INSANITY

September 27, 2009

Yesterday morning I woke up in the early hours to go the the bathroom. As I stumbled through the hall, I smelled something strange that reminded me of the bazaar. The door to the room next to mine was open, and I glanced into it as I walked by. This room is fairly small and just had a low square table sitting in the middle of it. In the middle of the table was a large mixing bowl full of raw, bloody meat. That explained the bazaar smell. I was reminded of a scene in a movie (I forget what the movie it), where the character has a hallucination that he sees his own brain sitting on the ground in front of him. I stood there and looked at it for a while, trying to figure out why the meat was there and who put it there. It was awfully early for someone to have gotten up and put it there, and I didn't remember hearing anyone coming in the night before. And why in that room? I have only seen them use that room for eating once when they had a huge guesting, and they never prepare food in there. So odd.

I wanted to do some laundry today, but with all of the dust that the house builders kick up, I think it would be counterproductive. Apa brought out the “washing machine” and asked me if I wanted to use it, but I hate that thing, and I would rather take the time to scrub my stuff by hand and get it more clean and not wrecked. Oh well, I have enough clothes left behind by other volunteers that I can just do some underwear and let the rest of it keep piling up for a while.

The builders have been here for at least three weeks now, and I wonder if they are getting sick of being here. They all sleep in the room connected to the kitchen that Apa usually uses as a dough-rolling surface and storage shed for dusty junk. When the place was first built, it must have been intended as a dining room, because it has a built in platform for eating on, which is typical of a lot of Kyrgyz houses. It is kind of gross and dusty, I think, and it has to be chilly at night. The platform has just enough room for the four men to sleep side by side, and they also eat all their meals there. They keep to themselves all the time and I never even see them talking with my host dad or brother, which seems strange to me since we have all been living in close quarters for the past few weeks. The compound isn't that big, and plus, there is only one outhouse, so there is a bit of a mad rush in the morning when everyone wakes up.

I would like to just sit and watch them work sometimes because it is absolutely fascinating, but that is kind of weird, and I always feel uncomfortable when I walk past them and they all stare, probably still trying to figure out why a random American is living here. I wonder if anyone has explained it to them?

Anyway, they have been building this house completely by hand, and it is a very interesting process. I love watching them throw the mud bricks from the ground up to the scaffolding. They have a very practiced rhythm to it, and they make it look like the bricks are nothing more than bean bags. I am excited to see how this house will turn out.

October 8, 2009

I have realized that making frequent trips to the city is essential for my mental health. It’s not like I am completely isolated. I meet up with the two other volunteers in my region during the week occasionally, I have a phone, and then there are the two English-speaking teachers at my school that I can talk to, but there are always these little things that wear me down and make me a little bit on edge. Just now, I was watching an episode of “The Office” on my computer. It was the last episode of season 2, where Jim finally tells Pam he is in love with her. I got choked up. I'm not kidding. I actually cried while watching “The Office.” Another example: last night I was reading a book of short stories by Nathaniel Hawthorne that I inherited from past volunteers. To be honest, Hawthorne drives me nuts, but I always feel like I should give him another chance, so I am making my way through this book a little at a time. There was this horrible story about a minister who wears a black veil, symbolic of some past sin or something stupid like that. Now, I need to say a bit about this really unreasonable fear that I have. In this area, many women wear full, burka-like garments. At first I could always feel myself be a stupid westerner and stare with my mouth open while these women walked past. Now I hardly notice it anymore. However, there are other women that cover themselves in another manner, with one scarf covering their entire face with another scarf tied over that in the typical Muslim fashion. This never fails to creep me out, and I have had three or four nightmares since I have been here that feature these covered women. Anyway, I was reading this story last night, and I couldn't finish it because I was scared. How ridiculous is that?

OK, now on to these little things that wear me down to the point that I become this nut case. Last week I was in Uzgen to run some errands and hang out with some volunteers for a bit. I ended up heading back to the village in a rush because I spent about a half hour at the post office trying to get an envelope mailed, and I was going to be late for my club. I climbed in a taxi at the taxi stand and hoped that it would fill up quickly so we could go. It did fill up quickly, but unfortunately one of the passengers was a very, very drunk older man, who was deposited into the seat next to me, leaving me squashed in the middle seat of the Tico, probably the smallest car ever made. Anyway, long story short, the man was bothering me so much that I made the driver pull over and I switched seats with the young man in the front, even though the ride is only about 20 minutes and I was in a hurry. I usually don't let things like that get to me, but I realized that I wouldn't put up with that kind of treatment in the states, so why should I let it fly here?

Last Saturday was Teacher's Day, and the other teachers at my school convinced me to stay in town for the festivities. I wasn't too excited about this because there had just been another teacher's party in honor of the director's son's wedding (they find every excuse for a party here, I swear) and it wasn't a lot of fun for me. There were two tables in two different rooms and I found myself sitting at the one with no English teachers, but with the young male teacher that all the women are trying to set me up with. It was a very long afternoon for me. They managed to get me to drink enough so that I participated in their little singing bowl game, and now that they have heard me sing, I am going to have to do it all the time. Great.

However, the Teacher's Day party was great. All the teachers gathered together in the cafeteria, the grounds keeper-janitor guy cut up some brush from behind the outhouse and started a big fire on the playground, and a few moms cooked a ton of food on it. Beside the food, there were games and dancing, and a lot of toasts, which I usually hate, but for some reason it was really fun this time. It might have had something to do with the fact that this party happened to have wine in addition to vodka and cognac, and although Central Asian wine is really horrible and, according to custom, must be drunk in shots out of a tea cup, it is definitely preferable to vodka.