On Saturday October 31, 2009, a little bit over a week ago, I woke up at the obscene hour of 5:20 am. After rolling out of the most uncomfortable bed I had ever slept in for one final time, I finished packing my bags, threw on a suit and was on a bus by 6 a.m. Unable to fully grasp the changes my life was going to undergo in the next 24 hours, I promptly went back to sleep and avoided the thoughts completely. By 11 am, I had sworn to support and defend the Constitution of the United States and was an official volunteer. Fast-forward twenty-four hours and I was on my first Kazakh train ride, the first of the “firsts” that I want to share.
Fifteen of us with about 5 bags each stampeded our way into that poor little train station. Getting our bags to platform #3 was an adventure in itself. We drew a lot of attention to ourselves but ended up with an assembly line that functioned. As far as I know everyone got their bags. We were going to be traveling “kupe” style, which is the typical type of train you see in most movies. Harry Potter fans should know what I am talking about. Usually made for four people the kupe has four bunks and minimal space for luggage. Because I had my entire collection of worldly possessions with me the Peace Corps decided to be nice and buy us two tickets on the train. I entered the kupe, placed my bags in the most orderly way possible and came to terms with the fact that the next 27 hours of my life would be reduced to the 3 by 7 foot square box that I was able to call mine. It is really not as bad as it sounds though. It is not very often where I am given that extended of a period of time to just sit. Airplanes do offer that but even they definitely don’t compare. An airline would laugh at an engineer who considered comfort when designing their chairs. I found the train bench to be pretty relaxing. A standard road-trip is not the same either because there is the inconvenience of actually paying attention. On the train you have no responsibilities at all, just your mattress/bench, pillow and blanket. I made myself comfortable and took advantage of the opportunity to do absolutely nothing. Well, I guess I did do something. I caught up on some sleep, journaled, read and watched. Watched as the steppe crept by and avoided showing any trace or evidence of that fact. It left me in awe. It was like watching the moon on an empty road and star filled night. No matter how fast you drive you can’t seem to gain ground on it. No matter how long the train moved the same exact landscape stayed in your window. There was nothing out there. The sheer nothingness provoked thought, and I had a lot to think about. I felt bad for the lack of communication with my kupe-mate but I did not want to manufacture conversation out of nowhere. The serenity of silence or carefully chosen music was a better option. Granted it was just the first time but I enjoyed the train.
Upon arrival to the city of Kokshetau I was greeted by my counterpart and two other English teachers. To my surprise, one of the other teachers had a car to ease the completion of my journey to Zerenda. During the car ride we listened to “Jenny from the Block” and a Christina Aguilera C.D., because randomness is a way of life in Kazakhstan. We pulled up to an apartment building and I was introduced to the family who graciously offered to take me into their home for 6+ months. They have two children, a seven year old boy and a twelve year old girl. They are quite shy, but in this situation that is better than the alternative. I did not stay there the first night but I was given a chance to shower (yes, they have one) and was able to leave my all my belongings behind. The rest of the week was a bit of a disappointment. The students went on a weeklong break Wednesday afternoon though I was expected to lesson plan and prepare the classroom for its entirety. Wednesday night I was surprised by a text from my counterpart explaining that she would be leaving town for a few days. Not the best news. I did not have a key to our classroom so that meant I could not work. It also meant two straight days of sitting. The peacefulness of nothing had lost its luster on the train and I was ready for some action. It never came. As the weekend approached I needed some new scenery and decided to hop on the bus to visit Kokshetau. My itinerary for the day was to visit the internet café(thank you for the emails), visit the bazaar, and have lunch with another volunteer in the city. All of that was accomplished and there was one more task I managed to complete prior to my departure. It happens to be the next “first” I want to share.
My first altercation with the police in Kazakhstan made about as much sense as a family pretending their boy is trapped in a giant balloon (yes I still read the news, yes it still shames me). I was standing at the bus stop and a policeman walked up to me and asked for my documents. Not too much of a problem, if a cop wants to spend his time making sure everyone that looks like a foreigner is actually there legally then that’s fine by me. I showed him my documents, told him I was American and that I was a volunteer. Under normal circumstances that would have been in it and I would have caught the next bus. He had different plans. He kept my documents, told me to walk with him, and left me to wonder how much money I was going to have to pay to get those back. I quickly pulled out my phone and called our Peace Corps Security Officer in Almaty. I told her the situation and handed the policeman the phone. They talked for a bit. He then turned to me and asked me if I had been drinking. Fortunately, I was able to say no I had not, but that wouldn’t matter. He smelled my breath and returned to the phone to say that yes I was in fact drunk in public. (Why he did not ask me that in the first place, I could not tell you. I still believe I was about to be bribed but when I made the phone call to someone official he had to make something else up.) So now I have a police man who is claiming I am breaking the law through public intoxication and a Peace Corps employee on the phone who probably believed him. She told me to go with him to the police station; not what I wanted to hear. At the station she called repeatedly and talked to various officers while I was put into an isolated room with a few other officers. The officers quickly learned that my Russian was not sufficient for a proper interrogation. This did not, however, stop their questioning. It was as if this room mandated questioning. Due to my lack of Russian they would proceed to ask the most irrelevant questions possible. I was not in the mood, but they proceeded to learn my sisters’ names, my favorite sport and that I have a girlfriend in Michigan (she is imaginary, we all have them). Minutes later I was given the phone and discovered that I will be released as soon as my Regional Manager picks me up. I would wait 30 more minutes for her. Meanwhile, the questioning eventually stopped and I had more not so peaceful quiet time. When she arrived she confirmed my breath was alcohol free and proceeded to scold and scream at the entire station of officers. I have no idea what she said, but I definitely agreed and I gave them my best smug look and condescending nod. Then we left and it was over. Now I would like to draw attention to that fact that in very beginning of this paragraph I characterized the words “altercation with the police” with the word “first”. If it is that easy to get into trouble, I am sure there will be a second. There is corruption here and an extreme suspicion of foreigners, another left over trait from the Soviet days. I am sure there are more altercations to come. For the most part though, it was painless. I knew I did nothing wrong and while it took some inner convincing I was able not to worry; you shouldn’t either.
After coming home Sunday afternoon I learned that my eventful weekend was not over. My host dad invited me to my first banya. A banya is a public shower/sauna/steam room. If you have seen the movie Eastern Promises and remember the fight scene you should picture that without the knives and bloody eyeballs. Banyas are full nudity, split male/female and are packed with culture. I was filled with excitement and ambivalence at the same time. This was new for me but after 11 weeks in this country, I was overdue. After disrobing I walked into the wash section where filled a bucket of boiling hot water. Throughout the next several minutes I used this bucket to splash and then wash repeatedly. The bucket doesn’t last long and I made many trips back over to the faucet. After I felt cleansed I made my way over to the sauna where I beat myself with a bundle of branches. I don’t know what type of plant it is, but it smells nice and gives you a nice crisp whipping sensation. Some people have a partner perform part this for them, I opted not to. I told you this place screamed culture. And I know it all sounds weird, but to be honest once I got over the stigma of how strange all of this seemed to my western mentality the whole experience was intensely relaxing. As the heat from the sauna forces your pores open, your worries seem to just seep out. The air inside is so thick it made me gasp and struggle to take a productive breath of air, but that was alright. Simply sitting in a room and concentrating on the basic actions of inhaling and exhaling was a nice release from my anxieties and insecurities. If you are brave enough to look through the dense steam you will notice the area is not only a means to cleanse yourself but also a social environment. For decades, men and women throughout the Soviet Union, and elsewhere in the world I am sure, have gathered on Sunday afternoons to share that weeks’ gossip. I couldn’t help but think about the large decisions that have been made in this environment. I just read in a book* that said U.S. Secretary of State James Baker and President Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan once shared a banya together to discuss the disarmament of Kazakhstan’s nuclear bombs. That is one example of a decision on a grandiose scale but I am also in aware of the countless other major personal decisions that had been confirmed in this setting. Whatever the decision is the banya allows a huge portion of the world to be absorbed in deep, profound thought. Yet, most of our country has no idea of its existence (including myself a short time ago). Again I go back to what I consider to be the essence of cultural exchange. Something so common to them seems so foreign to me. I’ll admit, at first I was uncomfortable, but part of my reason of being here is to embrace the unfamiliar. I came to have my comfort zone stretched a little bit. This week it was given quite the tug.
I was asked to give a better explanation of where the heck I am in this unfamiliar country. Take a look at this link http://www.tlfq.ulaval.ca/axl/asie/images/kazakhstan-map.jpg . If you draw a line from the capital Astana to the farthest north city called Petropalv and make a dot at the half way point I live just about on that dot. Hope that helps.
*The book is a short and light read called Apples are From Kazakhstan by Christopher Robbins. I highly recommend it. The premise of the book is essentially to accomplish exactly what I am trying to do with this blog, though he does it much better. After realizing his ignorance of this foreign land, the author traveled around Kazakhstan for two years and wrote a book to share his discoveries. He touches on the culture, history and ambitions of the Kazakhstani people, which you will see are actually quite rich. It is the antithesis to Borat, an easy way to minimally understand the young country I will be giving two years of my life.
Sorry this post is going on forever but I also want to include my new address and a general package request list. My address here is:
021200
Kazakhstan
Akmolinskaya Oblast
Zerendinsky Raion
Zerenda
Mira St. 38a Apt. 12
Myles Fish
021200
Казахстан
Акмолинская Область
Зерендиский Район
Село Зеренда
Улица Мира, 38а, Квю 12
Майлс Фиш
I suggest simply printing this off and taping it to any potential package.
General package requests:
Peanut Butter and Reeses Peanut Butter Cups - for some reason when you are deprived of peanut butter its appealing qualities grow exponentially
Beef Jerky - yum.
The Economist and Newsweek Magazines -Russian won’t help my political science degree if I have no idea what has happened in the past two years
People Magazine - I’m really just after the pictures, if you just want to cut out some celebrities and pictures with verbs that’d be even better
Swedish fish, gummy worms, cheesy gordita crunches.
I will probably have more specific requests periodically. This is a general list that can always be referenced.
Fifteen of us with about 5 bags each stampeded our way into that poor little train station. Getting our bags to platform #3 was an adventure in itself. We drew a lot of attention to ourselves but ended up with an assembly line that functioned. As far as I know everyone got their bags. We were going to be traveling “kupe” style, which is the typical type of train you see in most movies. Harry Potter fans should know what I am talking about. Usually made for four people the kupe has four bunks and minimal space for luggage. Because I had my entire collection of worldly possessions with me the Peace Corps decided to be nice and buy us two tickets on the train. I entered the kupe, placed my bags in the most orderly way possible and came to terms with the fact that the next 27 hours of my life would be reduced to the 3 by 7 foot square box that I was able to call mine. It is really not as bad as it sounds though. It is not very often where I am given that extended of a period of time to just sit. Airplanes do offer that but even they definitely don’t compare. An airline would laugh at an engineer who considered comfort when designing their chairs. I found the train bench to be pretty relaxing. A standard road-trip is not the same either because there is the inconvenience of actually paying attention. On the train you have no responsibilities at all, just your mattress/bench, pillow and blanket. I made myself comfortable and took advantage of the opportunity to do absolutely nothing. Well, I guess I did do something. I caught up on some sleep, journaled, read and watched. Watched as the steppe crept by and avoided showing any trace or evidence of that fact. It left me in awe. It was like watching the moon on an empty road and star filled night. No matter how fast you drive you can’t seem to gain ground on it. No matter how long the train moved the same exact landscape stayed in your window. There was nothing out there. The sheer nothingness provoked thought, and I had a lot to think about. I felt bad for the lack of communication with my kupe-mate but I did not want to manufacture conversation out of nowhere. The serenity of silence or carefully chosen music was a better option. Granted it was just the first time but I enjoyed the train.
Upon arrival to the city of Kokshetau I was greeted by my counterpart and two other English teachers. To my surprise, one of the other teachers had a car to ease the completion of my journey to Zerenda. During the car ride we listened to “Jenny from the Block” and a Christina Aguilera C.D., because randomness is a way of life in Kazakhstan. We pulled up to an apartment building and I was introduced to the family who graciously offered to take me into their home for 6+ months. They have two children, a seven year old boy and a twelve year old girl. They are quite shy, but in this situation that is better than the alternative. I did not stay there the first night but I was given a chance to shower (yes, they have one) and was able to leave my all my belongings behind. The rest of the week was a bit of a disappointment. The students went on a weeklong break Wednesday afternoon though I was expected to lesson plan and prepare the classroom for its entirety. Wednesday night I was surprised by a text from my counterpart explaining that she would be leaving town for a few days. Not the best news. I did not have a key to our classroom so that meant I could not work. It also meant two straight days of sitting. The peacefulness of nothing had lost its luster on the train and I was ready for some action. It never came. As the weekend approached I needed some new scenery and decided to hop on the bus to visit Kokshetau. My itinerary for the day was to visit the internet café(thank you for the emails), visit the bazaar, and have lunch with another volunteer in the city. All of that was accomplished and there was one more task I managed to complete prior to my departure. It happens to be the next “first” I want to share.
My first altercation with the police in Kazakhstan made about as much sense as a family pretending their boy is trapped in a giant balloon (yes I still read the news, yes it still shames me). I was standing at the bus stop and a policeman walked up to me and asked for my documents. Not too much of a problem, if a cop wants to spend his time making sure everyone that looks like a foreigner is actually there legally then that’s fine by me. I showed him my documents, told him I was American and that I was a volunteer. Under normal circumstances that would have been in it and I would have caught the next bus. He had different plans. He kept my documents, told me to walk with him, and left me to wonder how much money I was going to have to pay to get those back. I quickly pulled out my phone and called our Peace Corps Security Officer in Almaty. I told her the situation and handed the policeman the phone. They talked for a bit. He then turned to me and asked me if I had been drinking. Fortunately, I was able to say no I had not, but that wouldn’t matter. He smelled my breath and returned to the phone to say that yes I was in fact drunk in public. (Why he did not ask me that in the first place, I could not tell you. I still believe I was about to be bribed but when I made the phone call to someone official he had to make something else up.) So now I have a police man who is claiming I am breaking the law through public intoxication and a Peace Corps employee on the phone who probably believed him. She told me to go with him to the police station; not what I wanted to hear. At the station she called repeatedly and talked to various officers while I was put into an isolated room with a few other officers. The officers quickly learned that my Russian was not sufficient for a proper interrogation. This did not, however, stop their questioning. It was as if this room mandated questioning. Due to my lack of Russian they would proceed to ask the most irrelevant questions possible. I was not in the mood, but they proceeded to learn my sisters’ names, my favorite sport and that I have a girlfriend in Michigan (she is imaginary, we all have them). Minutes later I was given the phone and discovered that I will be released as soon as my Regional Manager picks me up. I would wait 30 more minutes for her. Meanwhile, the questioning eventually stopped and I had more not so peaceful quiet time. When she arrived she confirmed my breath was alcohol free and proceeded to scold and scream at the entire station of officers. I have no idea what she said, but I definitely agreed and I gave them my best smug look and condescending nod. Then we left and it was over. Now I would like to draw attention to that fact that in very beginning of this paragraph I characterized the words “altercation with the police” with the word “first”. If it is that easy to get into trouble, I am sure there will be a second. There is corruption here and an extreme suspicion of foreigners, another left over trait from the Soviet days. I am sure there are more altercations to come. For the most part though, it was painless. I knew I did nothing wrong and while it took some inner convincing I was able not to worry; you shouldn’t either.
After coming home Sunday afternoon I learned that my eventful weekend was not over. My host dad invited me to my first banya. A banya is a public shower/sauna/steam room. If you have seen the movie Eastern Promises and remember the fight scene you should picture that without the knives and bloody eyeballs. Banyas are full nudity, split male/female and are packed with culture. I was filled with excitement and ambivalence at the same time. This was new for me but after 11 weeks in this country, I was overdue. After disrobing I walked into the wash section where filled a bucket of boiling hot water. Throughout the next several minutes I used this bucket to splash and then wash repeatedly. The bucket doesn’t last long and I made many trips back over to the faucet. After I felt cleansed I made my way over to the sauna where I beat myself with a bundle of branches. I don’t know what type of plant it is, but it smells nice and gives you a nice crisp whipping sensation. Some people have a partner perform part this for them, I opted not to. I told you this place screamed culture. And I know it all sounds weird, but to be honest once I got over the stigma of how strange all of this seemed to my western mentality the whole experience was intensely relaxing. As the heat from the sauna forces your pores open, your worries seem to just seep out. The air inside is so thick it made me gasp and struggle to take a productive breath of air, but that was alright. Simply sitting in a room and concentrating on the basic actions of inhaling and exhaling was a nice release from my anxieties and insecurities. If you are brave enough to look through the dense steam you will notice the area is not only a means to cleanse yourself but also a social environment. For decades, men and women throughout the Soviet Union, and elsewhere in the world I am sure, have gathered on Sunday afternoons to share that weeks’ gossip. I couldn’t help but think about the large decisions that have been made in this environment. I just read in a book* that said U.S. Secretary of State James Baker and President Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan once shared a banya together to discuss the disarmament of Kazakhstan’s nuclear bombs. That is one example of a decision on a grandiose scale but I am also in aware of the countless other major personal decisions that had been confirmed in this setting. Whatever the decision is the banya allows a huge portion of the world to be absorbed in deep, profound thought. Yet, most of our country has no idea of its existence (including myself a short time ago). Again I go back to what I consider to be the essence of cultural exchange. Something so common to them seems so foreign to me. I’ll admit, at first I was uncomfortable, but part of my reason of being here is to embrace the unfamiliar. I came to have my comfort zone stretched a little bit. This week it was given quite the tug.
I was asked to give a better explanation of where the heck I am in this unfamiliar country. Take a look at this link http://www.tlfq.ulaval.ca/axl/asie/images/kazakhstan-map.jpg . If you draw a line from the capital Astana to the farthest north city called Petropalv and make a dot at the half way point I live just about on that dot. Hope that helps.
*The book is a short and light read called Apples are From Kazakhstan by Christopher Robbins. I highly recommend it. The premise of the book is essentially to accomplish exactly what I am trying to do with this blog, though he does it much better. After realizing his ignorance of this foreign land, the author traveled around Kazakhstan for two years and wrote a book to share his discoveries. He touches on the culture, history and ambitions of the Kazakhstani people, which you will see are actually quite rich. It is the antithesis to Borat, an easy way to minimally understand the young country I will be giving two years of my life.
Sorry this post is going on forever but I also want to include my new address and a general package request list. My address here is:
021200
Kazakhstan
Akmolinskaya Oblast
Zerendinsky Raion
Zerenda
Mira St. 38a Apt. 12
Myles Fish
021200
Казахстан
Акмолинская Область
Зерендиский Район
Село Зеренда
Улица Мира, 38а, Квю 12
Майлс Фиш
I suggest simply printing this off and taping it to any potential package.
General package requests:
Peanut Butter and Reeses Peanut Butter Cups - for some reason when you are deprived of peanut butter its appealing qualities grow exponentially
Beef Jerky - yum.
The Economist and Newsweek Magazines -Russian won’t help my political science degree if I have no idea what has happened in the past two years
People Magazine - I’m really just after the pictures, if you just want to cut out some celebrities and pictures with verbs that’d be even better
Swedish fish, gummy worms, cheesy gordita crunches.
I will probably have more specific requests periodically. This is a general list that can always be referenced.
Hope you like the pictures. The first one was taken out of my bedroom's balcony as you can tell I really lucked out there. The next two give you some perspective on the train. The last is my first encounter with a U.S. Ambassador.
