Pickles and Leaving Herrikgala

Pickles, Pickled and more!
I enjoy a good pickle as much as the next person, in fact when I was little I loved pickles so much I screamed for a good 20 minutes until I received said pickle. (The tantrum may have had more to do with the fact that my mom didn’t understand what I wanted rather than unwillingness to provide me with a pickle. I called ‘pickles’ ‘buckles’ which caused much confusion) In Türkmenistan there is an abundance of pickles and for that matter pickled substances. I am sure most of you have had pickled cucumbers and many people may have experienced pickled cabbage (more commonly referred to as sour kraut). But have you had the pleasure of pickled tomatoes? This is a treat in which one doesn’t eat the outside skin and instead bites a small hole at one end and sucks or slurps the pickled inside guts of the tomato out of. What about pickled eggplant stuffed with strange spices? Again you don’t generally eat the skin of the eggplant and I personally avoid the filling as it tastes like eating a strange concoction of spices from the container. But the inside guts of the eggplant do provide a nice treat. Have you had the pleasure of munching on pickled carrots? Here we enjoy it as a side salad for many meals. What about pickled garlic? This one is totally exciting! The pungent garlic taste has disappeared leaving you with a mellow hint of garlic and all the pleasures of toxic breath for the remainder of the day. I have also had the pleasure of eating pickled peppers (both green and hot).
Regardless of how much I enjoy all of the above on occasion there is one pickled treat I cannot seem to get enough of: pickled heat (this name is entirely my own creation made up on the spot and is in no way representative of the actual name of this treat). This side salad/condiment consists of carrots, tomatoes, garlic, onion, and red peppers that are medium spice. This is made into some sort of a mush and then pickled. It is absolutely amazing!
So, the moral of the story is that although I can’t seem to eat a whole lot of most Turkmen foods I am consuming a lot of pickled foods and hopefully I will learn how to pickle and could bring back a sweet hobby when I return to the states!
Last night in Herrikgala…
I don’t have too many thoughts on my last evening in Herrikgala (technically my second to last day of training). I am mostly really excited to get to site and to get through all of the goodbyes that I have ahead of me. I have given my gifts and said a lot of my goodbyes but I will probably be seeing a lot of the people (host family members and training counterparts) I’ve already said goodbye to on Friday for our swearing in. And then I’ll have to say goodbye to my fellow trainees in Herrikgala. It has been a series of ups and downs and the five other people in my village have been instrumental in my survival from day to day.
Once I arrive at site we will have a 3 or 4 day holiday. I’m still trying to figure out what the holiday is and why we have it but I have heard it involves swinging in these super dangerous swings to symbolically shake off the bad…I think. I have a koýnek (Turkmen dress) waiting for me. Which will be exciting, I just hope that it isn’t too ugly…there are many koýneks that are rather unfortunate looking. On the other hand there are a lot of koýneks that are beautiful! We will see which mine is. If I like the seamstress I’ll have her make another one for me out of the fabric I already have. She could also put darts in the other koýnek I got for free from the Peace Corps Office from some other volunteer who was leaving.