More pictures

Father Mother Nephew in our home

Carpets

Carpets here all all sizes and cover most of the floors in homes. They are also what most sleep on. Checking into what it might cost me to bring a carpet back home of maybe settle for a small carpet that will count a one of my bags when I return.

Kelsey and her teachers making carpets

I want to ride my bicycle

Back home during the summer my family has spent a fair number of hours biking the mountain biking trails for the past few summers. I really enjoy this pastime. In a lot of ways I miss the workout that really doesn’t feel like a workout because it is too much fun.
When I arrived at site I observed the large number of women riding bicycles and was very excited to be able to ride a bike myself. The price of bikes here is fairly steep for a Peace Corps salary. I could get one if I didn’t spend practically any other money during a month and I plan to save up for one or purchase one off another volunteer when they leave in a year.
I found out a few weeks ago that my family has a few bikes that they use to get around on occasion and I’m constantly asked if I know how to ride a bicycle. I reply, of course I know how to ride a bike. Today I rode my first bike since arriving in the country. All of the women here ride with skirts, I’ve never ridden with one so I chose to go with my sweat pants (especially since I already had them on). I approached the bicycle and was informed there were no brakes (I didn’t actually know the word for brakes but my brother did a good job of acting it out and pointing).
I have never ridden a bicycle without the brakes and while mountain biking I rely on them to reduce the number of times I crash. The roads here aren’t exactly mountain biking trails but they are not paved sidewalks or roads either. There are huge potholes, cars, motorcycles, large puddles of water, deep ruts, holes, small hills, etc. They are dirt/mud roads that are never maintained.
Given all this I did manage to go a ways, turn around, and return home and get the satisfactory rating of “gowy” or “good”. My family approves my bike riding skills. That doesn’t mean I didn’t get a little freaked out when I reached to hit the brakes and they weren’t there. So, instead I crashed into a fence (this was before my jaunt while I was riding in our backyard).

The Joy of Kervan

The joy of Kervan (aka the joy of children)
For those of you who don’t know one of the members of my host family is a little boy who is 9 months and one week old. He is my host nephew. The people who live in my house are my parents, one of my brothers, a sister – in – law (who isn’t married to the brother living at home but a different brother who lives two hours away) and Kervan. Kervan literally means caravan. I keep meaning to ask my family why they named him that but as of now don’t have the answer.
I have spent my fair share of time with children. While growing up I earned a living by doing copious amounts of babysitting, I’ve taught Sunday school lessons, school aged children, and have a number of cousins who were at one point very small. I have not, however, spent a large amount of time watching the development of one child. I have been living with my host family for the past two months and a week and have had the opportunity to watch Kervan change dramatically in the past few months.
He is, as many other little boys are, very active. Dilber, his mother and my sister – in – law, asked me a few weeks ago if he was a good boy. I replied that he is very curious and always happy, so yes, he is a good boy. She said, but he’s always dirty, he gets into so many things that he shouldn’t.
Kervan began attempting to walk several weeks ago. I don’t know exactly when the transition from not walking to walking happens, but I think he is currently somewhere in the middle. The first step was being able to pull himself up. In Turkmenistan that step proved somewhat difficult as there really isn’t anything to pull oneself up onto. There is very little furniture and therefore human beings became his playground. My favorite is when Kervan sneaks up behind you, uses his arms on your back to kneel and then pushes at your back until he finally is standing upright. It is rather challenging to prevent him from falling backwards when he is behind you.
Turkmen have a small celebration when children begin to walk. I had the opportunity to take pictures and some video for this celebration for Kervan. The general idea is to have him walk and then roll several rounds of çorek shaped similar to tires on either side of him. Then you congratulate him (Kervan) on his ability to walk. My favorite part of this celebration was the noise coming out of his mouth. It was some combination between a screech, yell, howl, and grunt. I believe I managed to catch this noise with my camera in a short video. If I (or my family at home) can figure out how to post video it will appear here at some point.
When I first arrived Kervan would find pleasure in staring at me. This is because I have glasses. There are very few ophthalmologists in Turkmenistan and therefore very few people get their eyes checked – ever. As a result the only people who ever have glasses are usually doctors and a few older members of the community who read. My glasses were a source of initial fear (doctors give shots) and now they are a source of entertainment. Kervan finds extreme pleasure in attempting to touch my glasses. He hasn’t had the opportunity yet because I’ve seen what he does with things that he finds fascinating (he pounds them into the ground and into other things). I’ve seen my father’s glasses broken, a ceramic tea pot, and numerous small toys.
Now, don’t get me wrong, he is not always a perfect laughing, bubbly, curious child. He does cry, make large messes, and today I had the pleasure of watching him throw up a large amount of milk (those of you who know my reaction to vomit know this was not a pleasant experience for me). Most Turkmen call all children haýwan (animal) or maýmyn (monkey) whenever they do something that isn’t in good behavior. Kervan gets called haýwan almost as much as he gets called Kervan.
When I found out I was going to be living with another small child (my training family had a baby a week after I arrived) I was disappointed. Children are fine, but they tend to cry and get into things they’re not supposed to, and generally make trouble. Whereas a girl aged 15 – 21ish who is unmarried (a sister) could be a great source of joy and entertainment. I didn’t get a sister but I did get a sister – in – law who is fantastic and I got her beautiful son. I am very happy how everything has worked out. I wake up every day and have a constant source of joy. I simply need to look into Kervan’s eyes, see him smile or laugh at me, and I’m all set. My only hope is that I will eventually be trusted to take care of him and not to screw up! I’ve already let him fall over when he bumped his head and I’ve given him the crust of the bread which he can’t chew. But just a little over a half hour ago he crawled into my bedroom unaccompanied sat down on my floor and watched me clean my room. Then I sat down and gave him the three toys I have in my room that are exciting (a stuffed lion that my family sent which will be his when he turns one, a plastic coca-cola bottle that I use to store clean water, and a jiff peanut butter jar filled with permanent markers that sounds very similar to a rattle). There we played until Dilber came to take him away.
I’m sure to those of you with children this is not anything new, but for those of you who don’t have children this post may be of particular interest. Everything is new and shiny through the eyes of a child. I’ll be sure to keep you posted on any new/fun changes in Kervan’s life.
As always I hope you are healthy, happy and that you find peace.

Wednesday

I love Wednesdays!
And today was no exception (1/21/09)! I begin every Wednesday with my weekly trip to the kindergarten. If you haven’t already heard this is one of the highlights of my week. There are several reasons for this. Firstly; it is the only real Peace Corps Health related activity that I have right now. Secondly; I get to see around 75 children ages 3 – 6 who are generally well behaved and are gradually getting more and more used to me. Today on my way to the kindergarten (a half hour walk away) someone said hi to me before I said hi to them – progress! When I arrived at the K-garten I went to my first classroom (4 – 5 year olds) and the teacher who is my father’s sister was there. She is wonderful! As I was walking into the classroom a particularly cute little girl sees me and runs to give me a hug. She is one of the most enthusiastic children in this classroom and it immediately brightens my day. I teach my lesson which includes “head, shoulders, knees and toes” then a short lesson on why fruits and vegetables are important to us. I’m in the middle of a very long nutrition theme at the moment. The children then all draw pictures of their favorite fruit or vegetable. Then they all gave them to me. So, in addition to the few that will make it up on my wall I’ll probably be sending some home in letters in the future. Then I move onto the 5 – 6’s. Each classroom has a special place in my heart but this classroom is special because these students usually understand my message better than the other two classes, and they really get into any games or songs we do. They sing along, loudly, to “head, shoulders, knees and toes” and at the end of the lesson I tried fruit basket mix up, it was entertaining! Then I moved onto the 3 – 4’s. I’m still working on this classroom, several of the children are scared of me in this classroom. They do the motions for the song but only one child actually sings it with me. At the end of their lesson I also had them draw pictures of their favorite fruit and while some children understood the concept others weren’t quite there yet. Today was my third week at the kindergarten and each and every week after I’m done the cooks in the kitchen have boiled pumpkin ready for me to eat. They know I don’t eat meat and that I really like pumpkin (this is Turkmen pumpkin and it is slightly different than what we have back home). So, I sat in the kitchen talking with the cooks while eating my pumpkin. I left to walk home. After the enjoyable walk I arrived home to the smells of one of the most surprising meals I’ve had while here. Even though I had already eaten almost an entire meal at the kindergarten I ate some of the foil dinner. I then retreated to my room to take a nap because I knew I was going to help get ready for a birthday toý this evening and I would need as much patience and brain energy as possible. I awoke and my parents, who were sitting outside in the beautiful weather, said that I should go over to Aysoltan’s (my counterpart) to help prepare for the toý. This particular toý was a birthday party for my counterpart’s one year old granddaughter, Enejaň. (Translation of this name is mother dear. A lot of times when someone dies the next child born in that family receives this name or the male equivalen Atajaň or Babajaň, the children also receive a second name that is used more informally I believe Enejaň’s is Lila or something similar to that). I put on my toý koýnek (party dress) and walked the two doors down to help prepare for the toý. I basically placed a bunch of different kinds of salads on various plates and then brought those plates to one of the five different rooms where food was set up. During this process I, naturally, tasted the food as I went along. There were four different kinds of salad. The first was a beat and mayonnaise salad. The second was a cabbage, dill, pickle, garlic, salt, and mayonnaise salad. The third was basically a potato salad containing potatoes, carrots (baked), pickles, peas, and mayonnaise. And finally, my favorite, the bread salad which has peas, spinach, little pieces of bread (kind of like stuffing sized bread), cheese and mayonnaise. Then we put compote (homemade pickled juice) into bowls. There was erikli (apricot), almaly (apple), pomidorli (tomato), and another fruit whose name I can’t seem to recall in either English or Turkmen. I was then taken to one of the five rooms which was where I was supposed to eat. I sat and relaxed while people arrived. This toý was particularily exciting because I knew a lot of the people who came to it. Several of the doctors and nurses came and I was able to talk with them. Several of my sister-in-law’s siblings as well as friends of my family who I had previously met were all in attendance. This makes talking a lot easier. They all know about where my level of Turkmen is. We have some history together which makes talking much easier and they all like me, I hope! The pinnacle of the evening was when Enajaň received her gifts. I was the evening’s photographer because I was the only person with a real camera. There were two other people taking pictures (or video) on their cell phones. The present giving was essentially Enejaň and her mother sitting on a sheet in the middle of a room with probably 50 other people crowding in trying to give their presents, most of which were 10,000 manat bills which they stuffed into her clothes. She was obliged to try on everything she received which was just about enough to make a person cry. It certainly was enough for Enejaň. When my watch finally read sometime after 9pm Dilber (sister-in-law) asked if I wanted to go home. I was most certainly ready to retreat so I said my farewells and went outside planning to walk home alone and found my brother who escorted me home (the whole two houses over). We talked about the toý and he mentioned that he doesn’t like a lot of people. I mentioned how we had that in common. The evening is winding down and on the way back from my nightly trip to the bathroom I looked up into the sky to see the beautiful sky filled with bright stars. I truly love being so far from main cities at night. It makes the sky so much brighter and more beautiful. Today was a beautiful day!

Thoughts Jan. 12

Sorry for the mixed up order of my blogs

I thought I should write another blog, even though many of you may not read this until several weeks to months after I write this. It helps to write down my thoughts and share them with you even if I don’t get this posted for a whileJ. I was just composing a few emails and thinking about my time here thus far and I thought I should share some of my thoughts with you. I have had a lot of time to read while I’ve been here. At this point (January 12, 2009) I have finished 19 books totaling over 6,000 pages. I am also currently in the middle (or somewhere) of seven other books. Those 19 books span the various genres. Through that reading I’ve gained insight, had a laugh or two, cried, and overall enjoyed the momentary escape from reality. However, some books forced me back to my reality through their words and passages. I thought I might share some of those excerpts that I found particularly influencing in case any of you are having similar thoughts or experiences. One of the books I read was an anthology of medical literature. It was overall an enjoyable book, one that I had purchased probably a year before I left and had every intention of reading but never got around to doing it. Each individual story, poem, or essay had a point to make but I think it was the last essay that I enjoyed the most. Perhaps it was because the book was finally over (I get this strange thrill out of finishing a book and I started this one when I arrived in T-stan so it was especially exciting), perhaps it was because it was relatively short or perhaps it echoed what I was thinking about at the time. It was a ‘gentle reflection’ by David Loxtercamp entitled “Facing our Mortality: The virtue of a common life”. He wrote several things that I believe are quote worthy, “We [doctors, nurses] are relief workers in a refugee camp, supplied with an insufficient stockpile of loyalty, friendship, and love. It is ordinary human relationship we engage in, no matter how much is made of the gap in power or degree of intimacy” He went on to discuss community in a hospital setting and how he felt it was lacking, but had this to say about community, “The purpose of community (because, in an affluent age, we no longer need it for physical survival) is to remind us who we are. This message is refreshed every Saturday morning at public market, along the Fourth of July parade route, at yard sales, benefit suppers, community plays, and YMCA runs”. I believe, Loxtercamp was chastising doctors for their disconnectedness as many of the authors in the book I read did. He also noted that, “It is a shame, really, that doctors spend so little time in the communities where they practice. If we did, we might come to see our patients from a different angel, as real people on equal terms, capable of returning more than they receive”. This, naturally, made me happy because this is one of the prides of being a PCV. Finally, he noted, “If there are any heroes or saints left in the world, they are each of us at our best, responding to the worst that the world imposes. Like a photo mosaic, our lives create the ethereal outline of virtue. But it is in the individual faces, or parts thereof, that virtue becomes most worthy of emulation”.
One of the seven current books I’m working on is entitled Soul Cravings by Erwin Raphael McManus and was sent to me by my pastor from back home. His book is split into three sections and the section that I chose to begin with is entitled destiny. In one of his entries he writes, “All of us are called to a place we have not been. Our lives were always intended to be journeys into the unknown. The invitation is both personal and mystical. No one else may fully understand what you are being called to. You may not even fully understand. The path you must walk may appear to others as strange or unreasonable, but you know there’s more going on than meets the eye.” I do believe this sums up the beginning of my Peace Corps experience more succinctly that I could have.
In case you are really interested in the other books I’m working on reading they are: African Nights by Kuki Gallmann, Yoga 28 Day Exercise Plan by Richard Hittleman, At Play in the Fields of the Lord by Peter Mattheissen, Great American Short Stories from Hawthorne to Hemmingway Edited by Corinne Demas, The Spirit Catches You And You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman, and The Beach by Alex Garland. They are all good in their own ways and I’m reading each to fulfill a different reason. I just finished a romance novel in which the main character was an avid reader and had a book for every occasion – her breakfast book, her lunch book, dinner book, her relaxing book, her soak in the tub book, her night book, etc. I like to think I have something similar.
As always I’m sending you peace and love. I hope all is well with you and you are happy and healthy. Keep the letters/emails/packages coming and I look forward to hearing from you!

I did it!

I did it!
Did what? Well, I crossed off another one of the bazaar things that I have wanted to do since I’ve gotten here. The list keeps growing but it includes things like make çorek (Turkmen bread) start to finish, learn to can things, garden our HUGE backyard, milk the cows, etc. One of those things was to make peanut butter from scratch. It is that item that I have officially crossed off my list. The story for the motivation behind the peanut butter is not short. It begins with a fellow PCV, a T-15 who is extending (this means she has already done two years and is starting her third year as we speak). Her name is Adrienne. Adrienne has done a lot of things over her two years in country and one of those things was having a girls’ club in which they participated in all sorts of activities including milking goats and making cheese out of those goats and, naturally, making peanut butter from scratch. This got me excited because as an avid peanut butter fan living in a country that does not have peanut butter is a challenging proposition. I slyly inquired how one might go about making said peanut butter and her reply was something along the lines of buy a bunch of peanuts, take off the silly brown casing (peanuts here come pre-shelled but with that dark brown covering), grind them really small and add salt and oil. I think, that doesn’t sound too hard I just need to get a grinder. I contemplated buying Adrienne’s when she leaves but that leaves me at the mercy of friends and family for my peanut butter needs for another entire year.
One week ago I found out, or realized, that my family has a grinder. I was elated! I made this realization after eating something very similar to foil dinners on several occasions. These dinners included ground beef along with the normal foil dinner ingredients. Now I had all of the necessary items (once I bought peanuts) but I needed some motivation…
I have been spending one morning a week at the kindergarten in town and we are currently doing nutrition. I have had brilliant ideas for the previous three weeks and this week we are covering the meat and protein group. I suggest you try to come up with a good idea to keep 3 – 6 year olds enthralled with meat for a half an hour, especially when you, as the educator, don’t like meat or talking about it for that matter. I thought about it for a while and thought, hey, maybe kids would like it if I made food for them. And I love to bake, so perhaps I could make some sort of baked good. But then we run into how a person is going to link baked goods to meat. I don’t bake with meat and even if I did I have no idea what I would make. Here comes my motivation for peanut butter…peanut butter cookies!!! I know…it is a stretch, but I’ll make it work (the lesson is tomorrow morning).
Now we return to the making of the peanut butter. I walk to the dukan (store) and buy a kilo of peanuts because I figure the container that my parents sent me fits 2 pounds 8 ounces of peanut butter and since it is empty it needs filling up. Once I’ve purchased the peanuts I settle onto a cushion on the floor with my bag of peanuts with the annoying casings, a ziploc bag for the good peanuts, and my garbage bin to throw all the brown casings and I pop in a movie (The Prestige). I finish the movie and look at my progress…hmm…well I thought I had done a lot of peanuts! I opt to put in another movie (The Bee Movie). Cute movie…well this is going to take longer than I had anticipated. I continue putting movies in and watching them while shelling peanuts and before I know it I’ve seen Eastern Promises, Babel, The Last King of Scotland, Capote and Enchanted. At this point I know I’m in trouble it took me 7 movies to get rid of the stupid brown casings on 1 kilo of peanuts and I want to make peanut butter cookies out of this which will involve using at least half of it during the making. Why did I have to get myself into this? Onto the next phase – the grinding, I take all of my peanuts to the kitchen along with my oil and set up the grinder and begin to grind. I quickly discover that the grinder doesn’t want to stay put. Although even with that obstacle this task took a mere 30 minutes (and that included a twice through on the grinder). The result is a fine paste of peanuts. I am adequately satisfied but now comes the guessing aspect. How much salt do I put in and how much oil? I know the consistency I want so I simply add small amounts of salt and oil and then stir and taste. The answer – a little salt and a lot of oil (well maybe a half cup or so, maybe a cup). The final part of this horror project will take place tonight when I make cookies for 75 children their 5 or so teachers and the 10 or so other workers at the kindergarten. That is 90 cookies, let alone the ones I’m obliged to make for my family any time I bake and if I want to have any for myself I’d better first make some for my coworkers at the clinic. We have a weekly English meeting on Thursday that I should probably bring some to. My guess is I’ll end up making 90 small cookies (very small) and then another 50 – 60 for everyone else. 150 cookies, no sweat…well maybe not much but there will certainly be no sleep! It is already 6:17pm and I have to wait to make the cookies until after we eat dinner which won’t be for another hour or so. I also HAVE to take a shower tonight. Don’t ask how long it has been, you really don’t want to know, it may scare you! Take care! As a final thought I’ve included my ‘to do in Turkmenistan’ list as it currently stands below. Enjoy!
Learn to pickleMilk the cows on my ownBe trusted with Kervan for more than 5 minutesMake a real friendMake Peanut Butter from scratchMake butter/Yogurt/Sour Cream/Cheese from scratchFarm/GardenRide a camelRide a donkeyBe able to understand a conversation during mhykmanning (guesting)Go to 75 toý’s (parties – I’m already at 12)Make an artistic masterpieceMake çorek start to finish (bread)Watch the tamdyr being made (tamdyr is the oven that bread is made in)Learn to make Turkmen carpets!

Funeral

We entered the house and it was incredibly silent even though it was filled to the brim with women. In the four rooms that I could see there were over 100 people. We walked through the first room and into a second where we placed our gifts (food, çaý, and in my case homemade peanut butter cookies – see blog I did it!!!) and shook hands with each of the women. They were, from what I could tell, the elders of the family. We gave each the standard greeting, ‘daýomy?’ literally - are you strong?, then we took our place along one of the walls and sat for a little while, there was a spread of food out but no one seemed to touch it. We sat in silence for a time and did a lot of praying. One of the elder women would say a prayer and everyone would cup their hands at their waist or chest and then when the prayer is over you take your hands and swipe them over your face as if your hands were filled with water and you are splashing it onto your face. Cutting through the silence was a startling, painful wail. It was much worse than hearing someone cry, even crying uncontrollably. The wail was filled with pain and anguish and intense hurt and sadness. Several of the women in the room I was in began to tear up and cry silently (this included me). Slowly, people began to exchange greetings and give condolences. Some food was brought out in bowls and people nibbled at it politely and after about five to ten minutes we left. We then went into a second hidden room that appeared to hold the immediate family. My director was in this room. I gave her a hug and shook everyone else’s hands. We sat down and declined the offerings of çaý and food out of what I believe was politeness. We sat in this room for another ten minutes or so and then stood up to leave. We walked back out the main room through 20 – 30 people. We then walked to another house, again filled with women, sat in another room after shaking hands with all the women who were sitting around the outside, we sat, exchanged greetings, prayed, ate a little bit, and someone gave me a gift of crackers (these are normally set out when you have guests over for çaý). I tried to casually leave them behind but one of the doctors told me I had forgotten them. I can’t really figure out why I got a gift, but this is not the first time this has happened. We spent another 10 minutes at this second house and then returned to walk home. On the way in and out I saw large gatherings of men. There were men coming and going from one of the houses and several large gatherings of men standing around the area where the women normally cook. It appeared that they were tending the steaming containers of food, if this was indeed the case this is a task not often done by men.
The lead up to the visitation is as follows. Today was the absolute right day to look as Turkmen as I could, I dressed the part and I didn’t even know what I was getting into. Last night Dilber (sister-in-law) suggested that I wear my new Turkmen vest with my one and only (not for much longer) Turkmen koýnek (dress). I have my weekly English lesson with the doctors and nurses on Thursdays (today) and she thought they would like it. They really did! Everyone’s face lit up as soon as they saw me. It was great! I felt silly, but sometimes you just have to. Shortly before our lesson began the doctors informed me that the head doctor, Jemagül, just had a death in the family (I believe it was a sibling but I’m not entirely sure). They said they were going to visit her after our lesson and asked if I would like to accompany them. I said yes. This is where I was very, very glad that I wore my Turkmen clothing. The lesson ends and we wait for a little while. I am asked if I have my hat with me because I need to have my head covered when we go and I run home to grab it. When I arrive at home I decided that it would be better if I was wearing a scarf rather than my crocheted hat. I opted for my one scarf. It is bright purple with crazy flowers on it – very Turkmen. I returned to the clinic with my head scarf looking incredibly Turkmen. I took pictures which I will hopefully get posted soon.
Looking back on it, I think that funeral rituals are very telling of a culture’s priorities. The number of people who were in Jemagül’s home and three or four surrounding homes was simply inspiring. There were so many people. The support of this small community was immense. On the way to and from the visitation everyone we passed seemed to be going to or coming from the house. My family knew about it and we live on the opposite side of town. In America community support in many places is, in my opinion, severely lacking. Americans go about their daily business and many times don’t connect with a single person outside of their home. I find, the more I travel, that much of the world finds this concept foreign. Most of the rest of the world embraces community and thrives with the support of community. While there are some communities that exist in the states they are usually far and few.