ab Chasing Kate: March 2006

Friday, March 31, 2006

I need your help!

Alright, I know I haven't posted in ages- the truth is, I have been afraid to blog after some of the events that have transpired here. In America, free speech is something that we have been used to all of our lives, I now know that in Kyrgyzstan it is a privilege, not a right. I am not used to censoring myself but it will be something I have to get accustomed to if I want to speak about my experiences here. What I say does have an effect on the people, country and culture here. With that said, I will try to give you the most honest version of what I'm doing here but I will also exercise this right with caution.

PHEW! So now that that's off my chest, I have so much to write and talk about so in the upcoming week I will sit down and sort through everything that has happened here. In a very short version, IST was not what I expected (nothing ever is) but it was great to see all the volunteers- I must say that the highlight of the week was when our team, the Chui team (Me, Charlie, Rick, Annie and Laurie- a guest member subbing for Scott) won the K-13 IST Flip Cup Tournament. Who's house?! Our house!

But let me get down to business. I need your help. The K-12s and the K-13s want to join up to help our old host village Koshoi. Koshoi has seen 3 groups of trainees come and go through 3 months of training, but we want to do something to give back to our community, something permanent. We want to develop a resource center so the children can practice their language without having to resort to old Soviet materials- I am sure they don't need texts on collective farming anymore. So here is what you can do to help: search through your basements for old children's books or magazines (think Highlights for Kids or Sports Illustrated for Kids) and send any materials that you don't need. At the end of May we're going to compile our materials, present them to the secondary school in Koshoi, fix up an area of the school and designate it as a place where kids can study and learn. I know that books and such weigh a lot but the Postal Service offers something called an M-Bag which allows you to send educational materials at a subsidized price. The minimum weight limit is 11 pounds which costs $11.50. The actual conversion may be a little more but the standard is around $1 per pound. Before you do anything, call and confirm that your local post office offers this service for parcels to Kyrgyzstan. I know all you fresh-out-of-college kids are poor too, but if you forgo going out one night during a weekend, then the costs of sending these materials should even itself out. So if you do what you can, myself and these children would be infinitely grateful. Also, this is just one project that I am working on- I know there will be MANY more opportunities for you guys to help but this is one that is underway right now. You can send the materials to this address:

Kyrgyzstan
Bishkek 720000
Central Post Office
Persavich

Again, thank you in advance and after May, I will give you an update with how it all turned out.

And stay tuned- I promise to fill you all in on what I've been doing for the last month.

Quick shout out:

It is always interesting to me to learn who is reading my blog. Sometimes I feel like I'm not reaching anyone through cyberspace but it's always encouraging to get feedback. I was so surprised to learn that a K-4 was reading my blog. Cari- I can't imagine life in Kyrgyzstan 10 years ago but something tells me that not much has changed at the same time. I hadn't thought about getting Vick's at the PCMO but I'll definitely have to try it out. I have thought about compiling my experiences into a book too when I get out of here, but right now it seems too ambitious to even think about! Anyway, thanks for your awesome comments and it's because of volunteers like you that this program has existed for so long!

posted by Katie P. at 12:56 AM 2 comments

Wednesday, March 08, 2006

Spring!

The weather is improving and I have noticed that my attitude and moods have followed suit. I wore a skirt to work every day last week and even wore short sleeves on one day. I have a feeling we haven’t seen the last of winter’s wrath but I am trying to enjoy the sun while it lasts. I had a fairly busy week… it’s much easier to be motivated when you don’t have to wear two pairs of long underwear to brave the winter weather.

On Tuesday I went for a hike with my student and host sister last week to take pictures of my village (which I promise I will post on webshots sometime this century). It was a little cloudy but you can still see the mountains pretty well. Unfortunately during the hike I lost the key to my room and the key to my schoolroom. I wasn’t worried about the room in my house because I have extra keys but I thought the school skeleton key would be harder to replace. I made my student come with me to the zavootch’s (assistant-principal) house to make sure there was another key so I could copy it. Unfortunately for me, it was her birthday and she and several other teachers were celebrating at her house. Talk about embarrassing. They quickly assured me that it wouldn’t be a problem and that I could have another one made. (Thank God because it was getting dark and I know there would have been no way to retrace our steps to see where I lost them). Mini-crisis averted. Phew.

Peace Corps 45th anniversary was on Wednesday so most of the volunteers in the Chui region went to the office open house to celebrate. There were a lot of important people there including the ambassador and directors of NGOs around Bishkek. They renewed our country’s contract here, which is always a good sign. Plus it was an excuse to eat a lot of yummy, free food.

On Thursday, Daniar, and I to see a modern version of the Nutcracker that the zavootch’s son performed in. The costumes were beautiful (even though I don’t recall Dalmatians or tigers being an original part of the ballet).

At 6 a.m. Friday morning I awoke to blaring music and my oldest sister doing her “morning exercises” of her running in place. She can’t weigh more than 110 pounds but it sounded like there were elephants in the next room. I decided I had had it with living in the sorority house. I forked over my last month’s rent to Jildes and told her I was moving out. She said, “What about our plans?! We need to plant a garden, we need to teach you how to can tomatoes and pickles and jam and what about our summer trip to jilo (pasture) to sleep in a yurt? I thought you were going to teach us yoga?” Then she cried. My heart absolutely broke. I know we’ve gotten really close in the past 3 months but I didn’t think I’d elicit this response from her. I was like all right, one more month but if things are still like they are, then I’m going to find a different family or move into an apartment. Hopefully I’ll start to see an improvement because I can’t live like this anymore.

My life came to a screeching halt this week because my mom sent me the first season of 24 on DVD. I had never seen the show before and didn’t understand the hype but I was absolutely addicted. I finished the entire season in one week and my low point was when I watched 6 episodes in one day because I didn’t have to teach the next day. At least when I was reading for that amount of time I felt like an educated couch potato, now I just feel like a couch potato. I just want to finish the show so I can get my life back. Oh. So that’s what it feels like to be addicted to crack.

On Thursday all the volunteers are coming up to Bishkek for our In-Service Training. I can’t wait to see everyone. I know the classes and days are going to be long but at least we’ll all be together. It will be good to see some new faces and see how people have grown and changed, etc.

Oh yeah, the other day I was walking through schools and I saw this 11th grader roughhousing this poor 5th grader. I usually don’t interfere (I don’t want to inflict the fight upon myself) but this time I said, “no, that’s not allowed, don’t do that”, and the larger student responded, “He is small, yes?” I was so proud that he correctly conjugated the verb ‘to be’ that I forgot all about him beating up the smaller student.


Quick shout out:

Annette, Ronnie, Aaron and Abby, I got your package, thanks so much. I never realized how much I miss pez!

posted by Katie P. at 1:07 AM 1 comments