Most volunteers move to their own housing at least by the time summer rolls around. But as I’ve never been one to always follow the pack, I have elected to stay with my host family. As with all things in life (except for Swedish fish in which not a bad word can be uttered), there are ups and downs that come with this.
My short list of ups of being with my host family:
*It is NEVER boring
*There is always food if I don’t want to cook for myself
*There is always (running) water to cook and clean with and fresh drinking water
*Somebody else burns my garbage
*We have a huge (clean) bathroom and western toilet
My short list of downs of being with my host family:
*I live with seven adults and two children
*NO privacy (see aforementioned bullet)
*I cannot wear what I’d like to ideally be wearing when I want (ex: It is 115 degrees and you are sweating every ounce of water out of you. Ideal outfit: tank top and shorts)
*Seven different comments on what you cook, wear, eat, and clean every day
*Being a live-in nanny in a world that only disciplines children by slapping them in the face but for the most part has a give-in at all times child rearing approach.
No matter what though, I love my host family. Sometimes they annoy me until I want to scream. But usually a few hours later I am really bored in my room and go hang out in the kitchen with them. Which is exactly what I think of as a family unit anyway. So who does this rockstar group consist of?
The Isganderovs:
Niman Dayi (Dayi actually means ‘Uncle’ but it is a title of respect – I’ve never once just called him Niman)
From the multiple times I have asked, the most I have gotten out of what my host father used to do is that he worked in an office. Now, he is a pensioner, meaning he collects 85 manat each month from the government. He is approximately 58, give or take a few years, and spends most of his days helping around the house, going to the city to do the bazaar shopping (even though only women cook in AZ, almost always, only the men do the food shopping), and watching a lot of Azerbaijani news.
Yagana Xala (Again, Xala means ‘Aunt’ – When I first came and didn’t know what to call my host parents – I tried out “Mama” once and knew it was way too weird)
My host mother is a village raised woman. She spends most of her days helping with the manual labor in the yard and her sons’ gardens. I have seen her lift things I wouldn’t not have been able to budge, cut the heads off of a lot of animals, and out eat my host dad. She is also approximately 58 years old, is a retired book keeper (now collects pension), has no upper teeth, and makes the best darn Plov (the Azerbaijan National Meal) this side of the Kur River.
Nariman
Nariman is a 31 year old worker. He is employed down the road at the village doctor’s house to do grounds upkeep. He also has about ten to 15 sheep and a huge garden with a tomato greenhouse, pumpkins, cherry plum trees, watermelon, potatoes, and persimmon trees. I’m not sure why exactly the garden/field is “his” since Yagana Xala works there every day and my other host brother and dad help out, but that is what everyone calls it. He recently just got married, and him and his new wife are currently living at our house until they build their own in a few years.
Ibrahim
Ibram is my 27 year old host brother.
He is unemployed, but seems to keep busy enough around the house. He has two cows and two horses and helps out with Nariman’s sheep. He is married with two children, and as the youngest son of the family, is required culturally to live with his parents in their house and take care of them until their eventual passing. In the winter he makes money by cutting down trees in the village and selling the wood to neighbors. In the summer he is gone a lot for what I think is gathering hay and oats for the animals.
Gunay
Gunay is Ibram’s 27 year old wife and my best Azerbaijani friend. She is a history teacher at the our village school, and a proud mother of a three year old and one and a half year old. I am not sure I have ever met someone who works harder than this lady. If she isn’t at her 12-15 hours a week at school, she is cleaning up after all of us at the house, or cooking for the mass amounts of people always milling about. I thought perhaps with Nariman’s new wife in the house, Gunay would get a break and work a little less, but she doesn’t like to sit around. So she works just as hard, and cleans even more.
Ilahe
Ilahe is Nariman’s 26 year old wife. She used to be a hair dresser at a salon in Goychay, but has not worked since the wedding in June. She comes from a family of five in the city, and I think the big family here added to living in the village is a big overwhelming at times for her. Technically the lowest on the totem pole (except for me – and sometimes I’m still considered a guest and get bumped up), she gets bossed around quite a bit. But, it is the life of a new bride in Azerbaijan. And both her and Gunay have told me on many separate occasions that my host dad and mom are the nicest in-laws they have every known and have never had a problem with them.
Rahim
Rahim is three years old and runs the show at our house. I thought my Azerbaijani was really bad last winter (it was) , but it really has been this summer where both of our language abilities have sky rocketed. When he doesn’t get what he wants, and sometimes even when he does, Rahim can be an ill-behaved child. He can scream really loud, throw, kick, bite, and hit until the sun goes down. But, he loves hearing and telling stories about wolves, giggles and giggles and giggles, can count to five in English, and him and I brush our teeth every night. This September he started attending pre-school, which keeps him busy from about nine in the morning until four in the afternoon.
Gulay
Gulay and I are besties. She will turn two at the end of January. When I first got here, she couldn’t walk, didn’t have teeth, couldn’t point or wave or blow a kiss, or say any words at all. Now she says mom, dad, look, come, and a garbled form of “I want”, is walking, albeit with bowlegs, and is developing quite the personality. If I am at home, usually I am watching Gulay. Even if her mother is at home, Gulay is usually trying to make a break for the neighbors or leaning far enough off the porch to fall off.
Our schedules have become pretty routine now. My host dad, mom, and two brothers eat their usual bowl of bread with hot milk and sugar over it in the morning, then leave to meander in and out throughout the entire day to drink tea between working in the garden, walking the sheep and cows to different pastures, collecting hay and wood for winter, collecting, selling, or canning vegetables, and cleaning up our yard. Gunay milks the cows in the morning, gets breakfast ready for everyone, goes to school, comes home and cleans up lunch, cleans the house in the afternoon, washes and irons everybody’s clothes, and takes care of Gulay in the afternoon. Ilahe makes lunch and supper for the family and helps out with the children if I am at school when Gunay is.
While people work really hard in Azerbaijan, lounging time is appreciated as well. Most nights when the sun is down, everyone watches television together until they go to bed. During the summer when the heat was unbearable and no one could move from one p.m. until four or five, we would just lay around on the porch, reading books and taking naps. It is starting to get dark a lot sooner now, which means soon enough it’ll be too cold to be outside. That means a lot more family time huddled around the wood burning stove in the one warm room in the winter. Maybe my perspective will be less upbeat when that time comes upon us. But I’ll venture to guess that I’m still going to like it a lot anyway.
