четверг, 26 февраля 2009 г.

Why I Still Feel Like a Pretender

February 26, 2009

Even after over sixteen months on the job, some days I still feel like I am not a “real” teacher, but merely playacting. This is due in part, no doubt, to the fact that I do not really consider teaching a long-term career possibility, but I also think that certain words and terms I hear everyday are somewhat responsible. A prime example of such terminology is the Kazakh/Russian word “costume” which English speakers should translate as business suit. If you read the word costume and first thought about a Halloween costume, you are not alone. When I first came to Kazakhstan and my host mother asked me about my “costume” for the first day of school, I thought to myself, “Damn, I did not know I needed to bring a mask or cape, and isn’t Halloween still two months away?” I have long since come to understand the Russian/Kazakh meaning of the word, but I still often feel that my “costume” is just that, a costume. I feel the stiff collar scratch my neck, the tie constrict my breathing, and the coat trap my arms, but I fight these short periods of anxiety with several different way, such as stretching the boundaries of what qualifies as “business casual,” and trying to foster a slightly less uptight atmosphere in my classroom.” Still, I do not think I will ever be fully comfortable in the roll of a teacher; I miss being a student too much. I hope that some of my students realize how fortunate they are to be students and how much they will miss it, but I doubt that they do. No one ever does.

Being Kazakh Means Never Having to Say Your Sorry

February 25, 2009

A few of my local friends have a new joke. When asked how well I speak Kazakh they respond, “ote zhaksy, ol ‘keshiriniz’ tamasha aitady,” which roughly translates to, “very well, he says ‘excuse me’ perfectly.” My mother used to say that I apologized too much, and it seems that even when speaking a foreign language I cannot break the habit. I am not the only one guilty of this verbal tic, however, and locals have noticed this tendency to be overly apologetic in my site mates as well. At first I thought that this might be the result of a subconscious sense of vulnerability due to our living in a very different country, but we have been here for a year and a half with no problems. Furthermore, according to Kazakhs at least, we say excuse me too much even when we are on our own turf. One local friend who studied in America even has a story about how he once bumped into someone walking down the street in Philadelphia, and then to his amazement, the person he bumped into turned around and apologized to him!

Americans are also apparently too grateful. Locals are amazed at how often we say “thank you.” While in America you might say thank you whenever someone passes you something at the dinner table, or opens the door for you, such behavior is considered bizarre here in Kazakhstan. One friend even remarked recently, “why did you say thank you when that policeman gave you back your passports? They weren’t a gift, they’re your passports!” Furthermore, this tendency to say thank you is sometimes not only considered strange, but rude as well. For Kazakhs, serving tea or food to guests is a natural and fundamental part of being host. Thus, when you thank them for handing you your teacup, you may mistakenly give them the sense that you did not expect them to do so, thus unintentionally insulting their sense of hospitality. Even in restaurants or cafes it often seems that the friendlier you are, the less friendly the waitress, and conversely, the terser you are, the politer the waitress. In fact, the times that I have had the best service at a café were my worst days when I was surly and impatient.

This does not mean that Kazakhs are not polite, in fact in some ways their hospitality outstrips what you will encounter in the U.SA, they just have different ways of expressing it. For example, Kazakhs might not apologize to you when they bump into you on the street, but few Americans would put together the kind of spread that a Kazakh regularly puts together just to entertain one or two guests. Ultimately, if you happen to travel to Kazakhstan in the near future, I advise you to be patient, especially in regards to communication gaps, hungry for all the food they will shove in your face, and slightly less vocal to how much you enjoy it.

Taking the Show on the Road

February 24, 2009

This past weekend, I went with the three other education volunteers in the Kyzylorda Oblast to Zhanakorgan with Medina Apai, one of the chief methodologists for the oblast, to give a seminar for village schoolteachers. I must admit that I was at first a little wary at the thought of spending a weekend with Medina. Conversations with her are difficult, and I feel like we need a translator, even when we are both speaking the same language. Also, like many people I work with here in Kazakhstan she is not really great at communicating what it is she needs or wants, and so I often end up misinterpreting what I am supposed to do with her. Still, our supervisor Alma wanted us to do it, and with my students on practice I did not have anything else to do, so I figured why not?

The seminar was on Monday and Tuesday, but we figured we would leave town early and go first to Turkestan, a small city only an hour away from Zhanakorgan. Turkestan is very small and is a lot like a village in many ways, but it is one of the most important and famous in Kazakhstan. Several hundred years ago, Turkestan was the capital city of Kazakhstan, and it is the home of the Mausoleum Kozha Akhmet Yassoui. The mausoleum is not only gigantic and beautiful, but one of the most important places in Islam. They say that if you go to the Mausoleum three times you are guaranteed a place in Heaven. I am not sure what qualifies as a repeat visit, (do you have to leave city between visits or just the walled compound?), but I guess that every resident of Turkestan is heaven bound, even that lucky Peace Corps volunteer who gets stationed there. We decided to take the midnight train down because it is a six hour train ride, and we figured that way we could sleep on the train and get to the city first thing in the morning. Unfortunately, the latest train was 11:10 not midnight, and we ended up getting to Turkestan at 4:30 in the morning. Once we got there we wandered around in the dark for a half an hour looking for a working bus or an open café before we found a small cafe where the woman was willing to make us eggs and instant coffee at 5 AM. After breakfast we hopped on a bus to meet the Kaz-20 living there. She told us to get onto the number two bus and get off at the small mosque, but since there was no number two bus and we hopped on to the thirteen bus because we were told that they followed the same route. As it turned out however, they did not follow the same route, and though I tried to convince him otherwise, my site mate refused to believe that the very large mosque where we got off the bus was not the small mosque” where we were supposed to meet the volunteer. Eventually though, I was vindicated when he admitted that the building that he thought was an inconsequential mosque was, as I insisted, the Mausoleum that we had come to the city to see.

The mausoleum was amazing, although the experience would have been more enjoyable if I had not been so cold. The weather in Kyzylorda had been a balmy 35 degrees Fahrenheit when we left, but Turkestan at sunrise was freezing, and it was even colder inside the mausoleum than outside. Most of the inside had been restored vandalized during the last few centuries before being recently restored, so there was only a little bit of the original stone work left, but it was still an impressive sight. The coolest thing though was the huge iron Kazan made out of seven different metals, and inlaid with script from the Koran. Apparently at one time, when pilgrims would come to the mausoleum they would be served a sugary “holy water” out of the huge Kazan to replenish them. I wish I could show pictures of it, but unfortunately, no pictures were allowed inside. The mausoleum was not the only thing on the site. We also saw the underground chambers where one of the kings had spent his last thirty years. He did not want to live any longer than Muhammad, so on his 63rd birthday he went underground. There was also a pretty decent Archeological museum in the area which house art and artifacts from the Sarmatians, Mongols, and Turks that once lived in the area. After we had seen everything we headed to a café to have lunch, warm up, and plan our next move. At first we decided that we all would head back to the Kaz-20’s house to hang out for awhile, but unfortunately, my site mate left his phone on the bus, so we decided that the two of us would head to the bus station to look for my friend’s phone and get tickets to Zhanakorgan while the Kyzylorda Kaz-20’s went to get their bags. As it turned out the last and only bus to Zhanakorgan had left at two so we ended up hiring a taxi, and we never did find the phone. We made it to Zhanakorgan and after a few miscommunications with Medina’s equally English-Challenged friend were finally picked up at the train station.

Despite our inauspicious arrival, Zhanakorgan was awesome. After we dropped our stuff off at the hotel we were taken to a nearby café. As it was Sunday, it was technically closed, but they made us tea and eggs, which was more than enough as we were still pretty full from lunch. Just then however, Medina showed up and we were whisked off to the home of a local teacher where they had prepared a full konak for the six of us that could have fed at least 15. There was so much food that for the first time ever I heard my site mate utter the words, “I’m full.” Eventually however, we excused ourselves, went back to the hotel, and quickly passed out. The next day we slept in because we did not have to be at the seminar until ten. I still got up around seven out of habit and got ready, but one of my friends slept till 9:15, an impressive ten hours of sleeping. I gave a presentation on using alternative English methods that admittedly fell a little flat. At first I thought it might have been my delivery, and in a way it was, I made the mistake of giving the presentation in English. As it turned out, only two or three of the teachers there had a working understanding of English, which left me to wonder how the other twenty-five teachers in attendance taught English.

After the presentation we went for a drive to see Tay Samal, where there is a campsite that we are interested in for a summer English camp. The camp looked great, even in February, but unfortunately the car we rode in was not in such good condition, and it broke down halfway back to the village. Our driver tried fixing it, and we even tried pushing it to get into gear, but in the end one of the drivers’ friends towed us back into town. We had barely gotten back to the hotel when we were picked up again and taken to another Konack, this one, incredibly, even better than the first. They served plov instead of the Beshparmak, and once again I ate too much. Bazargul’s boss came by so we actually had to repeat our toasts for him, but luckily my Kazakh gets better not only with practice but with a couple of extra shots.

The next day I gave my second presentation, but this one was about using the Internet and Google. I think it went better than the first one because I was more careful to use small words and my presentation was lots of pictures. I still got a few blank looks from the teachers over fifty, but the other teachers got it, and I honestly think that I lost the older crowed when I said computer. After our sessions were all over we had a short meeting where the teachers asked us questions about comparisons between education in America and Kazakhstan, which needless to say was a bit awkward. Then, we grabbed our things and boarded the bus back to Kyzylorda. The ride was blissfully uneventful, at least until we got back to the city. It turned out that Kyzylorda was not its final destination, and so it dropped us on the outskirts of the city. We got a taxi without a problem but it was still disconcerting to find yourself at the gas station across from the mosque when you are expecting the bus station. All in all though, the trip to Zhanakorgan was a great quick work trip, and the next time Medina asks us to go on an out of town seminar I will be one of the first to sign up.

If You Come to Kazakhstan, Don't Forget the Rogaine

February 23, 2009

Recently, my site mate and I realized something disturbing that we have in common. We are both losing our hair. I am not, mind you, referring to hair on top of my head that is still slowly, steadily receding, but the hair on my legs. Furthermore, the loss has not been slow or gradual, but sudden, within the last couple of months, and patchy. At first, I thought the hair loss was caused by friction from my sweat pants when I went running, but I scrapped that diagnosis since my site mate is having the same problem and he does almost no physical exercise. I then looked this problem up on WebMD and it suggested a possible thyroid condition, but neither of us is chronically tired or rapidly gaining weight. So that does not seem to be it either. The only thing left to blame I guess is the ecology or the nearby spaceport, Baikanor. I usually roll my eyes when my students blame their headaches on the shuttle launches, but who knows; maybe they are on to something, but if anyone has any other possible diagnosis, please share.