Jessik!!!!!

Who knew that the girl who was in my Aunt’s house just weeks before I met her in Philadelphia for “Staging” for the Peace Corps would become my Best Peace Corps friend? And what a pleasant surprise to realize at only 6 hours away she would also be the closest Kaz20 to me! Unfortunately, she had to return to America due to medical reasons last month and won’t be returning back to us in Kaz. Although we had only been in PC 9 months (3 of them in training; the other 6 at site), we still had amazingly fun times!! This is not an exhaustive list and we will definitely add more to this list in the future –

• Nose warmers – yes, these should be a new trend!
• Our “Language Group Date” with Dasha at the Shashlik place
• Club Sexy Bar
• Your crazy H.F. stories – waiting to eat or the dog stealing AND returning you shoe!
• You purchasing a lovely coat in Almaty; us missing the first Issyk bus stop and walking home in     the pouring rain because the local bus never came
• Watching movies at Dasha’s – I think we both fell asleep
• GIRLS NIGHT – let’s all take a personality test – Question 3 1 = patient and understanding 5 = impatient…oh good times!
• Your boxing glove mittens and the ultimatum you gave your mom to get them
• Leading the group in Almaty, even though neither of us had ABSOLUTELY no idea which way to go – sorry I let you fall…
• A million trips to the store near Dasha’s everyday
• Peeing outside at Charin Canyon behind the van  
• Banya during PST
• Swearing-In
• Getting stuck in Natasha’s apartment
• You eating like 100,000 tomatoes during training
• “Dozaftra” “Poslizaftra”
• Chocolate/coffee candy
• You and Michelle “gosting” at my host fam’s house for Monte!
• Two words: Party Van!
o Never-have-I-ever
o Listening to early 90s music with Hotard’s speakers
• Introduction of “The Dinosaur” picture – a nice touch – I love the 4 pics!
• Crocheting randomly – creating “new” things – like wrist warmers…oh wait…
• My first trip to Kgan – Thanksgiving!!
o The ticket window asking us to speak to the police – weird!
o Hotel Karaganda
o A New purse!
o Christmas Tree
o Gros Beir
o The Orchestra
• Christmas in Karaganda
o Making Kool-aid
o Reindeer Crafts with Ken
o Ice Skating
o Singing Karaoke – attempting “Black or White” by Michael Jackson – what were we thinking?!
o You singing that creepy Celine song
o Eating poverty cones outside at the picnic table
• Visiting in February when H.M. was out
o Text messaging all our Kaz20s from beeline website
o Tomato “soup”
o That weird bus break down
o Me purchasing a wrong way ticket back to site
• Bus trips from Issyk to Almaty
o Playing “Who Would You Rather Banya With?”
o And “matching” everyone up with most/least compatible partners
• The Boys walking us home, even though we probably should have walked them home on a few occasions
• Baby haters club – are we bad women? I don’t think so
• Starting “Fun Club” – we REALLY do need a “fun club.” We should plan one for our rendezvous!
• Me not ENTIRELY understanding the bus system in Karaganda
• TEXT MESSAGING!!
• Naryz!!!
o Hanging out in an empty apartment eating LOTS of those yogurt covered peanuts!
• Turkistan
• IST
o Free poverty cones (by free I mean someone else paid)
o Going out the last night with CPs; which could have potentially been weird, but was VERY enjoyable
o Club SOHO
o A bazillion trips to Ramstore like everyday
 COKE LIGHT
• Attempting at every possible moment to have a Kaz20 OCAP Karaganda Oblast moment by squishing Jamie in the middle – I’m going to think of another way to “torture” him – or another way where he will “pretend” he’s being tortured, but secretly like it
• I miss you

Thank you for your friendship (future) Dr. Kolb!! Can’t wait to see you in a few years!! GOOD LUCK with EVERYTHING!!! I hope you are enjoying all the comforts of America and I promise to return with yogurt covered peanuts, just for you…

Abandon Buildings

At site there are LOTS of abandon buildings! These buildings have become one of my greatest obsessions! Some of them are boarded up and difficult to get into, others are fairly easy and it’s suspected that people who are homeless live here. Unsure of whether or not we would be breaking some unknown law about entering abandon buildings, my site mate and I decided to venture into the abandon apartment building near his house. There really is ABSOLUTELY nothing left in these buildings except rubble. We walked into different apartments and attempted to read the graffiti on the walls, evidence that someone had been here. Some areas clearly had people living in them, as they had a “bathroom corner” and what appeared to be a “bed” where someone most likely slept. The building had five floors and as we ascended the building we became a bit more fearful that the people who lived there would be home or would be coming home, but still, we pressed on. Of course, floor 4 was not that different than floor 1. One particular apartment in the building had been cleaned out; it lacked the rubble that had been present in all the other apartments and had something that resembled that of a table. It was then that I felt like I was actually in someone else’s house.

It seems like a hopeless situation; no job, no money, no family, no where to live, nothing, yet they continue to wake up in the morning with the sunrise, go somewhere to get what they need and return to what they most likely refer to as “home.” They find the hope they need to continue doing what they do. I wanted to help them, but quickly realized they don’t need my help, but rather, I need to learn from them. I want that kind of hope they seem to have, no one was home and I didn’t speak with any of them, these are purely my observations. The hope of getting out of bed in the morning and expecting something better than I got the day before, or just the simple act of “going through the motions” even through the “dark times;” of waiting.

In America there are shelters, welfare, soup kitchens, and other programs for people who lack money. I haven’t seen a homeless shelter here in Kaz and don’t know about the welfare system? I can’t even begin to imagine the challenges of being poor in a developing country. Sitting at rock bottom everyday, knowing that things can only go up and hoping for something more, only to return “home” to the abandon building where one has staked his claim, the smell of feces radiates over the small space where one sleeps atop the rubble; then to have to power to get up and do it again the following day is something I don’t know that I will ever understand. What I do know is that I will be more compassionate to the beggar in the bazaar.

English Competition

At site, there was a 2nd Annual English Competition. This happened the last week in April. PCVs from other areas of Kazakhstan came to assist with the competition. It was really the first time that I had guests since being at site and I was UBER excited to show them my town!! The first Volunteers arrived the day before the competition and were given kind of a “run-down” of how the competition would go down. Then we all wandered to the lake where we removed our socks and shoes, rolled our pants up and walked into the water! We attempted to take pictures where the people in the picture were jumping – we were only successful a few timesJ

Friday was the day of the actual English Competition. It lasted approximately one hour in the afternoon. All people were where they were supposed to be. The test started with an assembly where everyone spoke and then students went to their designated testing areas. As a PCV my role was to wait at the school until the test was over, then collect the tests from the monitors, who were local teachers of anything EXCEPT English. We then began the tedious task of grading all tests! This took some time…thankfully, BridgeTV and brownies were there to assist us through itJ

Saturday the winners of the Written Round were announced and invited to take place in Round Two (kind of like American Idol…only notJ), on Monday morning. In the evening we had a special English Club for those students would be taking part in round two.

Round Two was the oral round. In which the participants would be asked open ended questions and had to respond as best they could – it was a 20 minute interview! These were taped and listened to afterwards so that a winner could be decided and announced. This was time consuming as there were 7 winners from each grade and there were 5 grades – it was a lot of people to get through, thankfully, other Volunteers came to assist with the project. Of course, they couldn’t stay forever, and had to return back to their sites, but not before playing Dance, Dance, Revolution at the local bowling ally!! WOO WOO!!

Final winners have been announced and an assembly is being planned to praise them publicly for a job well done!!