Christmas in T-Stan

Old habits die hard so although I haven’t been to church in over 3 months, I’m writing this while sitting in a church, or sorts. Actually, it’s the Vatican Embassy in Ashgabat, a house-like building behind a normal-looking gate with a plastic Christmas wreath on the door. Inside looks like a loved but under-funded home with walls painted the same yellowish beige that seems so universally chosen for religious interiors that it may be truly God’s will for the walls to make worshippers slightly queasy. The walls are covered with prints of Mother Theresa, a random Spanish saint, several Virgin Marys (including one that looks vaguely Turkmen and another vaguely Hispanic), a large glowing Jesus, and two carefully decorated but slightly bare Christmas trees. As is usually the case when I’m sitting in churches of any denomination, I feel slightly conflicted. On one hand, in my hand is a hymnal filled with “Amazing Grace,” “Lord of the Dance” (tune of “Simple Gifts”), “Joy to the World,” “O Little Town of Bethlehem,” as well as many other old and beloved favorites, but on the other hand, I’m sitting in a Catholic Midnight Mass that’s entirely in Russian (do you cross left to right or right to left? And why do they keep ringing the bell?). The only English was at the part when they served communion and the really hot priest (seriously, all of us are going to Hell) reminded us that it was “only for Catholics.” Eh. In general it was a lovely service. We sang “Silent Night” and “O Come All Ye Faithful” about eight times at different points before, during, and after - just the first verse of each, sung first in English, then Russian, then Polish, the German. By the end of the service the entire congregation (parish?) basically said “screw it” and we all sang it in our own language at the same time. The highlight of the experience -- the part that made leaving the debauchery in the hotel all worth it -- was the walk and cab ride there and back when the five of us belted out Christmas carols and hollared "Jingle Bells" to our driver's infinite amusement.

Across the world in about 10 hours when the 24th passes to the 25th, my parents, and whatever family decides to stay awake, will be at the midnight service lighting candles one to the other until the hall is lit only by several hundred small flames. The entire sanctuary will glow while the Stevensons’ operatic voices sing “Silent Light” and all the kids (and a few adults) play with the dripping wax of their candle and see how much they can tip it without wax getting on their bright red clothes. Still bursting with enthusiasm, we will clean up communion (raspberry juice so it will look bright red and Christmas-y – Mom’s theatrical touch to Christmas communion preparation) then run home to get lots of sleep for the long day of intense merriment ahead.

Written Christmas morning -
Last night ended watching "Secret Garden" with two good girlfriends (none of us brought X-Mas movies, but it has the same feeling) and getting the first full night of sleep after three days of clubbing and general debauchery (nothing serious, I'm still more crazy sober than drunk).

Christmas began at the PC Director's house where we were wined and dined on bread and juice and gave out our Secret Santa gifts. I received several blank notebooks and two really nice pens as my writing fetish has gotten around. After doing some shopping around with Andrea (who I will not see until April after we ship out tomorrow), I hung (am hanging) around the Peace Corps office playing Taboo with 15 other PCV, drinking two liters of Coke, and generally trying to enjoy the day and forget that tomorrow at 9am I'm leaving the world of pampered Americans. Baharly Here I Come.

Other important news, as of two days ago I am an official Peace Corps Volunteer, sworn in by the American ambassador while wearing a really nice dress (forgot to put the photos on the flash drive to post, oops) and wearing enough make-up to cause two friends to squint at my face and go "Annie?" Fun times. Hopefully I can put up a photo later the next time I have access to the internet - in a month. Write letters.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year (Taze Yyl)!!!!!!!

A darker side

Hearing the threat of “if you don’t eat your dinner you can’t have dessert,” even in Turkmen, is a very familiar sound. Children around the world from suburban Maryland to Lamu, Kenya, to Godkepe, Turkmenistan know that phrase so well they don’t really have to pay attention to catch the meaning. When staring at a heaping plate of unexciting dinner food, children hear that warning tone and they know they need to eat it or that pile of chocolate candy next to the teapot will remain only a frustrating mirage. In the past few weeks I’ve picked up a few new threats that I never learned in my sheltered home in Silver Spring, MD: “stop crying or I’ll hit you again with the rolling pin,” “wake up now or I’ll get the stick,” and the blindingly hypocritical, “stop hitting your sister, hitting is bad, if you do it again I’ll hit you harder.” Corporeal punishment extends to the classroom as well where I saw a teacher berate and beat seven boys (one got a knee to the crotch in front of the entire class) for a half hour when their offense was showing up five minutes late to class. Among other volunteers we joke about starting a program called “the pointer is only for the map.”

I’m sitting in the living room watching my host sister make the cat increasingly annoyed and I feel inspired to return to the topic of dogs and animal care in Turkmenistan. If you remember from one of the first entries, there was one truly affectionate loyal and friendly dog in Godkepe formerly living at my Turkmen language teacher’s house. I say formerly because a little over a month ago my teacher’s host mother gave the dog away to the near-by military base – presumably to be eaten – leaving three adorable golden puppies who were the highlight of our days until they similarly disappeared last week. The dog-apathetic host mother apparently gave them away to the electrician who expressed a passing interest in them when he came by to fix the TV. We hope Wily, Basca, and Goofy (the puppies) are dead, as the alternative fates for dogs here are all excessively depressing.

Another exciting cultural lesson of the past week was a Turkmen funeral ceremony. It seems strange to say that I’m looking forward to finally attending a funeral for an old person who lived a full and eventful age and died in their bed surrounded by loved ones. So far during my life I’ve attended the funerals of a suicidal 15 year-old (USA), a cholera-victim 12 year-old (Kenya), and now in Turkmenistan I attended the funeral of a tortured and murdered 22 year-old. The exact circumstances aren’t meant for mass distribution, but four days ago I went with my site-mates to sit quietly and chew bread with a mother so exhausted from weeping that all she could do was shake and whisper that she was glad we’d come. It’s the sort of day when you feel gloom is puddling in your bones.

I have a cold (partly the reason for the dark turn in this blog), and I wonder how much of it is a psychological reflection of the weather. For the past two weeks the sun has been only a hypothetical presence hidden behind a thick iron-gray curtain of cloud. With the gray mud combined with the dirty white-washed buildings (read: gray) and the gray-filtered light, the entire town looks like a faded coloring book no one has filled in yet. I wish I could take a bucket of red and green paint and literally paint the town to liven up the generally dismal winter scenery. I never thought I’d miss the over-decorated streets of suburbia in the Christmas season.

And on those cheerful notes, training draws a close with only one week to go. To review, Peace Corps service is two years and three months long, with that extra three months spent in intensive four-hour a day language training, three-hour a day technical training, and “Hub Days” where all the trainees spread around the capitol at their training come together to receive safety, health, and teaching methodology training (plus find out all the funny stories of what’s going on at the other sites). It’s strange to think that my entire study abroad semester in Kenya was roughly the length of training and I will stay here 24 additional months (or more, if I choose to extend). It seems like several life-times although intellectually I know two years is half of high school or college and a small fraction of a life-time. And in terms of the people I meet here, I will appear and disappear as suddenly as a change in the weather.

Although prospects of my permanent site fill me will equal parts of excitement, dread, and anticipation (like all new endeavors), my thoughts this week really aren’t as depressed as my choice of meditations would seem to illustrate. I’m truly looking forward to going to Baharly and beginning a 2 year adventure that will supposedly shape my future professionally and personally. I am especially looking forward to learning how to make carpets and becoming inducted into an artistic tradition some books describe as the key to the Turkmen soul. Carpets cover every floor and often the walls as well and they tell pictorial symbolic histories of tribal ancestors, inspiring heroes, and cultural values. (In the photo I’m learning my first carpet lesson at a Godkepe carpet factory) During my three months here I have found myself increasingly drawn to thread and its myriad of uses and forms in T-stan. I just finished crocheting an elaborate shawl using a flower-like pattern I learned from my Godkepe host sister. It even has fringe. Compared to the yards to simple easy lines I used to do at home, I feel like I’ve graduated into a new world of thread manipulation. It’s amazing how many uses they have for yarn here: knitting beautiful socks called “cheshkas,” crocheting their own sweaters and shawls, weaving carpets and rugs, and even braiding bracelets and necklaces with yarn and camel hair to ward off the evil eye. It saturates every aspect of life. When I’m busily occupied in the living room combining single threads together to create a beautiful shawl, hat, or scarf, I feel like I’m not only creating an intricate piece of craft, I’m also weaving myself into a part of an ancient art form and profession. I don’t wonder why so many of the heroines of Greek mythology were weavers (Arachne, Penelope, Helen, etc) and why multiple cultures have envisioned the Fates as weavers. It may sound overly poetic or cliché, but there is something truly magical about how a long strand of rolled cotton knotted together can become something beautiful and functional. And thus creation, occupation, and art help distract and lighten thoughts about the darker side of life here.

Permanent Placement Annoucement

The big news: I am living in Baharly Town for the next two years. It is about 45 minutes from where I am living now in the Ahal Region, about 2 hours (by public bus) from the capitol, Ashgabat. With 15000 people, Baharly consists of a small downtown center (where I’m living), surrounding villages, and is located at the foot of the Kopetdag mountains. The proximity to Ashgabat means I will have weekly access to the free internet at the Peace Corps office as well as regular mail. As the internet is unreliable (note how last weekend it was down), please continue to write letters. Staying in the Ahal region means I will continue to live in the most conservative and fundamentalist of the regions with the closest proximity to the PC Office (=close for medications, also close for staff’s supervision and control). No unauthorized travel for me.

More details: I will visit my permanent site to meet my host family and fellow Turkmen English teachers for five days next week so right now I only know what the PC packet says. According to the pamphlet about my placement, I have been assigned to a medium-sized school in Baharly town with 3 English teachers and around 1000 students. My school principal is an English teacher by profession. As far as ethnicity is concerned, Baharly is overwhelmingly Turkmen so I will not be learning Russian or Uzbeck. It is a new site which has never had a PC volunteer before and my nearest fellow America is Linda (one of my current training site-mates), assigned to stay here in Godkepe (45 minutes away). Some of my dearest friends among the other volunteers are assigned to Ashgabat, however, so company is an easy and cheap bus ride away. That's not including the new Turkmen friends I will be making at sites and my current Language and Cultural Trainer (LCF) who I love and is an hour away between Baharly and Ashgabat.

My host family information: To repeat, all of this is from the PC description sheets which have proven unreliable in the past, so take all this with a certain skepticism. I am living in a compound 10 minutes walk from my school and 15 minutes from the market and public transportation. My family has four members: a father who works at the Ashgabat airport (getting tickets may be really easy), a 50+ year old housewife mother, a 25 year-old sister who lives at home (yeah!), and an 8th grader sister who “speaks a little English” (= “hello”). I’m going to get really good at Turkmen. No one smokes and they have a puppy, hens, and a camel. I will have my own house on the compound with two rooms including a bed & mattress (!), a worktable, one or two chairs, a wardrobe (!), and curtains. The compound has a bucket shower, but with a gas heating system and they have a well in addition to a water pipe (which “usually works in winter,” whatever that means). They’ve gone on the record to state that I’m allowed to have guests of any gender visit and spend the night. When I talked to Ata (one of the PC staff who chose our host families), he said my family is ready to bend over backwards to be really friendly and welcoming for me – thus my own house on the compound. However challenging the professional situation may be adjusting to the conservative Ahal culture and helping them get used to the strange American in their midst, it sounds like my home situation could not be more ideal. I look forward to an exciting, challenging, interesting, and hopefully very rewarding two years.

Zack Braff and Sacred Bread

The internet was down at the Peace Corps office last weekend, so here is last week's post.

The photo at right is my 23rd Birthday party with my host sisters and site-mates.

Stories of the Peace Corps usually involve insects bigger than bats, monsoon seasons in thatched huts, and diseases involving swelling and pus. For me, the Peace Corps cultural adaptation process has been about watching “Scrubs” while eating breakfast.

Of course, it’s a little more complicated than that.

Firstly, “Scrubs” is dubbed in Russian by a single monotone male voice doing all the dialogue on top of the still-hearable English. JD and Turk are particularly easy to hear underneath the Russian as they use short slang which requires much longer Russian phrases to translate (“What’s up, bro” takes about a minute, not to mention explaining the significance of “black whale”). Unfortunately, with the exception of his sound effects, Dr. Cox’s original voice is lost beneath the Russian growl. The only time the television is not on during the day is when there is no electricity in a house, a situation which (despite its frequency) leaves the family as helpless as any American suburbanite. Their lives are designed around the presence of electricity, natural gas, and running water (I probably took our loss of both electricity and water for two days best out of all the family as I came emotionally prepped for it before I arrived).

My breakfast scene is further complicated by the fact that the table is three inches tall with the eight members of my host family plus myself all sitting cross-legged or laying sideways around it on the colorful hand-woven carpet. When it’s just us, my brothers and sisters sit and lay down haphazardly so that everyone has enough room and can still watch the perpetually-on television. When guests arrive, however, the traditional separation of the genders kicks in and the males get the guest room and the women either sit in the living room or busily prepare tea and sweets for the male guests. When a strange/guesting male is in the house, even when he’s separated by a wall, none of my sisters lie down, but rather sit with perfect posture with their legs tucked modestly beneath them. I'm still getting used to the geographical gender posture rules.

I’m also eating the Turkmen equivalent of oatmeal for breakfast every morning: pieces of crumbled bread (“churok”) in boiled milk straight from the cow an hour previously. The “churok,” a loaf about a foot-long and an inch high, a Turkmen specialty, tastes like hearty whole wheat and has the texture of wall insulation. The bread’s baking instructions and specially- designed earthen mound stove is so ancient it goes back to Turkmen nomadic days and the bread itself has a sacred significance – it is kept in a camel-hair woven blanket, should never be turned upside down, people take pieces with them for good luck when traveling long distances, and any uneaten scraps are saved for later consumption as it is blasphemous to throw it away. The bread is so dense that even when soaking in warm thick milk for five minutes it holds it’s shape so (with a lot of sugar) breakfast becomes a sweet bog of starch, protein, calcium, and cream. Not so bad, really, considering that poor Thomas and Dan were served fried camel organs for an entire week. Breakfast is actually one of my favorite meals here as the Turkmen food pyramid is visualized a little differently than what American nutritionists usually suggest. The Turkmen word for “sweet” is the same as “delicious” so nothing can be too sweet, and the word “food” – if it doesn’t have an extra modifier of “vegetable-like” – implies extremely oily, starchy, or meat-based (usually all three). Fruits and vegetables aren’t considered foods, but rather ignorable appetizers.

When contemplating my usual breakfast scene, we must also consider what I’m wearing: my first Turkmen “koinek” (traditional floor-length dress). Although I bought the red and black-patterned material at the bazaar, my youngest sister cut the material to fit my measurements, my middle sister wove the complex embroidery around the neck, and my eldest sister tailored it to be both flattering and comfortable. The next time I get paid from the Peace Corps I’m getting another one.

But that’s my life in Turkmenistan in a nutshell. Every day I drink about a liter of Coca Cola, I read books borrowed from the PC office, exercise with my youngest sister in the privacy of my room, and (despite the difference in language) my conversations with my host sisters follow predictable girly patterns: clothes, boys, weight, movies (they know as many as I do), cosmetics, knitting patterns, and how to deal with problem students (we’re all teachers of different subjects). In all, it is a complicated mix of the familiar and the unfamiliar which at once proves how interconnected the world’s pop culture has become as well as how it is mediated and conformed into the existing traditional life styles and values. And that’s just a complicated way of saying I’m getting used to it here, and really it’s not so very different than my life in America. The differences are in the details.

"Now I know..."

After sorting through the last few weeks’ disastrous and humorous anecdotes, I found one that is both. Last week after waking with a sense of comfortable contentment, I started my day by making eggs. The Turkmen philosophy of cooking is that if it tastes good with oil, then drowning a food in oil should be fabulous. After three weeks of scrambled eggs that were more grease than eggs, I volunteered to start making my own, to everyone’s satisfaction. Of course, I can’t actually cook. That I’d made it until last week without burning down the kitchen is a sort of miracle, really. I’d been experimenting with the different kinds of oils, grease, and fats that sit in recycled unmarked bottles and cans throughout the kitchen and discovered that the oil from the Coca Cola bottle next to the coffee ground can (now filled with camel fat) was the best for lubricating my favorite iron skillet. My favorite skillet was still caked with last night’s dinner, but some scrubbing (with water, there’s no dishwashing soap here) had it looking somewhat clean. So I got out the oil and started making scrambled eggs, every step bringing a sense of accomplishment and pride as the eggs sizzled and began to solidify into a familiar omelet shape. I pushed around the raw egg a small tea spoon (the only clean spoon in the bin) and although the fire was a little hotter than usual, it worked to my advantage as the eggs cooked faster and every part of the pan was heating more or less equally. Then came the moment of truth. I found a plate and grabbed a wash-cloth and took the skillet from the fire and moved it toward the table. The skillet, which under a smaller flame was never incredibly hot, was now far too hot to hold with just one wash-cloth. I cried out in pain as the iron handle became uncomfortable in my palms and I set the skillet down on the kitchen table, which promptly began to hiss. Damn. I grabbed a second washcloth, got hold of the skillet handle, and looked down to see a perfect skillet-shaped burned hole in the plastic covering of the table and a scorch mark on the stacked papers beneath the plastic. The table itself seemed undamaged, but as I surveyed my handy-work the pan wobbled in my hands and my perfect eggs began to slip and I brought up my left hand to steady it and brushed against the bottom of the pan, making another sizzle sound accompanied with a burning flesh smell. As I cursed again, the pan wobbled the other direction and the wash-cloths slipped and my right forefinger connected with the still-hot handle. I finally got the skillet to the cool side of the stove-top, dumped the still-perfect eggs onto the plate, ran cold water over my burned fingers, and entered the living room with pain and guilt plastered across my face. I presented my hands to my eje (host mother) and explained through gestures and large facial expressions what had occurred. I got lots of sympathy and Edugul (my host sister) put toothpaste on it (not a bad idea, really). I ate half my eggs before Edugul headed for the kitchen and I followed her, pointing to the hole I’d made in the table and apologizing profusely in English and Turkmen. She laughed and I made the “I’m really really sorry” face, which she shrugged off. When I came back to the living room my eje proceeded to explain to me that I needed more than one wash-cloth to hold burning skillets, that fire made iron hot, and that I should be careful. I chuckled a little, replied “Now I know,” and they all laughed. A week later, my fingers are still healing (mostly because I won’t stop picking at the scabs), but when you see me next I’ll still have all ten.

In other news, as I walking home from the bus station today a huge party at my neighbor’s house was playing the Macarena loud enough to be heard a block away. On the curb an elderly man looking like a slightly taller Yoda crouched chewing something and nodding with solemn contemplation to the song’s bouncing beat. I thought nothing would beat last night’s Turkmen professional ice skater (this is a desert country) performing on TV a choreographed ice ballet to “House of the Rising Sun” and “Cotton-Eye Joe” in full cowboy paraphernalia.

Why Turkmen kids walk the streets singing “Hit the Road, Jack”. . .

Lessons learned from my first weeks as a camp music teacher, 3rd form (7-8 year-old) assistant English teacher, and English language club teacher: 1) Ray Charles, “C is for Cookie,” and gospel songs work for all ages and are enjoyed even if the students don’t know any English beyond “hello,” while “Why Do You Build Me Up?” and “The Ants Go Marching” require either stereo accompaniment or English fluency, and preferably both. 2) Children have the supernatural ability to not only sense a ball’s presence at the bottom of a bag, but also to pass this knowledge to one another faster than sound. They can then beg to play with it in repeated harmonized whines specially tuned to grate the ears, mind, and soul. 3) If a visual aid doesn’t move or include more than one color, then kids won’t look at it. 4) Come to class/club/camp with at least four back-up games in case every carefully planned activity spontaneously combusts due to the combined catalysts of classrooms lacking a blackboard, too many/few students, and boys/girls beating up the other boys/girls. 5) When possible, bring a translator. Without one you run the risk of facing an entire classroom of uncomprehending but expectant stares as you try to explain the directions of a game for the fourth time using toddler Turkmen and charades that only induce giggles and no new understanding.

Despite some hitches, the first two weeks of intensive teaching technical training (translation: sink or swim classroom instruction with bi-weekly “hub days” where we learn how we could have taught better four days before) have gone very well. My kids have their colors, numbers (even out of sequence!), and introductions down pat and they come running to give me hugs from three streets away. A lifetime terror of children as a race has only lessened slightly after getting to know them better, but their beaming faces after getting positive reinforcement on an answer (Turkmen teachers generally don’t say “good job”) remind me why I’m here.

In other news, last weekend was my first visit to the large Gokdepe bazaar, a world unto itself, acres wide, with twisting labyrinthine stalls and alleyways that overflow its cement walls and cover much of the surrounding valley, only giving way to the rows of buses and large vans which retrieve and depart with the bazaar’s occupants. Every dusty square foot is filled with velvet, satin, cotton, and synthetic fabrics and prints; embroidery (patterns, raw materials, and completed pieces done by hand and machine); coats, jeans, sweaters, and shirts from Turkey and China; soaps, lotions, yarn, music (cassette tapes), socks, hair pins, sponges, pots, tea sets, cleaning fluid, gasoline, car doors and headlights, cookies, backing soda, Snickers bars, cotton cooking oil in Coca Cola liter bottles, and every other conceivable knick-knack and life accessory. Carts full of sacks of flour, fresh pomegranates, and Bollywood DVDs pushed their way through the streets barely wide enough to fit them as women carrying bags half the size of themselves darted out of the way and pressed themselves up against three-foot high piles of empty shampoo bottles. It was a fascinating adventure of sights, scents, smells, and buzzing human activity (women in pants! A sight to sooth the soul and, surprisingly, make me slightly shamed and scandalized on their behalf), which I hope I can avoid doing again for at least two months. The sensory overload was worth it in the end as I now have cloth for my first Turkmen koinek (floor-length dress) which I’m designing with my host sisters’ help/dictation. I’m choosing the neckline, my middle sister is designing the embroidery pattern and sewing it with her sewing machine, my oldest sister is cutting the fabric, and my littlest sister is tailoring it to fit me perfectly. With our powers combined, and assuming I survive their enthusiasm, I should have a lovely red and black dress fit for school, weddings, and guesting by the end of next week. After living with only four outfits during the past two months, the idea of a new possibility in the morning fills with me a sublime glee. Unexpected lesson of this week: PC makes you more materialistic, interesting how that works out.

Scary running feet

This week I met our family dogs, one a hulking beast with gray and white fur the size of a small couch and a second smaller red mutt that looks like a cross between a fox and a hyena. My initial hesitation (I won’t say terror) of the local dogs was partially influenced by the fact that until two days ago even the family pet guard dogs pulled at their chains barking and growling whenever I came near. Then during a recent bout of gastric insurrection (Colonial Pepto Bismol is on the case and the separatists should shortly be under control) I went out at night to our cement hole outhouse and the dogs were off their chains. I had a momentary surge of sympathy for deer in front of semi-trucks as I stood at the door regarding Garagol (the cough-sized one) with the moonlight reflecting off his impressive canines. He came forward slowly and my hand tightened on the door knob. The story about the guy who was medically separated due to dog mauling came into my mind (PC has lots of stories) and then Garagol began nuzzling my leg and we came to a quick understanding: so long as he acts like a big sweaty then I’ll perform my duties as the only human in miles who knows how to properly pat his head. We’re good friends now and when a strange dog came into the courtyard yesterday while I was in the outhouse, Garagol nearly killed it in his enthusiasm to protect me.

Yesterday was the first rain and it took us all by surprise. After nearly two weeks of high 80s and mid 90s, suddenly we awoke to 50s and a semi-downpour. Of course none of us dressed for it so we complained of cold and numb extremities the day after we complained of melting. Our poor Turkmen teacher threw up her hands at us never being satisfied, but, eh, if rain is the worst thing happening to us. . .

Next week is a challenging break from routine as we hold our own Extra Curricular Activity (not a “camp” due to Russian connotations, although it will last three days from 9:00am-1:00pm with the usual “camp”-like activities). I’m in charge of music – imagine a lot of “I’m A Little Teapot” and explaining the “hokey pokey” without the use of a shared language – and Linda’s doing English games and the fellas, Thomas and Dan, are handling sports and arts. With an hour of planning and almost no materials except for some balls and the school space, I expect barely controlled chaos held at bay with our toddler-quality Turkmen vocabulary. I don’t think the horror film genre has fully utilized yet the scariness of large groups of bored children you can’t talk to. Fun ahead.

End of Week #1

For my first impressions of Turkmenistan, I would like to begin with the dogs. Both owned and feral roam the streets, some as large as bikes and others as small as cats with teeth so big you think their heads should fall over. The way to avoid being ravished by these dogs is to, if approached, bend down and pretend to grab a rock. The dog will then growl a bit, but soon move away and let you pass whole. The reason for this is that all infant puppies have rocks thrown at their heads by children (and adults) and so have a just and understandable terror of rocks. Logical explanations for extreme situations seem to be around every corner in Turkmenistan. The extreme grandeur of the capital, Ashgabat, with its towering spires of marble and gold off the cover of a Ray Bradbury “Martian Chronicles” novel compared with my training site town of G— all have reasonable explanations. Free gas, electricity, and water in homes compared to a roll of toilet paper costing more than several liters of Coke.

Honestly, I really enjoy this place and the people. I have been blessed with an incredible host family who spends hours helping me with my Turkmen language skills (in a week I’m up the level I was with Swahili in 4 months and Spanish in 9 years) and friends who make the days pass so quick I feel like there aren’t enough hours in the day. Every time I walk home along my tree-lined dusty street I feel blessed that I can happily anticipate returning to my family and seeing what adventure in cooking, vocabulary, grammar, cleaning, or conversation they have waiting for me. With a diet of melons (really really good melons), fried dough stuffed with meat, salads drenched in oil, pomegranates (bigger than fists), and average seven cups of tea a day, I think I will gain about 50 pounds during the next three months, but I’ll be happy with every bite.

As I was walking back from the bucket-shower room (also the furnace room and the tooth brushing room although I haven't quite figured out how the combination of buckets work and where the drain is), I saw my host Dad watching the ABC "Arabian Nights" mini-series on TV (the TV is on constantly, I've seen more TV in the last 78 hours than in the past five years combined) and it blew my mind a little that I am living an Arabian Nights story. Merv, an archeological site near the city of Mary, is mentioned in one of the tales and the characters have Central Asian names and looked like my host family, my teacher counterparts, and my students. The town looks significantly different, think small town Midwest combined with southern Californian mountains with lines of private courtyard compounds, but I'm actually here.

Staging

After two days of generic Peace Corps preparation (travel in pairs, boil the water, be ready to face your fears, recognize your own cultural perceptions, etc) and an even longer summer before that (I love you all, but a four month summer is excessive), I am so ready to jump on that plane tomorrow at noon for Frankfurt, and then Turkmenistan. Our DC country desk administrator, Ben, is rather amazing and I'm glad to have him in our corner on the US side of things. If our admin in Turkmenistan is half as good, the next two years should run like a happily purring machine. From what we hear, Turkmenistan is one of the more challenging PC posts in the world, but also one of the most rewarding with the clearest signs of growth. We are the only international aid organization there so our individual impacts are noticeable, memorable, and noteworthy after only two years, unlike some other posts where you're tripping over other Western aid workers and the impact of individual projects are lost in the shuffle. My fellow PC volunteers (about 40 total, a mix of English teachers and public health volunteers) are amazing people, outgoing and enthusiastic, and after two days of intense socializing, I haven't found anyone yet who I haven't enjoyed their company. Good times ahead.

And thus it begins

Launch is less than two weeks away and preparations are beginning slowly to commence. Between two weekends ago in Philly and this last weekend in New Jersey, I have said my good-byes to all my dear friends ("good bye" if I didn't run into you to say it in person). I'm also beginning to accumulate enough portable technology to get cast as the dork side-kick in an action movie. Watch for me in the desert scenes of the fifth Indiana Jones movie ("Indiana Jones and the Enchanted Retirement Home") with laptops and DVD cases strapped to various limbs.

I begin this adventure with the usual mixture of excitement and my usual "what have I gotten myself into now?" feeling. The second is now so familiar after four years of globetrotter adventures that it's like an old friend. Of course, the welcoming of this old familiar dread/anticipation means waving good bye to the longest summer in Christendom and its lazy haze. Good bye, Comfort Zone, good bye, see you again in two years when it will be time to concoct a new one from sugared conformity and moistened apathy. Time to go out and see some of the world.