Hi Folks,
Ok so, its been a while, I’ll
apologize up front. No excuses really,
just living to volunteer, volunteering to live.
Also I realize my last entry was sort of a downer, but hey, I’m in
Well, since the last update at Christmas, a few things worth
mentioning have gone on. First of all, I
owe a New Years Eve update. I went to
Astana for a big bash with about 28 other volunteers from various cities around
Kaz. I took the train with my friend
Kristen, who is assigned to a city about 3 hours northeast of Ust called Leninogorsk. The train ride was almost 30 hours, even
though as a crow flies is I’d say about 20. The problem with trains here is that all of
the train lines run north/south, so I actually spent about 8 hours in
The train was an express. I stepped out and jogged beside it and was only able to keep up for about a half mile, so it was movin’.
Astana was a blast. We all crammed into three rented apartments. It was like being back in college, spring break to be exact. Everyone was so psyched to see each other that we had unlimited energy. Young and old alike spent every day and night just enjoying the ugly American-ness of the crowd. New Years Eve was spent at a restaurant that had a big part reserved for us. They had a floor show, some entertainment, and a lot of eating, drinking and dancing. I will take a bow for monopolizing the attention of an extremely attractive young lady called the “Snow Princess” (part of the local lore). For some reason, she took a fancy to dancing with yours truly for a bulk of the evening, at the dismay of many of my younger colleagues. Oh and, this is for Frank, one girl there asked me if I took dancing classes in college because I was so good. Workin’ it, workin’ it!
So anyway, that was New Years. I slept the entire train ride back to Ust. Since returning I did go through another small downer period, now that the big trip was behind me and a long semester was looming, and the dreary winter was firmly set in. I guess it was during these few days of free time that I did some introspection, realized that I’m going to be here for a long time, and “got my mind right” (that’s for all the Cool Hand Luke fans). I’m more focused now, I’m better able to focus on language studies, on getting work projects done, on being patient with the kiddies. I’m hoping this carries me through to the All Volunteer Conference in March, which is being held near Almaty.
I’m sure I had more stories…oh, the radio show cruises along. Since the departure of my partner, I’ve had guest co-hosts on each week. This place is amazing, I’m able to have a different female join me each week, to the amazement of Vova, the DJ who works the equipment for my show. Last night was the pinnacle. I showed up with FIVE beautiful females (two models, two flight attendants and one night club manager). It was just a coincidence that two different groups wanted to come, mostly to watch because they were nervous. It turned out to be a crazy show, me and this harem, drinking beers eating kerioshki (like croutons), laughing, oh and, talking to 10,000 listeners.
So that helps to bring me out of the doldrums J
What else…oh, my friend Jay here has had his girlfriend here for the past month or so, and she just left this morning, so I guess I’ll have my drinking buddy back (I haven’t seen him since she got here). I’ve also been making a few new friends, which is nice. I’m starting to carve out a little world of people I spend a lot of time with, which I assume will lead to close friendships in the end. The good thing is I’m not surrounding myself with English-speaking people, so I’m excited that my Russian is going to take off over the next few months.
Winter hasn’t been all that bad (knock on wood), although there is a flu epidemic here right now. My school has nine teachers out, they closed the elementary school temporarily (my tutor has the flu, that’s why I’m sitting here typing this instead of getting tutored). I was pretty sick a couple weeks ago, but I don’t think it was the flu. I had about three weeks of a pretty bad cold, but it worked its way out. Its funny to hear all the remedies people swear by here. The latest I just heard on the phone two minutes ago, you should cut up pieces of garlic and distribute it around your house to keep you healthy. I asked, isn’t this for vampires? She laughed and said yes, vampires and the flu. They also have many homegrown remedies for sickness, various herbs, all taken with vodka of course, the universal liquid.
There’s a girl here named Lelia that reminds me of Linda Tarbox, spittin’ image, inside and out. Check her out on the picture page. She’s classic Linda. I go 15,000 miles and who do I run into? Linda. (wouldn’t have it any other way my friend!). I’m hoping to get her to be my steady on the radio show, she’s awesome, her English is great and she’s extremely friendly and good-natured. Its very scary when I meet people I would easily hang out with in the States, then realize they live in a country that has Peace Corps volunteers. WEIRD.
So, some thanks go out, to my friend Holly, I got a great Stephen King book (Rose Madder) which I’m diving into. I’m anticipating two packages from two other wonderful people. Also we have one possible casualty, one package that’s still missing, with some pretty expensive DVDs, but fortunately it was insured. We’ll see how that pans out and I’ll give an update on if that’s a good strategy. I’m still holding out hope, it hasn’t been two months yet, and it was over the holidays.
Oh, I almost forgot. I now am on AOL instant messenger during the days I work at Pragma (we have a dedicated line), which is Mon, Wed and Thurs. I have caught Frank during the late night your time and my mom during the early morning, so if you have AOL IM, add me and we’ll catch up. I’m “pckazman”.
I guess that’s about it for this one. I think this entry is kind’ve informative and blah. I’ll try to get some more interesting quips in for the next one. I think when I wait too long it becomes just a chronology of events. I’ll pop one out that has absolutely no basis, those tend to be more interesting I think J
Enjoy the winter, enjoy your health, and keep the garlic handy.
Paka,
Andrew
(2003, what’s up with that? What an ugly number for a year)