Christmas Greetings from Dushanbe

The big New Year tree in my neighborhood. I have been thinking that Dushanbe is such a pretty, neat and well-kept city until they started decorating for New Years.

October 23, 2010

Ack, the dust! I could probably get some pretty decent cement out of my mouth right now. After cleaning my apartment thoroughly, I have decided to keep my windows closed until it rains.

Today was the first day since my arrival that hasn't felt like summer. It was still beautiful and sunny (though dusty), just a little bit cooler. Love the sun, hate the dust.

I'm as busy as ever and still love my job, possibly even more so now that I have really begun to get to know my students.

Dushanbe never ceases to amaze me with the strange variety of things it offers. In the past week or so I attended an international film festival, saw a performance by Native American dancers from the States, saw a belly dancing show and a performance of the opera Aida. Tomorrow I plan to go on a hike to see dinosaur fossils.

Maybe it's because I so recently lived in rural Central Asia, or maybe it's because whenever I read a news article on Tajikistan, it almost is always referred to as “the poorest of the former Soviet republics” or something of that nature, but I was impressed with the interior of the Opera Ballet Theater that is situated just on the other side of a small park from my apartment building. Not only was the theater beautifully decorated, but the place had the most comfortable theater seats that I've ever sat in. I could have taken a nap in that seat, but the performance of Aida was actually quite entertaining. The number of empty seats in the place was depressing, however. With the huge cast, there could have hardly been more than two audience members to each performer. With tickets at only $4, I don't know how they managed to finance the performance.

November 6, 2010

It's a holiday weekend! One great thing about the former Soviet Union is the multitude of holidays that are nicely spread out. I'm writing this while watching a concert on TV. Actually, its on EVERY Tajik channel (all four, that is). I have sputnik TV, so I have options, but I'm mesmerized by this concert. So far, it has mostly consisted of pretty girls in various varieties of national dress walking around in formations and occasionally dancing or braiding each other's hair in rhythm. There was one dance entirely choreographed around one woman's ridiculously amazing hair: it literally brushed the floor. In any case, it's not the most interesting thing I've ever seen, but there's so much sparkle and color, I just can't look away!

I spoke Tajik at the bazaar today! I can't believe how quickly I'm picking up the basics of this language. Only about half of the words I've learned so far are completely new. Many words are similar enough to Kyrgyz/Uzbek to be easily remembered, and all the borrowed Russian words are the same. Surprisingly, there are more than a few words that are related to English or Romantic languages. Mother is “modar,” father is “padar,” bad is “bad”. Awesome!

Also at the bazaar today, I realized I've been spending too much time in Central Asia. There were some women selling steaming-hot boiled sheep heads out of big tubs, and as I was walking by and caught a whiff of the boiled meat, my mouth started to water and I started thinking about what I was going to have for supper. Hard to believe that just a little over a year ago I would have forced back the urge to vomit at such a sight.

If you were wondering, I did NOT eat a sheep head. I had mac and cheese. Thank God Tajik people appreciate good cheese. Why it was so difficult to find edible cheese in Kyrgyzstan, I'll never know. I actually have big chunks of cheddar and swiss in my fridge right now.

November 14, 2010

Reasons I know I've spent too much time in Central Asia:

• At a party, I feel much more comfortable dancing in a Central Asian style than like an American.
• My kitchen perpetually smells like cumin.
• I've come to appreciate the beauty of a finely groomed uni-brow.
• After one month in Dushanbe, I've already bought two pairs of sparkly shoes.
• I'm more surprised to see a dog on a leash than I am to see a leashed goat, sheep, or even bear in the center of the city.
• I'm mesmerized by the weather girl on Tajik TV. I wish I could point at a weather map with as much grace as she does.
• After hearing that broccoli was sighted at the bazaar, I spent my whole lunch break searching for it with no success.
• I got really excited when a co-worker gave me an avocado.
• I know what persimmons and quince are.
• I haven't figured out the complex system of street crossing yet, but I do know that it helps to find the most formidable-looking middle aged woman with the glittery-est clothes and keep pace with her.
• I recognize that it is actually bad manners to buy something without bargaining for a lower price.

Reasons Dushanbe is an amazingly terrible / terribly amazing (depends on your opinion) place:

• Fried Chicken. There are at least 3 different fast-food chains in the city: “SFC” (Southern Fried Chicken), “New York Fried Chicken,” and “Kantri Fried Chicken” (I think with this one they were going for “country,” but they decided to spell it in Russian letters). They all look almost exactly the same. “SFC” (called simply “Chicken,” in English, even by locals who don't speak English) is dangerously close to home for me. They actually have really good pizza, too.
• Sawdust on your head is apparently adequate warning that a tree branch is about to be cut above the sidewalk you are walking on.
• An equally adequate warning is a plastic bag on a stick next to an open man hole.
• Fountains everywhere!
• Hate the chore of sorting your recycling? No need to in my neighborhood. I just take all my trash to the dump, and some poor desperate person will, as soon as my back is turned, jump on the bag, collect all my plastic bottles, brush off the bag the trash was in, fold it up neatly, and presumably will be able to sell all these things. I can't tell whether it would be nicer for me to just hand them the things that they might want rather than making them have to tromp through the trash to collect it.
• Have I mentioned the bear on a leash?
• The routine for getting bread for lunch at my office is as follows: 1. Leave the office compound and walk a few yards down a narrow alley. 2. Knock on an unmarked blue door halfway down the alley. 3. Wait a few seconds and knock again. 4. I the door opens, you are in luck! You can buy fresh hot bread straight from the bakers at whole-sale price. 5. Run back to the office, tossing the bread back and forth so as not to burn your hands. 6. Enjoy.
• Living next to a kindergarten = happiness.
• Keeping my window open = a dusty apartment.
• A reincarnation of the WWII-era Red Army marched down the main street on a Saturday afternoon. I'm talking long coats, furry hats, shiny black boots, rifles slung across the back, the whole shebang. I looked around for movie cameras or something, but this was the real thing. Allegedly they are from the police academy. I knew they weren't much for investing in new uniforms if they still have old ones that will do, but these guys looked fresh off the time machine.

November 16, 2010

Another holiday today. I was really looking forward to sleeping in this morning, but unfortunately I was awoken at 7 am by loud knocking at my door and children's voices yelling “do you have bread?” (At least this is what I think they were saying. I only just learned the verb “to have.” It took me only a peek out the peep hole to figure out that there was something of a trick-or-treat thing going on. I ignored the knocking until 9, but the kids were just so darn cute that I started giving out cookies. By 11, it was finished. Why didn't anyone tell me this would happen? And why do they do it so early in the morning?

December 3, 2010

Everyone keeps saying, "winter is here" but there are still roses blooming in the garden, and I eat lunch outside everyday without a jacket. It is chilly in the morning and evening, but I'll take that in exchange for warm and sunny afternoons! My Tajik teacher predicts that it will "barf" this weekend. I can't say I'm looking forward to that.

Onomatopoetry

Since Barf received something of a reprieve from me, I thought I would take the opportunity to highlight another wonderful product name that I came across in the store last night: a brand of baby food called "Plop."

Doesn't this product name entirely ensure you of the tastiness and nutritional value of the trusted brand? The best you could buy for your precious offspring.

Mystery Solved

"Barf" (Барф) means "snow" in Tajik/Persian. A much more pleasant thing to compare a cleaning product to.

"Runaways" Part II

I wanted to take this opportunity to follow up on the story recorded in June's "Runaways and Runway Models" post. A comment from Gemma made me realize that I never resolved what happened.

After my account left off, the runaway followed me around for a few days, and I bought him a few lunches in exchange for helping me with my English club. As it turned out, he stopped hanging around me after I reprimanded him (maybe too harshly, considering that his views were no different from most other Kyrgyz teenage boys) for some strong racist language that he used against an Uzbek shopkeeper.

Somehow, in the coming days, he finally made it home. He told me that he had apologized and made peace with his parents, but I don't know if this was the truth or not.

Soon after this, all hell broke loose in the June violence, so I lost touch with most people. I can only hope that he decided to resume his studies.

Afghan Gunmen

Sorry about the delay, everyone. For some reason, I haven't been able to access this page for the past week or so. I don't know whether to blame the connection or government censorship. No doubt all 777 of you have been anxiously awaiting the next installment. True story: at this exact moment, precisely 777 people have viewed my blog since the first entry. Actually, that can't be true. 777 computers have viewed this blog. Here's a special shout-out to my 19 readers in Guadeloupe (no offense, but who are you? I'd really like to know. Leave a comment if you are still reading.)

Last night I succeeded in breaking the lock to my apartment door. This is the second lock I've broken in Central Asia. I don't know how I do these things. Luckily, this time I was neither locked in or out of my apartment. Also, it took only an hour before the lock was fixed, as opposed to a month last time.

While my landlady was standing around with me waiting for the guy to switch the lock, I took the opportunity to point out a water stain on the ceiling that had recently appeared. My plan had been to march upstairs and, in the combination of Russian caveman speech and hand gestures that has been serving me so well so far, inform my upstairs neighbors that they are rudely dripping water on my ceiling.

I asked my landlady, who speaks some basic English, "Who lives upstairs? Do you know?".

"Yes," she replied. "Uh... gunmen. Afghan gunmen." Suddenly the water stain on my ceiling doesn't seem like such a big deal. I'll let the landlady deal with it whenever she gets around to it.

Journey and First Impressions

Once again, I must ask you to watch the dates of the entries. I am apparently incapable of doing anything in a linear fashion.

Sept. 28, 2010

Stockholm Airport

I find airports to be at once fascinating and terribly sad. Fascinating for many obvious reasons including its value as a giant on-going social experiment, as in “lets lock thousands of people from all walks of life and different parts of the world into one building for hours when they are already cranky and sleep-deprived, and just DARE them tolerate each other.” Its the same effect as going to the zoo, watching all these people. In fact, I strategically positioned myself across from the “Smoking Capsule” which is exactly what it sounds like. A round, elevator-sized glass capsule intended to contain smokers. Its deliciously cruel, watching all these people cram themselves desperately into this tiny container with a bunch of strangers, exposed to amused gawkers like me.

Well, its my lucky day. A man accompanied by a helper dog just sat down on the other end of the Ikea-ish bench I've sprawled out on for the time being. The dog was carrying the man's briefcase by the handle in his mouth. Adorable! Smokers in a capsule, cute helper dogs, this wait will go by in no time. Once I get tired of sitting here, I might move over to one of the red egg chairs on a circle of shag carpet behind me and look out the window, just because it seems like a fun place to sit. Oh, and there's also a kitchen gadget store here that I might go back and look through again. Kitchen gadgets have recently and inexplicably become an interest of mine. I never buy, just look. Its weird. I'm holding off on buying anything at all here because I have no idea what Swedish currency is called or what the exchange rate is. It makes me feel kind of guilty.

Which brings me to the reason that airports are so sad. So here I am, looking at souvenirs from a city I've never seen and will not see anytime soon. The flight attendant, the guy that stamps my passport, and security people all say what I assume to be “thank you” or “good-bye” or “have a pleasant trip” in a language I don't know, and I never know if it is more polite to say “thank you” in English or stay silent. I feel bad for not have doing some research on Sweden before I got here, like it should be an expected courtesy to know a little bit about a country you are visiting before you get there. I know even less about Latvia, my next stop.

Sept. 30, 2010

I'm here! My very LONG trip went smoothly, and although it took an irritatingly long time to get past the border control guys (there were three of them, but they kept switching booths for some reason, causing all of the travelers to run from one line to the other and back again, trying to predict which one would get them through the fastest. I did a bad job picking. If everyone weren't so cranky it would have been hilarious).

I was met at the doors of the airport by my new office's driver and American director, and they quickly got me shuffled off to my temporary apartment, leaving me to sleep (it was about 5 a.m. at this point).

Incidentally, I am writing this now at 4:30 a.m. today because I unfortunately have a messed-up internal clock.

The apartment, which from the outside and stairwell looks exactly like every apartment building I saw in Kyrgyzstan (boxy, cold, gray, crumbling), is very nice and comfortable. Its pretty huge for just me, nicely decorated with new-looking furniture and fixtures (if you like Central Asian neo-baroque, or whatever you would call the style of home decorating that they prefer in this part of the world), comfortable, and spotless. Some perks: three big windows, big bed, new stove and oven that looks like its never been used, and satellite TV (BBC World and Aljazeera English!).

I woke up around noon, cleaned up, and visited the supermarket across the street to change my money and get something to eat. As soon as I poked my head out of the building, I noticed a woman bent over a cooking pot propped on bricks in small fire. Hooray, I'm in Central Asia again!

My apartment is in a quiet area near the central hub of the city. Two of the Americans who work at my office live on the same block, and besides the supermarket, there is also a Georgian restaurant that the thee of us ate at last night (leftover hachupuri—Georgian cheesy bread—is in the fridge for breakfast!) and, apparently, a small produce market that I haven't visited yet.

The driver came to bring me to the office in late afternoon (its in walking distance, but I don't know the way yet), just in time for a quick tour and then a little award ceremony and reception for the Tajikistani lawyers who went on a professional development/study tour of America in the summer.

I knew I would like working at the office as soon as I saw the ping-pong table directly inside the office's compound gates. On the other side of the courtyard, exquisitely ornate carved wood doors of the office's main building were thrown wide open to let in the sunshine and fresh air from the garden (by the way, the weather is absolutely perfect). Luckily, they decided to set up my work space in the bright reception area rather than the isolated classroom. My desk is set next to a large upper-level window that opens up into the garden, giving me the illusion of sitting among the branches of a persimmon tree now heavy with bright orange fruit.

My new co-workers are being so nice already. As I went around meeting people in the office, a few showed me my date of arrival marked on their calendars with prominence. They kindly suggested that I sleep in tomorrow and come in to the office whenever I wake up (such a switch from PC where we arrived in the wee hours of the morning and started our first meeting a few hours later).

My first impression of Dushanbe: in many ways it looks a lot like Bishkek, but with a completely different vibe. It has a certain vibrancy similar to southern Kyrgyzstan which I suppose comes from the bright sun, fruit trees, and colorful clothes. I didn't think it was possible, but there are even more shiny, sparkley clothes here than in Uzgen. At night the streets in this area are lit up with colored lights. This street has multicolored palm tree shapes.