

2006-01-07T00:01:00.000-05:00

so i'm currently sitting here in almaty and after half a year in the village, this place is freaking awesome! i highly recommend it, if you're ever around.

i came here for some training, which actually was pretty informative and got me super pumped to go and be a teacher again (i hope it lasts). my visa was extended and now i can legally stay in the country for my whole term of service, sweeeeet.

training was super fun and it was great to see all of my fellow kaz quits again. . . those that were left (lol!!). i have a lot of great stories from training, but i won't put them up on the ole blog -- some of the people involved in these stories may want to run for office some day ;). i can tell you, however, that i saw charlie and the chocolate factory -- in english. hoot, hoot. good flick.

so anyways, i'm just hanging around the office until me and ann go to catch our 10 hour train back to the village. that's right. we're taking an overnight bus back home. it's cheaper than the train and i've heard it's not "that" bad. but, we'll see. it's an adventure and we've so done the train.

so, in sum: training was awesome. i love my fellow kaz quits. i am super inspired to be the kick-assing-est volunteer ever. buses are smaller than trains. i am a little sleepy. i am one quarter of the way through service. yay.

merry christmas with love

2005-12-24T00:58:00.000-05:00

hey all, it's christmas! color me jazzed!!!!

i am spending my holiday in taraz and it's going pretty well so far. today we'll have our christmas dinner. . . i made homemade buckeyes. i'm so brining the midwest to the central asian. i'm stoked.

of course i miss you all and wish i was home with you all instead of halfway around the world, but it's not all bad.

of course now that i'm typing i can't think of anything interesting to tell you about. . . we're just having our typical bonding time of americans in the kz.

my host mom is super cute. she sells avon and she got me some hand cream from avon for christmas because, she said, "it has a christmas tree on it and it has english writing on it. . . " she also said that she would take off of work early on christmas to make me bishbarmak (the kazakh national dish that they make for anything resembling a special occasion -- complete with homemade horse sausage!) and then we will drink coffee the living room and drink "100 ml" of vodka -- she said, "i know you don't drink vodka on your christmas, but we are in our kazakhstan now, you must drink to celebrate your holiday here!" twist my arm. . .

so i pretty much just wanted to say merry christmas to everyone. and i've said that, so there. now go and do it. HAVE A MERRY CHRISTMAS, DAMMIT!!

omg. . .have to pee!!

2005-12-18T03:57:00.000-05:00

hey all. i am on the internet! hoot hoot! and it's only been like two weeks. it seems that the internet gods are only benevolent in the big cities. it looks like from now on, i'll just have to suck it up and spend the 3 hour round trip in a big van so that i can get my internet fix.

anyways. . . in case you didn't know, i have just about the smallest bladder on the planet. i reallly have to pee right now. but i am holding it. i am holding it for you good people so that you may know about my life. it's not easy, but i will do it. . . .until my pee-pee dance starts to draw the attention of other people around me that is. and i can't just go to the bathroom. public toilets are a rarety here in the stan. i will have to walk half a block down the road and pay 15 tenge to squat over a seatless toilet when i actually to get to potty. boy howdy i will not miss this when i get home.

anyways, merry christmas. i'll be spending the holiday with other volunteers in the beautiful pink city of taraz. (well, actually, i've only heard that it's pink. this will be my first visit. i'll update you later.) it doesn't really seem like christmas here though. for one, it's like 60 degrees outside. and for two, people here don't really "do" christmas. so there's no sense of the impending consumer orgy that is the holiday season. they do, however, have new years here (new year's is pronounced "christmas" of course: they have a big 'new years' tree, santa claus, and gift giving). so that's fun.

after new years, i'm going to training in almaty. so i'll be able to use their kickass, reliable internet and i'll probably have fun stuff to talk about. ok, just a few more emails to check, and then i gotta go. . .potty!

love.

its winter in the stan'"

2005-12-01T07:04:00.000-05:00

evening folks! good news, i have found a reliable internet source -- ann!! i swear, is there anything that lady can't do? anyways, her host family got hooked up with the internet and, in light of my recent computer woahs, ann said i could use her connection.

speaking of the internet, i have a story: so, like i said before, the internet connection at the post office where i have been signing on is less than reliable and as of late, has not been letting me check my email. so i thought, sucks to this, i'll go somewhere else. in fact, there is an internet club in the village. i'll go there. ann had told me a few weeks before that the "technical issues" that the internet club had would soon be cleared up, so the internet would in fact be available at the internet club. so i go. i walk into the internet club, and i ask, in russian, "do you have the internet?"

the guy that works there looks at me like i am the stupidest person in the world for asking such a thing. he looks at me and says, "i already told you the last time you were here, we are having technical difficulties with the internet and we don't know when we will get it."

omg! i looked at this guy and gave the most angst-filled sigh i could muster (which is pretty angst-filled -- seeing as how i work with teenagers i hear them a lot and have gotten good at mimicking them) and said, "fine." then i left. the whole way home i kept thinking, "i wish my russian were better. i wish my russian were better."

why? you may ask. well, why indeed. there are two huge problems with what this guy said to me. 1.) i had never been in this internet cafe before. ANN had been there. and ann and i do not look alike. true, we are both 22 year old american girls with glasses. but that's all. i am a short little blonde girl that can speak broken RUSSIAN. ann is a very tall girl with black hair and a dark complexion that speaks broken KAZAKH. i know "we" all look alike to these people, but come on. 2.) the place is called INTERNET CAFE, but as far as i can discern, they have never had the internet. ITS IN YOUR NAME!!!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!! if you want to be a computer club call yourself "computer club". or, if you really must have the word internet in your name what about "we might possibly one day have the internet club." i don't know.

that's all i got. more later. love and kisses.

happy thanksgiving!!!!!!!

2005-11-22T05:24:00.000-05:00

hi everybody!! what's new?

ok, before i begin with my actual blog post, i want to share with you an amusing incident that happened to me a few weeks back, but i forgot to mention it in the blog. . .. so here goes: i went to the kitchen a few weeks back to make myself some less-than-delicious instant coffee, but seeing as how there is no such thing as actual coffee in the stan, i have to make due with what i got. anyway, back to my story. i am in the kitchen and i hear the cat (who i am alternately fond of and indifferent to) mewing.. at that moment, i was indifferent. i thought perhaps that she had been closed out of the kitchen and wanted to get back in.. whatever. i went about making my coffee. the cat kept mewing, and the mewing became more and more pathetic.. i felt guilty for ignoring the cat and went to the kitchen door to let her in. i open the door.. no cat.. in fact, when i go to the door the mewing gets softer, like ive moved away from the cat. odd. wheres the cat? again, whatever. i go to the fridge to get some milk product for my coffee product. i open the door. . . CAT!!! the cat was IN THE FRIDGE!! and she must have been there since breakfast time, which was like 3 hours earlier. she had some how climbed into the fridge when we were clearing the breafast things. oh, and she was covered in chocolate sauce, like the rest of the fridge. at least they matched. . .

the end

ok. . . i really don't like this keyboard. half of the keys stick, including the space bar. please excuse my typographical errors.. i also am not fond of my internet connection, which is not letting me check my emails.. i will try another connection at a later time. i hope. andd the fact that this room is not heated is also not pleasing me. i think its colder in here than it is outside (which, actually isn't that bad, maybe 50 or 55 degrees -- my mom would say that it is "healthy" in here!)

so, this is thanksgiving week!! yay!! even though i have to work on actual thanksgiving day, i will go to the city of turkistan this weekend to celebraate the holiday with other volunteers. i think i will make a pumpkin pie.. hoot hoot

over my holiday from school, i did very little. i went to school inthe mornings to write lesson plans, but fortunately for me, this usually degenerated into drinking tea and eating verious homemade salads and breads within a few hours.. then i would go home and read or watch tv. i was too full from my "lesson planning" to do much else. i think that the vaccation made me realize how much easier my job is when there are no students in my class. but now the students are back, and its not that bad.

that's pretty much all for right now, not much interesting to report: i'm starting my search for my own house/apartment to rent, which so far looks promising that i'll find a good, affordabe place but i can't move out from my host family until february. and my host mom has been working 20 hour days at the bank because all of her employees quit or something (i don't really know what's going on because it's all in russian).. anyways, my host dad has now taken over the cooking. and, even though before two weeks ago, he'd never done more than boil water, he's actually a really good cook. so, this is a sort of catch-22 for me: i dont want my host mom to continue to work herself ragged, but i also don't want my host dad to stop cooking, as he would inevitably do if my host mom can get some help at work. what do you think, gentle readers?

ps -- i am currently making christmas cards to send out to america. if you want one (and you know that you do!!), email me your snail-mail address (i will probably be abe to checkmy email this weekend and i hope to have my cards sent out by the first of the month so that they'll be sure to reach you by christmas!!)

hey, this is gonna be a quick one

2005-10-30T04:10:00.000-05:00

hey all. i'm in beautiful metropolitan shymkent as i write to you now. i'm on an adventure with my fabulous site-mate ann. she has to buy a train ticket, and i wanna watch her do it. yes, life in the stan is so exciting that this is my sunday entertainment.

so, yesterday i had my ''halloween party'' with my english club -- but i can hardly justify calling it a party because it was just me, ann, two girls from my club, a history teacher and the guy that runs the little shop at my school. but here's what i learned from my holiday experience: if you don't have an oven, it's impossible to bake pumpkin bread. and pumpkin bread dough makes very tasty pancakes (or in russian: tickvei blini). i also learned that when you bring pumpkin pancakes to a school, random strangers sit down to eat them and insist that you drink massive amounts of congac because, after all it is a holiday somewhere. but all in all my holiday was fun, even when my host mom thought halloween was over and cooked my jackolantern for dinner. i ate some of it, but i couldn't enjoy it. i felt like i was eating a steak made from the little calf that i raised from infancy.

so, anyways, i said this was gonna be quick, and i wasn't lying. i gotta get to the train station (or vakzal as we say in russian) and watch a foreigner buy a ticket to uralsk!

much love! (and i promise the next post will be longer and full of witicisms!)

ps-- i wrote this post last week, but for whatever reason, the internet cafe that i went to sent me to the blogger website in german, and instead of trying to go to an english version, i convinced myself that i could in fact read german. that being said, i accendently saved this post as a draft instead of publishing it. oops.

update, ann didn't buy her ticket on sunday, she waited until tuesday and hence, i did not get to watch her buy it. that made me sad. conversely, i did get to watch ann buy a coat at the bazaar, which made me happy. she bought a grayish coat. i helped her by speaking russian. i think that the coat-selling guy thought i was her keeper or something. i'm not though, i'm just a nosey, back-seat coat buyer. just wathcing wasn't enough for me -- i'm totally hands on at the bazaar!! ok. . .anyways, now i am in shimkent again for martha's housewarming and then to 'watch' some of my students take an english test.

next week is my fall break for school. i don't have to teach anything to anyone for a whole week! hoorah! i do, however, have to go to school every morning, from nine until one for. . . i don't really know why, but i have to go. but i have all afternoon to put the spices sent to me by aunt marla, gramma lyn and dad to good use. i hope i can do some justice to american cuisine (if there is in fact, such a thing. . . )

anyway, that's about it, for now. i hope that enough exciting stuff happens to fill another post soon!

dropping the communication ball

2005-10-17T05:13:00.000-04:00

gosh, what's my deal? i'm slipping when it comes to keeping you fine people up to date on my crazy journey in the former ussr. and hold onto your seat, because this is a real life, adventure-packed post i've got to give you all today. if only i were better at updating. . .

adventure the first: last weekend (as opposed to this past weekend. try to keep up, people.), about ten of us volunteers went camping. i mean, real camping. we slept outside, under the stars, we cooked our dinners on a fire that we made, started and maintained ourselves. it was great. the purpose of this camping trip was to see the ruins of the old walled city of sauram. apparently, it was built sometime in the 16th century as an outpost on the silk road, but was raised, pillaged and otherwise destroyed by the mongols or the huns or somesuch group of roaving, horse-riding ass-kickers. when this city was destroyed, it stayed that way. apparently, there is an old sauramese saying that goes, "to hell with it, we're moving over there!" and true to their word, the people of old sauram built new sauram at an acceptable distance from their demolished city.

the best thing about these ruins, was that they were basically ignored for the next couple hundred years. when we walked around the city, you literally had to try to not step on old pottery shards. there were archiologists there that were excavating, so the good people of the kz are into preserving their history -- but we were allowed to camp just outside of the city gates. after we were done doing our camping thang, we drove to the city of turkistan where there is this super famous and equally holy mausolium. no joke, muslims here say that visiting this mausolium two times is equal to visiting mecca. i don't know what the official muslim word on that topic is, but i'm gonna take the kazakh's word for it on that one (which means i'm half way to salvation and paradise! hoot hoot.)

of course the trip wasn't all ancient walled cities and salvation. . . on the way to old sauram, our marshrutka broke down and we were stopped by the police four times. apparently having an out of town license plate on a marshrutka full of americans driving through the deserts of kazakhstan draws attention. . who knew?

adventure the second: on saturday (we're talking two days ago) i went with my english club and my counterpart's homeroom class to this really cool cave and we spealunked! i'm not talking like cave exploring in america where you have a guide and a safe, paved walkway with handrail and electric lights. oh no. this was real cave exploring, we had a guide and all, but we were definitely in the dark with candles, grabbing onto the walls to keep from getting lost in the caves. and we were allowed to touch everything and take shiny rocks from the cave. there was really only one downside to this adventure. after caving for a good two hours, the students decided to continue our adventure be WALKING 10 KILOMETERS HOME THROUGH THE BACK COUNTRY AND FOOTHILLS! now you know me, i don't like to complain. but i walked for a long time and my tooties were all hurt-y when i got back home.

but it was fun and super worth it. . .

oh, now onto other things, i hate to sound needy but i have another wish (gimme) list:

i still need/want videos or movies from america
any cooking spices would be great
thanksgiving paraphanilia and special food fixings (i can get most of the foods here, but spices are harder to come by)
cookie cutters shaped in holiday designs (any holiday, i'm stocking up here)
any holiday decorations
tights (like pantyhose but thicker. . . and if you can find ashli-sized tights with fun designs to send, that would be even better)
maybe some longsleeve shirts or hoody sweatshirts or sweaters. . . winter, she's a comin'

i just want to end this post by saying, i do check all of your comments and sometimes i can't respond to them or send out emails, and i'm sorry. i do think of all of you every day and i want more than anything to see you all again. please dont' think i'm blowing you off. i guess what i'm saying, is if you're ever in the kz (between now and june of 2007) you have a place to stay. mwah! love to you all (especially ryan)

insert witty post title here

2005-09-27T00:45:00.000-04:00

yeah, i know, i haven't posted in like 2 weeks. i'm sorry. there were issues with my internet connection here in the village and going to the internet cafes in shymkent are much more hectic and expensive. i did, however, read all of your wonderful comments and emails. . . i just didn't reply. which i suppose is the important part. so today i shall attempt to make up for my flagrant disregard for your feelings and reply to your comments and emails. 2.5 tenge per minute is really all that's at stake here.

so. . . my life here has been going. i have been at site now for almost a month and a half. let me tell you, it has flown. i'm starting to get more comfortable teaching with my kids and some of them are even starting to understand me (notice i said some, i think a good portion of my students are hearing charlie brown's teacher's voice when i talk). i have some funny stories about my students. . . here goes:

funny story #1: there were still a few minutes before class started, so my students were all just sitting around and talking to each other. one of the girls, rimma, is complaining about something in russian, and to emphasize her point, she dramatically falls backward onto the desk. i see this and say in english, 'i think she's drunk.' and another student replies to me, also in english, 'i know miss ashli, i told her not to drink so much before class. she just won't listen!' [maybe this one's not that funny, i was just amazed at the quickness and grammatical accuracy of this kid's response. . . the next one's funny. i promise.]

funny story #2: in my advanced class we're discussing what happened in a short story excerpt that the kids read for homework. there's a part in the story (which is from australia) where a girl writes a note to a guy and asks him, 'will you go with me?' my students don't know what this means, so i explain that it means that she wants to know if the boy wants to be her boyfriend. so as i explain it to my class, i say to the boy who asked the question, 'so, when i say 'will you go with me. . .'' and before i could finish my sentence, the boy says (totally straight-faced), 'yes!!!' everyone in the class lost it and this poor boy (who had just accepted my 'invatation' to be my boyfriend) just sat there and turned so red! HI-larious.

let's see, what else. . . my first english club is today, and i'm super excited. however, i do not have any lessons to teach today either. why? well let me tell you: i was supposed to teach 2 classes today in the afternoon. my family was invited to some sort of kazakh wedding lunch -- i really don't even know what it is. anyway, my host mom so wanted me to go to this 'event' but i couldn't because of class. so my host mom CALLS MY COUNTERPART AT HOME AND TELLS HER THAT I WON'T BE GOING TO WORK TOMORROW. she doesn't ask her. she tells her. ashli won't be at work tomorrow, she has to go to a fancy kazakh lunch period. my counterpart says, 'uh. . .ok' and now i have no work today! [i guess we can refer to that one as funny story #3]

i went to shymkent for the weekend where i attended a conference on hiv/aids training and teaching. it was really interesting and i can't wait to start talking about it with my students and teachers. also in shymkent we went out and drank mass amounts of shymkentskaya beer. if you ever have access to this beer, i suggest you try it. it tastes pretty good, and there is no gross beer aftertaste. ok, now i'm off to read AND answer my emails. bye!

i'm a teacher now!! detentions for everyone!!

2005-09-08T05:47:00.000-04:00

first of all. . . SUCK IT GMAIL! that's right, i'm so over you. i've moved on, to another free web-based email service provider who knows how to upload. that's right, i said it -- gmail can't upload in the 'stan [it's ok, it happens to a lot of email providers. . . NOT!] if anyone wants to email me now and have me be able to read it, just check my profile. i'll change the email there. if gmail ever comes to its senses and starts treating me right, i'll let you know first thing.

second thing -- thanks for care packages, i can't wait to tear them open like so many christmas presents. this might sound like a strange request, but i just thought of it. could you send spices? like for cooking and baking. (i want to make i pumpkin pie come thanksgiving. . .) they don't have much here but dill and garlic and dill (did i mention dill)? if you do, i promise to bring spices (pronounced DILL) back from the stan and have a kazakh-style cookout. yay!!

so, last weekend i went to a birthday party in shimkent. . . an AMERICAN birthday party. there are, apparently around 10 other americans within reasonable traveling distance from me. i'm super stoked! we ate nachos at this party, like, real, mexican-influenced, american cuisine. they were prepared with love, the only way taht nachos can be made, by my warden martha, and her neighbor sandy. i can't even begin to describe how delicious they were -- martha and sandy are nacho goddesses.

i have been teaching now for a little over a week and, as promised, i have hilarious teaching stories to tell. one of the first questions that my students ask me is "are you married?" and when i respond with "no" they immediately ask "why not?" because at 22 in the stan, i am a spinster. sorry mom, apparently you'll get no grandkids outta this old maid ;) but one girl tried to console me by reminding me that "there are a lot of english boys in shimkent." so, when i went to shimkent, i obviously looked. ann, my sitemate, and i walked up and down the streets of the city searching. ann said to me "i don't see any english boys." the hunt, of course, is still on. . .

also, just today. . . a girl dropped her pencil on the ground and yelled "shit!" after i laughed for about 3 minutes, i had to remind her, that in english, shit is not a word that should be used in the classroom. after i got the class under control -- after the "shit hit the floor" -- buh-dum-ching, i innocently asked them to turned to page "six." they thought that was hilarious b/c six sounds like sex. . . . hardy har frickin har. then we had to read a poem about a "beach" which i never thought of before, but it sounds like "bitch." another 4 minutes gone. but i can't be too mad. . . after all, in kazakh the word for sugar is pronounced - no joke - [kuhnt]. . . so i crack up like the ninth-graders in my class everytime a kazakh offers me sugar for my tea. . .

now that i've told my sugar story, i have to go. . . my hour's almost up. talk to you all later!

one week down, 83 more to go

2005-08-31T05:54:00.000-04:00

so, i've just (successfully?) comlpeted my first week as a real-live volunteer. hoot hoot for me. ruskulova is pretty much like my last village except that it's bigger and i have less reason to go to the big city every weekend. which is good, because the big city is crowded and noisy and everything's in russian or kazakh.

i agree with my mom. i probably shouldn't have posted my cell phone number on my blog, but for those of you who tried to call me, you know that the numbers i posted are very wrong, and i can't be reached by dialing those numbers. i'm sorry. i don't know how to have you all call me on my phone. my bad. but i also couldn't have sent out a mass email with the numbers in them because I CAN'T GET GMAIL TO WORK ON THIS STUPID, SLOW, DIAL-UP COMPUTER!!!!!! GAAAAAAAAAH! I HATE IT. ok i''m done. so as for now, it looks like this blog is my only link to the outside. . . .

i'm trying to think of any amusing stories that i can tell about my week in r-town and i don't have any. . . yet. i'm sure that the anecdotes will overflow from my tiny blogsite.

so, i also noticed in my comments that some of you all want to send me care packages. this makes me happier that a pirate at a parrot sale. and i just so happen to have made a list of things i might need/want here in kazakhstan (i made this list instead of paying attention to a staff meeting which, like the city of shimkent was noisy and in russian).

ok here's my list:
1. vhs tapes -- these will be for use in a school-sanctioned english club, and i will more than likely donate them to the school when i leave.
2.markers (crayola, please! :))
3.photos (keep 'em classy, kids!)
4.books (in spanish too, if you have any to spare)
5.a camera that works on film
6.halloween costumes (just because they don't celebrate it in the kz, doesn't mean i can't dress up like a pumpkin if i want to!)
7.cheap holiday decorations
8. lists of what you guys want from the 'stan -- keep in mind that i'm trying to live off of $30 per month so i can go on vacation next summer, so i might have to bring you your gifts in two years when i get back.
9.speaking of vacation -- any ideas? anyone thinking of maybe meeting up with me?

also, i have it on pretty good authority that my cos date is june 18, 2007 instead of august 18!! guess whose turning 24 in the usa?

ps -- here's a kind of funny story from swearing in: i definitely went to a happy hour at the home of the executive cheif something-or-other to the u.s. ambassador to kz's house! he invited us during the swearing in ceremony. no joke. it was part of his speech. and i quote "blah, blah, blah, volunteers, blah, blah, happy hour at my place. . . .with marines!" so, obviously the phrase "happy hour" paired with the suggestions that good-looking marines will buy my drinks -- that's right, it was a cash bar, come on, america didn't get to be the unipole by being generous with its booze -- got my attention. it was super fun. they had peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (i told my host mom that pb&j is one of america's national dishes -- i don't think i'm too far off on that.)

i'm (finally) at site!!!

2005-08-22T02:04:00.000-04:00

greetings from beautiful ruskulova!! i arrived here by train yesterday morning at the crack of 7 am! for the next six months, i will live with a host family consisting of a mother, a father and a host brother. they (so far) seem like very friendly people. i also have a very cuddly little kitten that likes to lick my nose when i'm trying to sleep.

so, now let's move on to logistics. the days of free and somewhat limitless internet connections are now behind me. i can now access the internet for 2.5 tenge per minute on a 56k (if that) modem. just to let you know how slow this thing is, it has taken me almost twenty minutes just to get the post page to load. therefore, my post and emails will become even more infrequent than they have been of late (sob!!). but i do have good news: i have for you two alternantive and free (for me) ways for us to keep in touch. that's right, faithfull blog reader. . . i am now, finally, going to give you all what you've been screaming for theses last few months. i know i said that i would send indivudual emails with my phone number and address, but the connection here is too slow and too costly for that. so, i'm going to give you this information on my blog.

ok, my counterpart is getting bored at watching me type, so i'm going to go, much love and i hope i gave you the right phone numbers (remember, kz i 10 hours ahead of est!)

i'll be a volunteer on friday

2005-08-15T08:33:00.000-04:00

omg!! my swearing in is on friday!!! YIKES!

today i met my counterpart, her name is gulshat. she seems like a nice lady and hopefully she stays that way because i'll be working with her for the next two years.

so, i did get a cell phone yesterday. but i don't have a number and the phone doesn't work. . .i am also the dumbass that bought the wrong phone card. that's right. i'm an idiot. here's my sad, stupid story: there are two big cell phones companies in kazakhstan, activ and k-mobile. i got activ, and EVERYONE ELSE IN PEACE CORPS in on k-mobile. but luckily, another (more experienced) kaz15 volunteer told me that a lot of people buy both cards and switch them in and out. so, if 1)my phone starts to work or 2)i am able to get a k-mobile card, i'll post my number. no, i won't post it. i'll let people know the number by email. that seems safer. but please remember if you do get a hankering to call me when the phone number is revealed that kazakhstan in 10 ahead of eastern time.

more later.

ps - i didn't buy a winter coat. winter in ruskolova is like winter in ohio. i'm gonna stick with the coat that i brought.

mwah

2005-08-08T01:10:00.000-04:00

hey, i'm not dead. i know i have been posting on an almost weekly basis, but it sort of fell off this time. sorry i dropped the ball. i'll say my pentance later.

anyway, i'm in the middle of my practicum and it's going well. i'm meeting my counterpart next week and on August 20, i'm off to ruskulova! hoot hoot.

so, here's my fun kazakhstan story: yesterday my 19 year old host aunt and my 14 year old host sister GOT INTO A KNOCK DOWN, DRAG OUT GIRL FIGHT!!!!! it was the most hilarious thing ever.

let me briefly translate and reinact the situation:

adela: muhabbot, could you please help me carry the scraps to the cows? it's heavy.

muhabbot: you can carry it yourself. you are strong enough, judging by the width of your fat ass.

adela: shut up, bitch. help me carry the food to the cows.

muhabbot: why carry the food? it's already in front of a cow.

adela: shut your whore mouth! i'd rather be a cow that a ugly she-wolf, bitch.

muhabbot: fat-ass!!

adela: bitch!!

then they attacked. . . it was like two monkeys battling over who can dance for the organ grinder. the only thing that stopped them from clawing eachother's eyes out in typical cat-like fashion was my host mother beating adela into submission with metal spoon while my host grandmother hit muhabbot repeatedly with a rubber hose.

it was HI-larious.

now i'm off to buy a winter coat. i'll report more later.

who's got two thumbs and knows where she's going? this girl!!

2005-07-26T08:24:00.000-04:00

ok, so this post is a quicky, i've got a crowd of internet hungry pcv's behind me, so i gotta rush.

i will be spending the next two years of my life in Ryskulov!!! TA-DA!! alright, more specifically. . . my town is in southern kazakhstan and has 10,000 people and i will be teaching in a mixed russian-kazakh language school. that's right kids, i am probably have to learn kazakh (quadrilingual much?). the winters are mild, but c'mon this is by kazakhstani standards, so it's still gonna be cold. but since i'm in the EXTREME south the summers are hot as balls. there is another volunteer in my class that will be my site mate, which is awesome. and there are a bunch of other volunteers in my area!! hollaback!

so, that's all i got right now. do some research if you want. tell me what you think. . .GO!

ps -- welcome to my blog scott!! yay!!

more random crap from 'stan-sylvania

2005-07-23T05:09:00.000-04:00

ok, so i have received some comments about sending packages to me in the stan. these comments make me happy. i like to receive packages. i will now impart some information that might make sending me packages easier, and somehow, more fun.

while at pst i do have an address. the only problem is that i'm only at pst for another month and any packages that are shipped to that address will be stored in almaty. this doesn't sound bad until you factor in that i could be upwards of 42 hours by train away from almaty. however, i think that letters will be forwarded. . . mean people and jackasses do not read what is in parenthesis (check my comments for more info. :) )

in other news i wrote carmen cramer (who is awesome and you should all take time to tell her so [winky face]) and i found that my email contained a lot of information that i perhaps had forgotten to share with you all. . . so here goes!!

i have running (cold) water most of the time. for some strange and
unknown reason, the water is usaully turned off at night after 9:30 or
so. but i definitely do not have indoor plumbing. i do my business
in an outhouse over a squat-hole. you wouldn't think that squatting
would be an efficient way to relieve yourself, but it works
surprisingly well. it only took me a few times to avoid the
"splash-back" effect that is common for americans in the stan ;).

my house is small, but we do have a small summer kitchen which i can't
really think how to describe. there's like a stove and a table inside
and randomly a bedroom, and then there's another stove-like thing
outside with a table. we eat every meal outside. i suppose it's
different in the winter, but i haven't experienced that season yet.

the food here is awesome! everything is made from scratch and it's
all like doughy-oniony, goodness. i can't really explain it
adequately. my goal is to learn how to cook the food hear and have
thousands of "kazakhstani dinners". interesting note about food: we
all eat from communal plates and we only drink hot tea with milk and
-- no joke -- salt. they say that the salt and the hot tea is good
for dealing with the heat. i say that it's the 2 liters of water that
i drink every day on top of the tea. the jury's still out.

so, anyways. . .i find out in about 2 hours where i'm going to spend
the next couple of years!! i'm super jazzed!!

holy half-way point, batman!!

2005-07-17T07:04:00.000-04:00

ok, so it's just the half-way mark of my training not of service, no need to start planning my welcome home party yet! (but, for future reference, there is to be absolutely no clowns at this celebration, because i'm afraid of them. this is because, as we all know, clowns are haunted.)

on a completely unrelated note, ryan informed me via posted comment that he will be spending the beginning of january in beautiful, tropical, shut-the-hell up, mexico. well, i've got news for you, buck. while you're maxing and relxing in the hot sun, i'll be up to my butt in snow and 40 below temperatures. eat it!! you'll be so jealous when you read my posts about my eyeballs freezing shut!! but I KEED!! i hope you have tons of fun! now that we're talking about vacations, let's get some wheels a-turning!! i have discovered that it is possible for me to have round about a month to a month and a half of vacation time next summer. i can also travel anywhere i want! so, if anyone has a hankering for some international travel, next summer, lemme know. of course i don't need anything definite, i just wanted to get you all thinking. (but do bare in mind that i will have EXTREMELY limited funds for this. hostels much?)

ok, back to my kz narrative. we had immersion teaching this past week. i taught 4 sessions of 8th grade. my kids were great, but their english was not. it was a real eye opener to the level that i will be teaching (for example -- they constantly mix up he and she. and tomorrow we will have class is completely above their heads.)it's ok though, it's my job to teach and teach i shall!!!! my host sister was in my class and she is still calling me "miss ashli" (the kids in the village already knew me as ashli, but i needed to interject some illusion of authority).

speaking of my host sister, she and i went to the school's disco last night! omg!!! there are some hootchified dances in the kz. they all LOVE 50 cent, so when "candy shop" came on, they all tried to booty dance. then they wanted me to show them how to do it, because, as we all know, my booty dancing is famous world wide (winky face). i didn't do it though, i am a teacher, not a corrupter of youth (thank you, socrates, for that lesson!!! philosophy 101 what!?!).

my host mother's mother and sister are now visiting. the sister, muhabat is 19 and is studying english at university. now there's someone in my house that i can talk to! huzah! also, ryan listen up -- she is kelly's voice double. it's so weird, if kelly were ouiger and spoke russian, i think she would be my host aunt. small world!

let's see. . . what else?

oh yeah!! next week is site announcement day!!!!!!!!! i will find out where the heck i'll spend the next two years of my life (come on disneyland!! ;) ). there's gonna be a big ceremony with a map and then an american folk music jambaroo (i volunteered to play the jug). after that i have practicum (which is like immersion teaching but my counterpart will be watching me -- or judging me, whichever you like). then we have counterpart conferences, swearing in, then i'm off to the races. . . OMG!! this is going to happen soon!

ok, i'm gonna go now! BYE!

ps -- hey jodee: wor shor yeega may goran!! i love you!!
ryan, happy super belated birthday!!

quirky culture

2005-07-07T07:42:00.000-04:00

ok, i have several funny/interesting observations about my host country to share!

today, july 7th, is some official holiday here in the 'stan. on this day, and i'm not kidding, you randomly throw buckets-full of water on people for no reason at all. fortunately for me, the well in my village is dry and we will have no water at all for three days. ok, so it's not really fortunate, but i'll stay dry today.

last night, i officially made dad's spaghetti sauce famous in the kz. i made spaghetti for about 15 people last night and they all said it was fkoosna (delicious). however, my sauce to pasta ratio was off and there was not enough sauce for all of the noodles. i know this because i was somehow posessed to mix the pasta with the sauce. it had the consistancy of lagman (one of kz's tasty national dishes) but still tasted like delicious spaghetti.

in today's kazakh language class i learned some funny words:
to say "grapes" in kazakh, it is "gyzem" (teehee).
to say "bread roll" in kazakh, it is "ballsack" (i'm in junior high school).
the teacher had to stop class b/c we were laughing at the prospect of saying the grapes are tastey and i love bread rolls!! i will never grow up!!

on a less sophomoric note, we have official completed the first month of training. i got my official peace corps id today and i start "immersion teaching" (which is like practice, i suppose) on monday.

much love!

happy birthday america!

2005-07-03T05:51:00.000-04:00

ok, not really, i don't care much about america's birthday. but tomorrow is also my mommer's birthday. that i care about. i love my mommy!!

ok, anyways. to answer some questions: aunt marla -- i don't have a digital camera, but i think in a few months i can save up enough to buy a decent one. i wouldn't advise sending a camera though, only because apparently expensive devices sent to kz sometimes end up "lost or missing."

back to the 'stan: everything in k-stan is going well. it's hot, i don't speak russian, and i still poop in an outhouse.

but seriously, i'm doing very well. we went to almaty yesterday and
it was super fun. we went to the peace corps headquaters and that
place is plush: they had 2 showers AND toilets!! god bless america!!
tomorrow we get to go to see some petroglyphs which are apparently
very old and very famous. i say apparently b/c when i was told about
the trip i heard: blah blah blah petroglyphs blah blah no class on
monday. blahdy blah.

some of the americans in my village want to try to have a cook out some time this week for the fourth. it's kind of funny b/c we know where we can buy hot dogs, but we can't find anyplace that sells hot dog buns. i guess we'll have to improvise. any suggestions?

keep reading and keep commenting!!! (or, in gramma lyn's case; keep printing off my postings. it's nice to know that a hard copy of this exists somewhere).

word from the 'stan

2005-06-28T07:00:00.000-04:00

In leiu of sending out mass emails (because for whatever reason, email servers don't always feel like working)i decided to post a general dealy on the blog. But, rest assured, if you send me an email, i will do my best to respond in a timely manner.

It's been so hot here that i can't describe it (in russian hot =
zharka). there's no air conditioning, but i'm getting used to the
heat, kind of. i think it's been about 90 -100 degrees here everyday.
but apparently july get even hotter. my host family is pretty great
right now, but it's only been two weeks lol. we have cows and i poop
in an outhouse. yay!!

Here's how my time is being spent in Kazakhstan: basically, i spend four days a week at language class which lasts for6 hours. on tuesdays and thursdays we have technical classes which isonly good because i can occasionally get on the internet. we're learning how to write lesson plans and how to be teachers. i'm a
little overwhelmed right now, but hopefully everything works out ok.

My village is called Abat (a-VAT) and its pretty good sized. There
are little shops all over the place and i can get pretty much
everything i need there. i went with my host aunt a few days ago to a
"disco" which was more like a restaurant with a dj, but it was tons of
fun. the novelty of an american living in their village has yet to
wear off, so i'm like a talking monkey everywhere i go.

Thursday we get to go to almaty for the first time and see the
kazakh national symphony. i'm super jazzed.

How's everyone in the states? what's going on? how's michael jackson
NOT guilty? what's the deal with tom cruise and katy holmes?

No Worries, Everyone!

2005-06-07T16:04:00.000-04:00

Ok, I don't know how closely you all have been following the actions of the Peace Corps in Central Asia, but yesterday, the Peace Corps halted all operations in Uzbekistan yesterday. Here's a link to an article on the Peace Corps Website.
However, Kazakhstan is much more stable politically than its southern neighbor. So, I'll still be ok. So, in conclusion, I leave on Thursday, June 9. My next post will hopefully be from the 'Stan.

Here goes. . . .

2005-05-26T00:24:00.000-04:00

This is Kazakhstan

Ok. I can't promise that this will work out, but I'm going to record my Kazakhstani experiences for everyone to enjoy (and by everyone, I mean whoever reads this).

Since I'm not technically in Kazakhstan, I've got nothing to post right now. So. . . .there you go. . . . Umm. . . HEY! Look over there! A distraction!! *runs away*

HEHEHE!