Saturday, August 23, 2008

Banyas, Sheep, a Jehova's witness, and "Big Family!"

I had an interesting evening last night... I guess the first night here was a trick in a way, because my house was quiet and calm. Yesterday, everything exploded when about 10 other family members came home. In Kazakhstan, it's very common for all the extended family members to live in the same home. First, the cousins came back...There are 3 teenage girls. I was wrong about Raoka, she is in grade 8 but is actually 15 years old. Which is funny to me, because she looks like she could be about 9...she's so tiny. The other girls are 21 and 18. We made yablaka jam out of the apple tree in our yard, and we canned tomatoes to store inside. Then, the parents came back from the funeral, bringing their brothers and sisters along. We drank chai and watched olympic boxing on tv. That's when one of the uncles came up and tried to thrust a Jehova's witness book he got on the street in Almaty in my hands. One page was in English and he insisted that I read it to him...at PC training we got an extensive lecture about not associating ourselves with any religious groups that try to convert people..so I was thinking umm no? I don't want to read this? But Damir (the brother) came to my rescue and yelled at the uncle for me about trying to take jesus into my heart. As it turns out, he just wanted to listen to me read something in english, so later I got another book from my room and everyone was happy. I went upstairs to see what the girls were doing behind the door and they were having a makeup party, it was really cute..they gave me a manicure. I got out my makeup and they liked reading all the brands and listening to me say "blush", "mascara", etc. over and over. I took them into my room so they could play with all my stuff..which they tought was halarious. We took pictures of them in my sunglasses and holding my stuffed animals...lots of giggles. There was a lot of translating from the dictionary about why I wasn't married, blah blah blah giggle giggle. "this is Ryan photo, you lovvee him, giggle giggle" haha. Anyway, it was around 9:30 by then so I tried to ask the cousins if their family was planning to eat dinner that night (anytime soon??) The girls took that to mean I must be the starving American, so they grab me by the hand and insist on feeding me soup, salad, sweets, cookies, bon bons, tea...I kept insisting that I could wait to eat with the rest of the family but I don't think they were planning on eating until 11:30 for some reason. Damir told me they are used to the men coming home from work late so it's normal if I eat with the girls early..I guess this was allright because after that I fell asleep in front of the TV. Also, the one year old cousin Amir came to sleep over. I'm still trying to figure out who lives in the house and who is just staying. He's adorable, but he's a little scared of me and my "skin" apparently. (This morning he also threw up all over himself..cute) Anyway, I was sneaking off to my bed but my host mother grabbed me and told me "banya banya banya now now" so the girls again grabbed my hand and although I was pretty skeptical, I figured I had to get the first banya out of the way at some point. So how it works, you walk into the first room and change. I went in my swim suit...not sure if you are supposed to do that because the girls were in their underware. I'll figure that out later. Then you go into the sauna room. This is not like your typical american sauna, it must have been over 120 degrees in there. But sweating makes you clean, so I guess it was allright until you want to pass out. Then you run into the other room and throw water on yourself. They kept laughing because I used the cold water, but that's some sort of cultural taboo in kazakstan. Ok, so that's the banya and I got to use it again this morning after my run because they were not going to let me have my chai until I was clean. Today, after I was running I found Jamie, a girl in my language group walking around the streets of Amalybak because her family left her home alone, tear tear. I invited her over for chai, since there are so many people in my house now I figured one more wouldn't hurt. So after my banya we were presented with "breakfast" aka a massive feast of different foods spread across the table. My host sister Asil got back from Turkey this morning at 6am and brought us figs, hazelnuts, and halava, yum. That was the highlight of the meal....the rest of it consisted of bowls of stew and I finally got to eat bersmebak, the national dish of kazakhstan. Sheeps head and noodles, anyone? It's funny because Nora and Eulena told my family yesterday that I don't like to eat a lot of meat, so my bermebak plate had to tiny pieces of sheep floating around, and Jamie's was all meat and a few noodles. We were about to go into a food coma at this point, so we sprawled on the couch to watch Russian cartoons. This afternoon, Damir will take us on a tour of Almaty in his car...yay, cross your fingers for a cell phone!
Hope all is well at home, heard about Obama and Biden via Nora's text messages yesterday...guess I'm not so out of touch. Missing everyone. Das vidanya!

PS: Addie, how do I change it so my titles don't come out in what I think is Arabic?

इन्टरनेट फ्रॉम अमल्य्बक

Sorry I haven't been able to write or call yet. There is so much to tell! I arrived in Almaty thursday morning after an 8 hour delay at the Frankfurt airport. We were taken right away to the Sanitorium in Almaty for our orientation. That was basically a russian retreat/hotel from a long time ago, it was pretty rusty-but it had really hot showers! The orientation was great, we learned a lot about what to do with our host families and took an introduction to Russian lesson. The US ambassador to Kazakhstan also came to speak/have lunch with us. I found out I was going to be learning to speak Russian, and that I would be living in a village called Amalybak for the next three months. Amalybak is a suburb of Almaty about 20 km away ( but it took an hour to drive here in all the traffic.) I also got to walk around Almaty with Nora, who has been a volunteer here for two years. She's from Minneapolis and is now in Amalybak with my group in a house across the street, teaching us about the culture before she goes home in November. My language teacher, Eulena, also lives across the street from me. Everyone else lives a little further away from the school. I'll be training/ taking language lessons in the Russian school. there is also a Kazakh school down the street. My host family is amazing, and so is the house they live in. I'm feeling very spoiled at the moment..they have a two story house with a washing machine, indoor toilet, big TV and a computer (the internet doesn't work, though). Our Banya is also massive, three rooms-one for changing, one for showering, and one for the sauna. I'll be taking a long sauna later since we just went on a massive treck around Amalybak to see where everyone lives-this is not that small of a village! It's hot here, too! We also have a large garden at my house, so I've been eating a lot of vegetables that they grow. Last night I had stuffed peppers and soup. This morning I had one of the freshest omelettes I've ev er eaten. So, basically I'm very happy and you don't have to worry about me. I feel like I'm on vacation, everything is very relaxing. We even have a big covered porch where we sit outside and eat and listen to Madonna. Oh, Kazakhstan.

Also, I guess I should mention that I haven't met my host parents yet because they were at a funeral yesterday in another city. They will be home after six tonight, but Raoka (she's 8) and the Aunt and Damir (the 27 year old brother who speaks really good english) have been taking care of me. My host mom is a russian teacher at the Kazakh school. We have a dog and cat, too-Rex is the puppy and the cat is Malshanks? I have trouble with so many names to remember. My host sister, Asil is on vacation in Turkey but will be back sunday. they love to travel and yesterday showed me massive stacks of pictures from trips to China, India, and Malysia. They loved my pictures! They wanted to hear all about New York and my family and especially about Ryan...which was difficult with limited language skills. Damir didn't come home from work until late, so I was on my own for awhile. Nora and Eulena came to lunch at my house today and my aunt told them all about everything I did last night, s o I guess I'm doing allright so far! They were amazed that I helped with the dishes and made my bed. I'm such a nice guest, so I hear. Nora just went to get her haircut, there are three salons in Amalybak and this internet cafe.

Anyway, don't worry-everything is great..I'm meeting a lot of great people and really enjoying the country so far. Tomorrow is our day off so my family will (hopefully!) take me to buy a cell phone and I will call you when it isn't 3AM at home.

I miss everyone! hope to talk to you on the phone very soon.

Saturday, August 16, 2008

KAZAKHSTAN

I leave bright and early in the AM for this adventure. I will miss everyone and hope you will send me letters (care packages, too!) I will not have internet for awhile, but when I do-I will update this blog as often as possible. Wish me good luck! (already got a pep talk from Camerlooneytoons, ie Brianna)