Hospitality

It seems like so many of the best stories I have are of the disasters, the misadventures, the challenges that I've come across, so I'm very pleased to finally tell a story about something unexpected and pleasant.

Yesterday, while enjoying the gorgeous spring weather, I ran into an American colleague and his wife, who invited me to join them to see an art gallery where they were going to finish a payment and pick up an order. I'm not a huge art enthusiast, but having nothing else to do, I went along.

The art gallery turned out to be the private residence of the artist, who is well known and respected within Tajikistan. The home was easily the most beautiful I've seen in Central Asia. There are two rooms to the small gallery/studio that they showed us. The entry way is lined with the proudly framed work of children who take art lessons there. The main gallery is bright with natural light coming in through the skylight in the high ceiling. The walls are lined from ceiling to floor with brightly colored heirlooms--wall hangings passed down through the generations, grandmother's embroidered wedding dress, and, of course, the artist's work, which is stunning. The best part of this room was the grapevine, which the room was actually built around, so that the vine comes up through the floor and out through the wall onto an arbor outside, creating shade in the courtyard. The vine itself was another heirloom, having been planted by the grandfather.

As if this weren't surprising enough, the artist's family had laid out a full feast for their expected guests (making me feel guilty for tagging along, but Tajik people are always prepared for extra guests, and I think this family sincerely enjoys being hosts). This particular spread was in gratitude, I suppose, for the substantial purchase that my friends were making. The artist's life work, it seems, is reviving the Persian miniature style of painting. I thought that this meant little paintings, but most of them are quite large. It simply means that the subjects are miniature, which means that his work is rich with detail, and they are like illustrations--they tell a story. He also makes these beautiful chess sets, one of which is what my friends were there to pick up. These chess sets are also beautiful and richly detailed, and each set is specific to one region in Tajikistan.

After enjoying traditional Tajik food and chatting about the history of all the interesting things in the gallery and about the family's work, a huge amount of picture taking ensued. We were taking pictures of everything in the beautiful gallery, and the family was taking pictures of us enjoying the gallery. We all ended up laughing about it the situation was so funny--all of us taking pictures of each other. We even took a group photo on a timer.

Ironically, I actually didn't have my own camera at the time, so I don't actually have any pictures at the moment, but check out the artist's website at this address:

http://olim-kamalov.blogspot.com

Dead Goat Polo

So, if I remember correctly, today marks 2 years since I first came to Central Asia. How fitting that I should finally see an official game of Boz Kashi, known to the rest of the world as "a polo-like game played with a goat carcass."

I enjoyed the game about as much as I expected to; which is to say, I didn't. I mean no disrespect to this ancient and treasured tradition, but I just don't really like contact sports with incomprehensible rules and objectives, and I especially don't like standing in the mud and rain and cold watching such a sport.

Now that I'm home and warm and dry, I don't necessarily regret going. The attitude of the riders was impressive to me, and interesting, right down to their clothes, which gave me the impression that they couldn't decide whether they were in a rodeo, an American football game in 1920, or playing quidditch.

As far as I could tell, the game is something of a free-for-all with each rider competing individually for prizes donated by sponsors. The main riders are supported by a back up team that guards them once they get hold of the goat. The first winner was awarded with a prize of honey. The second winner received a car.

Happy Navruz!

It's almost Navruz again--I can't believe it! The last year went by so incredibly quickly.

Navruz (in Kyrgyzstan, Nooruz) is the Central Asian New Year holiday celebrated on the Spring Equinox, March 21. I arrived in Kyrgyzstan right after this holiday two years ago, and spent the following year hearing about how awesome it is. By the time Nooruz finally came, there was a freak mid-spring blizzard and the electricity was out all day. I sat around being bored with my host family waiting for the power to come back on, but it never did, so we sat around in the dark eating cake. Bummer.

So, as you can imagine, I am totally pumped for Navruz in Tajikistan, especially because it seems like so much of the Tajik national identity is centered around its Navruz traditions.

They started decorating the city over a week ago. On Friday, I started seeing lots of kids of all ages on the streets in national dress, heading to and from school celebrations. This morning I ran out to the store and found that someone had decorated my building's stairwell and my door with spring-colored balloons. The checkout girls at the store across the street were all decked out in their national dresses and hats. The weather is great and everyone seems to be in a good mood, including me!

UPDATE: Turns out the balloons were in preparation for a wedding! I had forgotten that the girl upstairs was getting married. I almost had a heart attack when I heard the horns and drums coming up the stairs.

The Coffin Lid on the Stairs

Today is Sunday, so I woke up late this morning. It had gotten colder overnight, so when I got up I turned on the air conditioner that heats my apartment. The strong smell of incense flooded in with the warm air. My next-door neighbor, an old Russian woman named Aleksandra, died of a heart attack two nights ago. Her funeral is being held in her apartment today.

News of her death came to me last night at precisely the moment the neighbor who lives in the apartment directly below Aleksandra and I were sharing complaints about her. “There's always people coming and going from her place early in the morning,” I complained. “Her doorbell is loud and plays annoying tunes like 'My Darling Clementine' and 'Happy Birthday. The chiming of her grandfather clock sometimes wakes me up at night.”

“She yelled at me about setting my garbage in the hallway for a minute,” added my friend. “And people were moving furniture around up there in the afternoon when I wanted my baby to sleep.”

Someone delivered the news to us while I was sitting in my friend's apartment, gossiping, and we felt terrible. We simultaneously looked to the ceiling, asking forgiveness, whether we were directing our prayers to the apartment above or further up, I don't know. I don't know why I was so ungracious toward this poor old woman. She always returned my greetings in the hallway when I saw her, but since the weather turned cold, I didn't see her very often. I was glad when she stopped coming out so much, because she whenever she did she would always talk to me, striking up a very one-sided conversation that always made me uncomfortable. Once she made me repeat her full name several times until she was satisfied with my pronunciation. A moment later, I didn't remember her last name. More than once she motioned to me that I should come in for tea, but looking past her into her dark and creepy apartment that emitted some strong unpleasant smells, I would say in my best broken Russian “nyet, sichas nyet.” (“no, now no”) and saying a word that I hoped best resembled the Russian for work, I pantomimed running in place, and left.

Today is a rare gloomy, damp, snowy day. It's cold, but not that cold, so the city is covered with muddy puddles. I preferred not to go out at all today, but I had a pile of garbage that needed to be taken out, and as all I had in my fridge was one egg, some ketchup, and mayonnaise, a trip to the bazaar was needed.

As I readied to leave, I could hear several voices on the other side of my door. I looked through the peep hole to watch for the mourners to move out of the way. I felt guilty trying to avoid the whole funeral thing, and I wondered if I should offer to do something, or at least go in and pay my respects, but I'm a coward, and it seems more respectful to stay out of the way than to risk a cultural faux pas.

When the mourners dispersed, I made my escape. The hallway was filled with smoke, not from the incense, but from Tajik women cooking over two open fires right in the stairwell. One woman is deep-frying potatoes, and the other is watching rice in a larger pot. A rare and out of place taste of community and local tradition in a building who's occupants are a mix of nationalities that all keep to ourselves.

A red coffin lid is propped up against the wall of the stairwell opposite my door. On my way out and the way back home, I navigated past these obstacles—the large coffin lid, the two fires and two cooking pots, the mourners huddled around the building's entrance with umbrellas. And now I'm hiding in my apartment again, the TV on, but muted respectfully. Rest in peace, Aleksandra. I'm sorry I never took you up on that offer for a cup of tea.

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.