Tears

Tears are an interesting cultural phenomenon, well, more specifically crying.
Weddings in Turkmenistan are huge, long affairs. They are usually at least four days of formal activities plus sometimes small family celebrations both before and after the actual wedding. On the final day of wedding there is a lunch at the bride’s family’s house. All of the women in the bride’s family gather around her and have a last meal. After the meal all of the very small children gather around the bride (who is wearing a velvet dress, probably 40 pounds of gold and ornamental jewelry and has her hair braided down to her waist using fake hair). The small girls cling to her like their life is dependent upon it and they place their heads in the brides lap and cry. The bride covers her face and she cries. It is symbolic of a time when your wedding meant a total removal from your family and the fact that you may never see them again.
The crying goes on for about 10 minutes until the women from the groom’s family arrive. They then pry the small girls one by one from the bride and shove them in the opposite direction. When the bride is by herself they lift her from the ground and lead her out the door to an awaiting vehicle. The vehicles bumper is covered with more small children – both boys and girls – who are also crying. The bride has her face covered this entire time with a small white cloth and is supposed to be crying.
The tears in probably 90% of weddings are fake. If the girl getting married loves the man she is about to marry it is all a show, however, I have seen real tears. You can tell because the atmosphere in the room with the bride is completely different. If there are fake tears everyone else in the room is joking around, laughing, and generally really happy. If the tears are real everyone is upset. Remember, the room with the bride is filled with all of the female members of her extended family and her friends. The weddings I’ve been to with real tears are girls who are getting married to a man they hardly know, or getting married quickly after finding out that their boyfriend married another girl.

Anecdotes

I got into a taxi to travel from Charjew back home. There were two passengers already sitting down, both men. I put my ipod headphones in my ears and lean back and relax. The man sitting in the back seat with me reaches across my legs and into the seatback pocket of the drivers’ seat. He pulls out a half empty bottle of vodka and proceeds to pour himself a shot. I rode the entire way back (over 2 hours) with this man’s pores leaking putrid stale vodka. Luckily he slept most of the way and wasn’t loud or obnoxious.
On one of my many trips back from Charjew we pass three tractors. They are all exactly the same, brand new, beautiful, and each and every one of them had a picture of the current president in the upper corner of the drivers’ side of the front window. A rather large picture – from where I was sitting I could not see the drivers of any of these tractors, just the presidents face and the body of a person sitting behind his head.
Last night I went guesting (a dinner visit with another family or friend) and the family I visited had the most quaint potholder. They had taken an old pair of jeans, ripped the back pockets off and tied them together with a very long string. Now, I’m not sure why they didn’t have just one, but I guess maybe having a set of two attached would be helpful for carrying big pots of things. They only thing I saw it used for was the teapot. Then they would use one pocket to hold the handle and the other pocket was held in the other hand.
On the road from Charjew home there was very suddenly some disturbance in front of us on the road. A police car with its siren blazing (something I have never heard here before) and a second one followed very closely behind. We pulled over to the side of the road and what should appear but eight boys on bicycles riding down the road. They were followed by an ambulance, a bus, three regular vehicles and an additional two police cars. The last police car was holding back the traffic behind to be sure they wouldn’t try and pass the boys on bikes.
Last night after eating dinner with my host family we were sitting down and watching some TV (Turkmen music videos) and a ‘commercial’ came on that was about this sports center – it looked like it had a ton of state of the art exercise equipment. I asked, “Where does that exist in this country?” and then answered myself, “just Ashgabat?”. My host family agreed with me and I asked, “why is it only available in the capitol and not everywhere?”. My host family said, “well, no one actually uses it so it doesn’t matter, all the people in this commercial are musicians – they all posed for this video”. I asked, “So, why even show it?”. Their reply was, “because the president paid for it and wants people to know he paid for it”.
This morning at work I came in to the clinic at the same time as this woman who was 36 or 37 weeks pregnant, who had a broken hand and a goiter the size of a baseball. Patients don’t visit my clinic all that often, so when they do I get really excited! My counterpart directed the patient to go with her nurse to get her hand checked out and gave her instructions for getting rid of the goiter. I can’t imagine how long she has been without iodine. Just goes to show the wonders of iodized salt. The free salt from the government isn’t iodized (at least not in Lebap – I’ve heard it is elsewhere).
The floor in my clinic, just outside my office is really weak! It was essentially wood laid down on piles of bricks that were randomly interspersed. So there are large areas of the floor that are unsupported. The wood has begun to rot and that leaves large patches of very weak floor. I am sitting in my office making sure my students are doing their work when a larger woman falls through the floor making a huge crash. It is probably a foot and a half between the wood floor and the subfloor. Quite dangerous. At least three children have fallen through in the past, but they are usually agile enough not to hurt themselves, a quick save. It is rather entertaining seeing a child who is only about three feet tall standing in a hole that goes up to their waist. The good news in all this is that my grant includes a remodel which means we will have a new floor! One that won’t allow people to fall through.

Visiting Turkmenistan

Post by Mom
It was great to see Kelsey and spend time in her village. We did alot in a short time. Thanks to other volunteers we had very successful programs. The people are great. Our guide was very informative and very helpful. He made a great video for Kelsey and copies for us and Kelsey host family.
It was fun to put names with faces and places. If anyone would like to visit Turkmenistan let us know. There is alot to see ruins of Alexander the Great. Dinosaur prints, Mountains, Desert.
Kelsey will need help when she returns home. We were getting dinner one of our last nights in capital she wouldn't take the first Taxi they wanted about $3.00 it was to much we did get a taxi and only paid $1.50 maybe, for all 4 of us. Yes it was a short distance and we walked back to the hotel after dinner. We also went to the largest market in the world, it is even on the list of 100 places to see. She told vendors way to much in Turkmen and clicked her tongue. It will be interesting for her to have set prices.
We could understand some conversations without knowing the language. It was great to see that Kelsey's community accepts her and likes the things she is doing. I know she will miss them when she returns home. I hope some day she will be able to have some of them come and visit in the US.
I felt like I had been tranported back to my childhood with all the families having farms or at least gardens. My grandmother would butcher a chicken every Sunday for dinner, I grew up on fresh cows milk and made butter. I do know I still like fresh veggies right from the garden.

Life in T-stan less stress but having grown up on a farm I would not say simple. Gardens and animals take work.

bureaucracy

Goal: to write a grant that is asking for money to remodel my office and turn it into a safe place for females to learn about their bodies, health, and to exercise.
Obstacles: Turkmen bureaucracy.
I started the process for this grant two months ago when, after our mid-service conference, my counterpart asked if we could create a room with the above goal. I got very excited and said that as long as she was willing to do a lot of work we absolutely could. Peace Corps has a program called SPA (small program assistance). It is in place to provide monetary support for small community driven projects and our goal was to get this room remodeled and then to provide lessons to the community on general health, healthy lifestyles and exercise classes.
The process has been slow in coming and to demonstrate the process I’m going to describe one small aspect of this process – getting the budget done for the remodel aspect.
Step 1: get a list of supplies needed to do the remodel. I had no idea where to start with this so I asked my counterpart to head it up. I told her we needed to find someone who could do the remodel and that they had to list everything they needed. EVERYTHING right down to the last nail or paintbrush. I asked her if she could let me know when this person arrives so I could be there in case anyone had any questions. Several days later I got a list written in pencil in really bad handwritten Turkmen with words I had no idea what they were. I spent several hours working through what they were (the grant had to be written completely in English) and then we went to the bazaar and attempted to find out the prices of these items. I discovered very quickly that this person had not included anything to redo the floor. The floor just outside of my room has huge holes in it. I have had three children fall through the floor – it is entertaining as they fall nearly two feet down to the subfloor.
Step 2: The grant will not pay for general labor, only specialized labor. Therefore, we had to find someone who would do this work for free. The person we had previously asked gave a very definitive no. (It turns out my counterpart had told him we were getting money from America and therefore he expected a huge amount of money for this remodel, he listed that labor alone was going to be about 3 times the going rate) I asked around to see what other volunteers have done to get over this obstacle and the easiest answer was to see if the etrap (local) hospital could provide someone from their staff to do the work. My counterpart called the etrap director and he said that would be a good idea. Success!
Step 3: Get new list of supplies needed from the new remodel workers. I asked my counterpart when we could expect the new list of supplies (including supplies for the floor). Her response was that the men who would be doing the work were really busy and the director said they couldn’t come look at the room until after we purchased the supplies. I tried not to get upset and went with the flow. We (my counterpart and I) would go to Halach (the location of the etrap hospital) and find new prices for the things the previous worker had listed and ask if anyone could give us guidance on a new floor. I have a decent understanding of Turkmen but the conversation about the floor was totally beyond my ability. We ended up settling on a floor that was totally premade. I had no idea how we would go about installing this floor but hoped that someone could help us figure this out. Our next stop was the hospital.
Step 4: Find construction worker and talk with them. The goal is to get a contract listing all of the supplies needed to complete the project, the number of weeks required to do the work and the total cost of all the supplies. We arrived at the hospital and went to the directors office. We were told he was busy and we would have to come back in 1.5 hours. We then went downstairs to what I believe was the accountant’s office. We asked him about a letter we had to get from the director regarding his support of the project and we asked him about the construction worker. He repeated what the director said earlier that this guy was too busy to come and look at the room but that he would try to get him to take a minute out of his busy schedule to come and talk with us. About 20 minutes later this very humble looking older man arrived, he wore very nice dress clothes (not the kind of clothes you would do construction work in). He listened to the accountant talk about the project and the fact that we needed a contract with all the above details. This man immediately replies that he can’t do any of that if he doesn’t see the room. (Finally! Someone with some common sense!). Following this is a long discussion about the quick response time required, problems with this proposed project, and many other things I barely understood. The end of the conversation was resolved with the goal of this man coming with my counterpart and I back to our village that very day and looking over the room and talking about the intended project. I am beginning to think this is going to work out.
Step 5: Drive from Halach to Guychbirleshik. Sounds fairly simple. I’m not sure I could have been more mistaken. This man had to get permission from no less than three different people to make the trip (even though we had been given permission from the director for the whole thing). Then we waited a half an hour for him to get his car. My counterpart began talking to me about various issues Turkmenistan has and about the tendency for people to require bribes for any small thing to get done and also the tendency for Turkmen to pocket any extra money they could get their hands on. This moved on to a conversation about the fact that the etrap hospital and the director responsible for all of the small clinics in the area doesn’t even provide blood pressure cuffs and stethoscopes to the doctors and nurses here. (Quick thanks to Judy Atkinson who was able to send 4 cuffs/stethoscope sets with my parents when they came! My co-workers were so incredibly thankful!) Nearly an hour and a half after we had decided on the necessity of the construction man coming to my village we finally arrived (the drive normally takes 20 minutes).
Step 6: Get new list of supplies and enter them into the budget. This step is still in the works. We did have a very productive conversation with the construction worker about what our priorities are and what we hoped to complete. He wrote down a bunch of measurements and told us he would get back to us on Monday with a list of supplies needed and hopefully their prices and the number of weeks it will take him and his team to do the work. Now I wait.

Kiek okara

“Does your milk have a smell?” the casual question my host mother posed to me this morning over breakfast. I, bewildered, replied that there wasn’t one I could detect. She and my host father then went on to expand upon the numerous numbers of smells that milk could and did have this time of year due to the things that the cows were eating in the desert. The prime offender was a plant called kiek okara. This is the third time I have heard the name of this desert dwelling plant.
The first time was several months ago at our mid service conference. The setting was very different. We were gathered listening to a panel of NGO’s in Turkmenistan. All of these NGO’s were based in Ashgabat. One of the NGO’s was a group called Kiek Okara – a word I had never heard before and wasn’t sure was Turkmen. I didn’t question the name at that time. The NGO focused on domestic violence support and prevention. It sounded like a great and unfortunately necessary group, however, as with the majority of the NGO’s we heard from that day had absolutely no programs or support outside of the capital.
The second time was during a trip that I took to the desert with my parents, sister, and host father. We parked near a well that was used by livestock wandering the desert and started wandering ourselves. My host father picked up a long dry round piece of wood and started to tell us about all of the medicinal properties for this particular plant. He also talked about how the plant stored water in the top and how it was shaped like a bowl and that the livestock would use it to drink from as they were wandering. Also the leaves from keik okara store large amounts of water and are therefore very nutritious.
From the very first time I learned about the desert, probably in 2nd grade, I knew that desert plants and animals had to adapt to their environment. This plant whenever I’ve seen it, living or a stump from the previous year, looks completely out of place. The grown version looks like a mini-palm tree in the desert. The fact that this NGO started to support women who are victims of domestic abuse used this totally out of place looking plant with healing powers, huge reserves of strength in the form of the water it stores in a very dry place, and an uncanny ability to adapt as their inspiration is something I found awe-inspiring and wanted to share with you.

Train Adventures

I wanted to share two experiences I had recently on the train. But first, a little about the trains. The cheapest way for me to get to Ashgabat is to take an overnight train. It costs about $5.50 to get a train from a village about 20 minutes to the north all the way to Ashgabat in a cupe (cabin with four beds). There is a cheaper ticket, but I have heard horror stories so as long as I have a choice I’ll pay the little extra to get a nicer place to stay. The trip from Ashgabat to Charjew or vice versa is about 12 hours. If you want to travel all the way to my village (well close to my village) it is about another 4 hours (this takes 2 by taxi).
Each cupe has four beds like I said before. Two are at the level that normal chairs would be and the other two are hung higher up on the ceiling. Under the two bottom stools there is storage room. And There is also storage on the top level at the end and between the upper beds (above the door to the cupe). Whenever traveling on the train you never know what kinds of cupe mates you will be assigned so whenever possible I try to travel with another volunteer so that I at least have someone sane and ‘normal’. The following are descriptions of two different trips that I’ve recently taken. Both trips I was accompanied by Jessie – a fellow volunteer. I believe both trips were from Ashgabat to Charjew.
Trip #1: The Plant Lady
Jessie and I were running late and I was worried we weren’t going to make it on time so we are running to the train. We get on and realize we are the first in our cupe. So, we arrange our things below our side of the bench and it takes up about half the room. Then we each grab books and our iPods and relax for the long trip.
We have barely gotten settled when a woman comes in with her arms filled with huge boxes that she has lashed together with rope to make handles. She sets them on the empty bench and disappears. Jessie and I look at one another, make that slightly suspicious/wondering face and return to our reading. Two minutes later she returns accompanied by a man (we learn later this is her father) and both of them are loaded with more boxes. The woman puts the boxes on the table we are supposed to use for dining and the man sets his down next to the ones already on the opposite bench. They both disappear again. Now half of the other bench is covered with these boxes and all of the dining table is covered. I glance at Jessie and give her an apprehensive look and we both return to our reading. The man and woman return with yet more boxes and again disappear. Now nearly all of the opposite bench is covered, the dining table, and part of one of the upper bunks. I look at Jessie and we start laughing. The woman and man return yet again with more boxes and disappear. Both of the opposite bunks are covered, the dining table and part of the floor. I begin to wonder if they are expecting to place themselves in this cupe as well as all of these boxes. The woman and man return one more time and now it is impossible for us to get out and for more than one of them to come into the cupe. All three beds are covered with boxes, the floor, the dining table and there is a box sitting outside the door. Our cabin mates begin to settle all of their boxes and the woman shows us what is inside them. They are all filled with plants. I have never seen plants for sale in T-stan – only seeds.
The man and woman fill the storage under their seat and the remaining half of ours as well as the storage overhead, two boxes end up under the dining table and another two boxes end up on top of it (we’ve all agreed that we’ve already eaten dinner and therefore don’t have a need for it). There are still a few remaining boxes. One ends up on the bed the woman is sleeping on and the other sits on the floor – severely limiting the space in our cabin. Jessie and I have been eyeing one another the entire time attempting not to break out in hysterical laughter. The woman and man both felt that this was a totally normal thing to travel with so many items that they overflow out of the storage containers and spill onto the floor and beds. The woman also stated – I would never put them into storage (I guess the trains have luggage compartments but I have no idea how one would use them) because she is responsible for the life of these plants and if someone treated them badly she would be out of money.
Overall it was an enjoyable, however bazaar, experience.
Trip #2 The Russians
Jessie and I were once again traveling together and arrived in the cabin to find it empty. We settled in, grabbed our books, but started talking instead of reading. We just finished with our Mid-service conference and felt the need to discuss it.
Several minutes later an older man and younger man entered our cabin. The older man smelled distinctly like vodka and cigarettes while the younger man was decently attractive and had rather large muscles.
We discovered very quickly that they were Russians. There are a fair number of Russians living in Turkmenistan – mostly in the cities. Most Russians living in Turkmenistan don’t know Turkmen because Turkmen became the national language after the country declared independence in 1991 and in the city you don’t NEED to know Turkmen. All restaurants and public services are offered in Russian (often only in Russian). Jessie and I silently breathed a sigh of relief as this meant we weren’t expected to interact with them because of the very difficult language barrier (we spoke almost no Russian).
Once they got settled the older man started trying to talk with us. He soon discovered what we had already determined. We spoke only Turkmen with tiny snippets of Russian while he and his son (we were able to figure this out) spoke only Russian with tiny bits of Turkmen. Normally this would prevent most people from making an effort to communicate (especially when communication is not strictly necessary) but not this man.
Given the language restrictions we learned that this man, his wife and four children lived in Charjew. The man worked in Ashgabat fairly regularly and the son was attending school in Ashgabat. The man is an animal lover and they have two dogs and several cats. We even were privileged to see a video of the mans’ family at a celebration attempting to include the dog in the toasts.
We also learned that his mother (or grandmother, not too sure) is a psychic/fortune teller. And, she passed on those traits to him – the son/grandson. At this point he pulls out two decks of tarot cards and proceeds to read my cards. Remember – we can’t communicate more than the most basic sentiments.
My reading: There will be two important men in my life. The first will be important but not the one I end up with forever. The second one, will have a farm, a good job, and he won’t be American. September is a very important month for me. There are at least 3 or 4 things that will happen to me during September. One of them involved one of those two men from above. I will have children – many of them. I am not allowed to become bored – as that will cause my mind to _____(this word was bad, but I have no idea what exactly he was saying, it was obvious this should not be allowed to happen).
The above was all I managed to understand in the 25 minute (or so) reading that he gave me.
You just never know what you might end up with when traveling by train.
Last year I took the train to get to Ashgabat to go on vacation and the man insisted that I had to call him when my family came to visit (in over a year). I had just met this man.
When I travel in a cabin that is all Americans the train directors (I’m sure they have a name but my English capabilities are declining rapidly) open our cabin every hour or so and bring spectators to stare at us. This happens even when we lock the cabin.

Top 10 reasons to live in Labop

1. Most verdant welayat in Turkmenistan.
2. Greatest access to water as a result of the Amu Dariya.
3. The regional capital is probably the only place in the world where the local dialect combines Turkmen, Uzbek and Russian. Volunteers (and some residents) have dubbed this unique language “charjewski”.
4. We have the best kBac. (a drink made of fermented bread)
5. We also have the best cocktails. (tiny portions of milkshakes that aren’t cold or made with ice cream)
6. Koyten Dag/Dinosaur footprints (beautiful national park with waterfalls, caves, and fossilized dinosaur footprints)!!!!!
7. Most awesome volunteer living quarters with the most educated, most married, and most gay volunteers in the straightest line.
8. Most liberal welayate with the most liberal people like my host father who said when discussing world travel, “people must travel if they can, they need to meet more people because, afterall, we are all just people”. We also supposedly have the only free radio in the country. Supposedly, because we can’t confirm its existence as we are not allowed to talk or meet with its producers.
9. We know how to party – every gathering is guaranteed to discuss public radio (specifically This American Life), AI, and the paper game (don’t ask).
10. We don’t have stinky camels or çal (fermented camel’s milk)!

16 months and counting

Today is February 4th. I have been in Turkmenistan for 16 months and counting. I have somewhere between 9 and 10 months left of service. Last week all of the volunteers were in Ashgabat for our ‘mid-service conference’. It is hard to believe that I’m already well over half done. I thought that instead of having a theme to my post today I would take some quotes from things I’ve been reading lately and comment on them and why they have spoken to me.
“And we shouldn’t be here at all, if we’d known more about it before we started. But I suppose it’s often that way. The brave things in the old tales and songs, Mr. Frodo: adventures, as I used to call them. I used to think that they were things the wonderful folk of the stories went out and looked for, because they wanted them, because they were exciting and life was a bit dull, a kind of sport, as you might say. But that’s not the way of it with the tales that really mattered, or the ones that stay in the mind. Folks seem to have been just landed in them, usually – their paths were laid that way, as you put it. But I expect they had lots of chances, like us, of turning back, only they didn’t. And if they had, we shouldn’t know, because they’d have been forgotten. We hear about those as just went on – and not all to a good end, mind you; at least not to what folk inside a story and not outside it call a good end. You know, coming home, and finding things all right, though not quite the same – like old Mr. Bilbo. But those aren’t always the best tales to hear, though they may be the best tales to get landed in! I wonder what sort of a tale we’ve fallen into?” Lord of the Rings The Two Towers p 321
I haven’t read LOTR in such a long time that I decided it would be great to re-read them. When I read this part I thought how wonderfully true it was. If I had known everything Peace Corps entailed before arriving in Turkmenistan, I’m not 100% sure I would still have done it. However, having said that, I also am so incredibly happy that I made that leap. This experience has been more than I ever would have thought and I will forever be different as a result of being here and experiencing this place.
“Everyone thinks of changing the world, but nobody thinks of changing himself.” Tolstoy
This isn’t actually from a book, because I have not (yet) read Tolstoy. I feel like this is very true of myself right now. I plan on returning back to the states to get further training to do the kind of work I feel I need to. Specifically I will be getting either an MPH/MD or an MPH/MSN degree. I then plan to work internationally on public health.
“It’s good to meet new people [and travel to new places], we are, after all, all just people” Begglych – my Turkmen host father, translated by myself
My new host family has been truly amazing I could not be happier with them and this quote embodies so much of what I love about them. My host father said this during a long conversation Jessica, Jessie (two other PCV’s) and I had with him about three weeks after moving in. I have never heard another Turkmen talk about anything remotely like this. And the fact that my host father believes that all people are equal is a sentiment that nearly brought me to tears. I am so thankful to be here and living with this family.
“All people have to lead good, wholesome lives. It doesn’t matter if you are a Muslim, a Christian, or a Bhuddist. Live a good life and you will be a good person.” Begglych – my Turkmen host father, translated by myself
Again, my host family is very welcoming and I think that one of the great benefits of Peace Corps is this ability to meet people who are so different from you and have so many new and different experiences. I am so happy that my host family has taken the diversity they have come into contact with and incorporated that into their worldview. I think this is one of the first steps towards a happier, more understanding, peaceful and loving world.
“It was very important to Paul to witness things,” Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder p98
Mountains Beyond Mountains is an amazing book about a man named Paul Farmer who started a non-profit called Partners in Health. The work that he does is truly amazing and if I had his personality I would strive to become Paul Farmer. I do not think it would be possible, but the book about him speaks volumes to many of the problems with international public health. I also feel the need to witness things. I find it makes me a more compassionate person.
Society during the Stalin era left open no real opportunities for self-realization or self-expression except within this perverted system of the Communist Party. Lenin’s Tomb by David Remnick p 171
Lenin’s Tomb is a discussion of the fall of the Soviet Union and life in the Soviet Union and former-Soviet countries. I would never have read it before coming to Turkmenistan. A lot of cultural, social, and economic practices in Turkmenistan make a lot more sense after some of the things I’ve read in Lenin’s Tomb. Self-expression (and to some extent self-realization) is something I’ve been really working on with the students in my clubs and my kindergarten students.
“Lives of service depend on lives of support” Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder p 108
I wanted to end with this quote because I can’t express my appreciation for all of you in any adequate way. The letters, packages, prayers and thoughts have made this experience and the past 16 months a very enriching experience. Thank you so very much!