Sleepy.
I wouldn’t normally consider myself a light sleeper but last night at exactly 3:47 I heard a distinct rustling noise coming from under my bed. I shot straight up with a, “what the- ” look on my face. I must have looked like I was in the middle of an exorcism. I was frantically running around my room, shuffling curtains, shining my flashlight everywhere, thinking there was something terrible lurking under my bed (so much for getting over my fear of the dark). I would crawl close to my bed, pull something out of the way then dart back as if something was going to reach out and grab me. After looking for 15 minutes I almost convinced myself that it was only a nightmare and went back to bed. Almost. 5 minutes later, the same rustling sound. I woke up like a maniac. This time, I made no mistake, there was DEFINITELY something under my bed. I armed myself with a flip-flop ready to take down this boogie monster. One by one, I took out bags and boxes until I found my perpetrator walking around nonchalantly- a small, harmless, brown mouse that had crawled out from under a bag. I sighed, threw down my flip-flop and crawled into bed, too tired to try to devise a plan to trap it. Unfortunately, I couldn’t sleep for the rest of the night because I felt like mice were crawling all over me. I’m pretty sure if someone had seen me last night I think they would have died from laughter.
The next day, I told my host brother (cousin, whatever you want to call him) the story. He said that the mice have probably settled in our house because we don’t have a cat and if I want to go out and find a kitten or cat tomorrow, then I am welcome to bring it home. I swear, my ‘to do’ list has never been stranger than here in Kyrgyzstan. We had a kitten back in the winter but one day it just left and never came back. I didn’t think about it too hard because I didn’t want to consider the possibilities that caused that poor ragamuffin thing to disappear (Charlie’s old puppy was mauled then eaten by other dogs). It was the scrawniest, dirtiest kitten I’ve ever seen and I wanted nothing more than to give it a can of tuna and a bath… but I digress. I was going to do the humane thing by setting up a jar/ramp/cheese getup to trap the pesky mouse and set it free but after remembering my last sleepless night, I am headed to the bazaar tomorrow to find a mousetrap. No mercy. Or I can be really inhumane and fill the jar with water… muahahaha…. alright, even I’m not that evil.
So our “running water” has been really shoddy lately. I think it’s because a lot of it’s being used to water gardens and plants now that it’s warm outside. Even the “well” in our back yard was “dried up”. My host family said it might come back tonight or next week. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for tonight. So I went for a run and I’ve gotten into the habit of warming up some water after my run so I can kind of rinse the stench away until my next banya. It’s not perfect, but it’s better than nothing. Our village has one permanent source of water so I grabbed our two buckets and trekked back up the hill thinking it’d take me five minutes to get back. Mind you, I was already exhausted and drenched with sweat at this point since I made the mistake of going out when the heat reached it’s peak. So I filled my buckets and started to head back for home, which was much more difficult than I had originally anticipated on several fronts... first of all, I had to steady myself to keep it from sloshing out against my legs but my biceps aren’t manly enough to keep my arms in a permanent ‘curled’ position, so I literally had to put it down every 50 yards or so. Secondly, every time a car or truck went by, it kicked up a bunch of dust so I had to maneuver them so I didn’t end up washing myself with dirty water. Third of all, I got caught in a ‘lamb jam’ and I had to lift the water up high enough so the sheep didn’t try to drink the water. I just wanted to get some water but it turned out to be a full-blown obstacle course. By the time I got back, my arms were like jelly and it was a chore just to keep them lifted long enough to scrub my hair. Earlier, I was going to try to find some weights in Bishkek but I guess I already found my new arm workout.
I read somewhere that we filter 99.8% of our daily stimuli because our brain would be on overload if we took everything in from all of our senses. Here, I feel like I’m on sensory overload all the time, my brain filter must have stopped working a while ago. Everything I do here, even the smallest task feels like it takes 20 times more energy then it would back home. Back in PST a few volunteers and I joked that we only have the capability to do one thing a day before we were absolutely, completely worn out, “ok, I brushed my teeth today, I guess I’ll make my bed tomorrow” or, “alright, I tied my left shoe today, I’ll get to that right shoe tomorrow.” Everyday, if I’ve done so much as gotten out of bed, gotten dressed, brushed my teeth and washed my face I already feel like I’ve accomplished enough for an entire week.
My mom called today and I must have sounded groggy because she asked if I had been sleeping. I told her I took about an hour nap and that I was so exhausted but I have no idea why. At the end of our conversation she scolded me and said, “geez, Katie, think about it for a second and give yourself more credit, you were up half the night mouse-hunting, taught 6 lessons today, went for a run, hauled 2 buckets of water up a hill for a bucket bath and you finally sat down for a second to breathe- no WONDER you’re tired. Didn’t that occur to you?” Haha, no, I guess it hadn’t.
The next day, I told my host brother (cousin, whatever you want to call him) the story. He said that the mice have probably settled in our house because we don’t have a cat and if I want to go out and find a kitten or cat tomorrow, then I am welcome to bring it home. I swear, my ‘to do’ list has never been stranger than here in Kyrgyzstan. We had a kitten back in the winter but one day it just left and never came back. I didn’t think about it too hard because I didn’t want to consider the possibilities that caused that poor ragamuffin thing to disappear (Charlie’s old puppy was mauled then eaten by other dogs). It was the scrawniest, dirtiest kitten I’ve ever seen and I wanted nothing more than to give it a can of tuna and a bath… but I digress. I was going to do the humane thing by setting up a jar/ramp/cheese getup to trap the pesky mouse and set it free but after remembering my last sleepless night, I am headed to the bazaar tomorrow to find a mousetrap. No mercy. Or I can be really inhumane and fill the jar with water… muahahaha…. alright, even I’m not that evil.
So our “running water” has been really shoddy lately. I think it’s because a lot of it’s being used to water gardens and plants now that it’s warm outside. Even the “well” in our back yard was “dried up”. My host family said it might come back tonight or next week. I’m keeping my fingers crossed for tonight. So I went for a run and I’ve gotten into the habit of warming up some water after my run so I can kind of rinse the stench away until my next banya. It’s not perfect, but it’s better than nothing. Our village has one permanent source of water so I grabbed our two buckets and trekked back up the hill thinking it’d take me five minutes to get back. Mind you, I was already exhausted and drenched with sweat at this point since I made the mistake of going out when the heat reached it’s peak. So I filled my buckets and started to head back for home, which was much more difficult than I had originally anticipated on several fronts... first of all, I had to steady myself to keep it from sloshing out against my legs but my biceps aren’t manly enough to keep my arms in a permanent ‘curled’ position, so I literally had to put it down every 50 yards or so. Secondly, every time a car or truck went by, it kicked up a bunch of dust so I had to maneuver them so I didn’t end up washing myself with dirty water. Third of all, I got caught in a ‘lamb jam’ and I had to lift the water up high enough so the sheep didn’t try to drink the water. I just wanted to get some water but it turned out to be a full-blown obstacle course. By the time I got back, my arms were like jelly and it was a chore just to keep them lifted long enough to scrub my hair. Earlier, I was going to try to find some weights in Bishkek but I guess I already found my new arm workout.
I read somewhere that we filter 99.8% of our daily stimuli because our brain would be on overload if we took everything in from all of our senses. Here, I feel like I’m on sensory overload all the time, my brain filter must have stopped working a while ago. Everything I do here, even the smallest task feels like it takes 20 times more energy then it would back home. Back in PST a few volunteers and I joked that we only have the capability to do one thing a day before we were absolutely, completely worn out, “ok, I brushed my teeth today, I guess I’ll make my bed tomorrow” or, “alright, I tied my left shoe today, I’ll get to that right shoe tomorrow.” Everyday, if I’ve done so much as gotten out of bed, gotten dressed, brushed my teeth and washed my face I already feel like I’ve accomplished enough for an entire week.
My mom called today and I must have sounded groggy because she asked if I had been sleeping. I told her I took about an hour nap and that I was so exhausted but I have no idea why. At the end of our conversation she scolded me and said, “geez, Katie, think about it for a second and give yourself more credit, you were up half the night mouse-hunting, taught 6 lessons today, went for a run, hauled 2 buckets of water up a hill for a bucket bath and you finally sat down for a second to breathe- no WONDER you’re tired. Didn’t that occur to you?” Haha, no, I guess it hadn’t.
posted by Katie P. at 2:08 AM
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