Back in Action

It has been quite a long time since I've posted anything. I have discovered a way to access this blog which makes me very very happy that I can continue to write here. SO let's delve right into a short, concise update, then some hopefully entertaining and thought provoking insights.
I last posted here on this site back in december. There has been many many happenings since then but here's a rough breakdown:
December-May-I celebrated New Years, got lots of ice in my eyelashes, had IST [Inservice training], winced the day it snowed in early May, "taught" a lot of yoga and moved into my own apartment.
May 25-School ended, went to work in Pavlodar for a business seminar [don't ask me how I can get away with presenting at a business seminar, that's the beauty of the projects you design here, you can call them anything you want]
June, July- Participated in campG.L.O.W., which I will be running this next summer, traveled around the south, namely Taldykorgan and Shymkent. [played frisbee, volleyball and went to an amazing flea market in Shymkent]
July 27-August 18- Switzerland with the family, celebrated 60 years of marriage between my grandparents [Congratulations again, Love you both very much], picked up a little Bern Deutch and simply just ate a lot of really good cheese.
August, September- Came back to Zhezkazgan, began my second year of teaching, got internet, figured out the proxy server thing and that brings us up to date.
WHEW. sorry if that wasn't at all interesting but laying the groundwork for what I'm actually going to talk about in this post seems necessary. Travelling in and around different areas of this vast, empty country of only 19 million (yes only 19 million) people and then getting to go to a magically beautiful [and frighteningly expensive] country for 23 days has left me with many sharpened observations of the people and ebb and flow of Kazakhstani life that I've had the urge to articulate and put into words.

Namely, that Kazakh people (not necessarily Russian) generally remain complacent in living not very far past their own doorsteps. As opposed to most Americans and Europeans. I, of course, have the in depth view of a large town of only 100,000 people. I can most certainly imagine that in the bigger cities of Astana and Almaty you will find people pushing their own autonomy to its' limits. I must also put the disclaimer that my insight has been into strictly Kazakh womens' lives. I work with women, teach Kazakh high school aged girls and most of the people I interact with in the community are Kazakh women. Therefore, my assertions should be taken within context. The last thing I want to do is make claims about a culture that I only know a fraction about in such a way that leads people to believe I know everything. Uncovering how another social system, culture and groupthink structure operates takes many many many layers of constant insights and breakthroughs. I have only scratched the surface of how the people I interact with every day think and how they are motivated the way to are day to day. I can say with some confidence that the stark contrast between the heavy reliance of a groupthink mentality seen so often in the pockets of Kazakhstan and the exaltation of autonomy seen everywhere in America came to me with the most prevalence.

I was sitting in my teachers room, drinking chai as usual and I just sat there and observed.These wonderful women, whom i've come to know and trust were just simply talking about life. Their conversations stretched from children, husbands, work to chores at home. They complained [and rightly so] about not having enough money for the work they do, how their husbands don't really help at home, how their children danced in a recital and the director said "not good enough". These anecdotes being passed around were cyclical and practically identical to many stories I had heard from them before. I withdrew from the conversation [which wasn't the most uncommon thing for me to do], sipped my water and discreetly scribbled in my journal:

"It's as if everyone is a slave to the same mindset, the same opinions. no individuality, which in turn drives complacency.
This is one affect of the "soviet hangover", more prevalent in Kazakhs simply because there is a rich tradition that aids this mindset and drives being subserviant to a certain way of life, especially for women. This country, this experience is making me a feminist. A big one."

By writing this, I merely attempt to make sense of an observation that had been formulating for many many months. And like i've said before my breadth is limited to my group of co-workers and community members. By no means, do I want to imply that this is a lesser way of thinking, living or working. I simply want to point out the contrast that has come to full volition whilst i've been here in Kazakhstan for over 400 days. With that being said, inside the same vein of thought, I am getting to know my college [high school] girls more closely and I've haphazardly become so attached to each and every one of them. They are my new mission. They are each so incredible, bright and promising in their different ways. I want to show them what empowerment, strength and gumption look like. Big shoes to fill, i know, but by simply being here I feel that i'm accomplishing a tiny fraction of that cause.

This entry was a bit introspective and contemplative but I hope at the very least it was entertaining, if not informative. Much more to come, very soon.

Here are a my other blog posts from January-May
05/25/2010
Well my classes finally ended yesterday. In all of the secondary schools there were huge ceremonies where the national anthem was played [most likely more than once] and kids marched for the “final bell” of the school year. I’m currently traveling to Pavlodar where i’ll take part in a business Seminar put on by the volunteers up there. I’m sitting at a cafe in Karaganda [that has free wifi] waiting for my friend Elena to come meet me for lunch. I really like this city, it’s big enough where I feel like i can blend in, but its small enough to where it’s not overwhelming. I’m really looking forward to being in Pavlodar for a week with Shannon. The weather up there should be moderate, like spring in CA. We’re going to go running and swimming which will be so refreshing and really help summer kick off to a great start. I will be in Switzerland in less than 9 weeks! I can’t believe it. These next few months are going to be amazing. I will post more pictures soon.

05/15/2010
Many things and events have taken place since then but i will try and summarize them quickly then send out some links to pictures from my facebook account to go along with this post.

January- I went to Astana to celebrate the new year and all that jazz.

February- We celebrated Valentines day and I went to the banya ALOT since it was -35 C outside most every day.

March- Weather was a little better, I taught more classes and we celebrated the big Kazakh tradition of Nauryz. Which is basically their new year. I was in Shymkent in the south and it was glorious to leave the snow and make it to sun and green grass. While I was down there I also helped with a project where we had some students show us around as english tour guides. I had a blast.

April- Things slowed down after I can back from Shymkent, It rained pretty frequently [but didn't snow] and I held a small health seminar with one of the other volunteers for my students. We talked about healthy eating, cooking and Jamie talked about smoking.

May- So here we are now in May. I know I brushed through all of that super fast and there are things I am leaving out but for the most part that is what I have been up too. Not too much has changed minus the snow melting and some holidays being celebrated. I am in love with Springtime here. The river behind my apartment is green and trees has lush leaves and long grass surrounding them. I can’t believe it’s the same ground I walked on for 6 months in gray and snow. In literally 4 days, the green sprouted up. I’m told that it will stay like this for the majority of the summer. It’s fantastic.

I did move out of my host family this month into my own apartment. It’s beautiful and I am really happy i found it. I have my own washing machine and BBC news on cable. I have my very own kitchen which is my favorite part. I’ve been cooking nonstop and have gotten down making handmade breads and crusts. I never thought I would be able to master the “make from scratch” skill. But Kazakhstan has changed me in more ways than one so I might as well add that to the list.

These next few weeks are going to be pretty busy for me. I plan to give a second session on resume/cv writing for my college and a teaching methodology camp for my students going on to work as elementary school teachers. I’ll basically share all the TEFL training that I received from PC while teaching them all of the games and activities I’ve learned working at camp my whole life. I can wait to impart all that knowledge, I have a feeling it will be fulfilling and the girls will actually appreciate it. That same week I hope to teach some art at an org for disabled kids here in Zhezkazgan. It’s called Children without Borders. I will open it up to kids in the community so that local kids can mingle with the CWB kids. I’ve been told that they kind of stay in their own world which can be detrimental.

Then after that I’ll be going to help with a frisbee camp which I’m really excited about. I love frisbee and the kids out here just can’t get enough of it! For the 4th of July we’ll all be up in Astana to celebrate then i’m going to hold a health camp with my friends Jess and Leah for the week following. After that I have a week or so to putz around and then I’m off to SWITZERLAND. Which is going to be the highlight of my year hands down. I can’t wait! More on that later.

SOOOO… As this is a very rudimentary and somewhat undetailed update I hope that anyone who has questions or wants to more will say something! Here are some links and I will most definitely post again and in more detail…
01/16/2010
So, with the new year already here I think it’s about time I posted another update. I have had a wonderful start to the new year. I was in Astana, visiting with some friends and I got to see the capital. I saw the Baeteilik [not sure on the spelling], which is on all of the money in Kazakhstan. It’s a symbol of Kazakhstan’s roots and future prosperity intertwined. The monument itself is said to resemble a tree with a bird’s nest at the top, what kind of bird i’m not exactly sure. It could be an owl because the owl is a bird that is highly revered in this part of the world. This is something I learned recently at my last Kazakh lesson. Supposedly, men who play the dombra [the national musical instrument, kind of like a guitar], place owl feathers at the end of their instruments for good measure. Needless to say, it was great to see. You enter in through the bottom floor, pay 500 tenge to get in the elevator to go up inside the “nest”, from where you can get a 360 degree view of Astana. There is a small restaurant at the top and a place to put your hand on President Nursultan Nazerbayev’s gold plated handprint. Some of the other volunteers and I agree that his hand must have been enlarged from the size it actually is. We only agree on this fact because the president is pretty short and stout and the handprint just doesn’t look like a match. Maybe he felt he needed to make his hand bigger to include everyone who comes to put their hand there. This is only a speculation, needless to say it was fun and I’m glad I went to the top. I took some pictures from there of the parliamentary “white house” where Nazerbayev lives. The golden towers are also there. The square in which the monument and the white house is situated is the most rapidly changing section of Astana. There are at least 7 magnificent modern buildings all right next to each other in the 3 block radius. The national library is also in the new section of Astana. All of the magnificent architecture has been constructed by many different european artists and professionals. Nazerbayev wants Astana to become a cultural hub for central asia and europe. I must say with the way he’s going, that very well may happen in the next few decades.

Basically there are two sides of Astana. The new city and the old city. The two parts are disconnected by a river and connected by a massive bridge. Astana is a very compact city and is smaller than the southern former capital, Almaty. Astana is also extremely expensive to live in and outside of. For example, a bus ride in my city, Zhezkazgan, is only 25 tenge. In Astana it’s 60! This doesn’t seem like much, but it certainly adds up. A 3 room apartment [a bedroom, kitchen and living room] can cost upwards of 70,000 dollars to purchase and that is on the low end! I saw signs for a new ritz carlton that will be built, which means prices are only going to go up in that area of the city. The architecture is really beautiful and Nazerbayev has spared no expense. Every day the city is changing and becoming more glamorous. More than 9% of all the country’s revenue goes to making Astana look better. So many new buildings have been erected in the past decade, it is practically a different place all together than what it used to be.

I also went to Pavlodar for the day to visit my friend Shannon. We had such a good time with her family and visiting the other volunteers. I was able to see a mosque that was gorgeous and we took pictures out at the frozen river. The people in Pavlodar are uncommonly kind and I had a great time speaking Kazakh with Shannon’s family. The whole city is pretty spread out and there are some really nice cafes there. Shannon and I went to a really great Turkish coffee place. It felt very european and had a very warm atmosphere. I would love to live in Pavlodar just as much as a I like living here in Zhezkazgan. I made some new friends too and I can’t wait to go back to Astana to visit! All in all I had an amazing New Year.