I’ll start off with today. Today was amazing and not at all representative of my daily life here. Here it goes anyway. I have decided the shortened version will sound much more impressive and much more off-hand (cause I’m that gosh darn cool).
I woke up, went running, showered, ate some chorek (bread), put on a bathing suit, sweater, and pants, put a skirt over my pants, got in a van with 10ish other volunteers, drove for an hour, took off the skirt, got out, climbed a small mountain, climbed back down, ate kebabs for lunch, took off the pants and sweater, swam in an underground sulfer lake, tried to rock climb the walls of the sulfur lake, dried off, put on the pants and sweater, drank a beer, put on the skirt, got in a bus, drove for an hour, got out of the bus, ate an ice cream, and came home. Whew. It was a big day.
But today was, like I said, not real life in Turkmenistan. Today was Peace Corps Fun Day to recognize that I am half way through training! Woot. And I am. I can hardly believe it. I have been here for 5 weeks.
Daily life here in Anew, where I am doing my pre-service training, is fabulous but in a peaceful, productive, full kinda way rather than a crazy, cool, bragging rights kinda way (above).
My day consists of six main components: walking, technical training, language training, family, wishing I had the dedication to study more, and eating.
I start my day off by donning the obligatory ankle length skirt, dress shirt, and dress shoes. I then drink 3-5 cups of tea with my morning bread before embarking on the 30 minute walk to school. I am often accompanied by my family’s dog whom I have affectionately nicknamed Chuck Norris. He smells. Like woah. Like a port-o-pot with four inch legs and a tail. Regardless, this walk gets my brain ready for the mental acrobatics I put it through.
Technical training is in the morning. This generally means spending quality time with my assigned counterpart in her classroom. And I have to say, my counterpart is superwoman. For all of you teachers out there, she has six preps. SIX. In one week. She teaches 4th graders and she teaches 10th graders and she teaches various other grades in between. Grade level really doesn’t matter though because grade level does not determine language ability. Inconsistent language instruction has made life pretty confusing. She teaches English in Russian for some classes and in Turkmen for others. This past week she picked cotton after school with the other teachers from Birinji Mekdep (1st school) in their government assigned field. She even teaches on Saturday.
My job, as I have defined it thus far, is to alleviate some of her hefty, hefty work load. Along the way, I hope to introduce various new teaching techniques (Peace Corps goal). Friday, I taught my first and second full lessons in Turkmenistan. I had done some 10 and 15 minute-ers before but this was the real deal. It felt so good to be in front of a class! Thank you Dr. Heckelman and company for preparing me for anything.
Lunch=Feast with 6 other trainees in group.
Language Training = Brain Beating. To all you pre-meds out there, I think I feel your pain. We have four hours of in-class language and in those four hours I attempt to shove as much Turkmen in my brain as I possibly can. But it the cramming does not end in class. Oh no. This is a ‘round the clock endeavor. This is absolutely positively the marathon of language learning. I enjoy the challenge and am doing my best to keep up my pace. Struggling. But doing my best.
On my thirty minute walk home, I am often accompanied by the green dress wearing/black suited school kids who get out at about of the same time. All of them are ready to try out their English.
HULLO. HULLO. HOW ARR YOU? I AM OK. I LUV YOU. GOODBYE.
I do a ton of informal English teaching on my walk home to preserve my own sanity.
Dinner here is huge. Honestly, most meals here are huge. Turkmenistan is quite proud of its guesting culture. They have a pretty simple and telling saying: the guest is king. The king requires copious amounts of food, copious amounts of cay (tea), and copious amounts of candy. Also, the royal family stops by often. All the time in fact. For the record, I think this concept of visiting is absolutely fabulous and enjoy helping my family prepare for guests BUT if I don’t break out of the role of king ASAP I’m going to gain 200 lbs real quick.
After dinner, I chill with the fam some more, do the dishes, study (too much my host cousin told me), and generally fall asleep with my face firmly in the pages and pages of Turkmen vocab for which I am responsible.
Yes, I am exhausted, but I love it here. I am consumed by my work, by my life. I am fascinated by the culture in which I will spend the next two years. This is what I want.
More later. Internet is super unreliable so don’t know when!
I miss you guys. Write me! Letters are amazing.
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4 comments:
Tess, I sent you a letter a week or so ago. There's plenty of information in it. I got one from you this week. All the questions you asked are convenienty answered in the one I sent. But when you say the royal family stops by often, that means the royal family of turkministan? wow?
Hi Tess! I'm so happy that you are enjoying life in Turkmenistan. Lots has been going on here in Houston with the hurricane and all-needless to say, it has been an interesting first year of teaching. I pretty much hate my job now because of crappy administration and back-stabbing co-workers. I'm in trouble right now because I want to use the book, "Walk Two Moons" as a read-aloud to get my illiterate teens excited about reading. I called in sick today, so I am enjoying some time at home in bed. We are going to the opera on a field trip tomorrow. Yea- my gangsters at the opera; I can't wait. Oh! Robert and I bought a house in the Spring Shadows neighborhood. We are moving next month and cannot wait! I hope everything continues to go well for you in Turkmenistan! Miss you!
Hi Ms. Elmore!
I'm Emily Driscoll, from your Shakespeare class at Rice summer school. You probably don’t remember me, since I tend to be completely forgettable. In case you cannot picture me at all, imagine a run-of the mill girl next door: same smile, same hair, slightly smallish, but for the most part average. Probably looking pretty bored and tired. Color the hair in dirty-blonde, fill the eyes with green, and mix in a pale complexion, and that would be me, Emily.
Anywho, i somehow found your blog, so i'm pretty pumped. I have to do a job shadow for school, and because I would like to become an English teacher, I remembered you as i was searching for someone to shadow.
however, you're kind of a zillion miles away, so that probably wouldn't work out. Anyways, though, (sorry my grammar isn't exactly english-teacher worthy right now, i'm not in a very grammatical mood) I wanted you to know that you really inspired me (which sounds kind of dorky, being that I'm 17 and am not inspired on a daily basis). I've always loved English, even if that didn't show up in your class. I really, really love it, not just "English" as a language, not just as a class, not only as a grade on a paper of a single digit on my AP results sheet. I love what words can do, I love how they’re more powerful than numbers, and I love their limitless. I love when words become more than words, when they cause feelings and ideas to form, when they make unlock some weird part of you. I want to show other people what words can do. I want to show them how the thousands of books in Barnes and Noble are more than ink and paper. I want to show this to people who really need it, who wouldn’t see hope otherwise. English is weird, but I really like it.
Several weeks ago, my school chaplain asked that unnervingly ambiguous question, “What is love?” Many classmates responded with “passion! passion!” and “caring about something a lot.” However, the final response came from a teacher sitting in the back of the room. “Love is something you do,” she said simply. I love words, and because I love them, I do not want to merely feel good about them, care about them, or use them. I want to do something with them that will help others. I want to teach somewhere where my love of words will help and inspire, as you are doing in Turkmenistan. I want to love by doing rather than feeling, and I want to motivate others to do the same.
And when you are open to seeing
And when you are well equipped
When you are responsible
You must act.
If you are standing still
You are on the wrong side.
Do not be afraid of change.
Your poem is on my wall. In the midst of my precal hate sessions (who cares about the unit circle anyway? What does it have to do with anything? Is it going to help me do my taxes or calculate the tip for a sucky waiter? Is it going to create world peace or end hunger? No. but my math teacher is pretty much in love with it, so there’s no hope for humankind), or crying over the stupid force of friction in my stupid, impossible physics homework (also irrelevant. I am not going to crash my car into a propane tank, so I don’t care about the gravitational force that would thrust me to my fiery death.) I look up and read your poem. Sometimes it helps, sometimes I am just too cynical to do anything normal, and I take my anger out on random inanimate objects. However, for the most part, your poem is very important to me. I promise you wherever I go, that poem is coming with me, along with my security pillow, Bible, and toothbrush. You were an awesome teacher, and I’ll never forget you (which is totally the most cliché ending ever, but whatever. It’s hard to forget someone who changes you. however, it is impossible to forget someone who changed you greatly, but will never know nor believe exactly how much. Someday you might understand, if I become like a totally beastly teacher/missionary to Africa, or end up on CNN. But in case I don’t, I just wanted to make sure that you knew that you made an impact, and that somebody is praying that you continue to do so.
good luck and god bless!
-Emily
Tess, just to let u know I think about u a lot. Hope u will recieve the brownies I sent!!
As well as the cards. I gave your mom a check for your account This bday and xmas! It made me tired just to read all u did on that day!!!
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