The other night I was knitting—my newest hobby; I’m already on scarf number three—and I dropped my knitting needle under my bed (actually an armchair that folds out). I first went digging around for it with a ruler, and then thinking I had finally gotten it close enough to grab it with my hand, I blindly reached for it. Only, when I pulled my hand back out, I was holding the tail of a long-dead and decaying mouse.
We have a stalagmite in our outhouse, and it’s not made of limestone. The outhouse pit was never deep, but now its so cold that a poopsicle has formed, and if not routinely knocked down, breeches the hole. As if going to the outhouse in freezing temperatures wasn’t bad enough.
My language has improved dramatically living with a family—and babysitting for the twins often. But still, its only three questions Ainuru and Tangnuru know they can ask me and I will absolutely respond to: 1) Can we watch Shrek/Lion King/Toy Story? 2) Can we draw pictures? 3) Can we brush our teeth? I’m not quite sure how my American habit of dental hygiene has rubbed off so successfully on them, but the number of times they ask to brush teeth each day has grown to far more than recommended ADA standards; on any given afternoon, they’ll ask me to get the brushes down 3-6 times. But given the dental hygiene around here (or serious lack thereof), I’d be the last to discourage a good habit.I returned from a trip to Bishkek in mid-November with new winter boots, and wearing them to school the next day, found myself besieged by (mostly joking) requests for “myda.” I had to ask my counterpart to translate. It turns out, Kyrgyz tradition—much like Papua New Guinea’s, actually—says that anyone who purchases something new for herself, must share some of her “wealth” in the form of cookies, candies, etc. with everyone else. I brought my offering of treats the next day, and had to laugh while everyone took turns toasting my new shoes.
On Mondays at noon (or sometime relatively soon thereafter), my school’s 27 teachers congregate in our teacher’s lounge for a weekly meeting. The meeting usual lasts about an hour, leaving 10 minutes or so before afternoon classes start for refreshments brought by one teacher or other. The fare includes cookies, candy, some slices of meat/fat, and very often, vodka, for what would a proper teachers’ meeting be without shots to conclude it?
Our oblast’s volunteers gathered together to celebrate Thanksgiving in as much of an American fashion as we could manage the Saturday after the actual holiday. Thanks to one small oven, stove top burners that could not be plugged in simultaneously, and a power outage, it took all day to cook (we started at 10 a.m., ate the main meal at 10:30 p.m., and finally had my apple and pumpkin pies at 1 a.m.), but the fare was worth it. We killed, cleaned, and stuffed 3 turkeys—though we only had time to cook two of them, and had to use a neighbor’s oven for one. The process wasn’t exactly pretty; the first slaughterer didn’t quite come down on the first turkey’s neck hard enough, and the volunteer who was holding it panicked and let go, so it had to be caught and axed again, at which point it started spinning around headless and spraying the spectators with blood. But the meat, gravy, and accompanying mashed potatoes, creamed spinach, and stuffing were well worth the effort in the end. Thanks Mom for sending the dried cranberries—they were the best addition to the stuffing!
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