July heat III

July 19, 2009

Wow, am I lucky. What I thought was going to turn into a seriously unpleasant stomach illness was cleared up within hours of taking the first dose of antibiotics. The worst of it was the funny noises coming from my insides. Not so bad. Although I am feeling a little queasy after the supper I just ate. Apa pressured me into trying kymyz again, even though she saw me almost gag when I tried it a few days ago. And all I had to wash it down with was some of the famous natural gassy mineral water from Kara-Shoro, which I also don't like. For the first time since I have come to this country, I started to feel like a picky eater. But I don't think not liking these two things is unreasonable. They are simply nasty tasting.

After she watched me gag down the one sip I agreed to take of each beverage and was finally satisfied, she went to the refrigerator and came back to hand me a leg bone the size of my arm in a manner that made me feel like I should be stepping up to bat, rather than enjoying a meal. I think she took the look of amusement on my face as indication that I love chewing cold, gamy meat off of huge bones. And really, if I can get at the good parts, it is not so bad, and it keeps Apa happy, so I guess it is all for the best.

July 21, 2009

Boredom is beginning to set in. Whereas I used to fill up my downtime with walks into the center of the village (a good time waster as it takes a good half hour even if I don't stop to talk to people, which I usually do) to just get an ice cream cone or a half kilo of apricots or something, it is just too hot to be out in the sun when you don't absolutely need to be. I did actually need to go to the post office yesterday to pick up some mail, and my host sister was horrified that I had made the walk there and back. An ice cream bar on the walk home was probably my salvation. Today I think I will brave the heat and taxi it to Uzgen to use the internet and maybe attempt to send out some mail (we'll see). A trip to Uzgen in the heat will probably just make me feel like a wimp, as I will have to look at all those women in burquas and wonder how they are surviving. I don't think they can even take advantage of the numerous ice cream places (which I will definitely hit up while I am there). Unless there is some trick to eating an ice cream cone that I don't know about.

Anyway, I have been doing a lot of lounging around in a sleeveless sundress that I stole from a volunteer that is leaving. Shoot. I should probably put on some sleeves before leaving the house. I read, listen to music, watch movies in English on my computer or in Russian on TV with my host sister (yesterday I actually watched Free Willy on TV with my 22-year-old host brother). I also write lesson plans for my clubs, but it is kind of pointless since I usually end up changing the plan completely. I feel like a lazy bum. I am learning a few house-keeping skills from Apa, like making jam. Last week, we made a ridiculously huge amount of apricot jam, and then moved onto cherry jam. This is a good skill to know, I suppose, except for that I only know how to make the jam using huge gallon canning jars (we filled up six with apricots and six with cherries!) and two huge kazans (iron cauldron things) over a fire stove: one for cooking the jam, and one with boiling water for sealing the huge jars. It was quite an interesting process, and not really as much work as I thought it might be, since the apricots were just washed and halved and the cherries weren't even pitted (watch your teeth). Yum, love Kyrgyz jam. So tasty.