Eating My Way Through Awkward

My beautiful country house

I may have survived the Holidays in Azerbaijan, but I am not sure my waistline did. To say I ate a lot of food would be an understatement. I ate mass quantities of food over the past week and half, and most of it was not voluntary. For three days in a row, we “guested” (socialized/ate/were the guests) from at least 12 to 7 p.m. eating no less than four meals per day. Mind you, meals here are served over a span of a couple hours with multiple rounds, and the most going to the honorary guest. It was a lot. But as a wise volunteer once told me, “Eat your way through awkward,” and I did just that.
Being in this country is a lot of fun. It is full of extremely hospitable people, full of laughs and love, and definitely good eats. But let’s face it, sitting in a room full of people you do not know, at a table with no excess room due to so much food and so many people, in a language you can minimally communicate, and having everyone watch every move you make because you are weird and foreign and the guest equals a whole lot of awkward. Sometimes it’s best just to lower your head and eat. However, it’s not a foolproof plan. I tried to avoid eating bone marrow after I muscled down some internal organs of the sheep we killed for New Year’s, but my host brother noticed, called attention to it, and everyone chimed in about my lack of eating. So with my obnoxious blush reflex in full force, I lowered my head and ate. And it did not get rid of the awkward nor the taste in my mouth. I think a study in what humans would do to not be rude would be fascinating.
Living in the village has been pretty good so far. I have a really great family, a huge country house, and am only a five minute walk from school. This week I start actually teaching in the classroom. I decided to teach grades fourth through ninth, as the younger students are too hard to handle, and the older students do not show up to class. There is a bus that goes in and out of my village twice a day, but my family says I should not ride on it alone, and so I have been taking a shared taxi to get to the city center and back home. I am pretty certain the bus is just fine and safe, but the fact that I am traveling to the city center for any reason kind of weirds them out anyway, so I do not feel like pushing too many issues at one time. I am in good hands, though. I did not feel very well one night and my host mother came and gave me tea with jam in it “medicine,” wrapped a really tight scarf around my waist and forehead, and then put a jar of hot water on my stomach with another scarf wrapped around that. She then tucked me into bed and let me sleep until ten the next morning. Needless to say, I felt awesome the next day. I know a lot of volunteers scoff at Azeri theories on getting sick, and methods to cure it, but so far, they have worked really well. I think my host mother is on to something.

The walk up to our country house. We share a gate and road with a neighbor whose house looks similiar to ours, but is only half finished.

Our orchard. We have pomegranate trees, a palm tree, grape trees, lemon trees, many quince trees, apple trees, rose bushes, daffedils, tuplips, and more things I don't know the names of.


Across our orchard is our animal barn. We have two horses, two cows, multiple sheep (one was killed for New Year's kabobs, but one had two babies... circle of life), chickens, geese, a couple dogs to protect the animals, four cats, and I still haven't determined whether the water buffalo is ours or the neighbors.


The room the family hangs out in at night. It also serves as the children's bedroom, so it is always really hot. The "petch" in the corner is a wood stove. I thought it was strange sitting on the floor all of the time at first, but now I prefer it.


Our unattached bathroom. I wear slippers to the side of the house, put on a pair of "shop shops" and walk to the bathroom, and then put on a pair of bathroom slippers while in the bathroom. Reverse that process to get back to my room. I think by the end of my service, I will be faster at changing my shoes than Mr. Rogers


Our kitchen. It is a pretty big kitchen for Azerbaijan. It is also relatively new, so in a year or so they want to add cupboards. But it is high class with a electric water heater to do dishes! My sister-in-law is using the oven to make cake.


My bedroom. It used to be the formal dining room, but I am slowly taking over. This week I added a map of North Dakota, a map of Azerbaijan, and twenty pictures. Note the flat screen TV that appeared one Sunday. Hello English News.


Overlooking our two horses. Also, on a clear day, you can see the mountains in the background. It is a gorgeous view.

The Start of Something New

Two days until my birthday. Three days until I take an oath to swear in as an official Peace Corps Volunteer. Four days until I break from the only familiarity I have come to know the past two and half months and move to my permanent site. Some day soon the reality of being here will hit me.
The unknown can be a very unsettling prospect to many people, present company included. Heck, embarking on the next stage of my Peace Corps life scares the daylights out of me. But, if history does in fact repeat itself, then I know things will be okay. I remember being absolutely nerve wracked to leave Junior High and go to High School, in the same building nonetheless. I was fairly confident of the safety net of my home town when I left for college and it turns out I did not need it that much ( I couldn’t quite leave the state though). And I cried unashamedly when my mother and sister left after dropping me off in Washington, D.C. for my internship. So needless to say, I do not feel ready to leave Pre-Service Training and go to my village for the next two years. I may be prepared, but I definitely do not feel ready. I’ve had a love-hate relationship with these last two months akin to that of eating a whole package of Oreos. I was hesitant to start, had highs and lows throughout, and felt pretty accomplished afterwards. The strength of the relationships I have forged with both Americans and Azerbaijanis is something I will forever cherish. And I do not have to worry about getting too sentimental yet, because most likely neither group will be going anywhere for the next two years, so our friendship can keep growing. But it is a frightening prospect to leave what I now consider familiar and comfortable for something new and foreign. I know it will work out. I know I will continue to make new memories and friendships and have ups and downs and days in between. But it is the start of something new, and that can be just as intimidating as a new package of Oreos.

Picture This

As promised, I would try and add a few pictures when I could get compliance from the beloved internet cafe. With about 15% battery life left, and an influx of Americans to slow things down, I at least accomplished this much...

This is in Gobustan at ancient cave paintings. It is my beloved cluster, Tagiyev 19, and our "Mama" Lale, our LCF who gets us through everything!


Mud Volcanoes



Our Trip to Baku:


Some Horses outside my window of my host family's apartment building:

The Blue River

November has been full of multiple big events in Azerbaijan. First and foremost, site placement was announced! I know now where I will be going for the next two years of my service as a Peace Corps volunteer… Goychay (Goyҫay – translates as the Blue River)! I am extremely excited about placement. I was a bit apprehensive before our program managers announced the sites because I had not really expressed any huge desires one way or the other about what I cared about for a permanent site. Of course there were some ideas I had formed about preferences, but I was not sure if they were valid or reasonable. For instance, I had hoped I would be placed somewhere that was not ultra conservative. But I also did not want to be in a city. Well those two sort of cancel each other out. However, I have heard now from multiple people that Goychay is not too conservative, so I can keep my head up about that. Also, I did not know whether or not I cared to have site mates. That would include having other volunteers in the same region as me, meaning they would be approximately within fifteen to twenty minutes at the farthest, and living in the same city as the closest. I rated my preference on sitemates as a three on a scale from one to five (I really dislike arbitrary scales). But as it sometimes pays off not to have too high of hopes, I ended up with not only four other sitemates, but some of the best. Two of the other men from my cluster that I am currently in for Pre-Service Training and I are all getting sent to Goychay together! Matt and I will be in two separate villages in the region, and Alec will be in the actual city center. Taḡiyev 19 will live on forever! My mouth and jaw hurt a reasonable amount from smiling so much by the end of site placement day.
We also had our two preapproved (and only) trips to Baku for training so we could see the city sites and learn to navigate the public transportation system a little. What an absolutely gorgeous city! I was not really sure what to expect from Baku. However shocking this may or may not be Azerbaijan is just really third world. Therefore when all of the locals told me about how beautiful Baku was, I sort of just attributed it to “Azerbaijani Pretty.” I figured it probably looked really good in comparison, but was not sure if I would feel the same way about it had I been looking at a picture while sitting at my desk in America. Well I was dead wrong. Baku is really gorgeous, full of oil money, and clean. That is a rare combination for the country. As always with big cities, there are drab areas, but that is to be expected. And my favorite part of the informational handout the Peace Corps gave us before we left explicitly stated, “Please be careful while in Baku. Pedestrians DO NOT have the right of way, even if they are in the crosswalks. Some cars will drive on the wrong side of the street to get ahead of other cars or stalled traffic. They will also drive on (wide) sidewalks so please be vigilant while you are sightseeing.” Ah, yes, this is a way different city than the rest of the country, but at the end of the day, it is still Azerbaijan. I do not have any regrets about being prohibited from driving for the next two years. Traffic laws are virtually non-existent, respected sides of the roads are arbitrary, and everyone drives about 90 mph at all times. And reason number 65 why I would not want to drive in this country: My twelve year old host brother is one of the drivers on the road (He sits on a pillow to see over the steering wheel).
This month I also finished a two week practicum to get experience teaching which was really beneficial, will have another Language Proficiency test in a week or so which I hope will go better than the last, celebrated a big Azerbaijani holiday with my host family, am getting together will the rest of Taḡiyev’s trainees to have a Thanksgiving bash, and am meeting with a representative from my new school in a couple of days.
Ideally the Peace Corps asks for an English teacher to come to the “Counterpart Conference” where they discuss a few of the finer logistics regarding having a volunteer for the next two years, showing us around the community, and preparing the school for us to come co-teach. I am already getting nervous for the conference. I am going to be living in a really small village for the next two years, and my school only has 200 children (equivalent to K-12), and therefore only two other English teachers. In contrast, one of the men from my cluster is going to a school with over 1000 children and ten English teachers. So he will be able to observe for about three weeks before deciding who to work with for the remainder of the year. I, on the other hand, will by default work with these two teachers all year. The reason I am nervous for the conference, though, is because if they are the only two English teachers in the entire school, there is a chance they will not have been able to leave to come to the conference. Instead, there could be a Director, Assistant Director, or some other teacher sent in their place. Meaning, for the two hour lunch set aside for us to jabber away, I am going to be able to showcase my broken Azeri as a good first impression. But this is all speculation. Some schools have all women teachers who are not able to get away because of children at home, tutoring after school, or other commitments, so it is not foolproof in any situation.
As for the next few weeks, all of us are buckling down on language for the final test, and anticipating our move on December 10th. My current host family is already really sad when we talk about my departure. In fact, every day they tell me how many days left until I leave and then get really sad faces. But they are excited because Goychay is the pomegranate capital of Azerbaijan and even has a pomegranate festival every year, which they swear up and down they are going to come see me next year when it happens. Apparently I just missed this year’s festival as it is always in October. I am anxious about moving to site, though. Right now we have an extremely structured and busy schedule. Every volunteer talks about the atrocious time you have on your hands once you get settled in and on a school routine. Every school runs from about eight in the morning until one in the afternoon, but there are not any teachers that actually teach for that entire time. Meaning there is a chance I will go to school from eight until eleven every day and have to figure out what to do with the rest of my time all day long. If anyone has some good ideas on an easy hobby for me to pick up, please throw them my way. I guess for the next two years I cannot say I did not have the time to learn.
**I tried to add some pictures of our trip to Baku, my house, Tagiyev, etc, but I just couldn't get the internet to comply. I promise they will come one day though!

Life in the Fast Lane

One month down, 26 more to go. Holy shannigans it has been a busy couple of weeks. I went on a little trip to visit a current Peace Corps Volunteer down in Beylagan, a region in south Azerbaijan. The Peace Corps has everyone visit a volunteer to see what their site is like, check out actual classes, see the community development they have been working on, whether you prefer village life or city life, and of course.. to have a little vacation from the grueling hours of PST. Then this week we have an interview to see what our preferences are for our permanent site placement, another interview to determine what our language ability is mid way through our training, and the biggest thing of all, practicum has started.
So far I have had one class go really well, one class go mediocre, and two classes completely fall on my face and bomb. Both of those were really horrific. However, I think everyone needs a couple of those to figure out what to do better and learn. It can only go up from here, right?
I forgot to add some captions for my last pictures I posted. One is a picture from "The Dove" in Sumgayit. It's a really pretty area right on the Caspian, that has a couple of restaurants where all of the trainees hang out year after year. Also, I added a picture with another volunteer, Stephanie, (the one and only other ND volunteer) and our host grandmother, and also her mom. For clarification, her mother and my father are brother and sister. Also, we are related to two other volunteers, so birthday parties are a hoot.
Everything else in between these crazy times have been fun and frustrating and busy and sad and crazy and every emotion under the sun. I am currently using another PCV's computer right now to write a quick blog and update you, so I have to keep it short. But once I can figure out a way to get my jump drive hooked up to the internet cafe computers, I'll have a lot to tell everyone. Everything in Sumgayit is in Russian, though, to cater to Foreigners, so it's hard to navigate. Hope all is well in the States!

Culture Shock

I’ve been here about two weeks now, give or take a few training days. Things have really been amazing so far. We are definitely really lucky as far as trainees and volunteers go. The weather is pretty nice. It is warmer than North Dakota for the fall, and also brings rain (and lots of mud!), but it is not exceptionally hot, nor cold, and keeps the mosquitoes at bay. Some of the other volunteers have already dipped into their long underwear though, and I think it is going to be a long winter for them.
At first I kept thinking, “I wonder when culture shock is going to hit me?”. And then it did… in more than one way. It sort of crept up on me, like a spider in your sleep, and then I got smacked right in the face with it. First it started when I realized all of the cultural things I was doing wrong, like sitting in the back row of the bus that is apparently only for men (who knew?), forgetting to put on my house shoes when I have socks on, and dropping my sugar cube into the tea instead of holding it in my mouth while I drank it. But then a couple of the people in my cluster (there are six of us per cluster, about eighteen per site) started getting sick, and for the first time since I have had my tonsils out, I got a terrible cold. Now, normally this wouldn’t be much of an issue. However, there are some odd things that go on in Azerbaijani culture related to colds. Basically, almost all things (besides germs, bacteria, and viruses) give you colds, except for the few “remedies” that make you better. For example, walking out of the house with one strand of hair wet even if it is eighty degrees out gives you a cold. Drinking cold water gives you a cold. Sitting on the floor gives you a cold. On the other side, drinking your tea with jam in it will help cure you. (While I don’t adhere to this principle, it is mighty tasty and I don’t turn it down). And then there is this odd practice of “sucking” the cold out of you with a hot jar on your back. And that’s when it hit me. This is “Culture Shock.” It’s not this big defining moment in your life when you realize you are out of America, but more of a series of events leading up to your body completely rejecting everything going on around you. So currently my body is rejecting Azerbaijan in the form of being constantly tired, coughing up some weird stuff out of my lungs, being perplexed on a daily basis, and just saying over and over and over again, “What?! Where am I?!”
But cold and all, things really have been terrific here. I love my host family and leaving for site in ten weeks is going to be really tough. I am not picking up on the language as well as I would like, but that seems to be the same phrase coming out of all of the trainees’ mouths. The people here are so patient when it comes to learning it because they are so excited a foreigner is attempting to learn Azeri and not pushing Russian upon them. Although most of us get asked if we are Russian and/or spoken Russian to when we are walking down the street. And for the next two years, I am resigning myself to being followed by a mob of children yelling “Allo! Allo! Vhat is your name?!” I think it’s going to be really good.

Land of Fire

I made it to Azerbaijan! I am here, and loving it. Things are really going fantastic, and it just feels so surreal being here. I'm in the Peace Corps... what?! My host family is awesome in so many ways. I have a dad, mom, 17 year old sister, 14 year old sister, and 12 year old brother. I think my host dad is a mechanic, but that might be one of those "lost in translation" things. My host mom teaches piano lessons, and my oldest sister speaks some English. So I am definitely one of the lucky volunteers because my basic needs are easier to be communicated. Everything is a process though, and patience is more than a virtue.
We live in Taghiyev, which is a suburb of Sumgayit. It is a really neat place in many respects. The man who founded it, Tagiyev, started the first school for all girls in Azerbaijan, and also commited the town to clean water. So I am drinking out of the tap, and have not been sick at all since I have been here. So much of the country has influences of the USSR, but it also has such a rich history of its own. I'll be corrected on a word that I have learned in school to use the Azerbaijani form, and not Russian.
Every single day I go to school just two blocks from my apartment complex. We do four hours of language training and then four more hours of technical/professional training. And then on to home for another approximately four hours of family time before bed. I am exhausted! The language is hard, but as with so many things, it will come in time. I heard a volunteer talking the other day about how the "Idealist" doesn't survive in the Peace Corps. The people that come thinking they will change the world, completely transform the country, or even bring about massive change in their community. It is really about the small accomplishments, and if you can get those down, you are doing well. So I'm doing one small thing at a time. Yesterday, I said a full sentence without hand gestures or my host sister interpreting. It felt really awesome.
I think the best part so far is that I have only been here less than a week (it feels like two years already), but I feel so much apart of the family. I am telling you, this culture could rival Italians any day for how much they eat, talk loudly, and laugh. The amount of food they eat is outrageous. And the women are absolutely stunning and thin. I need their secret. Although, we were at my host mother's brother's house the other day and one of the women told me I was fat because I eat too much fast food. That's another thing I appreciate. Everybody says what they think here. There is no beating around the bush. It is more fact, and less judgement. And I appreciate that. She also told me, 'You would be prettier if you wore your hair down.' Well that's true. It wasn't mean, it wasn't judgemental, but just simply stated. Fair enough.
So far, I really like it here. Some of the other trainees are having a tougher time. So maybe when the culture shock and homesickness kicks in, it will be really hard for me. But until then, I joined the Peace Corps and love it.