Saturday - June 6
Dear Elisabeth,
I miss you a lot. I'm sorry I haven't written or emailed you yet. I'm actually ashamed that I haven't so much as Facebooked you since I got here. But truth be told, it's difficult to be in contact with home while I'm here. Every minute I spend in this internet cafe feels like a minute of my summer that I'm cheating myself out of. I'm worried about spending too much time in my own little world, rather than becoming a part of this one. It's a little lonely here from time to time, since I haven't been able to build up much of a social life yet. These things take time. And in the meantime I hang out around the house reading or writing an awful lot, mostly coz I'm not sure what else to do with myself.
I wonder right now what you are up to. Surely, as sweet and popular you are everywhere you go, you're not struggling to keep busy? I bet you're having a really good summer so far. I wonder if you're with your family in Trophy Club still. If so, I imagine you spending time with your Mom and Dad, babysitting the kids for David and Deanna, or perhaps catching up with Terry or Jenelle or Bethany, or one of your other many friends. Did Kacie's wedding turn out okay? I'm sure your mom did an excellent job on the bride's maids' dresses for you and Bethany, and that you looked stunning.
Or maybe you are back in Columbia already? Perhaps right now you are beginning new classes, or finishing up your Philosophy course. I myself thought about registering for an Economics class at the American University of Central Asia in Bishkek, but it never quite worked out. Jeff, one of the guys at MK International, mentioned the idea to me, and honestly, I would have been glad for a chance to spend more time with him. Jeff is very good looking, and his English and knowledge of American culture is better than anybody I've met here -- which makes him a prime candidate for my summer crush.
But alas, the Economics thing fell through. I wouldn't have known where to begin with registering on my own, let alone figuring out how to buy my books and get to and from class every day. That seems to happen to me a lot here, where someone will propose a good idea, I will agree, and it never happens because either the other person forgets to follow through, or I'm just too shy to remind them to help me. And of course I don't know how to do anything on my own. So lately I feel kind of helpless; I sort of just wait for things to happen to me (which they always do, sooner or later).
It's not so bad though. I suppose surrendering some of my own self-confidence and sense of independance was all part of the trade off. After all, I get to see and do and experience things here that I would never have the opportunity to do otherwise. And all in good time, I'm sure I will learn how to use the bus, how to use the phone, and how to make plans to do things with friends. Until then I just pass the time by strolling, reading, and talking to people when I can.
You're on my mind dear. If there is any one person I want to have with me here, anyone on the whole planet, it would be you. I think of you often and I hope you are well. I love you and I'll call as soon as I can.
Sunday - June 7
There is a man who lives on the street in front of my building. He sleeps in the grass by the road, behind a hedge that I suppose shields him from sight at ground-level. But I see him every morning and every night when I sit at the window. I wonder who he is and what's his story. In my mind, his name is Ringo.
Tonight as I watched people walking below me on the sidewalk I noticed a man going by on a walker. He couldn't have been too much older than me, and judging from his irregular walk I think he must have some nerve disease. I saw him looking up at me and I waved from my window, which he responded to by waving back and blowing me a kiss. It made me smile. I dearly hope that one day I might live in a city, with an apartment high above the street where I can sit at the window every day and watch as people pass. Perhaps then I will also name people that I recognize, assigning them lives and personalities that I've invented. This is not a bad way to live.
Monday - June 8
Today I kept daydreaming about going home, and forevor remembering these two weeks as just an exciting, short-lived vacation. Unlike last time, these feelings did not stem from a sense of lonliness, but rather a continued frustration that I still don't know how to take care of myself here. On Saturday night the AIESEC kids went out to a disco, Fire and Ice, so we could send off Lumi (the Kyrgyz MC President) in style. It was fun. I stayed the night with Daniel and Begaiym, and we watched movies the next morning. It was cool, but I still felt slightly ho-hum.
There is some seriously good shopping around here, if you know where to look. I've GOT to find my way back to that mall somehow. Mom is talking about putting together a care package for me, so I need to give some serious thought to what sort of souvineers I will to take home for friends and family. This will be fun. I love shopping.
Tuesday - June 9
I'm having a tough time with my job. I wonder if I can do this; I just don't feel qualified. I dread going to classes, because I have no idea how to prepare. I don't know what the other talking club teachers do in class, or what these students have done in talking clubs for previous English courses. I thought I would have more training. I thought there would be a lesson plan or something I could follow, but there isn't and I feel a little lost.
I fear my students, and what they think of me. I fear that they are saying and thinking exactly what I would be saying, if I had a teacher like me: "This is bullshit. This chick has no idea what she's doing." I guess I figured somebody would hold my hand through this. I thought I would be nurtured and babied and my job would be easy. But that's not how it is at all.
Instead I feel sort of like I've been tossed into the water and told to sink or swim. It's experiences like these that show you what you're really made of, but maybe I don't want to know. Maybe I just want to sink. I want to quit and go home and never exert myself again. My home is safe, I always know how to get by, and how to keep myself occupied. At least now I do. I guess what I'm going through now is a lot like when I came to College Station for the first time.
Back then I felt like I didn't have any friends. I didn't know what to do and where to go for this or that. But I had no choice but just to carry on. What could I do? I knew full well that switching schools again would be just as difficult as staying there. And it's not like I actually had no friends. I had Kiki and Rebecca almost from the very beginning. And I knew tons of people in town from high school and TAMS.
And it's the same story here. I'm not nearly as helpless as I sometimes feel. I have AIESEC stuff to work on, I have Begaiym and other AIESEC people to hang out with. I have a job that I need to show up to every day, I have Kanybek looking after me, I have Marat driving me around everywhere. I have other teachers who are friendly and offer me tips and advice on how to run my classes. I have a host family who lives with me, cooks for me, takes me to the Saulna for hot showers. My host mother and Achmirelde are currently in Osh for ten days, but when they come back to Bishkek I will have a warm, maternal figure who is good conversation, and I will have a sweet little host sister to play with.
And yesterday's lessons were not so bad anyway. In fact, my elementary lesson went quite well. I reviewed numbers and letters with them, and we practiced pronunciation and spelling things out loud. After that was my upper-intermediate class, and although there were occasional lags in conversation at first everything went smoothly after things got rolling, especially once we started talking about English slang. Then my last class was pre-intermediate level. It consisted of just one girl, who despite her lack of English grammar was very enthusiastic. We talked about food and going out and things like that. It was fine.
Two weeks. I've been here almost two weeks now. Maybe if I just quit dwelling on my "hardships" I can do this. The first week was the toughest. The second went by much more quickly. Maybe the third week will pass even more quickly still? Next week I'm doing the trainings for AIESEC, and then? Maybe
then I can peter out and go home. I wonder if my mom would lie for me... perhaps a family emergency? Or could I simply tell the truth? Could I bear the disappointment of letting everyone down like that?
Of course not. This is silly. I'm not in any real pain or difficulty here, I'm just adjusting to a different lifestyle. People do this all the time, and I can do it too. So there.
Wednesday - June 10
I have to admit that I feel a little ashamed of the fuss I made yesterday about going to work. I mean what is there to prepare, really, for a talking club? These students learn out of books and memorize rules in their grammar classes, they don't need it from me. No, all they really need is a little bit of vocabulary review for the lower level classes, practice with some of their pronunciation, and an opportunity to think on their feet in English. That's easy. All I have to do, really, is prepare a few questions to get the conversation started. Of course there are moments when everyone runs out of things to say, but that's no real disaster. The universal human tendency to avoid awkwardness drives everyone involved to cast about for new subjects of conversation.
Thank God for my upper-intermediate level students. They are the most advanced. Talking to them is like talking to anybody with [more or less] fluent English. Especially Aziz, a student of mine who is quite interesting conversation. I actually wouldn't mind hanging out with that guy in a normal social setting. And as for my elementary and pre-intermediate classes go, their grammar is not so good and we do sometimes have to draw pictures for eachother to get our point across, but talking to them isn't bad at all. I see no reason why I should freak myself out over planning lessons and exercises for them. In retrospect I feel positively ridiculous for having agonized so much yesterday before going to work.
Today I washed two weeks worth of underwear with a bar of soap in the bathtub. Begaiym, who has a washing machine in her flat, insisted that I give her my dirty laundry so she could wash it for me; but before handing it off I made sure to go through and pick out all the undies so she wouldn't have to deal with them. Would YOU want to wash somebody else's old skivvies? I don't think so.
So I asked Aida, my host sister, how her family does laundry. I don't think she understood the question, coz she just showed me to a hamper of dirty clothes.
"Yeah, but do you wash them here in the bathroom, or do you take them somewhere else to be washed?"
"...Yes"
Uh, okay. I assume they wash their own clothes here at the flat. I've never seen them do it, but why else would they have clothes lines strung up in the back bedroom by the windows? I decided to get right down to it, and started boiling some hot water on the stove for me to wash them in.
This is a new revelation for me, heating up water in a kettle to wash with, rather than just enduring cold spit-baths. Actually I think I'm to be congratulated on such a discovery, because it's a problem I figured out how to solve completely on my own. That gives me great satisfaction. And to think, just a month ago I would have been utterly baffled at the prospect of washing my own clothes by hand, or having no hot water on tap. But now that it's a reality, I hardly miss the other way of doing things.
While the luxuries of Western living, sush as dish washers, hair conditioner, central air and TV dinners are indeed convenient, I really don't miss them very much. Without those things you kida just do what you gotta do to get by, it's not a big deal at all... I don't even miss normal American toilet paper. The stuff people use here is exactly like brown crepe paper. Ha, whatever, it' works. Human adaptability continues to amaze me.
Vanessa when I read your comment on my last post it made me swell with affection! In my talking clubs I sometimes ask students if they have any pets, and then I tell them all about my sister's noisy little dog :). I love you, I'll talk to you again soon!
Tune in later amigos.
