A Very English Month

Salut,

In mid-February, I took a trip to Bishkek for medical leave. My last time in Bishkek for medical was in July. A prospective K-31 member asked me if we ever get sick. I pride myself on having satisfactory health most of the time, but the same cannot be said as a whole for my cohort. We’re a sick bunch; food poisoning and dog bites abound. Anyway, the visit was perfunctory and fast—no problems, no cavities at the dentist. I was on a delayed flight with some Peace Corps staff members. Regarding an update on the grant and projects: it looks as if projects will not be restarted, and those who were in the middle of theirs (at varying stages) won’t get to proceed and may have to return the money. I’m in the process of working on submitting mine.

English Olympiad was in full swing. Olympiad is what it sounds like: district-wide competitions for school subjects that evolve into oblast (state) level competitions, then national. It’s a bit like UIL competitions back home in the US if anyone ever competed in those growing up. 9th-11th grade students compete in the Olympiad competition, and students can only compete in one subject. As such, it has become common for volunteers or teachers to ask promising students early to make a commitment to a specific subject. I had some students with excellent English who elected to do history or Russian language instead. Last year, I wasn’t super involved in Olympiad because I didn’t have any students competing in English. This year, I had one student aiming to compete who told me last summer he was interested in doing it.

As a precursor, schools want volunteers for all sorts of reasons: clout and prestige, money. Some explicitly want volunteers for English Olympiad trophies. In the eyes of some directors, wins increase the school’s reputation or may even lead to increased funding from local governments. Of course, I have doubts if there is a causation or correlation between PCVs and English Olympiad results, as it misses the intermediary factor: the students themselves.

Olympiad is also really, really hard. I looked at and prep materials, and they resembled English SAT-type questions. Last year, I remember some volunteers sent questions to the rest of us to confirm the answers, as they themselves were lost and unsure. One challenging section under grammar asks students to read a large paragraph of text and change underlined words to fit grammatically within the sentence, even going so far as to add prefixes or suffixes (for example: change to rechange) or to change verbs to past progressive, passive voice, etc. Anyway, this year, prepping my 11th-grade boy has been long and time-consuming. Usually, he came after classes for 30-minute to 1.5-hour lessons. I was in charge of preparing him for the speaking section, while Baktygul mostly helped him with grammar. Olympiad kept getting delayed over and over again. I first heard rumblings it was going to happen in December, but no—it was in the middle of February.

I’m going to describe the messy chaos that I endured at Olympiad, but after speaking to another PCV, I know this wasn’t the norm. I volunteered to serve on the jury panel. In Jalal-Abad at least, or at least in my district, they divide subjects into different schools. English didn’t happen at my school; it was at Vanessa’s. My school hosted the Biology and Chemistry Olympiad subjects. Yet most of the teachers at my school were dispatched to serve as administrators to another village conducting history and geography Olympiad. Not all districts do this; some host it at one school. Vanessa’s my next-door neighbor, so it was efficient and easy to get to her place. I went with Batma, an old English teacher at my school soon to retire within the next year or two.

English Olympiad is divided into two distinct days: the first being oral-focused, and the second audio and written-focused. In English Olympiad, students receive a topic and give a 3-minute speech. In my district, this was all quite haphazard, as I was the sole judge (technically, I was sitting next to another English teacher, but she didn’t write anything down), jotting down notes for all 94 participating students (topics, names, schools, speaking times, notes, etc.). This pales in comparison to 3-5 judge panels in other districts. The topics were all super difficult, some related to AI or climate change. They remind me, for anyone who was in high school debate/speech, of extemporaneous speeches. English Olympiad students are the cream of the crop within the district, but even then, this being their third language, I was unsurprised that only some were fully coherent with good grammar. I was deeply impressed by some, though about 20% of all students did not participate; they received their topics and refused to answer, usually because they didn’t understand it. A few, particularly on the topic of governmental response to climate change, sounded as if their responses came straight from ChatGPT or a textbook. One memorable student discussed his journey of self-discovery and self-help through reading to improve his wrestling abilities. High marks for the advanced vocabulary alone.

I was in a morose mood after being the sole judge taking notes for 4 hours without a break, and I even contemplated not going the second day. I relented to support my own participating student. Most of the administrators helping out with the English subject were not themselves English teachers, which was at first fine with me. I could communicate with them fine, except for the one who kept yelling at me in Russian despite telling her I didn’t speak or understand Russian. Anyway, on the second day, the lady in charge neglected to tell me that we wouldn’t even be allowed to start grading written exams until the nationally prescribed time, 2 PM, and then when it did roll around, she dipped, leaving me and a male English teacher to grade 94 8-page exams ourselves, which took us over 2.5 hours. Overall, very mid experience, and would not do it again. I go with the flow a lot of the time, but not when I voluntarily give my time and feel as if it’s being taken advantage of.

Ramadan has started! Last year my health was very messy, so I didn’t participate. I plan to participate for a good chunk of Ramadan (unlikely to be able to during spring break). My host mom is currently the only one at home fasting, and I’ve joined her. My host father is taking medication. Other family members, I’m unsure of (Aidana was breastfeeding last year, and my host cousin has “a lot of work” (major eye roll). The first day or two was hard to adjust, but I’m working on it. It hits the hardest in the mid-afternoon when my stomach roils, but after 4 or 5 PM, it’s fine. Students ask me if I’m observing a fast, and they all applaud and have the biggest smiles or astonished looks when I say yes. Similar to when I speak to taxi drivers in Kyrgyz. I adore food and eating, so it will be a semi-difficult month, but we’ll pull through! Sleeping or mid-day naps have helped.

Due to a variety of factors, English Week has been spread out across several weeks. Last year, English Week was a fast and fun event. This year, Baktygul went full in and invested a lot of time while I was in Bishkek. She bought large posters and cut-outs to decorate the front foyer of the school, paid for by money pooled by teachers. Our director had been telling us to decorate the whole corridor and hallways. My project has been a success in that, during this whole process, teachers have used the projectors, the laminating machine, the new printers, etc. It has made so many things easier. For me specifically, it’s super helpful in making new English materials. We obviously use the SMART board a lot, but hand-making materials or printing stuff from online to make flashcards or physical activities. In between all the preparations, we celebrated with short ceremonies: Kalpak day and Native language/language of the Mother Tongue Day.

Last year, I discussed Kalpak Day and Men’s Day (Defender of the Fatherland day). This year, both ceremonies were quieter and shorter. I asked Baktygul, and she said some of it had to do with unruly behavior by students. I have noticed an increase in student disciplinary meetings happening at school. I remember Guljamal (one of the vice principals) was carrying a large stick to whack students with at a student meeting last year. I haven’t seen it reappear yet.

In the days leading up to the English seminar, I saw an unprecedented mobilization of the students and teachers occur. My English clubs and the classes themselves became secondary to decoration. Teachers stayed after classes to help cut out and laminate decor. Baktygul and I had a semi-vision. I personally made an emoji wall (with less commonly used emotions, like embarrassment, disgust, confusion, annoyance, disappointment, amusement, relief, surprise, etc.) and a wall for international holidays. The students and teachers blew up an absurd amount of green and red balloons, and for the entirety of March 4th and 5th, students were taken from their classes to help move furniture, hang and blow up balloons, cut out decor, or practice their own performances. I’ve spoken at some point in the past about using students’ free labor and how the lack of staff means we often rely on all the boys to set up the sound equipment and carry tables and chairs. The girls are often asked overwhelmingly to do performances because of this. The day before, I took any students I saw to help me (very little was done that day, not seminar-related).

The English seminar itself was a success, I think. I’m not sure if my school has hosted something like this in the past. We offered an online Zoom for teachers in our district who lived far away, while around 20 or so teachers nearby showed up in person. We hosted two open lessons, one run by Kunduz, who is primarily a primary teacher, and the other taught by me and Baktygul. We chose our 8th-A class to be our students, and we actually taught the lesson around 2-3 times before the open lesson happened. 8th-A is the best class in the whole school, so we taught a more advanced topic: past and future continuous tense. We hosted a short training about effective lesson planning (using SMART goals), and then a short concert.

My 5th graders have been practicing for two weeks a short play (which Baktygul sourced from ChatGPT, though I don’t know why—it would have been fairly easy to write one) of Cinderella. We chose some of the best students to practice and bring in dresses and props. Some of them got very into character, particularly the evil stepmother, haha. Their acting overall had room for improvement, haha. They didn’t get the chance to perform it at the concert due to time constraints, so I’m hoping next week they’ll get to amaze the school with their acting skills.

Baktygul coerced me into performing Manas in Kyrgyz in front of the seminar attendees, despite it being an English seminar. We got lots of the smart girls to recite English Manas, reviving their memory of it from last year’s practice. Personally, I think we put a LOT of time and effort into the decor proportional to how much we put into planning the actual seminar logistics or content. All hands were on deck, and the school looked beautiful. They even prepared food for the visiting teachers, despite the majority fasting and unable to eat. Afterward, Baktygul asked me to help her video edit and stitch together photos and videos into a reel. I, being lazy and slightly tech incompetent when it comes to editing (I’m computer competent in other ways), told her to get a student to do it because they’re great at reels. God, I feel old already just by saying that. Anyway, she did and got Begaim, an 11th-grade girl, to edit a reel to the song Clarity by Zedd (which is a major throwback!) on her phone. I’m so used to having a computer, but I forget how much you can (and most people in the world have to without a computer) accomplish with just a smartphone.

Aidana went to Moscow with Kuz Saykal for two weeks to work on some documentation. Initially, I was told she would be gone for 3-4 days, but I’ve been told countless things about when people in this house come and go, and it’s rarely ever accurate. I noticed a pronounced moroseness amongst the kids with her absence. I refused to fill in the gaps with my host mom by cooking, as that’s not in my contract or job, despite their jokes about making me. Adelya’s not going to school, and Alihan and Emir seem to be glued to their screens more than ever. I think their mom grounded them, and her absence made their moods worse. Overall, the vibes are much better now that she’s back. She brought with her suitcases full of new clothing for the kiddos and lots of candy. Russian candy must be better than Kyrgyz candy because every time a family member comes back from Russia, they bring a 3-5-pound bag of candy with them.

A second year brings new things, while others stay the same. You only know what you have after you lose it. The holidays aren’t the same. Last year, I was awash with holidays in February, though this year, protracted English week festivities and Olympiad threw most of February into disarray and uncertainty. Spring is coming slowly, and I welcome it with hesitation and a bit of sadness. I’m from Texas, and Texas winters are shrinking in length every year. I learned that I love real seasons; I love the ebb and flow and the way I feel time passes as the seasons do. Obviously, much of the world lives around the tropics, and climate change won’t be making any of this better. Yet I revel in the changing of the trees and the melting of the snow. This year, it seems to be staying cold later than last year, with spring seeming to sneak up on me. It still snows, even into March here. With spring, Ramadan, and the sun rising again, it reminds me that I’m nearly out of time.


À Bientôt,

Grace


PS. Yay, the Oscars! I watched 8 of the 10 Best Picture nominations and also watched all the animated film nominations and a few of the other award movies. I’m happy for Anora, which I liked.

PPS. I think the blogpost title is a homage to A Very English Christmas or A Very English Scandal, though I've seen neither. 

PPPS. I'm not entirely sure where Baktygul got the super accurate royal guard outfits but they slayed!