Small Scenes of Central Asia: May 2018

“Kettik, let’s go,” the sweetest word you can hear after an hour sitting in a minivan waiting for passengers to come in from the village. I’m not sure whether it’s more satisfying when a driver announces a departure immediately after climbing in to the backseat of a packed Stepwagon, or after having waited in a stuffy marshrutka for seventy minutes on a slow day; I think it’s probably a u-shaped relationship.

Guljamal is the only person in her family who’s fasting for Ramadan (her mother is too, though when I’m visiting, she’s taking a few days off for her time of the month). She’s young, only in fifth grade, and she slips up when I bring out candy from the US. Immediately after popping a Reese’s peanut butter cup into her mouth, she clasps her face – which I read as a sign that she’s allergic, and start to panic. “No, no, Orozo!” she says in English. I put a finger to my lips and tell her I’ll keep it a secret. Later, when Guljamal runs inside at 8:30 to prepare for ooz achuu (Kyrgyz for mouth opening, or breaking fast) with a xeroxed copy of iftar prayers, she tells her mom anyway about the candy incident.

While staying in Togolok Moldo village, I took a day to visit the county capital, Baetovo. After my morning meetings at the school board office, I panicked about finding my taxi back to the village. Baetovo is pretty small, only about 10,000 people, but it’s big enough to take up more than just the one main road – the taxi could be anywhere. I stop in to a bodega and ask the woman behind the counter if she can call the driver and then point me in the right direction. She’s surprised that I made the request in Kyrgyz, which necessitates the full “who are you” conversation, complete with the “And you’re sure you don’t want to marry a Kyrgyz boy from our village?” line of questioning. I buy some juice from her on the way out, because I’m thirsty and she was helpful, and it only takes a minute to find my taxi. We wait in front of the bazaar (on a Wednesday afternoon, only 3 ladies selling vegetables under tents) for another three hours until the car fills up with the same people who came out from Togolok Moldo that morning.

Spending the weekend in Internatsional’ without internet was a breath of fresh air; I ate so much village bread, took a trip out to saray (“the animal shed,” aka the field where the family’s cows and sheep are taken to graze) to bring food to Urmat’s dad, and watched kids play in puddles. My host family has grown since I saw them last; baby Jansuu was born in January, right after New Year’s. I don’t know why people laugh when I say Jansuu is a copy of her dad, because it’s true – look at them.

It was easier, but also more expensive, than expected to get a taxis from Naryn to Kazarman to Jalalabad. I booked a seat on a Bishkek-Kazarman taxi, and even though I was only in the car for the last 4 hours of the 10-hour journey, I paid full fare. The driver was chatty; even when I put my headphones in and pretended to sleep, he just called out my name louder to ask whether I’d tried this Kyrgyz food or liked that Kyrgyz song. The Kazarman-Jalalabad trip was easier to arrange, but was logistically more challenging: the 3 men in the backseat, visiting from Andijan, Uzbekistan, delayed departure by 4 hours by calling every 15 minutes to say they’d be right there; a snow storm blocked the road at the top of the pass, leaving us stranded until a van of young men with shovels could arrive to dig out a path; normal stuff.

Big Life Decision: Peace Corps in Central Asia

In the past two weeks, I have taken a trip to Istanbul so I could visit the U.S. Consulate, submitted an application for a second passport and a visa, had my fingerprints taken, and spent a bunch of money sending these documents to Washington D.C. It finally feels real enough to say: I have accepted an invitation to serve as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the Kyrgyz Republic.

Where?

The Kyrgyz Republic, Kyrgyzstan, Киргизия (take your pick), a small country (about the size of South Dakota), situated snugly between China, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan. I visited there in October, but here it is on a world map for context:

Map taken from Free World Maps: http://www.freeworldmaps.net/asia/kyrgyzstan/location.html

This is a 27-month commitment. In April, 2015, I will spend my 23rd birthday on airplanes heading to Bishkek and will live in Kyrgyzstan until I finish service in July 2017. This will be the longest I have lived continuously in one place since I left Minnesota for Washington DC in 2010 to start university. Since then, I have lived a nomadic life – packing a suitcase once every month or so for a trip; printing out tickets for planes, trains, and ferries; saying hello and hugging goodbye. The decision to move to Kyrgyzstan and live there for more than two years is huge for a lot of reasons, but largely because of the commitment to stay in one place and grow roots.

Unlike many of the blogs and stories I have read, my decision to apply to the Peace Corps was fairly impromptu. I was sick, lying in bed in a hotel in Ankara, when a wave of anxiety about the future and job security rushed over me – I spent the whole afternoon writing essays and reaching out to friends and bosses for letters of recommendation. I read through the list of posts available, carefully choosing three former Soviet states to list as my preferred places to serve. I assumed I could think and reflect after I submitted the application; everything I’d read said it would take a year for things to fall into place, anyway.

The new application system, which I used to apply, meant that this wisdom was outdated. I interviewed in late September, and received an invitation in mid-November. In all, just over two months separated my application and acceptance. Nevertheless, I am thrilled about the opportunity, primarily because I see the Peace Corps as a path for public service.

The Peace Corps operates with three goals:

• Helping the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women.
• Helping promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.
• Helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.

These goals are simple, and I hope that my skills, passions, and talents can lend themselves to promote mutual understanding abroad and at home. I want to empower people and communities to realize their potential and build a better world. I will work as an English teacher in secondary schools, meaning my work will largely revolve around language education and language acquisition pedagogy. I strongly believe in the role language can play in empowering communities and creating bonds between cultures. My work at the Concordia Language Villages and my experiences abroad have shown me first-hand just how powerful an exchange of simple phrases, “Hello, welcome, thank you” can be between strangers.

I hope this blog will advance the third goal, to promote an understanding of the people I met and work with in Kyrgyzstan among American readers. Kyrgyzstan – and Central Asia in general – is a mysterious place for Americans. The country is framed as “obscure, oriental, and fractious,” to borrow from Nick Megoran and John Heathershaw, and so is seen as a place of insecurity, terrorism, violence, and danger. This discourse of danger in turn shapes the policy-making decisions, which end up further endangering Central Asia (in terms of aid money, military operations, and energy deals, for example).

When not seen as dangerous, Central Asia is portrayed as unimportant – one “Stan” can be replaced for another, with no real repercussions. Stephen Colbert riffed on Secretary of State John Kerry’s mix-up of Kyrgyzstan with Kazakhstan, in which Kerry mumbled a strange chimera of the two, “Kyrzakhstan,” during a press conference. With feigned indignation, Colbert says:

“How could anyone ever mix up Kazakhstan with its neighbor Kyrgyzstan? Sure, people in both countries enjoy drinking fermented mare’s milk and they both sleep in yak-fortified yurts, but everybody knows that in Kyrgyzstan they play a fretless string instrument called the komuz, which is nothing like Kazakhstan’s dombra, also a fretless string instrument (though with a slightly thinner neck). And what are you going to do Kerry, go to downtown Bishkek and try to use a bunch of tenge to buy a new kalpak? Not without first exchanging into soms, you’re not! What are maroon. Quit embarrassing yourself, John Kerry.”

But actually. It’s not cute or funny to sing songs from Borat when Central Asia comes up in conversation or to play off mixing up the names of these countries as a meaningless mistake. (Because, who even cares about Central Asia, right?)

I hope to use my blog to share stories of the people I meet and the culture I experience in order to change the commons perceptions about Kyrgyzstan and Central Asia. I’m fascinated by Kyrgyz politics and history, its constructed notions of nationalism and ethnic identity, the involvement and influence of outside powers (Russia, China, Turkey, Europe), gender dynamics, economic development – oh man, there’s just so much to learn and share.

This will be a long and difficult journey, peppered with setbacks and small victories; replete with mountain hikes and unthinkable cold; and shaped by new foods, words, people, and places.

LET’S GO