September 4, 2006
6:15 PM
So it is September; the smell of Fall is in the air, the sun is setting sooner and sooner, and day by day the temperature is submitting to the stress of the season’s change. I have been in Kyrgyzstan for just under two months and, parallel to the seasons, my life is rapidly transforming. With the passing of every day, I become a tiny bit more comfortable with life here. My language is progressing, not as fast as it could, but it is. I am becoming more conscious of what happens around me as my ability to have conversation increases. I can hear, read, see, and respond to life quicker as more of life here begins to seep into my unconscious understanding. And above all, every day I am discovering more and more direction—purpose—to why I am here and what I am supposed to be doing.
The most recent discovery of purpose came this past week during a visit to my permanent site (the location which I will be living and working for the next two years). I will be spending my time in a small village on the northern shore of Issyk-Kul Lake near the city of Balychy. The village’s location is beautiful (sorry, I took no pictures during this trip, so no new postings on the photo site) resting peaceful in a valley between the Küngey/Alatau Range to the north and the famous Central Tian Shan Range to the south. Oh, and by the way, between my village and the Tian Shan Range there is the second largest alpine lake in the world (second only to Lake Titicaca in South America), Lake Issyk-Kul (ысыск-кол). The village itself, as I can tell from a five-day visit, is a small, yet perky, Kyrgyz community teetering on the walls of tradition and modernity. The stamp of seventy-plus years of soviet rule has left its mark throughout the village; but there clearly is a sentiment, in the aesthetics and emotion, of wanting to step out of the shadows of the hammer and sickle to truly define itself as a village of Kyrgyzstan, an independent nation. This exact sentiment may vary, but tends to not waver, throughout the entire country. The first “free” generation has barely reached puberty; there is still so much this country is capable of.
As I walked the streets of my village on Thursday evening, I found my way to a clearing where a seasonal mountain river lay dormant and dry heading into the winter months. The sun had begun to roll down a set of mountains to the west and I decided to pause for a short bit. As the sun hit the horizon, as if on cue, scattered clouds lit up the sky in colors only the heavens can create. While watching the reds and oranges battle for prominence in the sky, my mind began to wander. Lost in the sight of a valley painted orange, I was hit with the sharpest of truths: I am about to embark on two of the most challenging, and equally rewarding, years of my life. Two years—a number, an amount of time, an eternity, a memory—can hold so much and so little meaning, depending on how you say it, depending on how you hear it. I am here to discover, I am here to explore, I am here to change someone’s life; I am here to change my own life. This was all a reality I knew existed before I landed in Bishkek, but a true reality cannot be conceived, it must be experienced, that’s what makes it real.
Standing on the bank of a river with no water, my life began to flash in front of my eyes. The empty riverbed became a free-flowing set of memories and dreams. I sat and watched as my pre-teen years weaved around the rocks and zipped past, my teens not far behind. In the distance I could see my twenties swelling and creeping higher along the banks of the river as they approached me. My life was molding itself, shaping itself into a living, breathing river flowing in front of me. It was then, as my twenties began to pass me and the future began to slither down the river, that I knew what I needed to be here to find out: my life, like everyone other human beings’, has a purpose, and I have a choice to act on it or waste it; and I am surely not about to waste it. My time here on earth is meant for so much more than I will ever be capable of, but that is not going to stop me from trying to reach capacity. It sounds pompous and naïve to say it, but I truly believe that I am here on this earth to make other people better. I still have a lot to learn and I will endlessly be discovering and rediscovering who I am; but in this journey where my dreams become reality, and my reality begins to shape my future, I know that I am here make a difference. I am not alone, by no means; there are millions of people that have been given this same mission in life. Many know it, many have yet to discover it; but no matter who they are they are all part of a something much larger than they could ever imagine. We are all part of a collective mission to give away as much as we receive, to share with the world the knowledge we discover. I know this now, and I now understand that this is to be the wind for my sails. I have a lifetime of mountains to climb, rivers to cross, rocks to stumble on, and valleys to trek through; this is all part of a journey I am meant to take, a path I am meant to follow in order to frequently head back and help others find their way down the same path.
September 5, 2006
8:15 PM
Just brewed my first cup of Dunkin’ Donuts coffee courtesy of my wonderful parents! The coffee tastes great, besides the fact that I need to learn how to use a coffee percolator; like usual, the coffee I brewed is way to strong and I will be up until four in the morning doing who knows what.
September 8, 2006
6:30 PM
I am ready to begin, to start my life here in Kyrgyzstan. I knew these three months of PST would be tough; but I had pictured the struggles to be in learning the language, getting accustomed to the culture, and adjusting to my new life. These all still exist, but now a new struggle has arisen: I want to start doing what I came here to do. I am no where near where I need to be with my language studies, I have a lot of learning and studying left to become a successful teacher, and there is a lot about the way Peace Corps and Kyrgyzstan function on the NGO circuit that I need to still research. But all of this is quickly being overshadowed by my desire to just get out to my village. To get out to the site in which I will be spending the next two years and start working. I know there are plenty of mistakes, miscues, and misjudgments awaiting me in the next two years; and at this point, I am ready to start the learning process, I just want to get out into the field!
Peace Corps has done a wonderful job (among the mad rush of the past two months) of providing me, and all of the volunteers, with a great foundation to build off of. There has surely been no shortage of information, this has definitely been an “intensive,” (sticking true to their brochure descriptions) PST so far. But now I am so close, in two weeks I will be traveling to my permanent site to begin my life as a Peace Corps Volunteer. I want to take my foundation of language (tenses and vocab everywhere!) and get out and start to build on it. I am progressing very well with my language, but I am no where near comfortable yet. My notebook is filled with grammar charts, practice lessons, and endless columns of vocabulary. I barely have time to think about each individual grammar tense from one lesson because another is inevitably waiting for me the following day. I need time to digest, to get out and use what I have; to get out and learn through my mistakes and start to build the confidence needed to speak a foreign language.
In the same light, I have been given a crash course in art of education. What many college students spend four years studying, I have gone through in two months. I have more handouts, packets, and pamphlets than I can keep track of. I have a binder that has not been filled yet, it just sits there accumulating more and more papers on top of it, waiting for me to organize it. I have a million and one ideas spinning through my head of what to do once I am given a classroom (A FULL CLASSROOM OF STUDENTS, WAITING FOR ME TO HELP THEM LEARN ENGLISH!). It’s kind of overwhelming to think that in two weeks, I will walk into the school in my village and begin my first day as an English teacher (I bet Westphal, Hipp, and Hanni would have laughed if I told them this is what I would be doing five years after my first class with all of them). I just want to get in the classroom; I want to see the eyes, the smiles, the frowns, and the joy of my students. I have an incredible battle ahead of me, and I am ready to begin; I am emotionally ready, and as mentally prepared as I ever will be.
The most surprising desire that has hit me in the past few weeks, coupled with my desire to start my service, has been a budding interest in the Peace Corps goal of sustainability. It sounds cheesy, but I have begun to see the real meaning of what being a volunteer is. From visiting my permanent site village to sitting in on HUB and Technical day sessions, I am getting more and more into what it actually means to be a volunteer here in Kyrgyzstan. It may sound naïve and ignorant, but I came here for many reasons. One of them was to help others, to share what I have learned in life so far. But beyond that idea, I really had not idea of what helping really meant, or how to do so. There more I read, the more I learn, and the more I experience here in regards to my role here, the more I begin to really understand that I am here to not just pass on knowledge. I am here to start a learning process, whether it be in English or community development, that can thrive beyond my presence here in Kyrgyzstan. It may sound entirely obvious, but it was not until I arrived here and truly saw the need for patience and diligence needed to create an environment suitable for learning. What I am doing here is not different than any teacher, community developer, or volunteer working around the world. I here to share the knowledge I possess with as many people as I can in order to allow them to then one day share their knowledge with others. I am here to teach English, to share my culture and experience a new culture; but most importantly I am here to help guide, no matter how small of an effect I may have, as many villagers, students, and volunteers as I can towards the wonderful world of knowledge (I am so cheesy, it scares me sometimes, but sometimes cheesiness is all that will suffice).
********* NEW THOUGHT PROCESS*************
It is very ironic that I came here to explore the depths of my own mind, and more and more I am getting excited with the prospect of being able to help others do the same.
Life is far more beautiful than we give it credit for.
September 9, 2006
7:30 AM
It’s a brisk Saturday morning and the roosters, as usual, are crowing out of unison, and doing so seemingly every five minutes. The early morning cow herd has moved through town on their way to the pastures for the day. Our family’s three dogs lay guard near the front gate as the neighbor hops on his donkey-pulled cart to head out for a day in the field collecting wood, hay, and manure for the winter months. My Apa has been up for a hour already, preparing for a day of canning beats, tomatoes, carrots, peppers, sunflower oil, and more. Piles of coal have been stacked in the empty chicken coup (chickens just run around the yard, but never wander off; they are eerily well trained or very loyal to the people that will eventually eat them) in case of wood shortage and/or lack of electricity (coal fueled generators) come December. As the temperature has dropped, tiny remnants of the Kyrgyz’s people traditional nomadic past have come alive. In the morning and at night, the temperature has begun to drop to a comfortable high 40s, low 50s. More and more I have begun to see the heavy hand-woven wool jackets and sweaters appear, some still barring striking resemblance to many of the glass-cased outfits in the national history museum in Bishkek. And who could forget about the Kalpack, the traditional hat for Kyrgyz men. It is said that this hat (picture a top hat with more squared edges and the rim is flipped up) can be worn in both winter and summer. In the summer it supposedly collects cool air inside the hat, and during the winter it keeps the warm air in. Besides its temperature regulating effects, the hat is still an imbedded part of the Kyrgyz culture, it can be seen throughout the entire country worn by men everywhere. As the winter creeps closer, the high-topped white hat seems to work its way more and more into the everyday fashion of Kyrgyz men. The entire country, in one way or another, is preparing for the glories of Fall, and following quickly behind, the wonderland of Winter, have started their preparations. Preparations and duties that have been developed, adjusted, and passed for generation dating back to the beginning of life in Central Asia. With the rise of every new sun, more and more I’ve begun to notice tradition hidden everywhere. Little daily life tasks and actions that equally show they have made the test and felt the strains of time. This is a beautiful culture, just dying to be explored; and I now have two years to do so.
******Final Thought*******
Fall is upon us and leaves are changing their colors; life is changing, for everyone, and it seems so natural. The world is used to this subtle change, the adjustment of life according to the Globes rotations and revolutions. It all seems so gradual, so similar, a common thread woven through the fabric of civilization. People everywhere live their lives according to a many forces beyond their control. Nature and her seasons, her destruction, and her beauty; they all play a key role in tirelessly reminding us that we are part of something much bigger. Our lives are a bleep on the radar, a star in space, a leave in the wind; in the grand mural of time our unique qualities will simply be the stroke of a brush. The world and its people are not as different as many claim us to be. We are a world of smiles, laughter, love, compassion; we just need to stop convincing ourselves otherwise.
September 10, 2006
I have been living in a foreign country for two months.
September 15, 2006
3:15 PM
“I am a week away from becoming a Peace Corps Volunteer.”
This phrase, it’s literal and metaphorical meanings, has been on my mind, in one way or another, for the last two years. In the literal sense, this is what I came here to do. I came to Kyrgyzstan to take the next step in my life. In a week I will have been sworn in as a Peace Corps Volunteer and I will be traveling to my permanent site in the Issyk-Kul Oblast (State). I will officially move into my new host family’s house where, God Willing (Kudai Burusaa), I will be living for the next two years. The school in my village is waiting for me, in dire need of an English teacher and very excited to be having a native speaker come and help their school for a few years. In two weeks I begin my job; my role as a teacher, a community developer, and an ambassador. In the most tangible sense, I will finally have a chance to get out and start to live in Kyrgyzstan.
On the metaphorical level, this next step, becoming a Peace Corps Volunteer, is the culmination of at least, if not more, the last three years of my life. Ever since Semester at Sea, the world began to call to me. I knew that I could not spend the rest of my life living in the United States, there was too much of the world left to explore. Through two years of doubts, confusion, and misdirection I contemplated if Peace Corps was really what I needed. Even in the last moments before leaving I was not really sure if was ready to take this step. But now two months in, a week away from starting my service, I am more ready than I’ve ever been to head into the unknown. I am ready to do this; I know that. I am ready to begin.
