Looks like I’ve got about five days to cover since my last post. That’s ok, it’ll force me to be more succinct (I hope). Let’s see, I guess I left of with Wednesday. Teachers at the London School have Wednesdays of usually, so I had most of the day off until later on when I had to observe “talking club,” but I’ll get to that later. I took the opportunity to check out downtown Bishkek for the first time. Some of the other teachers had mentioned going out for coffee on Wednesday, but I hadn’t heard a time or place and non of them had my phone number (I had only gotten it the day before), so I figured I’d just head out on my own and hopefully get in touch with them somehow. I rode a trolleybus for the first time (In Bishkek, that is) to the city center, and was surprised that there is no “konduktor” who collects your money like on the buses and trolleybuses in St. Petersburg. Instead, you pay the 3 Som fare (about 11 cents) to the driver as you exit, which seems a lot less efficient, but whatever. I got off in the center and just started wandering around and taking pictures. I found a lot of the sights I had read about, including the Erkindik (Freedom) statue, the White House (the center of the Kyrgyz Government), and Ala-Too Square. There were some cool parks I wandered around in to. One is called Dubrovy park and has lots of cool traditional Kyrgyz statues made of stone. As I was coming out of Ala-Too Square, two policemen approached me. One of them said, “Hi,” and I kind of acknowledged him but tried to keep walking. The started walking after me and I knew I couldn’t really get away from them now, so I turned around and went up to them. Anybody who knows about my run in with the militsia in St. Petersburg will understand why I’m a bit paranoid about the police in foreign countries (and to an extent in the US). So I was kind of freaked out here. One of them asked for my passport, which I luckily had with me. He was friendly enough. He asked if I liked it in Bishkek and why I was there. I kind of half intentionally and half unintentionally stumbled over my Russian while talking to him (I was nervous, you understand). While still holding my passport they told me to follow them across the street to where another police officer was standing, which made me even more nervous. They handed the passport to the third guy, who thumbed through it, found my Kyrgyz visa, checked it out and then handed it back to me. That was it! I said thanks and was quickly on my way. It was much less painful than I anticipated. I didn’t even have to bribe them or anything! So, I walked around some more, around the White House and in a park full of rusting carnival rides that are out of operation in the winter, and over to Kievskaya street, one of the main drags in downtown Bishkek. I found a “Shmel” internet club, which was the same as another one I had been using close to the London School, and I went in to get on the internet only to find that the internet was down, and after waiting around for a few minutes to see if they could get it working I gave up and set off to find some food. I found a cluster of stands around the corner of Sovietskaya and Kievskaya and bought a couple of hot Samsas (meat-filled pastries), followed by a shaurma (which turned out to be one of the worst shaurmas I’ve ever had). Just as I was paying for the shaurma my phone started ringing, but I didn’t answer it cause I was in the middle of a transaction. After I ate part of the shaurma and threw the rest away, I called back the number. It was Nargiza, one of the office workers from the London School. She said that the teachers were trying to get a hold of me, and that I should meet them at a restaurant called Fatboy’s, which I had heard about before. The place was close, so I beat them there and got a table, A few minutes later, Jane, Katy, Nick, and Jessica arrived, so I got to chat with all of them really for the first time. Since I had just eaten I only ordered a beer, but it was nice just sitting around and getting to know people. Fatboy’s apparently serves diner-style breakfasts with eggs, hashborwns, etc., so I’d definitely like to come back for a meal sometime. At some point Jane’s Norwegian friend showed up and sat with us. She’s apparently on a never-ending trip that’s taken her all over the world, and she had just flown into Bishkek from Thailand. She was about to start traveling through Central Asia, and is apparently shooting for Afghanistan. She kept name dropping all these places she had been, which of course made me jealous. Once we were finished I had to get over to the school to sit in on talking club, but instead of riding in a marshrutka with some of the other teachers I decided to walk, since I hadn’t seen the area between downtown and the school yet. It’s about a half hour walk. When I got to the school the power was out again, which wasn’t a problem until it got dark out and we had to have talking club by candlelight. Talking club is something the school does every Wednesday evening to let students have an opportunity to get more English speaking practice, all on a volunteer basis. They get a different teacher to guide the club every week, and this week it was this guy named Carl, who's an older British guy who seems like he's done a lot of cool stuff (apparently lived in Russia, Ukraine, and Mongolia for extended periods of time, probably more places too). I just sort of sat in and listened, offering a little help here and there. The topic of the first group was cell phones, and the topic of the second was honesty. There was one older student there who made the argument that cell phones destroy families because the radio signals destroys the area between your waist and your knees, as he put it. He was pretty fun to listen to, actually. Before I left for home, Kenje, the director of the school, pulled me aside and explained that one of their teachers had a family emergency and had to go home to Turkey, and that she needed me to fill in for his classes. This would mean starting teaching over a week earlier than originally planned. I said ok, and started psyching myself up to teach beginning on Friday. I walked home in the dark and hung out at the apartment for the rest of the night after that. Thursday was a weird day. I don’t really remember the whole day chronologically, but the gist is that the realities of my responsibilities while on this internship kind of hit me all at once, coupled with the fact that I felt like I was having some extra pressure being put on me at the school, but I don’t really want to nor am I really supposed to get into it. Also the minor everyday annoyances of living in a new place (especially in a weird place like this) kind of caught up with me too (like, having no power when I got home), and I just felt kind of crummy most of the day. I talked to mom just before going to bed, so that was nice. I guess that’s all there really is to say about Thursday. On Friday I had to be up bright and early for my first class at 9:00. I was able to catch a Trolleybus, and got to the school with about 10 minutes to spare. My first class is at the pre-intermediate level. It’s pretty much all 10-13 year olds, and I think they were pretty apprehensive about having a new teacher, but I think they warmed up to me after a little bit. I taught the next section of the series that their regular teacher was using, which made planning the class somewhat simple. They were all pretty quite in that class, but I would be too at 9:00 AM. I think they’ll warm up to me some more in the coming days. After that class I had something like a six hour break until my next class, so I used most of that time to prepare my next three class lessons, all of which were also already decided by the regular teacher. I actually kind of like preparing the lessons, though it does take me a while at this point. I’m sure I’ll get faster pretty quick. Once I finished with the lesson plans I popped over to an internet club to do some interneting, with a brief stop at a samsa shack on the way over. I finally got to see the last Tim and Eric episode, which had been dying to watch. I had luckily been placed at a computer that was set up for skype and had headphones plugged in. The connection there is super slow, so I had to wait about 15 minutes for both halves of the episode to buffer on youtube. Just as I was finishing the first half, the power cut out for a second and everybody’s computers shut off. I was pretty pissed, but determined to see the rest of the episode, so I loaded it all up again and watched it the second time without interruption. It was definitely worth it. But anyways, the rest of my classes went pretty well except for the fact that the power went off again just before my second class, and by the end of my third class I was teaching by candlelight. The second class was mainly teenagers, and some of them seemed to have a bit of an attitude but most of them were welcoming enough. There is one 9-year-old Afghani boy in that class, which I thought was pretty cool, Near the end of the class his dad was standing outside the classroom liking in through the all-glass walls. Apparently it was too much for some of the girls in the class, and they couldn’t keep from cracking up whenever they looked over at him. He was wearing a funny hat, I suppose. The third class was probably my favorite so far, just because everybody was very welcoming and enthusiastic about having a new teacher, so they were a lot of fun to teach. These guys were mostly teenagers too, with one older guy thrown in for good measure. Everybody in that class was just so sweet, and I’m most looking forward to teaching them more this next week. My fourth class of the day seemed far less enthusiastic and excited about being there. Part of it was probably that the class was so late (7:00), and that the power was still out and we all had to huddle around candles, but a few of the students seemed to have a bit too much of an attitude. Apparently they had already learned a lot of the stuff we covered too, so that probably didn’t help. There are a couple college students in that class, but again mostly teenagers. During this class my host mom started calling me, and after the third time I decided to interrupt class to answer. I had forgotten to tell her that my classes would be late, and she was apparently really worried about me. After class I walked home, arriving around 9:00. I was scolded a little for not telling her that I would be home late, but she was glad I wasn’t hurt or anything. The rest of the night I hung around my room and watched Mr. Show. Saturday came next, and it was nice to sleep in a little bit (until about 10:00, to be exact). Bubuzainap was out, so I had a little bread and butter (my usual breakfast, as it turns out), watched a little more Mr. Show, then decided to take advantage of the sunny weather outside and do some exploring. The weather has been really cold this last week. It’s been at least 0 degrees F (actually that would be “at most,” I guess”) most of the time, and just like when I was in St. Petersburg, people are saying this is one of the coldest winters in 50 some years (though Carl assures me that people always tell you that when you go to new places). However, on Saturday it was nice and sunny, with the temperature a balmy 10 or 15 degrees (I’m guessing, I’m not really sure at all though). It was definitely good walking around weather. I rode the Trolleybus to the center and tried to find this store I read about that sells maps. I tracked it down on the third floor of an anonymous building, only to find out that they are closed on the weekend. I wandered some more, this time going north towards a major street called Jybek Jolu. I found a cool Russian Orthodox church next to a big empty lot filled with rubble and scavengers picking through it. I wandered around in the back allies of some neighborhood where kids were playing in the snow, and I got the feeling that these back allies in poor residential neighborhoods are the true heart of Bishkek. I took some cool pictures and kept moving. I walked down a tree-lined path back towards the center, where a group of kids playing on a play structure saw me coming and had me pinned as a foreigner right away, cause they started saying “Hi!” to me as soon as I walked by. They were all really curious and eager to try out what little English they knew. They let me take a picture of them, which I was excited about because I really want to take more pictures of people. I kept walking and stumbled upon the American University of Central Asia, and the obligatory Lenin statue. I eventually found my way over to Victory Square where there’s a big arch and an eternal flame. One of those ever-ubiquitous wedding parties was there (This is when a newly married couple and all their friends drive around the city and get their picture taken in front of all the city’s most famous monuments), and I took some pictures of them under the arch / around the flame. I then wandered over to TsUM, which is the big central shopping center for all of Bishkek. It’s about five floors of whatever you might want, from cell phones to appliances to cleaning supplies to souvenirs to house ware to pirated CDs and DVDs. Guess which section I went to! The prices here weren’t as good as I know they are in outdoor markets and other places, but the quality is better and you can even watch some of the movies in English! I ended up buying three pirated movies: The Simpsons Movie, Hot Rod, and I’m Not There. I ended up paying $16 for the three of them, but they checked them all on the DVD player to ensure that they were in English as well as Russian, and they all looked good. I left TsUM and walked past some street vendors outside. I bought a power strip for me room, so now I can use my laptop from the bed and keep it plugged in (there’s no outlet near the bed). I had a shaurma for a late lunch (better than the first, but still not great), and headed home to watch a movie. I took a marshrutka back, and let me tell you, the marshrutkas here are insance compared to the ones back in Petersburg. There, once all the seats are full they won’t bother stopping to pick you up. Here, all the marshrutkas have a standing area in the front, and so the drivers let as many people as want rides cram in, regardless of whether or not there is any room. These things would be a nightmare for anybody with claustrophobia, especially if they are as tall as me. These things are basically big vans, so the roof is only about 5 1/2 feet from the floor inside, so my head is crammed up against the ceiling. There’s never an open spot, so I always have to stand, which means trying to squirm around people who are trying to get in or get out while also trying to grasp on to a handrail cause it is after all a moving vehicle. The worst part is that since my head is crammed up against the ceiling I’m not able to see out the window at all, and so I have no way of knowing where I am at any given time. I have to estimate how far I am from my destination and yell out a stopping place to the driver when I think we’re getting close. This time I got off at a point when I thought I was pretty close to home, but I actually had quite a ways to go, so I had to walk the rest of the way. It’s insane. Anyways, I got home and chilled out by watching the Simpsons Movie. There was talk amongst the teachers of going out to a nightclub on Saturday, and so I eventually got a text message from Nick saying to meet them at their apartments at 9:00. I was originally planning on going, but as 9:00 approached I started getting pretty tired, and sent another text back saying I was gonna stay in. I was practically tucked in when Nick called and urged me to come out with them, and after a lot of pleading I finally decided to go. My host mom and bother were already in bed, but my host mom got up to call a cab to take me to their place. She’s very sweet. The cab came and took me to the other teachers’ apartments (which are right next to the school). Nick, Jess, and Katy were in Katy’s apartment with a few of their friends from around Bishkek (some American and some Russian), and they were all giving Katy dreadlocks. We hung around the apartment for a while before we called for a couple cabs to take us to this place called Promzona, which is out in the middle of nowhere a ways east of town. I was somewhat apprehensive about going to the place, but once we got on I saw it was actually pretty nice. We managed to find a table for all of us (7, plus some others who came later). We snuck in a bottle of vodka because it was apparently really expensive here. I had a couple beers and some vodkas with Coca Cola, and I was feeling pretty good. There was a live band that did a bunch of Russian and American cover songs. They even covered a Kino song (Vosmeklassnitsa, for those who were wondering), which I of course got really excited about. I danced around a bunch to them and to the recorded music that they played after the band (which included another Kino cover [Videli Noch]). This Bulgarian girl who had been one of the teacher’s students and who I had met at talking club came to meet us with her German boyfriend. The bill for every table came in a hard hat for some reason (The place was industrial-themed, I guess), so I wore that for a while. I ended up having a really fun time, and I was glad to get to talk with the other teachers some more. Around 2:00 I rode back to town in a cab with Nick and Jess, and ended up paying a little more for the than was probably fair, but it was only a matter of 75 cents or something, so it wasn’t that big of a deal. I got home safely, at least. I slept in until about 11:00 on Sunday, and later on in the afternoon I went with Adik (host brother) to the Orto Sai market, about a 15 minute walk away. This place was pretty big, and had all kinds of junk you might want to buy. There was lots of clothes, cleaning products, produce, CDs/DVDs, etc. There was even a row of pet vendors selling fish, birds, and even some guinea pigs. I didn’t buy anything, but Adik bought some meat for diner, a bag full of apples, and a new hook for the bathroom. Actually, I did buy some blinis from the blini stand, but they were pretty bad. I miss the blini stands in St. Petersburg, but I think I know where I might be able to find a good blin here in Bishkek. I’ll let you know how that turns out. I got my first real look at the mountains south of town while we were walking to the market, and they sure are impressive. They’re huge, and they’re only about 10 or 20 miles out of town I think. My host mom said we’ll take a trip out to Ala-Archa Canyon south of the city sometime maybe next month, so I’m pretty excited about that. The rest of the day Sunday I hung around in my room, watched Hot Rod, and relaxed. I showed Zainap and Adik some pictures of my family, and gave Zainap some informal English lessons (she’s learning pretty fast). I worked on Monday’s lesson plans, talked on the phone to mom and dad, took a shower, and then started writing this post up. And now, 3672 words later, I’ve gotten all caught up. It’s 1:44 AM now, so I better get to sleep. Thanks for sticking this one out. Oh, and check out the flickr page if you haven’t already, cause there should be about 40 new pictures up by the time I post this. Peace!
-Austin
1/24/08
This is two days old at this point
I’ve just finished my third day in Bishkek, and the second of my internship. Here’s what’s been happening: Monday morning I got up around 9:00, had some bread and cheese for breakfast, watched a little TV, received and unexpected phone call from mom, and then Zainap (that’s the short version of Bubuzainap, my host mom’s name, and I think I’m just gonna use that from now on) walked me to the London School for my first day. It’s about a 25-minute walk between my apartment and the School mostly down a major street named Sovietskaya. The walk includes going through the courtyard of a children’s hospital and crossing two other major streets (Akhumbayeva and Mederova). One of the first things I’ve noticed about getting around in Bishkek is that crossing the street can be really treacherous; way more than it was in St. Petersburg, even. There’s no light to tell you when to go and no established crosswalk even. You just have to watch the cars and wait for the cross-traffic to stop, then cross quickly while keeping in mind the cars trying to turn, while also being sure to walk gingerly across the slippery ice underfoot on either side of the street. I still haven’t made it to the center yet, but apparently there are underground walkways between the streets like there were along Nevsky Prospekt in St. Petersburg, so hopefully it won’t be so bad there. Anyways, Zainap showed me to the School and then went off on her own, and I had my first meeting with the director, Kendje, with whom I have been in contact for a while. Before Kendje was ready, I waited in the school’s café where a young girl was watching that show Kablam on Russian Nickelodeon. She was really friendly and started talking to me as soon as I sat down. We had a short conversation in Russian about our mutual love for Nickelodeon (the old Nickelodeon for me, anyway). Kendje then showed me around the school, introduced me to the office staff, and then we went over some basic information about my duties, expectations, etc. I met with some other member of the staff as well, who each went over specific information with me. The entire office staff there is really friendly and helpful, and I think I’m going to enjoy working with them. I also met a few of the other English teachers, and they seemed to be very friendly as well. I had some free time before I had to do a class observation later, so I asked one of the English teachers if he could recommend a good internet club in the area, and he pointed me in the direction of a big shopping center down the street called Tashrabat that had a relatively cheap internet place inside. I hadn’t used the internet since I had left Corvallis a few days before, so I was pretty anxious to check my email and everything. The shopping center was really modern and slick-looking inside, and the internet place was pretty nice. There’s this thing I see signs for all over called IP-Telephone, which I guess is like a phone service that uses the internet so it’s a lot cheaper top call internationally than a regular phone. They seem to have them at every internet club, including this place, so I think I’ll have to try it out for calling home one of these days. I got caught up on all my internet stuff, and even tried to watch the last episode of Tim and Eric on YouTube, but I couldn’t get the sound to work, either through the computer’s speakers or headphones, and now I’m really anxious to see it because it looks really funny, as always. I had some samsas (meat pastries) in a café inside the shopping center, then headed back to the London School. I still had a bunch of time to kill, so I walked around some backstreets a little bit before heading back in. I had a meeting with one of the office workers named Natalya, which only took 15 minutes instead of the allotted hour, so I spent the rest of the time sipping a Coke and relaxing in the school’s café. After that I had my first class observation, and it just so happened to be in the class of the other teacher from Oregon. Her name is Katy, and instead of focusing on the fact that two Oregonians ended up in the same obscure country, she seemed kind of hung up on the fact that I go to U of O and she went to OSU, which seems pretty silly to me. She was nice enough, though. I sat in on her class and was supposed to take down some notes for my own benefit. Some of the kids in her class were a bit rowdy, but it seemed like a lot of fun to me. They were all pretty curious about me and asked a lot of questions. Most of them were teenagers with a few young adults. There was one 10-year-old kid from Turkey, and he reminded me of the 10-year-old girl named Kcyusha that I taught back in St. Petersburg. After Katy’s class I sat in on a lower-level class taught by one of their local teachers named Kaira. This class was much more disciplined and task-oriented than the other one, which I guess I might have expected from a local teacher as opposed to an American teacher. She didn’t even take the time to introduce me to the class or say what I was doing there, which made me feel a little awkward, as well it probably did the students. As soon as this class ended, all the power went out in the neighborhood around the London School, and it was already dark out so nobody could really see anything. Amidst the confusion of the blackout I met Jane, who started teaching at the London School a couple weeks ago and whose blog I had found a while back. Zainap was there to pick me up and walk me back to the apartment, and she assured me that this type of blackout was completely normal in Bishkek. I hope it doesn’t happen again at some really inopportune time, though I’m not really sure when that would be. We walked in the darkness until we got out of the blackout zone, which luckily did not include our apartment. When we got home Adilet was gone, but he had cooked some sort of pasta and potato dish for us and left it waiting on the stove. After dinner I relaxed in my room for a while. As per her suggestion, Zainap helped me move my mattress off of the bed frame and onto the floor, since I decided that the bed frame was too small and creaky. I think that I’ll end up going to bed pretty early most nights while I’m here, because walking to and from the school in the snow and ice and everything really seems to take it out of me. This morning when I woke up both Zainap and Adilet were gone, so I had the apartment to myself. I took the opportunity to take some pictures of the apartment and check out the balcony for the first time. Zainap got home before I headed out and we chatted a little bit. One of these days I will write more about my host family, because there are a lot of interesting things to say about them, but for now I’m just going to write about what I did today. I walked to the school alone this time with no problems. Kendje went over some of the work she wanted me to do today, which was mostly sending some emails to a few different organizations through whom the London School is hoping to send some of their students to the US. I had another break and walked back to Tashrabat to use the internet place again. I used a different computer this time but I still couldn’t get the sound to work, so still no Tim and Eric! I’ll find a way to make it work somehow, someday. I had lunch at a little fast food place called Domino (not like the pizza chain), where I had a Russian cheeseburger and fries. The quality was pretty low by western standards, but it was tasty enough so I was reasonably satisfied. I had a meeting with Uchkul from the office staff and helped her formulate some questions to ask another organization in the US, then sat in on another class. This one was with a teacher named Kevin, who I had met the day before and who seems like a pretty cool guy. His teaching style was really laid back and casual, which I liked. After his class I worked on writing up and sending out the emails that Kendje had wanted me to do. The internet connection at the school is limited and very slow, so it took a while to take care of it all. I was then done for the day, and I figured it was probably time to get a new SIM card for my old phone from Russia. I asked some of the office staff where they would recommend buying one, and the suggested a company called Megacom, which has a sales center in the big shopping center across from the London School called the Vefa Center (I guess it has two names because people also call it Ramstor). On my way there I ran into a few of the students in Katy’s class that I had met the day before. They asked me where I was going, and when I told them I was going to go buy a new SIM card they offered to come with me and help me out. I probably would have been able to do it on my own, albeit awkwardly with my limited Russian and reluctance to talk to salespeople, but I figured it might be a good idea to have these guys help me out so I didn’t get screwed over or end up with the wrong plan or something. They really did make it easy. We walked right in, they talked really briefly with the woman behind the counter and told her what I wanted, then they helped me pick out a number from the list of available numbers. I paid the $4 or so for the SIM card, and in about 3 minutes we were done. We took the new card and the phone outside and tried to get ‘er going, but one of the students checked the balance and it showed that there was no money on my account, after he assured me that there would automatically be some once I got my new card. We took it back inside to the store and found out that we had left before they could activate the card on the phone. I might have made the same mistake if I had gone alone, and I wouldn’t have known to go back and get it fixed, so I’m really glad that these guys were there to help me. So, now I have a phone, which will definitely make things more simple once I start getting around the city more and meeting new people. I headed back home after that, and after a quick stop at the grocery store for some snacks, I got back just after dark. I’ve been lounging around my room feeling pretty tired sore, which seems weird but I guess I’ve forgotten how much trudging through the cold can take a lot out of you. It has been quite cold, by the way. Not as cold as it was when I first got to St. Petersburg, but pretty darn cold nonetheless. I guess that’s all for now. To be honest I felt like this post is pretty boring and not that great overall. It probably has something to do with being tired, but I’ll try to be livelier and write only about the interesting things in later posts. Until then, take it sleazy!
-Austin
-Austin
1/22/08
It worked this time!
(written on Sunday night, Jan 20)
I am here, safe and sound at my host family’s apartment in Bishkek. I’m really tired but I’d like to try and recount the experience getting over here before I go to bed. I left Portland Friday morning, first stop Minneapolis. Before I even boarded, I looked at my luggage return tag and noticed that it said that my checked back was only going to be checked through to Moscow and not Bishkek, despite my having made it very clear to the woman at the counter that it needed to be checked all the way through. The reason this is so important is because I didn’t have a transit visa for Russia, which is fine if you’re only changing international flights and not leaving the terminal, but if I would have had to get my bag it would have meant leaving the terminal, which I wouldn’t have been able to do and who knows what would happen to my bag. So, that stressed me out a little, but I knew I couldn’t do anything about it until I checked in with Aeroflot in New York. Anyways, the first flight was alright. I was seated in the window seat of the very last row, and the woman who had the aisle seat had her 18-month-old daughter with her, which visibly seemed to annoy the guy seated between us. Luckily he was able to move up to a different seat, and I was left with the Mother and her kid. At least we had more room in the aisle, even if the baby was sitting in the middle seat most of the time. The mother seemed pretty old for having such a young child (I think she said she was 44), and seemed REALLY into being a mom, with lots of books, toys, juices, and diapers crammed in a big baby bag. She even had a portable DVD player and a brand new Elmo DVD to keep the baby (whose name was Glenn-eden, by the way) entertained. I just looked out the window most of the time and dozed off a bit, though the baby was really cute and I did enjoy playing that game where you smile at a baby and they smile back. I had about an hour wait in Minneapolis, during which time I called my mom to tell her about the baggage thing, and bout a bottle of Coke at the Fox News store, though I really hated giving them my business. I don’t even get why Fox News has a store in the airport selling magazines and drinks. For the flight to New York I was seated next to a young couple who I assume were from Minnesota and who were headed to New York for the weekend just to party or whatever. Again I just looked out the window, listened to music, and napped a little bit. It was fun flying into New York and looking down on Manhattan and everything. I had about 4 hours to kill in the airport this time, and I was starting to feel pretty tired and travel-weary. I didn’t have my boarding passes for my next two flights with Aeroflot, so I didn’t even know which gate or terminal I needed to be at. I wondered around for a while lugging my heavy bags and reading the monitors and trying to figure out where to go. The flight wasn’t showing up on the monitors and as it got closer to the flight I started freaking out a little bit cause I really didn’t know where to go or what to do. I had asked one airport employee if they knew where to go and they said that the flight would definitely be in that terminal somewhere, but with less than 2 hours before the flight it still wasn’t showing up on the monitors. I asked someone else for help and after talking to three more people, I was informed that Aeroflot operated out of an entirely different terminal. I rode the train thing to the new terminal and got to the check-in both with plenty of time to spare. I checked in at the Aeroflot counter and told them about the whole bag situation. The woman at the counter got this other guy to help (neither of them were Russian), and he seemed really pissed at whoever had made the mistake, and seemed intent on fixing the problem. He took down some information about the bag, and said he would contact Moscow about it and they would sort it out there. I was very pleased that they were able to take such decisive action, and in fact this would be the first of many things about Aeroflot that would come as a pleasant surprise. So, I got my boarding passes and headed to the gate with some relief about the bag. The flight was delayed for about 1 1/2 hours, which was fine for me because it just meant that much less time waiting in the airport in Moscow later. As we boarded the plane, an Aeroflot employee checked everyone’s passports for visas I think. I was prepared to explain to him that I was only transferring and didn’t need a visa, but he saw my Russian visa from two years ago and immediately handed back the passport, which saved me the hassle of explaining the situation. I was seated on the aisle of the middle row of the plane, second from the front of economy class, and there was nobody sitting in the middle so the older gentlemen on the other aisle and I were able to put our bags in the middle seat. It was interesting to see all the jet-setting “New Russians” on the flight with their fancy phones and bags of duty-free goods. The woman in front of me was one of those, and in true Russian form, made no apologies about spreading out all of her things, and herself. Even though she was in the bulk head seat and had her legs up on the wall in front of her, she still had to put her seat all the way back, and put her boots under her seat taking up more of my leg room. It was kind of annoying is all. There was this other guy sitting near us who I mistakenly took for some typical crazy Russian alcoholic dude, cause he seemed lost and helpless, would just sit still and make weird facial expressions the whole flight, and would make huge messes of his in-flight meals. I later figured out that he was actually blind, which accounted for his strange behavior. He was also Bulgarian I discovered after seeing his passport, and I just couldn’t help but wonder what a blind, disheveled Bulgarian man was doing on a flight between New York and Moscow, or what he was doing in New York in the first place. Now, about Aeroflot: I had heard all kinds of horror stories about taking the Russian airline, about how they had a terrible flight record, how the planes were old and crumbling, how the flight attendants are rude, and how the flights are generally a bad experience. I found all of this to be completely untrue, and if fact just the opposite in most cases. Both of my Aeroflot flights seemed on par with or better than any flight I’ve ever taken with any other airline, domestic or international. The ride was smooth, the planes were clean and well-maintained, the flight attendants were as friendly as any Russian woman typically is (which isn’t saying too much, but I’ve never really found flight attendants in general to be all that friendly and personable, so these ones seemed as friendly as any do. Actually, some were very polite and patient. The picked up after that blind guy without any complaints, and one of them was even patient enough to fill out the migration card for him), and even the food was good. For dinner I had curry rice with chicken, and for breakfast, and honest-to-god breakfast burrito! Considering it was being served by a Russian airline, it was pretty darn good and fairly authentic. I was quite pleased with the whole experience. Of course all the typical annoyances of any flight were there (cramped seats, difficulty sleeping, etc.), but these aren’t things that Aeroflot could control. I guess my only real complaint was with the movie selection. First they showed Ocean’s Thirteen dubbed into Russian, and even though there were multiple channels when you plug in the headphones, there was no English channel for the movie (there were two in Russian, though), I watched it in Russia anyways, and was actually a little disappointed in myself because I couldn’t really understand a lot of what they were saying. My Russian has gotten a bit rusty, but I know it will come back while I’m here. I had seen Ocean’s Thirteen before, so, I already knew the story and could follow along fine. The second movie was a terrible Russian movie called “Shadow Boxer 2” or something. It’s about a Russian boxer (apparently you’re already supposed to know about him from the first movie,) who comes to the US and blows everybody away with his amazing boxing. This one Mexican guy at his gym provokes him so he basically beats the guy to death, only to find out that the guy’s dad was a bigwig in the Hispanic mafia who’s now got a big vendetta against him and his girlfriend through his connections with the Russian mafia. It wass really stupid, and I couldn’t even watch the whole thing. It was interesting, though, because a lot of the dialogue was in English with Russian over-dubbing and English subtitles. But, anyways, I guess that’s enough about that flight. We got to Moscow and I went through the “transfer without visa” desk before entering the terminal. Amazingly, the woman at the counter had a note about my bag, and called the baggage people to have to put in the Bishkek flight, which was pretty reassuring again. I had about 9 hours to spend in the terminal, and after shelling out $10 for 2 20 oz. Bottles of soda, I didn’t want to spend any more money there. I wasn’t even hungry, and the only thing to buy really was a bunch of cheap “Russian” souvenirs and duty-free perfume. I was able to find a power outlet and had high hopes of getting a wifi signal on my laptop. There were several, actually, but all of them required a password or registration with different cell phone companies. So, no internet for Austin. Most of my time in the terminal was spent reading magazines or trying to sleep on the floor. I think I actually got a fair amount of sleep there, though it wasn’t very satisfying as I would often wake suddenly with paranoid thoughts of people robbing me while I was asleep. The time flew by relatively fast, and before long I was on my plane to Bishkek. This plane was even nicer than the last one, with high-tech reading lights and fancy seat backs with adjustable pillow tops. I was seated next to two Kyrgyz guys, but there were plenty of open seats and after we were served our meal (meat and pasta), they both sat somewhere else and I got three seats to myself. It still wasn’t that comfortable, but three is better than one. The flight attendants were relatively polite again, and even though it was a flight between two Russian-speaking countries, they still made announcements in Russian and English. I slept a little bit, and before you knew it we were finally in Bishkek! Passport control was no problem, then it was off the baggage claim. Even though Aeroflot had been so good about taking care of my baggage situation, I was still prepared for my bag to be lost, but wouldn’t you know it, there it was on the conveyor belt! I was quite thrilled with the idea of not having to go through the hassle of having a missing bag, which I had already kind of resigned myself to. I was met at the airport by a woman from the London School named Nargiza, who lead me to our van and we were driven off to my host family. It was still dark when I arrived so I couldn’t really see much out the window, though we did pass the philharmonic. I asked Nargiza a lot of questions and she was very helpful. I was taken to my apartment, where I was met by my host mother (her name Bubuzainap Baidlde, though the polite way to address her is Zainap Eje) and host brother (Adilet, or Adik for short). We briefly got acquainted, but I had to crash for a while cause I was so beat from 33 hours of traveling. I woke up a few hours later and chatted with them some more, gave them their presents, and walked down the street to a supermarket so they could buy noodles and I could buy some beverages. Here’s what I know about my host family so far: Bubuzainap works as a freelance Dutch translator/interpreter, even though she only started learning the language about 5 years ago. She has a very strong talent for learning languages, as she apparently just started learning some English but already speaks it pretty well. In fact, she speaks to me mostly in English already. Her and Adilet speak Kyrgyz in the home, because she was born in a town in rural Kyrgyzstan called Naryn so Kyrgyz was her first language. Adilet is 16 and really likes American rap music. I’m actually staying it what is obviously his room while he sleeps in the living room, and there are pictures of 50 Cent and Eminem on the wall. Both Bubuzainap and Adilet are very kind and friendly, and I don’t foresee any real problems living with them. Bubuzainap told me that while I am here, I am like family (you know, like at the Olive Garden), so that was nice to hear. She told me that they are Muslim, but not very strong. They do observe the rules of no pork and no alcohol, but she said that she doesn’t mind if I drink in the bars, just not in the apartment. They also have a picture of Mecca above the kitchen door. All in all, a very pleasant and fun experience so far. I’ve only seen a tiny bit of the neighborhood so far but it seems easy to get the hang of. There are plenty of little details about the host family I’m leaving out but by now I am getting really tired and need a good night’s sleep before going to the school tomorrow for my first orientation meeting, so all the other details will have to be revealed in later posts. Look for some pictures on flickr and facebook soon. Bye for now!
I am here, safe and sound at my host family’s apartment in Bishkek. I’m really tired but I’d like to try and recount the experience getting over here before I go to bed. I left Portland Friday morning, first stop Minneapolis. Before I even boarded, I looked at my luggage return tag and noticed that it said that my checked back was only going to be checked through to Moscow and not Bishkek, despite my having made it very clear to the woman at the counter that it needed to be checked all the way through. The reason this is so important is because I didn’t have a transit visa for Russia, which is fine if you’re only changing international flights and not leaving the terminal, but if I would have had to get my bag it would have meant leaving the terminal, which I wouldn’t have been able to do and who knows what would happen to my bag. So, that stressed me out a little, but I knew I couldn’t do anything about it until I checked in with Aeroflot in New York. Anyways, the first flight was alright. I was seated in the window seat of the very last row, and the woman who had the aisle seat had her 18-month-old daughter with her, which visibly seemed to annoy the guy seated between us. Luckily he was able to move up to a different seat, and I was left with the Mother and her kid. At least we had more room in the aisle, even if the baby was sitting in the middle seat most of the time. The mother seemed pretty old for having such a young child (I think she said she was 44), and seemed REALLY into being a mom, with lots of books, toys, juices, and diapers crammed in a big baby bag. She even had a portable DVD player and a brand new Elmo DVD to keep the baby (whose name was Glenn-eden, by the way) entertained. I just looked out the window most of the time and dozed off a bit, though the baby was really cute and I did enjoy playing that game where you smile at a baby and they smile back. I had about an hour wait in Minneapolis, during which time I called my mom to tell her about the baggage thing, and bout a bottle of Coke at the Fox News store, though I really hated giving them my business. I don’t even get why Fox News has a store in the airport selling magazines and drinks. For the flight to New York I was seated next to a young couple who I assume were from Minnesota and who were headed to New York for the weekend just to party or whatever. Again I just looked out the window, listened to music, and napped a little bit. It was fun flying into New York and looking down on Manhattan and everything. I had about 4 hours to kill in the airport this time, and I was starting to feel pretty tired and travel-weary. I didn’t have my boarding passes for my next two flights with Aeroflot, so I didn’t even know which gate or terminal I needed to be at. I wondered around for a while lugging my heavy bags and reading the monitors and trying to figure out where to go. The flight wasn’t showing up on the monitors and as it got closer to the flight I started freaking out a little bit cause I really didn’t know where to go or what to do. I had asked one airport employee if they knew where to go and they said that the flight would definitely be in that terminal somewhere, but with less than 2 hours before the flight it still wasn’t showing up on the monitors. I asked someone else for help and after talking to three more people, I was informed that Aeroflot operated out of an entirely different terminal. I rode the train thing to the new terminal and got to the check-in both with plenty of time to spare. I checked in at the Aeroflot counter and told them about the whole bag situation. The woman at the counter got this other guy to help (neither of them were Russian), and he seemed really pissed at whoever had made the mistake, and seemed intent on fixing the problem. He took down some information about the bag, and said he would contact Moscow about it and they would sort it out there. I was very pleased that they were able to take such decisive action, and in fact this would be the first of many things about Aeroflot that would come as a pleasant surprise. So, I got my boarding passes and headed to the gate with some relief about the bag. The flight was delayed for about 1 1/2 hours, which was fine for me because it just meant that much less time waiting in the airport in Moscow later. As we boarded the plane, an Aeroflot employee checked everyone’s passports for visas I think. I was prepared to explain to him that I was only transferring and didn’t need a visa, but he saw my Russian visa from two years ago and immediately handed back the passport, which saved me the hassle of explaining the situation. I was seated on the aisle of the middle row of the plane, second from the front of economy class, and there was nobody sitting in the middle so the older gentlemen on the other aisle and I were able to put our bags in the middle seat. It was interesting to see all the jet-setting “New Russians” on the flight with their fancy phones and bags of duty-free goods. The woman in front of me was one of those, and in true Russian form, made no apologies about spreading out all of her things, and herself. Even though she was in the bulk head seat and had her legs up on the wall in front of her, she still had to put her seat all the way back, and put her boots under her seat taking up more of my leg room. It was kind of annoying is all. There was this other guy sitting near us who I mistakenly took for some typical crazy Russian alcoholic dude, cause he seemed lost and helpless, would just sit still and make weird facial expressions the whole flight, and would make huge messes of his in-flight meals. I later figured out that he was actually blind, which accounted for his strange behavior. He was also Bulgarian I discovered after seeing his passport, and I just couldn’t help but wonder what a blind, disheveled Bulgarian man was doing on a flight between New York and Moscow, or what he was doing in New York in the first place. Now, about Aeroflot: I had heard all kinds of horror stories about taking the Russian airline, about how they had a terrible flight record, how the planes were old and crumbling, how the flight attendants are rude, and how the flights are generally a bad experience. I found all of this to be completely untrue, and if fact just the opposite in most cases. Both of my Aeroflot flights seemed on par with or better than any flight I’ve ever taken with any other airline, domestic or international. The ride was smooth, the planes were clean and well-maintained, the flight attendants were as friendly as any Russian woman typically is (which isn’t saying too much, but I’ve never really found flight attendants in general to be all that friendly and personable, so these ones seemed as friendly as any do. Actually, some were very polite and patient. The picked up after that blind guy without any complaints, and one of them was even patient enough to fill out the migration card for him), and even the food was good. For dinner I had curry rice with chicken, and for breakfast, and honest-to-god breakfast burrito! Considering it was being served by a Russian airline, it was pretty darn good and fairly authentic. I was quite pleased with the whole experience. Of course all the typical annoyances of any flight were there (cramped seats, difficulty sleeping, etc.), but these aren’t things that Aeroflot could control. I guess my only real complaint was with the movie selection. First they showed Ocean’s Thirteen dubbed into Russian, and even though there were multiple channels when you plug in the headphones, there was no English channel for the movie (there were two in Russian, though), I watched it in Russia anyways, and was actually a little disappointed in myself because I couldn’t really understand a lot of what they were saying. My Russian has gotten a bit rusty, but I know it will come back while I’m here. I had seen Ocean’s Thirteen before, so, I already knew the story and could follow along fine. The second movie was a terrible Russian movie called “Shadow Boxer 2” or something. It’s about a Russian boxer (apparently you’re already supposed to know about him from the first movie,) who comes to the US and blows everybody away with his amazing boxing. This one Mexican guy at his gym provokes him so he basically beats the guy to death, only to find out that the guy’s dad was a bigwig in the Hispanic mafia who’s now got a big vendetta against him and his girlfriend through his connections with the Russian mafia. It wass really stupid, and I couldn’t even watch the whole thing. It was interesting, though, because a lot of the dialogue was in English with Russian over-dubbing and English subtitles. But, anyways, I guess that’s enough about that flight. We got to Moscow and I went through the “transfer without visa” desk before entering the terminal. Amazingly, the woman at the counter had a note about my bag, and called the baggage people to have to put in the Bishkek flight, which was pretty reassuring again. I had about 9 hours to spend in the terminal, and after shelling out $10 for 2 20 oz. Bottles of soda, I didn’t want to spend any more money there. I wasn’t even hungry, and the only thing to buy really was a bunch of cheap “Russian” souvenirs and duty-free perfume. I was able to find a power outlet and had high hopes of getting a wifi signal on my laptop. There were several, actually, but all of them required a password or registration with different cell phone companies. So, no internet for Austin. Most of my time in the terminal was spent reading magazines or trying to sleep on the floor. I think I actually got a fair amount of sleep there, though it wasn’t very satisfying as I would often wake suddenly with paranoid thoughts of people robbing me while I was asleep. The time flew by relatively fast, and before long I was on my plane to Bishkek. This plane was even nicer than the last one, with high-tech reading lights and fancy seat backs with adjustable pillow tops. I was seated next to two Kyrgyz guys, but there were plenty of open seats and after we were served our meal (meat and pasta), they both sat somewhere else and I got three seats to myself. It still wasn’t that comfortable, but three is better than one. The flight attendants were relatively polite again, and even though it was a flight between two Russian-speaking countries, they still made announcements in Russian and English. I slept a little bit, and before you knew it we were finally in Bishkek! Passport control was no problem, then it was off the baggage claim. Even though Aeroflot had been so good about taking care of my baggage situation, I was still prepared for my bag to be lost, but wouldn’t you know it, there it was on the conveyor belt! I was quite thrilled with the idea of not having to go through the hassle of having a missing bag, which I had already kind of resigned myself to. I was met at the airport by a woman from the London School named Nargiza, who lead me to our van and we were driven off to my host family. It was still dark when I arrived so I couldn’t really see much out the window, though we did pass the philharmonic. I asked Nargiza a lot of questions and she was very helpful. I was taken to my apartment, where I was met by my host mother (her name Bubuzainap Baidlde, though the polite way to address her is Zainap Eje) and host brother (Adilet, or Adik for short). We briefly got acquainted, but I had to crash for a while cause I was so beat from 33 hours of traveling. I woke up a few hours later and chatted with them some more, gave them their presents, and walked down the street to a supermarket so they could buy noodles and I could buy some beverages. Here’s what I know about my host family so far: Bubuzainap works as a freelance Dutch translator/interpreter, even though she only started learning the language about 5 years ago. She has a very strong talent for learning languages, as she apparently just started learning some English but already speaks it pretty well. In fact, she speaks to me mostly in English already. Her and Adilet speak Kyrgyz in the home, because she was born in a town in rural Kyrgyzstan called Naryn so Kyrgyz was her first language. Adilet is 16 and really likes American rap music. I’m actually staying it what is obviously his room while he sleeps in the living room, and there are pictures of 50 Cent and Eminem on the wall. Both Bubuzainap and Adilet are very kind and friendly, and I don’t foresee any real problems living with them. Bubuzainap told me that while I am here, I am like family (you know, like at the Olive Garden), so that was nice to hear. She told me that they are Muslim, but not very strong. They do observe the rules of no pork and no alcohol, but she said that she doesn’t mind if I drink in the bars, just not in the apartment. They also have a picture of Mecca above the kitchen door. All in all, a very pleasant and fun experience so far. I’ve only seen a tiny bit of the neighborhood so far but it seems easy to get the hang of. There are plenty of little details about the host family I’m leaving out but by now I am getting really tired and need a good night’s sleep before going to the school tomorrow for my first orientation meeting, so all the other details will have to be revealed in later posts. Look for some pictures on flickr and facebook soon. Bye for now!
1/21/08
I'm here, but...
So, I have a big long post to make, but it looks like I didn't save the file the right way and now I can't open it here at the internet center. So, I guess I'll have to try again tomorrow. I may even have a second post to make by then. I'll just say this really quick: I've made it safely to Bishkek, have moved in with my host family, and have started my training and everything at the London School. Check back tomorrow and hopefully I'll have gotten the longer post up.
-Austin
-Austin
1/17/08
Here we go again!
So I set up this blog to chronicle my upcoming adventures in Kyrgyzstan and around Central Asia. I had another blog when I was in Russia, but haven't done any blogging since, so I guess it's been about a year and a half since I stopped. Now I'm ready to get back to it, and I imagine I'll have all sorts of fun and interesting things to write about this time. The way I did the blog last time was by typing the posts out on my laptop at my host family's house in the evening, copying them to a thumb drive, and then uploading them to the blog either at the school where I was studying or at an internet cafe, and as a result the posts tended to be really long and rambling as I had time to just type out everything I did in a given day. I think the blog suffered a little in structure, grammar, and overall readability, so I'll try to do somewhat of a better job this time, but I still anticipate that the posts will end up being pretty long and rambling either way. As long as anyone doesn't mind reading through it all, I'm happy to write it.
A little more about what I'm doing: I'm flying to Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan this Friday (in, like a day!), where I will be an interning English teacher at The London School (check the link on the side over there). I'll be in Bishkek through the end of March, staying with a host family and teaching classes. In April I'll be heading out for a backpacking trip around the rest of Soviet Central Asia, which promises to be a real adventure! So I'll be blogging here about my daily activities, experiences, and observations related to my internship and my explorations of the city/country/region.
I have a 33 1/2 hour flight itinerary ahead of my, including a 10 hour layover in Moscow that I'm really dreading. I'm not sure how soon I'll be able to start posting to this blog once I get there, but it'll probably be sometime withing the first week. So, check back in a bit, and in the meantime check out some of those links and my flickr pictures (mainly from Russia), if you haven't already seen them. Wish me luck!
-Austin
A little more about what I'm doing: I'm flying to Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan this Friday (in, like a day!), where I will be an interning English teacher at The London School (check the link on the side over there). I'll be in Bishkek through the end of March, staying with a host family and teaching classes. In April I'll be heading out for a backpacking trip around the rest of Soviet Central Asia, which promises to be a real adventure! So I'll be blogging here about my daily activities, experiences, and observations related to my internship and my explorations of the city/country/region.
I have a 33 1/2 hour flight itinerary ahead of my, including a 10 hour layover in Moscow that I'm really dreading. I'm not sure how soon I'll be able to start posting to this blog once I get there, but it'll probably be sometime withing the first week. So, check back in a bit, and in the meantime check out some of those links and my flickr pictures (mainly from Russia), if you haven't already seen them. Wish me luck!
-Austin
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