I Am An RPCV Now

As you may or may not have discovered by this point, this blog sort of fell by the wayside during my extremely busy and productive second year of service. And then before I knew it, I was no longer a Peace Corps Volunteer, but an Returned Peace Corps Volunteer (RPCV). I hope this blog provided some insight into the life of a Peace Corps Volunteer in Azerbaijan, or at least some general amusement. I am leaving this blog up because it might prove useful to someone in the near future. Do not hesitate to contact me with any questions. Sag olun!

“I Need To Stay Home And Feed The Chickens” Or How I Justified Staying Home To Watch “The Wedding”

It was the Friday following Easter Weekend, and my friends in my adopted homeland had spent the week bragging that they’d spent more time at home than at the office in the last 7 days.

What was the reason for this influx of bank holidays? Wills was getting hitched.

Cue appropriate pomp and circumstance. And an embarrassing number of posts on my Facebook Wall asking how I was coping with the fact that my first teenage crush would be officially off the market by the end of the week.

I desperately wanted to stay home and watch the wedding. The still relatively new novelty of DSL meant I would be able to stream it Live. For once, time zones were due to be in my favour. But I was supposed to be at school. And my after-school clubs had finally picked up some momentum.

I was torn: Be a good PCV or indulge my inner Anglophile.

I was up late debating my proposed course of action with a similarly conflicted PCV on the computer. It was approaching midnight and I was still undecided. It’s not every day a Prince gets married. But the prospect of having more than two kids show up to club for more than two days in a row doesn’t happen every day either.

Then my landlady came bustling into the room:
LL: Melissa. That was my son. I need to go take care of his kids. He has to go to Baku tomorrow. He’s coming right now to pick me up.
M: Oh. Is everything OK?
LL: Would it be OK if you stayed home and fed the chickens and watched the dogs tomorrow? I know you are supposed to go to school, but I don’t want the dogs to be left unattended all day.
M *trying to sound at least a little bit put out*: If you need me to I will. They won’t miss me for a day.

When I relayed the conversation to my friend, she laughed and observed that only in Azerbaijan would keeping an eye on chickens and house-pets be an acceptable excuse to skip school.

So I got my justification in the end, and I spent all day Friday in front of my computer watching the BBC’s Live Feed of The Wedding accordingly, after making sure the chickens and dogs were fed and watered.

My Thoughts:
- I want an excuse to visit a haberdashery, mostly because haberdashery is such an awesome word.
- Pippa had the nicer dress. Harry had the nicer uniform.
- I muddled ‘God Save the Queen’ with ‘My Country ‘Tis Of Thee’, but cried during ‘Jerusalem’
- I think the Duke of Carrickfergus (or however you spell it) is quite possibly the best title ever.
- I want a yellow search and rescue helicopter to do a fly by during my honeymoon send-off.
- Dear Woman In The Crowd: It is not OK to cut up flags to make a dress! At least not where I come from (maybe I’m not as British as I pretend to be after all)

Sing-Along Saturdays

My carpool neighbour has been badgering me to tutor his two young school age boys since I moved in next door.

I was conflicted by this on two counts:
1. He speaks fluent English: Why can’t he do it? Especially since they go to school in Russian (and therefore are learning English through Russian.)
2. If I tutor one kid at home, the word will get out and I’ll have to tutor everyone. (I learned this the hard way).

But….
-The dude has been giving me a ride to work everyday without complaint.
-I actually like the 2nd and 3rd form textbooks.
-After Novruz my schedule was looking pretty empty.

A compromise: Round up another half-dozen classmates and I will hold a primary school club on Saturday mornings.

It has been a success. We review the simple vocabulary that is in the class textbooks: Colours, Animals, House, Family, Fruits and Vegetables. We act out dialogues.

But I’m not going to lie: we spend most of the time singing songs: ‘cause it’s Saturday and all the kids involved are under the age of 10.

Now I have to admit most of songs in questions are ones I’ve poached from other places and then altered to suit my needs: Ten Little Indians became Ten Little Rabbits. And the ones I didn’t change are definitely not musically faithful to the original. But that’s OK because the world always needs a little bit more “Head Shoulders Knees and Toes”.

Even if I can’t keep the kids’ names straight.

Kindergarten Hour

Remember the village host sister who upon her return from Russia called the ankle-biting two year old to her side, only to discover that I was the person he considered an ‘aunt’ instead? I can’t remember if I told that story to the world at large. But it was a pretty amusing.

Fast-forward a year:
She is the director of the village kindergarten/daycare. One Thursday morning as I was sitting on the couch watching her rush around getting ready for work, I had an idea. If I was just going to sit around my host family’s house for four hours on a Thursday morning, why couldn’t I help her out at the kindergarten for an hour or two?

So I started going to the kindergarten for an hour on Thursdays. It gives the teachers a break and I like to pretend the kids are actually learning some English.

In the end: I think I managed to teach them the colours of the rainbow and a handful of animal names. And “Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes”.

There are good days when the kids actually generate words rather than simply repeat what I am saying. (Not that I can hold this against them they are just learning the alphabet in Azerbaijani.) And approximately 70% of the kids are paying attention.

There are bad days when the kids get way too excited about my little animal figurines or markers. It is amazing how difficult it is to get twenty 5 year olds to sit in a circle. On these days I am just grateful to get one kid to listen to me (and hope that the rest of them don’t injure themselves as they climb over and under the furniture.)

In conclusion: I stand by my previous threat to bypass the toddler years entirely through adopting 5 year olds. But maybe it’s easier if there isn’t a foreign language involved. Maybe…

The Wheels On The Bus

For most of the spring I had to take the oil company bus to work every day. It’s a good thing I am a morning person.

I have developed quite a rapport with other commuters. Anyone who makes the mistake of sitting in ‘my’ seat faces the ‘wrath’ of the entire bus.

There are the ladies that sit behind me, who are constantly bickering about whose brother I should be betrothed to. There is the cravat wearing old man, who greets me with a smile as soon as he steps into the bus. There is the woman who gets mad when the man with questionable hygiene sits next to me. There are my neighbour’s relatives who walk home from the bus stop with me.

Of course there are still moments of cultural discord.
- The constant reminders that I am going to ruin my eyes if I continue to read as we bounce over the pock-marked asphalt. To which I reply: Then I better read as much as I can before I go blind.
- The good-natured jibes about how I need to get married immediately. My retort: “I have time” - is usually met with good-natured laughter, and the subject is dropped until the next day.
- The disapproving looks on the days my skirt doesn’t quite cover my knees. But there is also the skirt that the ladies swear is an ancient Azerbaijani pattern. (I don’t have the heart to tell them I bought it at TJMaxx.)

But I have recently been re-christened with an Azerbaijani-friendly version of my name - apparently off some Turkish soap opera.
So I am going to consider my commute a cultural integration success. Just don’t ask me to spell my new name. Or threaten to take my books away.

I Will Never Be Rafeal Nadal, Or I Have Issues With Follow-Through

Remember that time I promised I would update regularly since that I have DSL upstairs now?

The calendar in the sidebar tells me that was sometime back in April (or Month 19). Oops.

What can I say? My fan-girl tendencies are detrimental to my productivity. Don’t judge. You know you have a guilty pleasure too.

Now it’s June. Or Month 21. (Six months!). School’s been out for three weeks. And Rafa has reclaimed Roland Garros from Roger. Which has inspired me to tackle the ever-expanding Word Document of Blog Post Titles. (The good intentions were there!).

So I have something like 72 hours before I head off on the great Summer Camp Circuit 2011. Let’s see how many of these snapshots of life in Azerbaijan I can type out before I leave home for the foreseeable future.

With luck I might be able to remember how to properly construct a sentence in English. (Something which is clearly beyond my grasp at the moment.)

‘Əlu Ver’: How Azerbaijanis Say Excuse Me

I bump into people quite frequently; it is a side-effect of being perpetually unable to walk in a straight line.

In my previous life this simply meant dodging moving vehicles and velocipeds (it occurs to me that last word may not be English, but I like the alliteration) and mumbling apologies and excuses to anyone I inconvenienced en-route to wherever I was headed.

It turns out there is a little bit more ceremony involved in these encounters in Azerbaijan. The idea: ‘əlu ver’ – a social nicety that translates as ‘give me your hand.’

When I first arrived in country, this concept confused my culture shock addled mind. I didn’t understand why when I bumped into someone on the street or stepped on their toes (literally – the figurative instances are a whole different category), they would turn around and offer me their hands. Just because I was a foreigner and clearly lacked any sort of social grace didn’t mean that you could use any excuse to make my acquaintance.
I would stare dumbly at the offered limb until it crossed into my personal space and squeezed my hand.

Eventually I realized that this misshapen meet-and-greet served another purpose – a gesture of apology. But even once I understood the intention behind it – it would still take me more than a fraction of a second to act in the way that I knew was expected of me. And extended arms were forced to take the initiative. I did get a little better about this but it was still a jolt to the system – I like my bubble; stay out of it.

Finally somewhere between the awkward outcome of an unintentional game of footsie with Latifa my during first month in the village and the well-intentioned ‘xamins’ who have jostled me on the bus for the last year and a half, I have finally acquired the muscle memory to complete this social grace without delay.

“Əlu Ver”: Unconscious Acts of Assimilation Achieved
- A woman stepped on my toes getting off the bus and my hand was outstretched almost before I had processed the pressure on my trainers (or the baby dangling precariously in her arms)
- I was making my way towards the door at “Whole Foods” when I slipped on the mud-guard cardboard, bumping into the shop-keeper stocking the shelves. My hand was extended behind me before I regained my footing (and to a male no less!).
- I just know I am going to need to apologise to the woman I need to climb over to get into my seat on the bus every morning, so I am 80% sure the way I shuffle my bags around before boarding is to accommodate for this fact.

Novruz: Adventures in Bayramlaşmaq-ing

Novruz is the biggest national holiday in Azerbaijan. An observation of the Spring Equinox, it is celebrated on March 20th or 21st. I live in a city, work in a village and have ‘family’ in the capital. Fortunately for me, the city I live in celebrated Novruz on the 20th, which gave me time to visit the village on the 21st for their celebrations; then on the 22nd I woke up early and was in Baku by lunch-time.

On March 20th, I went upstairs after lunch and was put to work in the kitchen alongside my landlady’s daughters-in-law. We laughed and smiled with each other as we baked fish, plucked turkey, dressed a goose and put too much sour cream in the salads. Four hours later we sat down to eat, and it was only half-way through my first helping of fish that I realized I had yet to pick up my fork. I was eating with my hands just like the family around me. After the meal we sat together and made jokes at each other’s expense just like I would have if I was home in America, then other relatives came over to wish us all a happy Novruz.

Although I didn’t get to bed until well after 1AM the night before, I set out for the village I work in as early as I could manage the next day. I stepped on the bus and was immediately greeted by one of the women I usually ride into work with every day. The bus was full due to holiday travel, and I had resigned myself to standing for the 45 minute ride when I heard my name being called from the back of the bus. One of my students was riding back to the village with her family, and she kindly offered me her seat.

I arrived in the village at 11AM. I needed to catch the 3:30PM bus back into the city. This meant I had exactly 4 hours to wish my neighbours and friends in the village a happy Novruz. (The walk to and from the bus stop would take 30 minutes). I had just enough time for one cup of tea and one piece of bakhlava at each house. So off I went. Of course there were protests at every house when I made my excuses after a single cup of tea. But I could see that everyone appreciated the fact that I had made the effort to come to the village during the holiday, and were surprised and pleased by my appearance. The smiles on their faces made the windy wait at the bus stop later that afternoon worthwhile.

Finally on the 22nd I set out for the capital. Even though I live a relatively short distance from the capital (only an hour and a half), I was not particularly thrilled by the thought of a martshurtka trip that necessitated a caffeine-free morning. (Inter-regional travel in Azerbaijan rarely involves clean roadside restrooms). I was even less excited when the driver informed me that I was the last passenger to board. This usually means an extremely uncomfortable ride sandwiched between two other people on a half-size jump seat in the middle of the bus. But I was expected for lunch, and needed to get on the road. So I climbed up and was greeted by yet another unexpectedly friendly face – one of the librarians from the local library and her daughter were also traveling into the capital. So even though I was sandwiched between two people on a half-size jump seat for the majority of the trip, I didn’t mind so much because they were familiar faces.

And there was peach juice and my favorite salad waiting for me upon my arrival at my destination.

Making sure to wish all your friends and family a happy holiday (bayramlaşmaq) can be a juggling act at the best of times, I needed to be in three places at once. It was quite an exhausting 48 hour stretch. But somewhere between the transport chaos, more air-kisses than I can count and more bakalava squares than I care to count, I was struck by a sense of contentment. The time and effort I have put towards cultural intergration made it possible for Norvuz 2011 to be such an overwhelming personal success.

Yes, I Have Been On Facebook A Lot More Frequently

I officially have internet at home in Salyan.

My landlord offered to run a cable downstairs for my personal use. But I opted out of that figuring that I would feel less inclined to spend hours in cyber-space if I had to walk upstairs to use it. The jury’s still out on the effectiveness of that particular game plan.

- My first Skype call was Ata and Ana. They call me more frequently than my ‘American’ parents now. Granted time zones are in their favour.

- Thanks to free US landline calls through GMAIL I can talk to people away from a computer. I wish there was a similar deal for Europe.

- I actually lesson plan for clubs and class now.

- I can read the news in English.

- I have rediscovered the stress relief provided by YouTube and Yahoo.


Ergo, if you want to talk to me in real-time through your own phone, send me your phone number. Or add me on Skype.

Puzzle Time

When I was in America in December I stocked up on Walmart-priced jigsaw puzzles in preparation for the electricity-less winter ahead. Turns out I didn’t have a chance to open the box before mid-February. And I can only recall one afternoon that was electricity-less.

Anyway…
I had mentioned to my landlady during one of our kitchen chats that I had all these jigsaw puzzles downstairs. She said that when her youngest son was small, jigsaw puzzles had been something of a fixture in their house. So when my landlord came home the next week for a two-week vacation, I brought a puzzle upstairs and we set about putting it together.

We quickly discovered winter landscapes are not the best jumping off point for out-of-practice puzzlers. But we had our 300-piece snow covered masterpiece assembled within an evening or two. Then we worked our way through another two puzzles in the five days before the relatives arrived for Novruz. 2000 pieces in 5 days.

My landlord eventually abandoned our puzzle evenings in favour of trying to figure out why our DSL router still wasn’t working. My landlady and I laughed at his frustration as we were quite happy to continue living a internet-less life. My landlady became mildly obsessed, leaving dishes to pile in the sink and housework undone in favor of puzzle putting together. When Skype was up and running (a week behind schedule), Mom wanted to know exactly what my landlady was doing puttering around the table in concentration.

I just enjoyed spending quality time with the people I live with. It was fun work together creating something. And I was quietly celebratory when my landlady exclaimed night after night: I’ve missed my TV show again! (She watches far too much TV.)

Good old-fashioned fun is under-rated in these technological times.