Moving On
Salut,
This is going to be a long post, so I am sorry in advance.
Last week, the week of August 21 and onwards, felt so surreal, like I was back in Ashu House or in the last week of being in Austin or Houston, watching the world shift slowly and I was watching it happen. The winding paths were changing, and just as quickly as I arrived in my village, I felt like I was leaving. I remember, almost so vividly, first arriving, and to now be leaving, felt unreal.
Last Monday was our last lesson, and even that felt like it wasn’t truly over. We ate our last lunch at my house, and we had lots of mantu. I remember taking a long nap and beginning to pack. My room was still a mess. My host family gave me a lovely chapan (Kyrgyz vest) in front of everyone, and I remember being so happy. On Tuesday, we all went to the Jannat Hotel in Bishkek. There, we met our counterparts and did lots of teamwork building, talking, active listening, and roleplaying, among other things. A counterpart is the local English teacher we work with inside our communities. A counterpart is not always a teacher, but because my cohort is TEFL specific, they all are, but sometimes they can be NGO workers, healthcare workers, etc. (Kyrgyzstan to my knowledge has had TEFL PCVs for a long time, but I know at one point, it also had a health sector. Many other countries have health, community development, and environment sectors so their counterparts are different). I met my lovely counterpart, Baku eje, as I call her. Her English is very good. Another volunteer, Frank, is also in my village, as it is large in Jalal Abad, and I had the pleasure to meet his counterpart, who is wonderful too and very extroverted in a fun way. He will be working a few blocks away from me.
The counterpart conference is a large teacher conference Peace Corps holds for us volunteers to meet and get to know our counterparts, as well as all together discuss expectations, common problems, conflict resolution, etc. The counterparts all had varying degrees of English ability and there were a few male counterparts too, though the vast majority were female. The conference lasted three days, and after the first, we all went home for one last night in our villages. One of the PCVs is going to one of the villages we stayed at in Chuy for her permanent assignment. On the last night of my time in the village, my host family made us Lagman which was insanely good. Next to the hotel was a Globus (a supermarket franchise in Kyrgyzstan), a large one, one of the largest in the country as Valerie said, and a mall on the other side, where I stopped twice to get fresh lemonade.
The morning we left the village was unsurprisingly emotional, and it was a moment I think many of us didn’t process. Because we were two language groups in one village, we went in separate marshrutkas, and for me, we all met at Responsible Rakhat’s house and put all our bags in. I got to see Alex, Jacob, Tess, and Resonsible Rakhat’s host family one last time. The entire last week of leaving was hard, and most people cried.
Right off the bat, I will say it was immediately daunting, first because almost none of them speak any English, and they have significant sway over future clubs and projects we will do. My school director, Gulzara, is no-nonsense, occasionally funny when I understand her jokes, and has a startling RBF. On the third day of the conference, I wasn’t feeling amazing and was not enthused to be that way in front of my boss. Fortunately, she was in good spirits. My counterpart, Baku eje, left the conference early to see her husband who is visiting from Europe, which meant I had the lovely circumstance of going to my site alone with my school director 😣. My Kyrgyz was sufficient enough to carry a basic conversation but not good enough to understand most of what she was saying to me and even less when she talked to other directors.
In Bishkek, a recurring theme is that a restaurant can be “x flavor/type of food” (Turkish, Chinese, Georgian, Russian, etc.) but it will nevertheless, always also have pizza, ramen, and sushi. So every restaurant is an every-food kind of restaurant, which I find endlessly amusing. The restaurant started playing very loud live music, and I successfully dragged several of my friends to the dance floor. I was lame and had pasta and salad for dinner. The DJ played Let’s Get Loud and Billie Jean upon seeing us Americans. I learned later the restaurant charged us all 100 som for the live music, which was not great. After returning to the hotel, we all met in Santi and Zachary’s room to practice our Komuz and song performance in addition to signing the rakhats cards, as we had bought them photos and frames as parting gifts.
I knew if I was going to cry over anyone leaving, it would be us leaving our rakhats. Responsible Rakhat leaving to go to Talas, and Rich Rakhat staying in Chuy to tutor embassy kids. They’ve seen a lot, and they’ve probably seen worse and better Kyrgyz speakers, so I take a weird comfort in that. I still miss them endlessly and will never tire of hearing rich Rakhat say “Oh my goddddd” and allegedly saying “What’s up my homie?” to Frank.
There is a part of me that is sad that wonderful people in my life, whoever they are, often come in and out, leaving their mark on my life and then just as quickly leaving. Such is the bittersweetness of it all. On those last nights, part of me wished I could have frozen those moments, the moments where I was laughing with people I loved, and lived in those memories forever. You never can, and part of the change is what makes it beautiful.
The morning of the swearing-in ceremony was chaotic, as I expected it to be, but I was very lucky I was not in a state of disorder and disarray. 18 volunteers were leaving that day, while 8 of us would stay in the hotel for an extra night. 6 of us, including me, were flying to Osh and then taking cars to Jalal Abad which meant we needed to stay the night to avoid travel at night, while the other 2 people, Jacob and Alex, were leaving in a car the Saturday as well in the morning because their sites are so remote they also needed to leave the next day to avoid travel at night. Everyone was running around the hotel, checking out their rooms, but we all looked snazzy.
Dasima was the gorgeous venue where we had our swearing-in. Several of my friends and family live-streamed the event on Facebook, and I am so grateful for those who did and those who texted me while it was going on! We had the pleasure to meet the US Ambassador to Kyrgyzstan, though less than pleased with his Kyrgyz pronunciation. My village sang the same Kyrgyz song we sang at the culture day, and a few of our host family members came as well (I think they usually only allowed one host family member, my host mom came). Our swearing-in ceremony also had a Kyrgyz band accompanying us and playing music. The most beautiful moment of the whole ceremony was when the band began to play our song along with us as we sang and as other members sang it with us. The ceremony was full of important people, including the ambassador, representatives from the Kyrgyz Ministry of Education, other diplomats, etc. At the end of the ceremony, we all sang Kyrgyz jeree, a song we had been petitioning the PC staff to allow us to sing for several weeks which is a PC tradition to sing, as I’ve been told.
It is never lost on me how much has changed since June 9, when I first left. How can so much change in such a short amount of time? I am always amazed how strangers can turn into friends, into family, into people we love. I was given government-issued friends, and now as I look back on my old posts, I see clearly how much is different. Everyone is a stranger but with enough time and effort, people become friends, and now there are people I never expected I would love so much.
The PC regional manager, Becca, told us to not rely on each other too much, which I found interesting. She said our job is not to befriend each other, not to create our own little expat community in Kyrgyzstan, that our job is to integrate into our community and to rely on locals. I don’t think it’s unsurprising we find comfort and ease in people who are experiencing the same things we are. In addition, they are fluent English speakers, a rarity in this country.
After everyone left, the eight of us rested for the afternoon. The hotel felt eerily empty. I went to Globus and the mall next door which I had never had enough time to explore. Here in Kyrgyzstan, I’ve picked up an old habit of browsing at shops or bazaars, but I don't like to buy anything. Or I buy useless stuff. In Kyrgyzstan, notebooks are these small copybooks, which are more often grid paper, with quirky patterns on the front, some have only 20 pages and others have a standard 80-100 for a school year. I’ve also picked up a habit of collecting copybooks I don’t need because I want their set of patterns (for example, there’s a historical castle notebook set I convinced myself I needed the entire set of). I guess it’s the hoarder in me, and my mom must be reeling. But because I was flying the next day, I couldn’t bring anything due to my bag already being overweight. My proudest moment was that night when I successfully packed everything into one checked bag, a carry-on, and an extra carry-on, with a backpack. On my way back, I’ll buy an extra suitcase and bring more souvenirs home.
The next morning, we woke up super early, as our flight left at 8 am, and the airport was 45 min to an hour away, so Alex and Jacob woke up early to say goodbye as well. Six of us with our counterparts and directors all took the flight to Osh. As I said earlier, my lovely counterpart was not present, so I had the awkward experience of being with my school boss. The 45-minute flight to Osh was absolutely gorgeous, albeit short of course. Looking out in my window seat, we flew above the mountains, and you could see the snow caps and the clouds hovering above them. After landing, my school director’s son came to pick us up, and we drove to Jalal Abad, which was a 2.5-hour drive or so. It was scenic, though I fell asleep in the back. I finally made a playlist for when in the Kyrgyz mountains, as I feel like that is its own aesthetic, and I anticipate many other trips through the mountains in the future.
It was at least 2 or 3 p.m. by the time we arrived at my permanent site. I was greeted by a large group of people, including my host family, members of the community, and other teachers, and a large feast of food. The village chief/leader showed up out of the blue to the first meal we had. My house is close to the school and just across the field. I already love my house, with a large compound and an open garden and grass. I love stargazing and it’s so easy here.
Unfortunately for me, it immediately rained nonstop the first two days I was here, and it rained all the way down to Osh as well. Surprisingly cold for the end of August, it was high 50s and low 60s, and I actually got to pull out the rain jacket. As opposed to my first host family, my new host family eats outside on a tapan, a sort of raised platform. We rarely eat sitting in chairs, which I don’t mind. Lots of tea and food.
My new host family is pretty different from my first in many ways. Firstly, I have both a host mom and dad, who are both retired and in their 60s. When I first talked to them, they immediately gave off a very carefree vibe. I’m convinced my host dad exists as a vibe, he sits on his phone watching reels most of the day if he isn’t out. They just kind of chill. My new host mom vibes too, they both sleep a lot and do occasional manual tasks.
My counterpart, Baku eje, showed me around the village, and I even went guesting to her house. I got introduced to the school staff, and it’s mostly women with a few men. There’s one funny Russian language teacher who is an old lady who studied English a very long time ago. She occasionally blurts out English words at me in incoherent rambles. It’s a recurring pattern I’ve found that many people I’ve met have studied a little bit of English at some point in their life but have completely forgotten it many years later, due to the inability to practice and the dominance of Russian.
I enjoy the vibes of the household, though sometimes it’s trickier to extract myself and spend time studying, reading, texting friends, etc. The kids practically have no bedtime, and I even asked my jenge, Aidana, what she does in her free time. She said she reads and scrolls on her phone, but that she’s rarely free now with four kids.
The family also watches lots of Russian TV and movies. One of my favorite things they did which was insightful was that my host dad was watching lots of Russian travel documentaries. They were National Geographic-esque, going to remote villages in Brazil for example, and reminded me very much of documentaries I watch on my own or would watch, so I appreciated seeing such a similar interest in the world. My host dad, despite not being an avid reader, and also having what sounds like a relatively comfortable and straightforward life (he’s been married for over forty years and has been a taxi driver the whole time), has such a vivid interest and curiosity about the rest of the world. We’re so close to the Uzbek border, so he’s been there too, and they all speak Russian, Kyrgyz, Kazakh, and Uzbek. I asked them why they wanted a volunteer, and they had one years ago, and they said they wanted to learn English. Most specifically for their grandchildren, Adelia, Alihan, and all, so that way they could go to America one day. Like I said before, here in Kyrgyzstan you could speak Russian and Kyrgyz and get so far in life because the Russian language sphere is large. But getting further, going farther, you need to speak English or another lingua franca.
I spend most of my time now eating food, drinking chai, playing with the children, and studying/relaxing by myself. The shower in this house is more volatile than the last one, and I think you can even flush toilet paper in this house! What a rarity indeed.
I had basically a week to spend with my host family before school started. We went to Jalal Abad city twice, and it is only a thirty-minute drive. It’s so much faster than when I was in Chuy when going to Bishkek was over a 1.5-hour drive from my village. On August 31, we celebrated Kyrgyz Independence Day, and we went to the city, where a large parade and concert were happening. We went to the bazaar and I was able to buy some clothing for school, as my school’s dress code is black and white, and I had minimal of that. I currently have three solid outfits for school, which I feel is enough, considering most people here only have two or three outfits.
I found it immensely harder to be in a bazaar with my family who don’t speak English and shopkeepers who also don’t speak English. It’s always good language practice. Right now, my language is stalled because we stopped learning and will resume with a local tutor soon. But I think it’s okay because it’s a good opportunity to practice what I already know. I would say my vocabulary is slightly limited compared to others, but what I do know I know well.
One thing that I already am beginning to notice that wears on me is the immersive experience. I previously have always been wary of immersion, as I wasn’t convinced it alone could fix my language issues. I was right in some ways, I need to keep studying, but it is effective. My love language is words, and I put so much value on oral communication, and waking up every day to speak Kyrgyz is hard. I’d done that my whole time during PST but it’s more pronounced here where I’m more alone. Of course, it’s given me immensely more sympathy for people learning a second language and ESL learners. Even with other English teachers and staff, they aren’t native speakers, so the way I speak to them is inherently different than the way I talk to other volunteers. It’s several different forms of code-switching, which I am trying to get used to. Frank is the other volunteer in my village, and it has been nice to exchange notes about the village with him. The village is quite large, so I’ve had to be driven to the supermarket (it’s like a 15-minute walk), and Frank lives a few blocks away from me.
We celebrated the first day of school on September 1st, an annual tradition with the “first bell”. When first graders first enter school, they ring their “first bell” to signify the start of school, and seniors ring the bell to signify the beginning of their last year. There is also the “last bell” which is in May and signifies the end of school and seniors’ graduation. At my school, they had a first grader and senior walk hand in hand ringing the bell. The first day was more of a ceremony instead of an actual school day. Students had one lesson and then left for the day. The entire thing was very formal, and I gave a short speech to the students and teachers there.
This was a basically universal experience among volunteers; many were asked to give speeches introducing themselves to the school and were singled out. Students also give teachers lots of flowers, and I received several bouquets which now sit in my room. After the ceremony was over, I got stuck in the school and played Scrabble and Solitare on my phone before the day officially ended. At noon, all the teachers went to a cafe on the main street and had lunch. It ended up being *so* long in a very Kyrgyz way. We ate, then we danced, as they had a huge speaker in the cafe, and they asked me to play an American song, and I played Moves Like Jagger. I finally got home around 4 p.m.
On Saturday, I went to Jalal Abad city with the other volunteers. Peace Corps provides free taxis to volunteers to take us to our rayon or oblast center every week if we choose (rayon and oblast center means your nearest major city from your village. The oblast center is the regional capital, and the rayon is like a big town (like if San Marcos is a rayon center and Austin is the oblast center as an analogy). I don’t want to get into a habit of going into the city every week, but it was nice because I needed to get some stuff, and I bought several toys for the kids. Jalal Abad city is very different from Bishkek. It is smaller but like Bishkek, it has a large main road. I would describe the city almost like a triangle, with expanding roads jutting from the main road. It is less western than Bishkek and a lot more local places. When I went with my family, we ate in a downstairs local kitchen and it was super cheap, and we all had lagman (7 plates!). That is one thing I don’t think I got in Bishkek and it was local Kyrgyz cafes/restaurants. I ate a lot of Western-esque grill food, mostly because I was so used to Kyrgyz food at home. There are a few cafes in my own village, though I admit I am a bit sus about some of the meat, despite it being cheap. I’ve heard some volunteers have already gotten food poisoning within a week of being at the site.
Life out here moves slowly, as I’ve said and I feel it here but not necessarily in a bad way. Several of the guests and family members have asked me if I’m bored, and I always say no. Sure, there are lulls, and I’ve found a way to pass the time. I study both Kyrgyz and am starting to study some basic Russian words, while also trying to restudy Chinese so I don’t lose it. I also play lots of games on my phone and bought a few Rubik's cubes. I’ve already learned to write Kyrgyz cursive, and I hope to pick up another hobby or two (I’ve been dropping lots of comments about wanting to visit the mountains and hope we visit them soon!). The sunset out here is pretty too, and though sometimes I want to go out more, the house is big enough that I never feel too trapped. My family keeps asking if I’m cold and I keep telling them Austin and Houston are so hot, so 70 and 80 weather is a godsend.
This is where lots of Peace Corps accounts begin to diverge. My story now becomes my own, because every other PCV will have a different experience from here on out. You could say the same about everything, which is true, we all have different experiences with PC. But during staging, orientation at Ashu House, and PST in Chuy, we all were following similar steps. We got to do different things, we got to see and have different experiences, but now we’re across the country. We’ve gone to far-off places away from Chuy, and now while our teaching schedules might be similar, and our difficulties and troubles might be the same, our lives now are what we make it.
Peace Corps will probably be one of the hardest things I’ll ever do in my life. It is daunting, and some of us will struggle and face different hardships. We talked about comparisons. It’s easy to compare even now once we’re gone whose site is better. Easy to dismiss during training, but even harder to avoid when you’re on your own. Some volunteers have repeated power outages (I’ve had only one brief one), and others have an outhouse and no indoor toilet. Others have mountain views and easy internet access. Others have terrible internet and are remote and secluded from other volunteers. But in the end, I think, our time here is not about what kind of toilet we get, nor is it about how many tois we attend. It’s not about how nice our room is, nor is it about how many mountains we get to hike, or how much chai we end up drinking.
Our time is whatever we want it to be, whatever happiness and connections we forge, and it’s also creating the seeds for things we’ll never get to see grow. I already know I’m going to be a crying mess when I leave Adelia so far from now. I’m stepping into this place at this moment in time, and it can’t last forever, just like PST couldn’t. I couldn’t be a trainee forever. I wished I could stop time and be with people I loved, but I was sad because I knew I had to leave. And for those crying when we left, I am glad we cried, because it meant we loved.
À Bientôt,
Grace
PS. Music!
By the Ocean- Besomorph and RIELL
I Rise- Pentatonix
Eyes Wide Shut- David Guetta and MORTEN
Turn the Tide- 2WEI, Edda Hayes and Kataem
Wildest Dreams- Taylor Swift
Pomepeii- Bastille
See You Again- Chainsmokers and ILLENIUM
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