Mulligan's Mulling's

Photos

2008-09-13T05:27:00.001-07:00

When i was at home many of you asked me to post more photos. the first one here is in front of my house looking at the mtns i climbed yesterday.

This pic is looking down at Zaqatala from the top of the mtns.

This is a sheppard and his hut that i met and had tea with up on top.

This is a graveyard that was on top of the mtns. i don't know anything about it yet but there was a tombstone behind the gate that had dates from the 1600's

this is a look accross the ridge that i came across. if you look really hard you can see the sheppards hut next to the pond.

More Photos

2008-09-13T05:15:00.000-07:00

The first pic is of my host mom and brother at their house.

This pic is of the football game in the street during the one year party.

This is a pic of one of my classes when we went on a field trip to a village called Ilisu. the bridge they are standing on was really old and made with eggs used as the hardening element for the cement.

This is a waterfall in Ilisu that we hiked to.

This was looking down from an old fortress we hiked up to.

Here we go again

2008-09-13T05:12:00.000-07:00

13 Sept 2008

Well I stopped writing on this because I thought what I was writing was boring and didn’t think anyone was actually reading anymore, but after going home for a wedding and to see family many of you told me you wanted me to continue? It’s sometimes difficult to write over here because the things that you may find interesting have become normalized in my life over here. I will try to write more and if it does start to get boring I guess you can just stop reading right?

The only major things that have happened since writing last are getting kicked out of my house, and going to America for a wedding.

Before I tell you the story about getting kicked out of my house I want to say that I believe in Karma and sometimes when you’re not a nice person Karma can be pretty shitty literally. I got kicked out of my house after having a number of PC friends over to celebrate our one-year anniversary. I had a large awesome house with a ton of beds and the lady that lives downstairs was in Baku for the weekend so I gave in and agreed to host the party. The party was great we had a great time hanging out with people we hadn’t seen in awhile, we had good cultural exchange in having a street football game that all the neighbors came out to watch and cheer for, and we had some good laughs. Then Sunday morning came around.

That morning I was sleeping really peacefully when one of my buddies came into my room and said “hey Donny there’s a Hanam (old lady) at your door.” I asked what she wanted thinking maybe we had left the gate unlocked and it was a beggar. He said, “I have no idea but she’s yelling your name”. Knowing the beggars don’t know my name and the condition we left the yard in the night before I popped out of bed to go find out who this could be. When I got out of my room I could see the lady from downstairs, who told me she wasn’t coming home till that night, looking through my window at all the bodies sleeping on the floor. I ran to the door and started to apologize profusely for all the beer bottles, garbage, and the guy sleeping in the hammock in the yard. I told her I hadn’t expected her till that night and we would all come down and clean everything right away. She didn’t seem to hear me and just told me to come downstairs. Thinking my Azeri was a little off I tried telling her again that yes I understand that the place was a mess and we’ll come down and clean it. She just motioned for me to follow and I did. When I got down she motioned for me to follow her into her house which I thought was weird because I’d never been in there before and she led me to her shower room where even before I got into the house I could tell where the sewage smell we had been smelling for the last few days was coming from. When I got to the doorway of the shower room I saw what was three days worth of PC Volunteers sewage, which had been coming up the drain in her floor! At this point as could be expected she was talking so fast I had no idea what she was saying and had a volunteer with better language skill come down to understand what was going on. She told us that she was a lady and can’t deal with things like this and I needed to get it fixed right away. Not knowing the number for the local roto rooter I called my host brother and explained the situation to him. He told me not to worry he knew a guy that could fix it but not till Monday because he didn’t work on Sundays. I explained this to the lady gave my brother the money to give to the guy and in less than 30min everyone was out of the house and at the vagzal (bus station) ready to go somewhere else. And then to make the rest of the long story short after I called my landlord to tell him what had happened they decided to raise the rent so high so I could no longer afford to live there. This is the nonconfrontational way they say they don’t want you living here anymore.

So now before any of you start to feel sorry for this poor hanam that had a shower room full of sewage I need to explain that this is the same lady that had been sneaking into my house while I was at lessons and had stolen food my mom had sent from America and $250 worth of my clothes, some of which I saw her son wearing around town. So the way I see it, and you can call me heartless if you want, but I think this is just a great example of how karma can be pretty shitty sometimes.

Since then I have moved into a new place that is nice but more of a shared living situation. I have two rooms a living room and a bedroom. I have a stove I cook on in my living room and I share the toilet, shower room, and a fridge with a family. I’ll send some pictures soon.

The other big thing that has happened, as most of you know is that I went back to America! One of my great friends from high school got married and I was lucky enough to be able to come back to celebrate it with him and his beautiful new wife. The wedding was one of the best weddings I’ve been to and it was great to see so many of my old friends.

I was also able to see all my brothers and sisters, their kids, both moms and dads, and my grandpa! When I got off the plane 31 family members were there to greet me. As I walked down the hall I saw them all with their huge signs they had painted and they all started singing happy birthday to me then all at once all my nieces and nephews threw the signs down and came running and gave me a huge group hug. I couldn’t have asked for a better reception. It took me a few days to recover from the jetlag but after I did I had a great time eating, spending time with friends and family, and experiencing everything that makes America so great.

Photos

2008-04-13T05:40:00.000-07:00

Here are some photos. the first is my bedroom. the second is my cool western toliet that i can actually flush toliet paper down! (most toliets here you have to either use the red flower watering pot that's next to the toliet or have a bag for dirty paper which can be pretty smelly). the 3rd and 4th are of the best packages i've gotten! my mom managed to fit all this into the flat rate boxes that you can send for 37bucks. if any of you need any ideas look at these photos and see the randomness. i asked her to go to the super market and just look for fun small things you would never normally buy spices to make things with here are awesome!!

Photos

2008-04-13T05:30:00.000-07:00

Here are some photos. the 1st is the dinner i made for my girls club, a few PCV'S, and my brother. the second is of my new house from the road. THe third is my house form the yard. the forth is my kitchen. The last is my living room.

Spring Is Here!!

2008-04-13T05:29:00.000-07:00

April 13, 2008

Hello everyone. I can’t believe how much the weather can brighten a person’s attitude! This last month and a half has been pretty exciting. We had our annual Peace Corps prom in Baku, I moved out on my own, and spring arrived.

Over one weekend the weather went from winter to spring and now everyone is outside and happy. Today I went for one of the best runs in my life. We had a thunderstorm last night with tons of rain then when I woke up this morning there wasn’t a cloud in the sky but all the roads were still wet and clean. I ran down toward a great village called Danaçi which has all these little village country houses spread out along this long straight road that has tall cottonwoods on the sides spread out enough to still see the fresh snow on the mountains from last night. I had my ipod playing some great music and felt like I could have gone on for hours. (Then I turned around and realized that feeling of being able to go on forever was aided by the fact that I was running on a slight down slope that I had to run back up at a much slower pace.)

Our prom was all sorts of fun. Volunteers have been planning a prom in at the end of February for a few years to have something to look forward to during the hard winter. This year the theme was high society and everyone dressed up really nice I however decided to do it high society redneck style! I had been growing my hair out since our swearing in ceremony in September which was fun but time for a new look so I had one of my friends cut it into an awesome looking mullet complete with lines on one side and a lightning bolt on the other! Then I had my mom send a tuxedo t-shirt which unfortunately didn’t arrive in time (something about accidentally being sent to Thailand?) So I took a white t-shirt cut off the sleeves and made my own which turned out to be even better. Then I got a brown bag from our medical staff and bought some beer in pounder cans from the store next to the bar and drank cheap beer form a brown bag all night. My camera was acting up that night so you’ll have to wait a while longer before I can send you some pics of all my sexyness in a mullet!

A month ago today Peace Corps let us move out of our host families and into houses of our own! I thought the process would be really crazy and interesting after I asked my brother how I could find a place and he said we would just walk up and down the streets asking people if they knew of places for rent but it turned out to be easier than that by using my conversation clubs. I sent everyone home with the assignment to find me a home. They came back with all sorts of places but two actually were cheap enough to meet the PC requirements. One of them was nice and relatively new sharing a courtyard with a family but the family said the only way they would allow me to live there for that cheap was if I would teach their kids English. The other place which I took is really old but huge. I have three bedrooms a huge kitchen an indoor western toilet and an indoor shower. The first story has a divorced old lady that people say is a prostitute and who has a key to my house and has stolen food and clothes from me living in it but other than that and the fact that I have very sporadic water and wont have any in the summer and winter the place is great. I’ve realized being here how much Americans myself included really pride ourselves on our independence. Even with all the issues living in this house have and will produce it is still so nice to have a place of my own where I can cook my own food, wash my own dishes and laundry, wear socks only when I want to, and not have someone constantly hovering over me.

Moving out has also produced some great topics of discussion for my conversation clubs. It is unheard of here for people to move out of their family’s homes until they get married. I have some students who are in their late 20s to early 30s, who for some strange anomaly because people usually get married early here, are still living in their parent’s homes. Then there is the whole topic of how I eat and take care of myself without a mother, sister, or wife to take care of my eating, tea drinking, and cleaning needs. In the last two weeks I’ve had two of my clubs over and I cooked dinner for them. They were more than astonished and not only at the realization that Chinese food isn’t made entirely of weird looking bugs. When I met with my girls club the next time I realized how much they liked the experience when they (who are all between 16 and 22) all told me it had been the best day of their lives. Then this last Friday I cooked for my teachers club which is a bunch of middle aged women who are used to doing all the work over here and it was funny to watch how much nervous energy they had sitting there watching me do all this work for them. They kept getting up trying to jump in and help but I wouldn’t let them. It turned into a great cultural sharing experience as we sat over dinner and I explained to them how men and women share household responsibilities in most US families.

In all things have really been going really well and I’ve been having a great time. There are still the moments where I sit in my big empty house all by myself on a Friday of Saturday night and go to bed at nine o’clock because there’s nothing else to do and think about how long these 27 months are going to be, but the good times are still overwhelming making up for some of the long nights.

Photos

2008-02-13T09:16:00.000-08:00

Here are some new pics. The first is of the front of my host families apt. in the snow. The second is loking up my street with the mtns above town. The third is of the street of the college where i hold all my clubs. Then the last is the sun rising over the caspian sea after the superbowl.

Trucking Along

2008-02-13T09:13:00.000-08:00

February 10, 2008

Hello everyone sorry it’s been awhile since writing last it’s become more difficult to blog as my life has settled into more of a routine. I struggle to find new and interesting things to write about. It’s interesting how the things, which would have stopped me in my tracks with amazement 8 months ago, now seem completely normal. I noticed that the other day when I was walking down the street on the shoulder of the road passing a butcher with a head of a cow hanging on a hook and a car driving the wrong way on the same shoulder I was walking on came up behind me honking for me to get out of his way and instead of thinking wow there is a dead cows head and here is a guy driving where the pedestrians are forced to walk moving in the wrong direction and he’s honking at me! Instead I just casually moved to the side with all the other people walking so he could speed past us just inches away at 3 times the posted speed limit splashing slush all over us and didn’t really think much about it other than how it was funny that I now think of that as normal.

Other than the normal near brushes with death from the crazy drivers (Don’t worry I’m slightly exaggerating this mom) things have been going really well. It has been cold and water has been causing problems with most volunteers but I’ve been really lucky with my family and my host brother in particular who has been able to maguyver a way to have water almost constantly. I could complain about the week we went without water and thus a shower but the other volunteers would be really angry since many of them haven’t had water since the 1st of the year. So, understanding it’s cold but could be so much worse keeps my outlook positive.

My language is coming along slowly but surely. There are many volunteers who are learning it much faster than I am but I did realize that on Super Tuesday I was able to sufficiently explain to my host mom what Super Tuesday was and how the primary elections work in the US. I’m sure it still sounded like a 3 year old explaining it but the concepts were transferred?

I was able to go into Baku and see the Superbowl! A big group of us went in and one of my friends was able to talk a bar owner into keeping the bar open from 3 to 7:30am for us to watch. Up until it was over and I realized it was 7:30am and the sun was up it was good fun.

Everything else aside my work is going really well. Last week I met with the head of The Azerbaijan Scouts and learned that there really is no program so he and I are going to work together to create the advancement curriculum for Scouts!

I’m in the process of trying to find a new home! Here in PC Azerbaijan we stay with a host family for the first 2 ½ months during our training. Then we move to our sites and stay with a family for an additional 6 months. At the end of this 6 months (March 13th) we have the option to move out on our own. The theory of us living with a family for this long is to help us integrate into the community and culture better. There is an on going debate between volunteers and our Country Director about the significance or lack there of for this, but for now it just is, and it will be ending in one short month. I will keep you posted to how this process of finding a house or apartment in a country where it is almost certain to be an entertaining process that makes no sense at all, but will find some way to work itself out.

Happy New Year

2008-01-03T06:04:00.000-08:00

January 3, 2008

Well Happy New Year and Merry Christmas! This last month has been really busy with all the things I’ve been doing and seems to have slipped right by. I hope you all were able to enjoy everything the holiday season has become in America. Being this far away has really made me miss all the little things.

They teach us many things in training here and one of the most important is about ourselves. They taught us that our service would be full of emotional peaks and valleys. This last month has been one of those valleys for me. I don’t know if it’s because of the holidays or just the fact that up to this point I really haven’t had a valley yet but I really missed home friends and family this past month. Now that the month has passed and it’s the start of a new year I can feel myself climbing the hill again and hope to be at that peak again soon.

The biggest event of this last month was our IST (In Service Training). For this all the volunteers in my class, the AZ5’s, went into Baku and spent three nights in a hotel and had trainings during the days. It was really pretty nice how they scheduled it. They had us all come in on Christmas day so that night we were all able to be together. We had an entire floor to ourselves so in the large common area we moved all the sofas and couches and almost all 50 of us ordered pizzas and sat around catching up with each other. Things like this are always kind of bitter sweet. It is all sorts of fun to be back around all the friends I grew so close to during our training, but then it’s always much more expensive than the money PC gives us for our Per diem. Then to be back around all those Americans again it can remind you of home that much more.

During IST I had my LPI (Language Proficiency Interview) During my training some of us didn’t score high enough so a few others and me had to retake the test during our IST and this time I passed. It was a great relief since before the test sometimes I was scared that I was going backward in my language skills but as it turned out I was able to go in there and relax and just have a normal conversation in Azeri. I still sound like a what talking to a three year old sounds like not getting all of my tenses correct in each sentence but I am able to understand and communicate.

The other exciting event of this past month was going to one of my student’s homes for dinner. I have this amazing student who is also my Azeri tutor and she just really has things figured out. So a few weeks ago I learned about this opportunity for youth to be involved in something called the youth fund where they are given the responsibility of distributing grants to different projects youth apply for. To be on this committee would really increase someone’s opportunity to be selected for other programs here to study in other countries. She wasn’t able to attend so I got the video and some applications and told her roommate to let her know I wanted to come over after dinner that sometime that week to tell her about these things. Well, her roommates English isn’t as good as I had thought and she didn’t understand so she told her that I was coming over but didn’t know why but thought I wanted her to cook me dinner. So when I got over there she had this huge meal prepared that she and all her roommates had worked on all day long. When I got there I was able to explain it all and we had a good laugh. After getting the through the language barrier we all had a great time and it was the most fun I’ve had with host country nationals since I’ve been here.

Just in case some of you have forgotten my address, here it is again : -)

Donald Stevens
Məzkəzi Poçt
Tələb Edilənədək
Zaqatala, Azərbaycan
Az 6200 Azerbaijan

note: i just looked at the address and the upsidedown e"s did not appear. anywhere there is a square put an upsidedown e.

GO DUCKS

2007-12-01T02:32:00.000-08:00

Here is a photo of me with the duck stuff my mom sent. She got me duck Crocks, a stuffed duck that quacks, and then a that shirt before i left. i'm wearing this around all day today in my show of support! Read the Civil War post below and then go get changed! GO DUCKS!!

CIVIL WAR

2007-12-01T02:31:00.000-08:00

December 1, 2007

When you wake up today it will be the most important day of the year and many of you may not even realize it! Today is the 111th annual Civil War! GO DUCKS!! Even though I am on the other side of the world thanks to many of you and especially my mom I have been able to keep up on the football season this year. Some of you have emailed or called me with eyewitness accounts of the games thank you Sean, Monica, and Dave. Many of you have forwarded me articles, thank you all. And my loving mother has sent me play-by-play text messages in real time, Mom You’re the best! Yes Sunday mornings I wake up in the middle of the night and lay huddled under my sleeping bag anxiously awaiting the messages. Then I forward them to fellow duck fans here that are waiting patiently. I hope you all understand how incredibly awesome each of you are! GO DUCKS!!

As many of you know this season has been great but tragic! We started the season unranked but very quickly moved our way up in the polls and then slowly moved our way into the number two ranking which would have led us into the national championship game. But then, while we were on top of the world the season came to a crashing halt as our Heisman quarterback tore his ACL in the first quarter of our game with lowly Arizona. We went on to lose that game and then the next week our second string quarterback sprained both ankles and then our once mighty, best in the nation (yes I know we were like 4th or 5th but the teams in front of us don’t count because they don’t play the same caliber teams) offence was shut-out by a marginal UCLA. So that brings us to today where the Duck’s will face the beat up Beavers. GO DUCKS!

The Beavers GO DUCKS! are beat up a bit they are on their second string quarterback they are without their top receiver and may be without their starting running back. That sounds bad until you realize the Ducks are without their first and second string quarterbacks, one of the two great running backs the one playing has a serious turf toe problem, many of our defensive backs, and our two best receivers. This game is turning into a JV Football game but there is still state pride behind the game. The state of Oregon is a wonderful state in that a person may not watch football or even care that much about it, but when the Civil War comes around everyone has an allegiance to one team or the other. GO DUCKS!

This game means more than people from outside Oregon can understand. 3-4 hours each year decides who has bragging rights for the rest of the year. No matter the conversation, it could be about a any sport, who has a better academic program, or anything else comparing the two schools, but whoever won the previous years civil war can always come back with “Yeah but we kicked you butts is the civil war last year” and that, is the ultimate trump card. GO DUCKS!

So all you who are Duck Nation get into that closet and get your Lightning Yellow and Thunder Green out. Wear it with pride down to the store and get the something to BBQ get the chips, dip, beer or soda, and take in the pageantry that is… College Football! GO DUCKS!!

Photos

2007-11-27T01:42:00.000-08:00

Here are some new pics. the first is of me holding a mirror pond that my wonderful sister sent me!! then the other three are of the pig roast.

Thanksgiving

2007-11-27T01:40:00.000-08:00

November 26, 2007

Being away from home always seems to make you appreciate what you are thankful for more than when you’re around everything you’re thankful for. This year on thanksgiving I spent the entire day on a bus going back into Baku. I was asked along with a few other volunteers to go into the PC office for a meeting to help further develop our youth development program. The meeting was on Friday so I had to spend all day Thursday traveling into the capital. When we all did get there we all went out for a meal of nachos, which was amazing but still didn’t compare to a lazy day of watching football, napping, and eating my moms home cooking.

The day after the meeting I headed down to visit a few volunteers in a town called Ali Bayramli who were cooking a small thanksgiving feast complete with a couple of chickens, mashed potatoes, candied carrots, cranberry sauce, gravy, and pumpkin pie! It wasn’t moms and I didn’t get to see all the family but it was very nice to be around others who understood and were in the same situation.

As I was riding the bus into town on thanksgiving I was thinking about what it is that I’m thankful for and realized I’m most thankful for my family, and the things that have happened in my life to allow me to do the things I’ve done and am currently doing. It’s an amazingly humbling experience to live with people who have so much less than we have in the US but are just as happy. It really confirms what I learned on the trail which is all you really need in this life to be happy is one warm meal in your belly a day and a semi dry place to sleep. Everything else just gets in the way. We tend to get lost in the rat race thinking we need to have this and that to be happy but why? Will those things really bring you happiness? I think its just more stuff you’ll need to sell or ask to store in your moms basement to collect dust when you leave on your next life adventure?

I really hope you all had a wonderful thanksgiving and that you had an opportunity to share with someone what you are thankful for.

Oh, I almost forgot I have to make a special note that I’m thankful for the best sister in the world. The day before I left to Baku I received a package from my sister with all sorts of goodies and as she knows me best she sent me three bottles of Mirror Pond Pale Ale and a note saying I was thinking you could use this about now! Thank you, thank you, thank you Becky! You so rock. I did the best thing I could and took them to the thanksgiving celebration and shared them with everyone there and they are all so appreciative of the kindness. There was even a fellow Oregonian who could appreciate it not just as great beer but as a little taste of home.

Luau and Thanksgiving

2007-11-27T01:37:00.000-08:00

November 20, 2007

So I got an email from my sister with a guilt trip just as bad as the one I sent to all of you when I hadn’t gotten an email in over a week. It made me realize if I want to keep the support coming from your side I better keep up my end of the bargain and keep this thing posted more often! I couldn’t believe it when I looked at it and realized I hadn’t posted an update in 20 days!! I’m deeply sorry and I thank you Becky for keeping me honest!

Well let me try to recap what has been happening the last few weeks. After Halloween my host brother left to go to Baku for training for two months. He is going to be an air traffic controller at the new airport they are building in our town. The significance of this is that he is fluent in English so now a whole new host family dynamic has started. Before he left I’d get frustrated because my parents talked to me through him and when I tried to speak in Azeri they would look at him. I had asked him over and over to try to talk to me only in Azeri and he would, but really fast and if I asked him to slow down he would repeat it in English rather than slower. So now that he’s gone I miss him because he’s a really great guy and I’ve realized how much easier life was with an interpreter.

Now around the house there’s a lot more charades and laughing while shrugging the shoulders as my family and I try to communicate. I’ve learned that instead of getting frustrated when we can’t get a simple point across it’s much better to laugh and give my mom a big bear hug. I think she thinks I’m nuts and I haven’t yet figured out if when she’s laughing, she laughing with me or at me, but there’s rarely a dull moment when we talk.

The weather has gotten substantially colder the last few weeks. It’s not really that much colder than the weather in Oregon the difference is that there just isn’t any insulation. So it just feels much colder. We brought the heater in and set it up a few weeks ago and the room it’s in is really warm, when the gas is on, but when you head into any other room you either hurry to get back or start putting the layers on and jump under the sleeping bag. I’ve actually got two bags. I brought the one I hiked the PCT with and then Peace Corps gives us a massive subzero slumberjack bag that I mostly sleep on as a mattress but on the really cold nights I crawl into it as well.

The room I hold my conversation clubs in is really cold. It’s in a really old building and during the day it is actually colder in the room than it is outside. I’ve tried to talk my students into having class outside but when I mentioned it they looked at me like I just stepped out of a spaceship or something. The Room is actually just what I wanted though. I was talking to another Peace Corps Volunteer the other day and we were discussing how each of our conditions, yet different from each others, were just what we had imagined in our romantic vision of what PC was going to be like here. I have two oil lamps in my classroom that we use for light (we don’t have any electricity in the room) but also to stay warm. They smell really bad because they don’t have oil for the lamps so we use diesel. On the really cold days we all gather really close and act as if the lamps are a campfire.

My weekends have been pretty busy lately. I went to a city called Ganja two weekends ago for another softball tournament and the PCV’s who hosted it put on a pretty good show. After the games we went back to one of the guys houses where they had a luau themed party. The day before they went out and bought a pig then all day while we were playing ball they were roasting it! This was good in so many ways. First anytime you eat an animal you can still see what it is while eating you have that cave man like feel of manliness. Then the fact that this country is Muslim and they don’t eat pork made it to where I really craved some and it was one of the best meals I’ve had! After the meal when the food comma wore off we decided to have a dance party that lasted until the early hours of the morning when it was just a few of us rocking out in the kitchen in nothing but our underwear? Not sure how that happened but it was good fun!

This last weekend we had a thanksgiving party in Baku at the house of the DCM of the Embassy (he’s the guy that is second in command to the ambassador). It was a really nice event, which everyone looks forward to and gets all dressed up for. PC works with the embassy to find us Americans who work at the embassy to host us in there completely western houses. Our host was completely amazing. She gave us the key to her place with a fridge full of beer and let us have it for the weekend. She came in Saturday afternoon to check up on us to see if we needed anything and then left us to just completely relax in a real western home! We even had a few English news channels!

Well this year because of budget issues the dinner was not catered as it had been in the past. Our country director threw in for a few turkeys and everyone signed up to bring something. My site mate and I, probably because we were relaxing so much, waited until the last possible second to get ready and prepare our meal. Well as it turned out we didn’t have the pots we needed to cook the things we had planned so we hit the market to see if there was anything we could substitute. Unfortunately we didn’t find anything and this put us way behind schedule. We decided to go without and be a little late rather than really late.

We got out of the cab and followed where the directions told us to go. As we turned down a shady unlit alleyway we thought we must have turned the wrong way so we asked someone if there was a barber down the street (which the directions said as across the street from the house) and the person said no the barber was out on the main road. (It should be noted that Azeri people are so nice they will still give you directions rather than tell you they don’t know). Well, we were not smart enough to investigate for ourselves and went back out to the main road and walked down every other alleyway. We decided we must be lost and thought we should call someone to find the way because now we were about 40 minutes late. None of the three people we called answered their phones so we thought it must be so formal that everyone has turned their phones off. So we decided rather than show up to a formal party late with no food it would be better to skip the party. As it turns out we just called the wrong three people. The party was tons of fun and it wouldn’t have been a problem if we had shown up. We ended up walking all the way back to where we were staying, which was about a two hour walk and completely missed our thanksgiving feast. We did end up meeting up with everyone after it was over and had a good time but really wished we would have just walked another 100 meters down that alleyway.

Halloween

2007-11-03T01:50:00.000-07:00

October 31, 2007

This past weekend I went down to the southern region of the country to the city Lankaran for a Halloween party. The country is only the size of Maine but because of the roads it takes 12 hours to get from where I am in the north to the cities in the south. The morning I arrived a group of us went hiking in a village to the east called Lerik.

The drive to Lerik was really beautiful and reminded me of driving in the Oregon coastal range in the fall. When we got to the village we walked around looking for some socks that they make there that are supposed to be really neat and unique to the area, but they said they wont start selling them until it snows. Then we saw some hills above the town we wanted to walk to, to get a great view of the area.

It was pretty comical walking through the town some of the looks we got you would think that we had just stepped off of a UFO. When we got to the top of the hills the clouds had rolled in and we were in an eerie fog that was really neat. The land up there was a rolling pasture land that was all green. We’d wished we’d brought a Frisbee. We wanted to have a competition to roll down the hills but because of all the cow pies we decided just running down yelling would suffice for the childlike urges we were having. We also saw fresh wild saffron growing on the hillsides. I tried to get some close-ups of the flowers with my camera but my photography skills were lacking. The saffron flower is really pretty. It is a purple flower, which has a bright yellowish orange center, which my friends said was what they use as the spice. After playing around up in the hills like kids we decided to head back to get ready for the Halloween party.

The party was pretty surreal. There was probably about 40-50 of the volunteers in country that came. And it ended up being just like any other college party in the states. The next morning when I woke I decided I’d experienced enough and didn’t think my body could handle another night of it so a few friends and I decided we’d head back a day early. When we got into Baku we found that there weren’t any more seats on the night train (and we can’t travel the roads at night for good reason) so we talked to Peace Corps and they allowed us to stay the night in the capital. Lucky for us there was a volunteer who was in town for a dentist appointment so we were able to crash in her room and didn’t have to spend the big bucks for a room.

The greatest thing about being in Baku is the food! Out in the regions there are very few restaurants and when there are they are usually all the same Turkish food, which is good but lacks variety. So that night we first headed to the Thai restaurant where I had one of the best curries I’ve ever eaten. For dessert we went to McDonalds where I had a happy meal with a chocolate milkshake! Oh, was that heaven.

While we were in McDonalds we all got a text telling us they uncovered a terrorist plot to attack on the US Embassy and other western buildings in Baku so as a precaution the office would be closed the next day. It turns out that they got everyone before anything happened which makes me feel safe that the authorities have a pretty good handle on what’s happening but it was a little unsettling realizing those feelings are here. Which when really thinking about it there are those feelings and threats anywhere in the world you travel. But now that I’m back in my city 8 hours from Baku I feel just as safe if not safer than walking down the street in any city in the US. The news covered it pretty well over here and the next day as I was talking to people in town everyone’s reaction was the same telling me how bad those people were and how happy they are that I’m here. So thank you to everyone who saw it on the news and sent me an email. There is no need to worry however as living in this small town way up north is probably much safer than being in most cities in the US.

Weekend Photos

2007-11-03T01:44:00.000-07:00

Here are some pics in Lerik. The first is while driving there. The second is of main street. The Third is of us having fun in the fog. The last is a house that reminded us of Borat.

A Day In The Life

2007-11-03T01:42:00.000-07:00

October 24, 2007

Many of you have asked me in emails to try and describe my normal day. It seems like that would be a pretty easy task but everyday here seems to be a little different from the last. Then, when I try to put it into words it doesn’t really seem like I do that much, yet the simplest things in life take so much more effort and time here. So here it goes this is what my life looks like on this side of the world.

I wake up every morning around 5am to the lovely sounds of the prayer call. My neighbors in the apartment above my room get out of their beds and I listen to them pray. Then I sit there and think about how I should get up and run but so far it’s only been a thought. I usually end up talking myself out of it with the excuse that if I do run I’ll get so skinny that I’ll end up disappearing. Then I roll over and fall back asleep till about 8:30. I get up go into the bathroom to light the water heater. Mine is actually much nicer than others, some people have to build an actual fire ours is gas so the only bad thing is when the gas is off or the fear of the thing blowing up. After the fire is lit I need to wait an hour so I usually eat breakfast while I wait.

My breakfast is usually bread with salty cheese, butter, honey, and sour cream with a cup or two of sweet tea. Sometimes my brother will try to cook me some eggs but he hates them and the way he cooks them I’m not surprised. They have this stuff here called super sun that they call butter (but they also called the grease I spooned out of the beef for tacos butter) and my brother puts about a ¼ cup of the stuff in a pan and then beats two eggs just enough to break the yokes and pours them in. The eggs are so greasy even with hot sauce they are almost inedible and I think I can eat anything with hot sauce.

After breakfast I boil water and wash the dishes. Then go and take a shower under the trickle of water. I have absolutely nothing to complain about because some people only get showers once a week if that in some cases and then sometimes they aren’t showers but bucket bathes. I only want to let you understand the time it takes to wash lathered soap off your body with such a small trickle of water it takes five minutes just to get wet enough for the soap to lather.

After the shower I usually try to study my language for about an hour, but often times get side tracked in some conversation with my brother. Then it changes depending on the day. On Mondays and Wednesdays I go to my tutor for an hour and a half. On Tuesdays and Thursdays I go to my conversation club with my first Teachers University club for an hour and a half. Then I get home at 12:30 and start to make lunch. Lunch is normally bread, grease soup from the night before, fresh chopped tomatoes and cucumber from the garden, and then sometimes fried potatoes. Grease soup is a staple here it is a soup base with varying spices, potatoes, sometimes meat, and enough grease to allow you to hold it over your head upside and shake vigorously when you get it out of the fridge. (This is not an exaggeration we did this one-day and we shook really hard.) After lunch depending on the day I plan my lessons for an hour on Mondays and Wednesdays then go to my conversation club with kids from the college followed by my awesome girls club. On Tuesdays and Thursdays I plan my lessons for a half hour after lunch and then have my second club from the Teachers University followed by a club made up of middle aged teachers which is actually really enjoyable I always try to help them see the crazy things their daughters are wanting to do are just the same as the crazy things they wanted to do that there parents wouldn’t let them do. After this club I hang out for an hour and then I have a club with educated but unemployed guys that are all economic majors. These lessons seem to be lessons of me trying to remember what I learned in micro and macro Economics nine years ago.

So on Mondays and Wednesdays I finish at 6 and usually read or take a nap until dinner. Tuesdays and Thursdays I finish at eight and without fail my Ana is putting dinner on the table as I walk in the door. After dinner is over I usually hang out with the family watching Azeri TV or just drinking tea. Sometimes (and I want to get in the habit of doing this more) I go guesting. Guesting is really just going over to someone’s house to drink their tea, but it is really neat and everyone loves it when I come to their house. I get tons of invites everyday just walking down the street. Then when I get home or get tired of the TV and retire to my room next to the TV room put my headphones on and try to read. My family is usually watching TV till about 12:30 – 1:00 so I’m up until then and as soon as it’s off I go to bed.

Then I have my Fridays where I head to work for about an hour and if anyone shows up I sit and talk to them about anything but work for an hour if not I sit there and wait and then leave after that hour. I’ve left my Fridays open from conversation clubs so that I can actually try to use that time to plan some youth activities. Right now I’m trying to put something together where I will help the youth in my conversation clubs plan and run a weekly Saturday activity where we lead a round robin of games with purpose with an attempt at trying to teach life skills through play.

My Saturdays and Sundays if I’m not traveling for work or play right now I try to get caught up on all the things that get put aside during the week like laundry and cleaning. And I usually use a bit of time to read a bit more. I’m reading more now than I ever have before and I’m really enjoying it. If any of you come across any good books throw them in the next package I can always use something to read, and they say it only get worse as the winter and darkness set in.

I hope this gives you a little bit of an idea what things are like over here. Kristin if you’re still reading or any others that may be coming next year please feel free to email me or anyone else over here directly and we can give you even more details and answer any questions you may have. If your anything like I was you’ll be full of them.

Tacos In The AZ

2007-11-03T01:41:00.000-07:00

October 17, 2007

For this post I must first profusely thank my Mom, Dad, and sister Becky for being so absolutely gracious for sending me supplies to make these tacos!!

Today I had the best meal of my life! Since I’ve been here I’ve craved nothing more than a taco the way my mom used to make, and today that craving was finally satisfied. (For the next few hours at least.) This conquest began two days ago when I made salsa from the great fresh produce we have here in our bazaar. I let the salsa sit in the fridge for two days to allow the flavors to completely merge. Then last night my brother and I pulled a Kilo of beef out of the freezer, took it outside, and ran it through the hand grinder. This morning I woke up like an excited little boy on Christmas morning. Luckily I had a few errands to run this morning otherwise I would have eaten them for breakfast. When I got back I started the beans and paced the house. When it was finally lunch time I browned the beef, grated the cheese, sliced the lemons and tomatoes, and started to heat the oil for the real CORN TORTILLAS my sister sent from home.

We have something here called lavash that is kind of like a flour tortilla but… different so it was absolutely amazing to finally have the real thing. Ever since I can remember my mom made us tacos this way where she takes a corn tortilla and fries it in corn oil just enough to cook it but keeping it flexible.

Like a symphony all the parts came together perfectly the tortillas were ready just as the meat finished cooking the veggies and cheese were prepared as the meat was started and my brother and I sat down and enjoyed complete ecstasy.

Here are some pictures to show how great tacos in the AZ look!

Taco Pics

2007-11-03T01:32:00.000-07:00

The first is cooking the tacos on the stove. The second is the spread. The third is of one great taco. Ane the last is some corn chips i made!!

Bayraminiz Mübarek

2007-10-17T00:07:00.000-07:00

October 15, 2007

This last weekend was great. I got to meet many new people, practice my language a bunch, and eat tons of food. I went down to one of my friend’s villages, which is about 20 min south of my town because they are a bit more religious and his family was having a huge celebration for the end of Ramadan.

Ramadan is the Muslim holy month when they do not eat during daylight hours. As with every aspect of life here I wanted to learn and understand more about the people I’m serving so I asked anyone I could what the significance of Ramadan is and why they fast during this month. What I learned however was not why they fast but just another example of the leftover Soviet mentality. There are many things people do here not because they make sense but because they’ve been told to or learned it that way. Many people here are much different than most people in the US in the sense that they don’t question authority. They just do what they are told and go on about life, and Ramadan seems to be an example of that. Each person I asked why they fast had a different answer and all of them revolved around because it is our custom, or because this is what Muslim people do, nothing about the significance of why the fast happens, when it happens, or for how long. I don’t write this in an attempt disrespect the people here only as an observation of things I’ve seen and experienced.

With the lack of understanding of why the holiday happens aside, we had a wonderful time and got a four-day weekend out of it. I got to my friends house around 12:30 and he had already had lunch 3 times at 3 different houses. My arrival created a reason to have another lunch and that theme carried on for the rest of the day. Throughout the day we went to six different houses and had six meals that were all the same in both content and size. It didn’t matter how many times you said, “no, no I just ate and I cant eat anymore” you were still served massive amounts of food. What else we learned was that if you didn’t serve yourself or you didn’t serve yourself the “proper amount” whoever was sitting next to you would take your plate and fill it with twice as much as anyone else was eating.

All of the meals were the same. We would get to the house go in sit down and have tea with really great sweet cakes, sweet biscuits, or any other type of sweet pastry. Then the meal would follow. This consisted of Plov, which is rice baked with massive amounts of butter then nuts, dried fruit and more butter are poured over it. This is also the national meal of Azerbaijan. Then we had either cabbage or grape leaf dolma. This is one of my favorites. It is a rice and meat mixture that is wrapped and cooked in either grape leaves or cabbage. Then a sour yogurt is poured over the top of it. Then there were the whole chickens or a once whole chickens depending on where in the line of guests you fell. Then there was the lamb stew stuff that was lamb cooked with potatoes and some sauce that I poured over the plov in an attempt to counter the massive amounts of butter. And finally there was the staple Azeri salad of cucumber and tomatoes. That’s literally all the salad is, cut cucumbers and cut tomatoes and it’s at every lunch and dinner here, but they are the best tomatoes I’ve ever eaten since everyone has a kitchen garden here and these are picked ripe off the vine right as the meal begins. After the main meal is over we would sit and eat either bad watermelon, which is now out of season or great pomegranate, which has just come into season. Then the table would be cleared and more tea and sweets would be brought out. After the tea was done we would say our goodbyes, wash, receive our eggs and move to the next house on the list and start the entire thing over again.

As we would walk we would see everyone else from town walking to their next meal and we would play the egg game. The eggs we were given as we left were hardboiled and dyed a tint of red by placing onionskins in the water as they were boiled. As you walked to the next house you would challenge other people for their eggs. One person would hold their egg in their closed hand with one tip facing up while the other person would hit their egg on top of it. The person’s egg that cracked lost and the other person would get their egg. The objective was to get as many eggs as you could. We on the other hand couldn’t understand the need for any more food and didn’t want to walk around with our hands and pockets full of eggs so for some mysterious reason we always hit the egg in a way to make ours break. I think the kids really thought we sucked and sometimes would try to have mercy on us and let us keep our broken egg, but we insisted that they won the egg fair and square and that they needed to take the egg.

I had the opportunity of watching the end Ramadan while I was in Egypt. Five years later I’m in another Muslim country but this time I had a much better experience as I felt that I was able to participate rather than just watch from the outside.

Photos

2007-10-10T01:41:00.000-07:00

Yeah so i'm still trying to figure out this blog stuff and the pictures on the last post didn't really end up in the text like i wanted. The Pics are of my underware hanging infront of my apartment, a cow in the streets of Sheki, me and my cheese burger, and my buddy katie pitching in our softball game.

Softball In The AZ

2007-10-10T01:34:00.000-07:00

October 10, 2007

This week has been really great. On Friday I went down to Barda in the central part of the country for a softball tournament with the Sheki team. There are four regions that have softball teams with Americans and Azeri’s.

Friday night was great fun we went to one volunteer’s house and had a wonderful spaghetti casserole with garlic bread and got to meet up with a bunch of different volunteers. The next morning we woke up and went to a field, that actually had grass, and played a double header. My team lost the first in a total melt down in the 9th inning we were up I think 12 – 3 in the top of the ninth and ended up losing to something like 17 – 15. Then the second game I think we won by 22 – 2. It was so much fun to be out in the sun playing softball. Later that day we all gathered at a different volunteers house where we ate some great lentil stew, mashed potatoes and homemade biscuits!

The next morning we woke up and headed to the field again and played two more games with the Azeri’s. Unfortunately not all the Azeris showed up so we couldn’t do a real tournament. But we divided up who we had and they all had a really good time! There we a few that actually really good. After the game we had to leave right away to catch our marshrutka back to Sheki.

As we were pulling into the Sheki Autovagzal the last marshrutka to Zaqatala was pulling out. So we went up to the 5 star western hotel and ate a real cheeseburger! Then those of us from the north shared the cost of a cab back home. As we were in the cab satisfied from our cheeseburgers and completely exhausted from the weekend we realized how much each of us wanted to get back to our homes. It was nice to have that feeling of this being my home and the desire after being away to want to come back to what I’ve learned is familiar and comfortable.

This weekend I’m heading down to one of the villages to stay with another volunteer and his host family to experience the end of Ramadan. They are a very strict Muslim family and it should be a great cultural experience! Ramadan is the holy month from mid September to mid October where Muslim people fast during the daylight hours. Then at the end they throw a huge weekend long feast! It should be great fun and I look forward to sharing it with you.

Getting Into My Groove

2007-10-03T22:00:00.000-07:00

October 3, 2007

Today was one of the best days I’ve had here! The last two weeks have been pretty difficult meeting all these new people and trying to explain to them what it is that I’m here to do. It’s actually kind of comical if I take a step back and look at it. I mean even Peace Corps doesn’t know what it is that we (Youth Development) are doing here. We are the first group of youth development (YD) volunteers so we are tasked with the job of figuring out what YD volunteers will do in Azerbaijan. In our training we studied different methods to assess the youth and our communities in an attempt to figure out what it is that the people and youth of Azerbaijan want and need us to do. However these assessments take time and require us to have a relationship with the youth so PC has us teaching English conversation clubs as a way to create these relationships and to give us something to do while we figure this out.

There are a few problems to this. First, it’s never been defined what an English conversation club actually is. Second, every person in Azerbaijan wants to learn English. Where this has created problems for me is that my counterparts at the organization I work didn’t really know what a club was so they promised everyone that I (their American) would teach them English. Well a club isn’t a place to teach people who don’t have a base it’s a place to practice the skills you already have so you can apply the language practically and it works best in a group of about 8 – 10. So long story short my counterparts promised me to all sorts of people and then when I explained what it was that I was doing all sorts of people got mad.

Then the last problem with this is that because PC didn’t know what it was that we will be doing all they told (or all the counterparts had heard) was the we would be doing these clubs so they want to help us fill all our time with these, which will take all our time so that it will be more difficult to create real sustainable youth programs.

Well, so that was why my last two weeks have been difficult. The reason today was so great was that it seems like things are finally starting to iron themselves out and I had two really great club meetings today. One was with a very beginner club that was just down right fun. We played a few games that everyone enjoyed and I just felt good to finally be connecting in some way to the youth here. The second was a club that I will look forward to going to each time. It is what a club is really supposed to be with 9 girls that speak really well but are losing it when they don’t have an opportunity to speak. The reason I’m so excited is that while I’m here I want to focus my work on creating more opportunities for girls and these girls will be perfect to get into their minds to figure out what it is that Azerbaijan girls want.

Then to cap the day off I got a package from my mom with all sorts of fun stuff that just made my day, including a new battery for my computer which makes writing blog entries much easier as the power goes on and off.

If any of you have questions about life over here or ideas of blog entries you would like me to write about please email them to me.

September 11th

2007-10-03T21:58:00.000-07:00

September 11, 2007

Two years from today I will have completed my service here! We had our last training meeting today and we will swear in tomorrow. Right before lunch staff had all of us gather around in a circle to remember what happened on September 11th. We had all of us trainees and many of the staff both Azeri and American. There were about 65 to 70 of us and we were given a chance to talk about what September 11th means to us.

I talked about how those events helped me make the decision to join Peace Corps. After the terrorist attacks most Americans reaction was to fight back harder and stronger to teach “them” (whoever “they” are) a lesson. I had a different reaction. I thought what would make someone hate Americans so much that they would kill that many innocent people. I thought if they only knew me, or all the people in those buildings, there is no way they would hate me that much, and instead of going out and killing more people and making whoever we were killing (and their families and children) innocent or guilty hate us that much more. But instead why don’t we go out into the world and let people get to know what real Americans are like and dispel any thoughts they may have about us from watching TV and reading newspapers. Then, learn from them what things America does either directly or indirectly which makes people hate us and come home and try to change those things.

As I said in my first post Peace Corps has 3 goals and two of them are completely related to this.

The 2nd goal is: To help promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.

The 3rd goal is: To help promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of all Americans.

I really feel much more patriotic serving here in the Peace Corps than I ever have before. I am proud of my country and appreciate the things we take for granted every day, such as freedom of speech, freedom of the press, or a free election. Even countries that claim they are free people don’t always have these rights.

These are just a few rambling thoughts I had today on the anniversary of September 11th. You may or may not agree with these thoughts but that’s what I love more than anything the fact that I have the right to express my thoughts. And if you do agree do something about it because you CAN! Go out and protest if you think something is wrong or vote or write a letter to your congressman or senator (tell them you support Peace Corps and what we are trying to do) or join Peace Corps. Whatever you do just don’t sit around and let things happen act like a real American and stand up for what you believe in.

Photos

2007-09-26T03:30:00.000-07:00

I had a post from sept 11th that didn't load right i will post it next time in. Here are some recent pics.

The first is of my good friend Whitney in front of the Caspian Sea.

The next is of me and my good oregon buddies.

This is me and my cluster mate Jenni

This is me and the coolest Azeri i've met she is my language teacher vafa

The last is of my new room

The First Week Of The Next Two Years Of My Life!

2007-09-26T03:27:00.000-07:00

September 24, 2007

I apologize for how long it has been since my last post. The last 2 weeks have been really busy. I’ll try my best to fill you in on everything that has happened.

Back on September 12th we had our swearing in ceremony. Even despite the stifling heat and the feel of a high school graduation it was really pretty neat. We all got dressed up and our host families came. We had speeches from representatives of the 3 ministries our programs fall under the ministry of Education, Youth and Sport, and Economic Development. Then we had a speech from the U.S. Ambassador who did hers in Azeri followed by one in English. Then we had a couple speeches from volunteers one in English and one in Azeri. After all the talking we stood up and raised our right hand and recited the same pledge to defend the constitution that I did 12 years ago before going to basic training. (that was kind of strange) Then each of our names was called as we walked across the stage getting congratulated by the Ambassador, our country director, and training director. Afterward we had some good food with our families and then all the volunteers and language teachers went out to celebrate and say our good byes.

The next morning I awakened to the realization that I should have started my packing sooner, and threw all my stuff together as fast as I could. I made my bus and was off with the wonderful feelings of anticipation. As I was riding on the 8 hour bus I had a bit of time to reflect and the major feelings I was having were finally the “oh crap what have I gotten myself into”. I have been waiting for these feelings from the day I finally got my acceptance letter but up to this point hadn’t really felt them. I think with every great adventure you really have to have the moments where you ask yourself, “What in the world am I doing?” And the more times you ask yourself that the better the adventure will be. So I was feeling the opposite of what most people would feel in that situation since I had the conscious understanding that these feelings were not only good but also exciting.

I got to my house and from the moment I walked in the door I had an overwhelming feeling of being the long lost relative, which they couldn’t wait to have return. I had been a bit apprehensive after my site visit but all those feelings melted away as soon as I arrived. I went into my room dropped my bags and actually felt as if that was my room. The next day I unpacked all my things, did laundry, and spent the time settling in.

On Monday I went to work where my 2 counterparts and myself went all around town meeting many different people. Of those were the directors of the college and teachers institute. They asked me if I would be willing to teach both English conversation clubs and computer classes. I said yes and then thought, “Do I have any idea how to teach a computer class?” I mean sure I know how to use a computer but to teach a class! I thought that especially when I was asked to help a man in the office next to ours. He said there was a problem with the monitor going to sleep. I went in and looked at it for a few minutes and I was stumped to. I couldn’t even press control alt del to restart the computer. So I thought well we can unplug it and try to start every thing up again and it was only at that moment that I realized he had not turned the computer on. He had only turned the monitor on and couldn’t figure out why it didn’t all just come on. That got me thinking this is going to be hard to realize all the things we think are just common knowledge.

Reading over this it seems paint a picture of a much less busy week one in which I could have written many posts. In reality however it was really busy, things just seem to work in slow motion here sometimes. Take this post for example it is just longer than a page in a word document but it has taken me two days to write because the power has gone out so many times and my battery no longer holds a charge. I promise as I get into my routine I will update this much more often.

2007-09-05T05:37:00.000-07:00

This is a shameless attempt to get each of you to include a frisbee in you next (or first) care package! We loved this one to death and i'm not even at my site yet where i had planned on getting them into ultimate frisbee since it's so foriegn that boys and girls can play together. My thought was if i put it on the blog each of you will send one and then we will have many for all the teams i want to start! the ones that ore the best are the ultimate or heavy weight ones. I think they are 180oz -200oz. then if you have any other old sports equipment laying around the house we could really make good use of it over here! ie. basketballs, soccer balls, footballs, old baseball mits, and softballs. If you deflate the balls i can get a pump here and they wont take up too much room! thanks in advance!!

Photos

2007-09-05T05:20:00.000-07:00

Here are some new pics the first is of my cluster and LCF, the second is of our great teacher vafa trying to teach us, the next is my oregon friend sporting the ducks shirt the day of the first game! the last is of some traditional azeri dance.

“I’m about to go eat a bologna sandwich!”

2007-09-05T05:19:00.000-07:00

September 2, 2007

Last Sunday was probably my worse day thus far! I’d been going through a little mini slump in my motivation. I thought I had sent some subtle hints in emails and the post previous to that day, that my attitude was not as rosy as it was when I left. I hadn’t been to the internet café for a week and as I was going there all I could think was how I was going to have so many emails because I hadn’t been there in so long. So when I opened my email and all I had was junk mail I was devastated.

I pasted the post I had previously written which explained even further how I was having a hard time. I sent the email letting all my friends and family know that I had updated the blog and was about to leave, but then said no wait a minute I’m going to need to prod a little more if I want to get their attention. So I sent a second email mainly explaining how excited I had been and how if I had just had one email not even saying anything important just a simple, “I was online nothing new has changed just wanted you to know I was thinking about you” how that would have made my day that day! Classic guilt trip stuff.

Well as you can imagine my inbox 3 days later was stuffed full of all sorts of emails. I got the “keep your head up”, “you inspire me”, and the “don’t worry this will pass” emails. But my absolute favorite and the one that totally made my day was from my best friend Dave it was in a string of completely random emails he had been sending each time he got online and it only read, “I’m about to go eat a bologna sandwich”. Nothing more nothing less and that was enough to totally make my day! I even think a few azeri’s got a kick out of it as they were laughing at the crazy American who couldn’t stop laughing at his computer. Thank you all for the encouragement and happiness you have brought me this last week.

I don’t know how to describe the feeling someone goes through when they leave their family and friends and life happens while they’re gone. When you’re away you feel as if everything has stopped and all people are doing is sitting around wondering what’s going on with you in Azerbaijan. You don’t think about how when you were back in the US a week or month went by without every realizing it.

This experience is really humbling in understanding how much a person really depends on friends and family. I know there is no way I could ever do this without all of your support. I also know there are many of you reading this who have children, siblings, parents, or friends who here with me. As much as I want you to read this please open a new window and send them a little note even if it’s as simple as “I just ate a bologna sandwich!” They will love every word of it and it may just make their day!

This last week as I said has been much better. We had a hub day where all the trainees came together for a day of lectures. Our language teacher shook things up a bit, which was good. She split our class in two. For two hours she works with the more advanced then the next two hours she works with us that need a little more attention. Then during the other two hours she has us sit in a separate room studying vocabulary.

Then yesterday we had a cultural day where we tried to share parts of our culture and then went and had a great traditional meal followed by a fantastic demonstration of Azeri dance. The part we shared had to do with environmental awareness. The main hub city we all live in and around is ranked by the state department as the most polluted city in the world. There just isn’t any infrastructure to deal with all the trash yet. So as most people would do they burn garbage here. Yesterday we tried to educate university students and anyone else that would listen about the harmful effects of plastic and then told them about the new plastic recycling plant, which is opening this month. Then we all went out to the beach and picked up hundreds of bags of plastic water bottles. It was great when looking at the truck seeing how much we were doing but really disheartening when looking at the beach and realizing we had only walked about a half mile. We have to just keep reminding ourselves that these are baby steps but you need to take those before you can run.

So things are starting to wind down here in training. This next week we have our last language test. Then we have two hub days next week learning about transitioning into service and then later next week we’ll have our swearing in ceremony and the next day move to our permanent sites! Thanks again to everyone for the flood of emails.

Photos

2007-08-26T03:21:00.001-07:00

Here are some pics from zaqatala! the first is looking down the main street in town. the next is looking out the window in my office at the street next to the park. the last is looking to the mountains from my office. on the otherside of those mountains is Russia, as the crow flies it's about 20KM!

Catch Up

2007-08-26T03:17:00.000-07:00

August 26, 2007

Well I apologize for the recent lack of posts. I’m not dead or seriously ill we’ve just hit the tough part of Pre Service Training. We all seem to be completely exhausted. We aren’t doing anymore than we were before but we just don’t have any energy. I think it’s just the fact that in the beginning we were running on the excitement of everything being new, and now that’s worn off a bit. I also think the training is starting to get to everyone we are treated like children and at first it was ok, it was just kind of funny, but now it’s really starting to get old. Things will be much better once we get to our sites. With all we have done it’s crazy to think that we haven’t even started our two-year service yet!

Since I wrote last the only major thing that has happened has been my site visit. I went up to Zagatala for a few days to see where I will work and meet my new host family and community members. I can’t explain how excited I am to be going up there! The town is absolutely beautiful. It’s a little mountain community and in a way it actually feels a bit like Ashland. It’s a smaller community, people go there to vacation, they are much more modern than any other town other than Baku, and they have a park that goes up into a valley kind of like Lithia park.

I’m also really excited about the work I’ll be doing and the people I’ll be working with. My director is supportive and maybe even a little excited that I want to create more equality for women through sport. I work across the street from the brand new Olympic complex. Azerbaijan has all of these complexes throughout the country where “sportsmen” go to train to hopefully some day compete in the Olympics. It’s kind of like a really nice massive YMCA. The great thing is that I will have complete personal access to it and it has a brand new weight room and swimming pool! I’ll let you all know about the family situation through email.

Again sorry for the lack of posts I’ve just been a bit tired. I do think however that the motivation levels are going to start rising fast as we approach the end of this training. Also a side note hold off on sending any packages now. We are two and a half weeks from moving to our sites so the package would sit at the Peace Corps office for who knows how long. I will post my new address as soon as I get it.

More photos

2007-08-19T06:15:00.001-07:00

Here are some more pics (it wouldn't let me post them all in one) This is me and my friend katie in baku, my aunt, and my cousin and i at her birthday party. Sorry i don't have an entry this week. i think we have hit the point where the honeymoon is over because we have all been really tired. i need to find my stride and get myself in some sort of routine for the next few weeks. i think the waiting game is starting to get to everyone and we just want to get to our sites and get started doing what we signed up for. I'll try to get a post sometime this week with a little more thought hope all is well at home.

Photos

2007-08-19T05:59:00.001-07:00

Here are some pics that i wanted to send last week. sorry i got down here and realized they were full size and that would have taken hours to upload! the first is of me pointing on the map to where i'm going. then the rest are of my birthday. i've got one with the extended family, me and my ana with the cake she made for me, the dolma we ate, then my uncle and cousins son.

The Wonderful Doner

2007-08-12T03:25:00.001-07:00

Aug 11, 2007

I don’t know if any of you have ever gotten sick from food poison but I tell you what it’s not a very pleasant thing. Before Thursday I had only gotten it once. It was when I was a freshman in college and I remember calling my mom crying thinking I was going to die or wanting to die one or the other or both. I think it is probably the worst feeling I’d ever felt. That was until getting food poison in the AZ a few days ago.

I was down in Sumgayait I’d just left the internet cafÈ I had that high we all get after hearing about things back home, I really didn’t have a care on my mind. I saw a few friends at a Corner doner shop and decided to stop and enjoy one of my favorite treats with them the wonderful doner.

The doner is a sandwich from turkey. It is made by shaving chunks of meat off a massive conglomerate of meat with an equally sizeable sword. Then the meat is stuffed into a fantastic piece of bread that was cut like a pita but bigger and much better. Then they throw in some fresh cucumbers and tomatoes with a little sauce and mayo, and all this for only 40 cents it’s really quite amazing.

Well, still excited about reading new emails and seeing some friends I stop to grab a doner with them. All is good in my world. That is until I see him scraping the sides of this mayo jar to get the last of the mayo out of this jar that had been sitting in the sun all day with the normal flies buzzing about. Before I go any farther I should note that it is well know that we will all get sick from the food here it’s never been a question of if but more of when. So we all know that we should be precautious and not put ourselves in situations, which increase this already apparent risk. So I get this doner and in my head know that I should pay for it, walk away, and drop it in the next trash I see… but I did mention there were these friends of mine. Well, one of them I kind of find a fair bit attractive so I don’t make the smart and logical choice I choose to sit and hang out. I know what many of you are thinking and yes I am aware that this isn’t the first time I’ve made a dumb decision because of a girl.

Well things went well we all sat and talked for a few hours and then decided we’d better get home and all was still well in my life I was now even more excited than I’d been after leaving the internet cafÈ. I got home studied my language a bit and went to sleep. Then about 3:30 in the morning I woke up to the worst stomach pain of my life and ran to the bathroom.

Without getting too graphic (this is the second time I’ve written this the first was much funnier but after reading it I felt it was a little too nasty) for the next day I had was relived of everything inside of me from both ends simultaneously. I was actually eating bananas because they tasted the same when they came back up and that was much more pleasant than the alternative. It got so bad that my host mother who didn’t have a clue what was wrong with me got out the yellow card. The yellow card is the card that PC gives to host families and on it are instructions on who to call if I were not to wake up one morning, or was hurt and unconscious and was not able to call for medical help myself. Needless to say I was a hurting unit. But as bad as something like that is in the states just for a moment try to imagine what that is like in an unfamiliar place in 110 – 115 degree heat with different bathroom and toilet situations! If you need help I could forward you the unedited version of this in an email, but I’m sure you’ll never look at me the same.

However I’m glad that I can now announce that I am alive and well with all systems working properly, and on the bright side I can think about how some people pay a lot of money to purge their systems and I got mine done for 40 cents, a great tasting doner, and good conversation with a beautiful woman! What more can a guy ask for? Things are great in the AZ!!

My Counterpart

2007-08-12T03:24:00.001-07:00

August 7, 2007

Just a quick note. I met my counterpart today and I couldn’t be more excited about where I’m going. He speaks a little English but understands quite a bit. At the conference we had an opportunity to get to know each other the best we could with our limited language abilities. Mainly we talked about our families, which always gets interesting when I try to explain how I have 6 sisters and 5 brothers. People here aren’t used to the idea of split families. Then we tried to talk about why I’m 30 and not married. The usual first conversation talk over here.

After all the formal talk we were able to get down to talking about what their expectations are of me and what they envision me accomplishing during my service. He explained that they were completely open to any new ideas and would support almost anything I could bring. He explained that there are tons of youth wanting to attend English conversation clubs (which I thought the best use of my time would be to build a program where I teach the older youth how to run conversation clubs rather than me running clubs that will be gone when I am or when PC is done). Currently they have a bunch of soccer teams as well as some judo and wrestling all for the boys. So I think I’d like to focus some of my time on creating opportunities for girls to participate. One of the NGO’s that have come and talked to us told us about an area that started ultimate Frisbee teams and because it was a new sport gender roles weren’t already established and they got boys and girls to play together which is a completely different concept here. I’ve thought that would be tons of fun, but I won’t really know what they want or need until I spend some time in the community. I’m just excited that they are open and willing to explore new ideas.

The Big 30

2007-08-12T03:21:00.000-07:00

August 6, 2007

Wow, what can I say I’m 30! I can’t really say I’ve been looking forward to this day but I guess I’m doing what I really want to do and that’s the important thing. My mom says it’s not hw old you are but how old you feel and I guess if I’m a combination of that and how old I act I should probably be about 12.

When I woke up this morning I got the first call from home since I’ve been here! First my dad called and then my mom! It was great to finally talk to someone from home. I know it hasn’t been that long since I left but it sure was nice to hear a familiar voice. After talking to each of them I had my language class followed by a youth development meeting where all the youth development people came together and they all sang to me. It wasn’t nearly as good as all my nieces and nephews but it was close. After the meeting we got mail and I actually got one of the packages my mom sent to me, which was really great to get on the actual day! (Great timing mom) Then, I went home and my host family had a big birthday dinner party for me!

My host mom invited my aunts, uncles, and a bunch of cousins over to celebrate the big day. She took the day off work so that she could prepare the feast. We had a bunch of salads followed by pomidor (tomato), badimcan (eggplant), and biber (pepper) stuffed dolma.

Dolma is the national meal and this type is my favorite. Normally it’s stuffed in grape leaves and sometimes cabbage. The stuffing from what I can tell is some type of ground meat (which ever type we have at the market that day I imagine) with rice and some spices. That is stuffed or wrapped and then cooked in a pan with considerable amounts of grease, oil or lard. After dinner which was more like 3 or 4 dinners one right after the other, they just keep bringing the food out until it’s gone, we had cake and AZ style ice cream. (I say that because it is ice cream but just… different?) Then we had glass after glass of cay (tea).

It wasn’t salmon on the BBQ with corn on the cob and my mom’s great chicken salad up at the lake after a hard day of waterskiing. But, if I had all those things it wouldn’t be as difficult to be here and the next birthday I have those things I’ll appreciate them that much more. In all I wouldn’t have wanted the day to go any different. I spent my 25th in Egypt and now my 30th in Azerbaijan I can’t wait to learn where I’ll find myself on my 40th?

Zagatala!!!

2007-08-04T04:21:00.000-07:00

August 4, 2007

Yesterday we found out where we will be working for the next two years! PC staff gathered us all into a room passed out a folder to each of us telling us not to open them until everyone had one and then all at once we opened it. They let us have about ten minutes to read and run around the room to see where other people are going and then brought us back together and we each went up and placed a pin with our name on the city where we will be working. After the announcements were over they had cake and soda for us and we were able to talk with different staff members to find out more about the site and what the organization was like.

In this process PC identifies different sites and organizations that want a PC volunteer. Each of these has many different personalities and needs. Then the staff meets us and in one short month gets to know us and then they have the difficult task of trying to figure out where each of us would be most successful.

In each of the different interviews I’ve been saying I want to do something with youth and sport, gender issues and I’d like to be somewhere cold as far north as you can send me. The only problem was that everyone was asking for somewhere cold. So in the last interview I told my program director “alright everyone is asking for something cold and I can understand that. However, what I can promise you is this, When it gets really cold way up north I can promise you that I wont be the one complaining about how cold it is I’ll be the one out there playing in it.”

So when I opened my envelope and saw Zagatala all I could think was Yeah buddy someone’s living right! Zagatala is the most northern city PC serves. If you look at a map it may not be on there but if you find Sheki it is about two hours North of there near the Russian and Georgian borders. (You don’t have to worry dad I’m the furthest one from Iran.)

The following is the description that was in my packet. I want to ask each of you to search through the Internet and try to find anything out about the place. One of the things I may be doing is helping to promote tourism and outdoor activities and I want to find out what is already out there about the place, but I don’t have the speed on the internet to do a good search. And it will be fun for you to know more about where I’m going to be living. And then anything you find email it to me!

Zagatela region is situated within the bounds of the Greater Caucasus, in the valley of Ganikh-Arichay. There are 7 rivers flowing through the territory of the region. The relief is mountainous and flat. The Climate is mainly moderate and damp, subtropical. About half of the territory is covered by forest. There are 22 populated points on it’s territory. There are more than 70 archaeological, architectural and historical state protected monuments in this region the beauty of which astonishes everybody. They all are related to the carious periods of the history and are considered to be unique. There is one outstanding monument in Yukhari Chardahlar village located on the steep slope of the Khangildag Mountain. This monument represents the bays situated very high, made in the form of double gates with the wall altar at the depth of the central embrasure. The economy of the region is based on agriculture (grain, cultivation of Tobacco, and vegetable growing.) The food plant, nut-processing factory, tobacco, furniture, and sewing factories are functions here. The population of the region is 107,000 people and is located 385 km from Baku.

The organization I will be working for is Zakatala City Youth and Sport Office. The packet says my main responsibilities will be an English conversation club, helping with youth project planning, creating links with international youth organizations, promote tourism and outdoor activities, and organize camps.

A day after finding all this out I am still on such a high. This is really turning into all that I had hoped and dreamt about! So now this next Tuesday (a day after my big 30th birthday) I will be meeting with a representative from the Youth and sport department and then later this month I will travel out there for 3-4 days to meet my new host family and see first hand what I’ll be doing. Things are great in the AZ

Baku

2007-08-04T04:20:00.000-07:00

July 29, 2007

(This post and the next I wrote after the events happened and tried to write fast so I could get some posts up so I apologize if there isn’t as much thought in them.)

Wow what a city. I generally had a good time this weekend but the city has both the things I like and dislike about the U.S. I’ll post a blog later to get my feelings out better after I have a few more experiences there.

I went to Baku with nine other people from PC and we a really good time together. We got there and eventually found our hotel. They give us the PC discount which is 50 Manat a night so we being broke PC volunteers got two rooms for 10 people. When we got there we found out that rooms at mid level hotels in baku are really pretty different than hotels I’m used to staying in. The two beds were not even big enough for one person to sleep in but especially not for two and a half people to fit into. It got interesting but we made it work.

We first went to tequila Junction where we were able to get nachos!! They weren’t the best I’d ever eaten by any stretch but at the time they sure tasted like it. Then one other guy and I went and got haircuts (which was a much better experience than I thought I would have) while some of the girls went out to buy some clubbing shirts. And the rest went back to the hotel to pre funk for the night. (mom that’s not anything really bad. it just means to start drinking before going out so you don’t have to spend as much money when you do go out on all the expensive drinks at bars.).

Later that night we met up with an AZ4 who showed us around a bit and took us to a really cool little bar that we could play pool and darts at. Then we went across the street and danced the night away. Think about me at Dave and Lyndi’s wedding Yeah buddy! I was a dancing fool.

The next morning we eventually got up and around and then headed over to seriously the coolest McDonalds I’ve ever seen. The place way more upscale than any other McDonalds I’ve ever seen. After that we walked around town for a little while before realizing we needed bloody marys. So we went over to the Irish pub and sat in the shade for a few hours. Finally we decided to head over and get some Thai food and then head home.

It was neat to see Baku and all but other than the nachos I could probably do with out the rest for the next two years. As I was riding back to my site I was thinking about how the weekend was great but how I could do all of those things in the states and how that wasn’t why I gave up so much to come out here. But like I said in the beginning I’ll dedicate a blog just to Baku later on in my service and we can see if my attitude will change. It may turn out Baku trips might just be the thing that keeps me going when I feel like I need that little taste of the states. It may be that this time was still a little too early?

Catch Up

2007-08-04T04:15:00.000-07:00

July 29 2007

It’s been a week since I wrote last. Things this week have been pretty busy and any free moment I was attempting to study for my first language assessment, which was yesterday. I’ll try to give a quick recap of the week.

Last Sunday I woke up did a little studying and then headed into town to attend an arts and crafts workshop a few AZ 4’s put on. (AZ4 is the class of Peace Corps volunteers that started last year we are AZ5’s) After the workshop I headed down town and hang out with some other volunteers, which turned into about 25 volunteers. We all had a really good time but got our wrists slapped later in the week. We attracted a bunch of attention and a few girls were drinking, which is ok but they want them to keep it a bit more discrete.

Monday and Tuesday were pretty normal just school stuff. Then Wednesday we had our second hub day where all of our class comes together again and we have all sorts of boring lectures on health safety and security. This time though we had the second in command of the embassy come and talk to us about the state departments view about Azerbaijan. It was a really good discussion where he addressed all the real issues and held nothing back. We found out some really interesting things from him that made me even more glad I’m here.

We had some Azeri’s in the room while he was talking and many of them got offended, but I think that was good. The culture here tends to stick with the, if you don’t have anything good to say don’t say anything at all. Then, the media is intimidated by the government with reporters being thrown in jail on charges of slander or being murdered. So the information many people get is not the most accurate and the people that work for PC are some of the best and the brightest with many of them moving on to work in government. So hopefully it will help enlighten them to the understanding that change needs to happen and they can help make that happen.

The next few days I just prepared for my big test on Saturday. The test turned out to be the biggest BS I’ve ever experienced. The tester came in and asked us questions about things we hadn’t even learned yet and talked about ninety miles an hour. The test was recorded so it could be played back to all the LCF’s and they would be able to debate on what rating we should receive. During the test because she was talking so fast I would ask her to repeat what she said, but instead of saying it again or slower she would write it down on a piece of paper in English! Normally, This would be great I wouldn’t complain too much if a tester was trying to blatantly help me cheat. The problem was that her handwriting was so terrible I couldn’t read a word she wrote! So I would ask her again in Azeri to repeat herself and she would just point at what she wrote again. So I just started to answer the questions with things I knew. She could have asked me what I did yesterday and I would answer with “My family is large. I have many brothers and sisters.” And then go on about my family or what foods I liked. It was so bad that all we could do was laugh about it afterwards because it happened to everyone. My rating ended up being novice high which was one step below the highest score people got at intermediate low. In order to pass PST we have to end with a rating of intermediate mid.

As soon as the test was over and we laughed for a while I packed up and went to Baku!!

More Photos

2007-07-22T10:22:00.001-07:00

this is joe helping me cook fajitas, my sitemates mom and katie eating, the watchtower, and my friend collen and I drinking our 2 liter beer!

Hiking

2007-07-22T10:19:00.000-07:00

July 21, 2007

Today was great fun they got all of us pc trainees together and took us north to go hiking! We went to some old ruins of a 5th century watchtower. These towers stretched the distance of the Caucuses and would light fires to send warnings north. As much fun as it was to be somewhere with such historical significance I was in heaven just to be in a forest hiking. It was cooler (not quite yet cool) and it felt nice to get some physical activity that got the heart rate up.

We got to the top and the tower was massive. A few people climbed to the top but I decided I’d pass on that as I saw rocks crumbling off as they were climbing and there were already too many people up there.

As we were starting to go down our language director (who is a host country national) slipped and sprained her ankle pretty bad. I ran down there and suggested that me and one other guy carry her down. But, some of the other host country nationals said that it would not be culturally appropriate so she attempted to walk which wasn’t working and finally allowed us to at least assist by putting her arm over my shoulders to use me and one woman as a crutch. She was a trooper though she walked with limited assistance about 2 miles barefoot with a really bad sprained ankle. Finally about the last 400 meters it was hurting bad enough that she allowed us to use a branch that she could sit on that was long enough for me and one other guy to hold in front of us as she put her arms over our shoulders. When we finally got her down the ankle was really swollen and got her to lay down and elevate it with some ice and got her some Advil.

It’s difficult to accept or sometimes understand the culture over here. In this case this woman hurt herself more because she didn’t want to be “culturally inappropriate”. If we would have been allowed to carry her we would have been down much sooner to get ice on it and without her walking on the foot it would have torn less and healed faster. I have the utmost respect for the culture here but in cases like this where someone’s health or well being is in question it’s frustrating.

Chicken Fajitas on a Camp Stove

2007-07-22T10:11:00.002-07:00

July 20, 2007

Today was a great day! We had our language club right after our language lessons and we had a ton of kids show up. We decided that next week we are going to split again so we each have our own group and can give more one on one attention. Growing this group is working exactly like I had wanted Cub Scout packs to form when I was working for the Boy Scouts. We are also running it like a Cub pack. We are going to meet in our own ability groups and then meet together in a larger group to do bigger activities hopefully working on language in our smaller groups that will lead into or help the larger activity. It’s great to see all the enthusiasm these kids have when they show up.

After language I went home and started the prep work for chicken fajitas! I invited my site mates, LCF, and a friend from a site next to ours over for a little taste from home. In the Bazaar I was able to get green peppers, onions, chili peppers, tomatoes, cilantro, lemons, cayenne pepper crushed red peppers, and some bread called lavash that’s like a flour torttia.

When I got home I got all the chopping done and then before everyone arrived I found out that the gas was off for the whole town. That’s when my host mom pulled out a camping stove and I thought ah I think I know how to work one of these. The process went a bit slower but I got all the food out and everyone was thrilled to be eating something with some spice to it.

The food here is great but Azerbaijani’s don’t really like spicy foods so having something with a little fire in it was a real treat. Many of you have been asking what kinds of things should you send in care packages and I haven’t really come up with anything in particular because I think completely random things from home is great but after this dinner I’d have to say if anyone could fit a bottle of hot sauce and taco seasoning into a box that stuff is like gold over here. You can’t buy it in any of the stores here they say there are some expat stores in Baku where you could buy some of the taco seasoning but we still can’t go in there and they said they were like $5.00 for one of those 50 cent packets you can get in any grocery store at home. And normally something like that I wouldn’t think $5.00 is a lot but here on a Peace Corps salary that’s a small fortune. (old sports illustrated’s or ESPN the magazine’s would be a great contribution as well especially as college football season get into full swing. Even just email updates on things that are happening in the world and sports. One girl’s friend sends her things like that and she is trying to keep us informed. I don’t get to the internet very often and when I do it’s too slow to browse the news pages)

The dinner was great in two ways the first being the food was so good but the second was the example I was setting for my host brother. This last week in our Youth Development sessions we had a discussion on gender roles and how things are so completely different over here for women. Women here (being mothers, wives, and sisters) are expected to wait on men hand an foot. In my family over here from the beginning I insisted on clearing my own dishes and they thought that was one of the weirdest things they’d ever seen. Then I took it a step further and insisted that I wash my own dish. Now I am able to do all the dishes after meals, but the first few times my mother would stand in the back of the kitchen and watch to make sure I was doing everything all right and occasionally jump in and tell me I had too much soap or something like that.

So as you can believe a man in the kitchen cooking was hard to swallow. My brother came in a number of times with a concerned look on his face and would ask, “Donny, why are you doing this? You should be sitting on the couch and the women should be in here cooking.” and this wasn’t just playful joking he was absolutely serious. After he asked me this I explained how in America men cook for women all the time and how chores around the house are shared equally and how if a women wants to work she can and sometimes men stay at home with the children. Then he would just shake his head and walk out of the kitchen confused.

After the meal was over I told the girls not to help because I wanted to extend the example. I went in and was doing the dishes and my host brother came in, as I was finishing, with another dish and I told him to go ahead and put it on the counter and I would wash it when he said in English, “no I wash” and I stepped aside and watched as my brother probably for the first time washed a dish.

This one thing defiantly is not going to “change the world” or for that matter even make it to where my brother does the dishes on a regular basis, but it did open one 17 year old boys eyes that in some worlds men and women are more equal than they are in his, and some day hopefully this example will make him a better man. I think that’s what Peace Corps is really all about working at the grass roots level showing people through example that there sometimes are different ways of doing things.

2007-07-22T10:11:00.001-07:00

2007-07-22T10:11:00.000-07:00

Photos

2007-07-16T05:34:00.000-07:00

these are photos of some of my host family

the first is my host mom the second is my host uncle then my host brother and last is my host niece and nephew

Sheki Visit

2007-07-16T05:02:00.000-07:00

July 16, 2007

This weekend was our site visits. We all got go visit a volunteer at their site and see what their normal routine as a PCV is like. As I write this I’m hanging out at my Volunteers office while he gets a few things done. I got lucky and got to go up north to Sheki which is at the foothills of the mountains. Things are much cooler up here and yesterday and today it actually rained! It was nice it felt a bit like home other than the fact I’ve heard you guys have been in the middle of a heat wave.

I came out here with two other volunteers who are staying with someone who lives on their own and then I’m staying with a guy that still lives with a host family. The marshrutka ride was interesting I’ll have to dedicate an entire blog one day describing a marshrutka ride just think of a van smaller than a 15 passenger with about 17 people and their stuff with no AC. It took 5 and a half hours to drive the just under 200 miles with two scheduled stops and one stop because a boy vomited a two rows in front of us. When we got here we were greeted by the two sheki volunteers and were taken to one of their homes where we had a wonderful dinner of taco salad!!

The next day I my host volunteer took a few boys from his youth site and me hiking up above the city which was amazing. We first went to an ancient Albanian church called Kish and then we hiked up to an old abandoned fortress called Gelerson gorison, which was built by the sheki khans in 18th century. We met up for tea with the girls and another American who is doing a 2-month internship with an aid organization. Then we went to awesome hotel, which had Cheese Burgers!! After the burgers we went up to another fortress, which was built by Genghis Khan’s Grandson and had a couple of beers in a really neat outdoor bar.

I’ve really enjoyed coming out here to see how things are on a day to day basis and I think it’s defiantly a motivation to keep working hard on the language. It’s amazing how well they speak only having been here a year.

Tonight we’re going to a concert to hear real life country music. I guess some band is in Azerbaijan touring on a cultural experience tour and we are lucky enough to be in the town they’re stopping in! I can’t even believe my luck a cheeseburger one day and a country concert the next! Yeah buddy someone’s living right!

English Conversation Club

2007-07-16T05:01:00.000-07:00

July 12, 2007

Today we had our first English conversation club and it was a huge success. As youth development directors PC wants us to create English conversation clubs within our communities as a way for us to learn how to work within the communities and learn more about the youth of Azerbaijan, while providing an opportunity for the youth to practice their English, which is a seen as a very marketable skill here.

Me and the four other volunteers at my site decided to have our first meeting together and then gradually split off into our individual groups. As we’ve been preparing for the meeting we had wondered whether anyone would show up or if it would only be guys, since most of our families said girls wouldn’t show up because they have too many other things to do (which means preparing food and cleaning up after the men), but we were all surprised and excited when an hour before the meeting was supposed to begin people started to show up. In all we had 16 people show up and even more exciting over half were girls! This is our seed and each additional week each of them will bring more and more friends and pretty soon we should have a big group of youth to practice English with. We’re going to try to do it in an environment where they are learning while having fun.

Things are still going great. I haven’t even had a down day yet. Everyday there is something new I learn and some new food I eat I’m really enjoying my time here.

First Day Off

2007-07-16T05:00:00.000-07:00

July 8, 2007

I just got done reading my post from yesterday and realized how many spelling and grammatical errors I had writing it after a long day. Just remember I warned you in the first post that this is in no way a way for me to demonstrate my vast literary abilities especially as I mainly write this at night while falling asleep.

Today I had my first day off and it was great. I took the bus into Sumguyait by myself and just wandered around and explored. The bazaar is amazing. I really liked going through the food area. There are so many different kinds of fresh fruits and vegetables and then there is this meat area that has all different kinds of animal meat being cut up with axes and random animal parts hanging on hooks. I really wanted a picture but as I was by myself and was drawing all sorts of attention to myself just by being there I thought I would wait until there was a larger group of us where it would be impossible to try to blend in and more accepted for us to take pictures.

After walking through the bazaar for 3 or 4 hours I went out and had a Donner, which is a very popular sidewalk food. There are these stands on just about every corner that have this skewer of stacked meat and fat that spins next to a heating source. They shave the meat off on a little fry surface where they sauté it with tomato’s and cucumber’s and then stuff it in a piece of bread with a white sauce and some red sauce. It costs about 30 qepik (or just over 30 cents) and will be enough to fill you up for a meal. I think I’ll probably eat these as a staple when I have to eat out just because they are so good and inexpensive.

Then I went to the internet café and tried unsuccessfully to post some pictures on my blog. Blog spot is in Azeri here and I can’t find the options button to figure out how to make it in English because it’s in Azeri. I can post blogs on it just because I can sometimes remember where the buttons are that guide me through that process. So as for pictures I will try to post some as soon as I can but it may take a little while.

After I got done I took the bus back home studied had another amazing meal and studied some more. I don’t think I ever studied this hard or much while I was in school. Living in a place where the majority of the communication is done playing charades really motivates you to learn the language!

2007-07-08T00:37:00.000-07:00

40 Day Funeral
July 7, 2007

Today after language lessons I went over to my uncles where I was able to participate in part of the Azeri culture. My Nana died 40 days ago today and here in Azerbaijan when someone dies you throw a big feast 40 days later.

By big I don’t mean your extended family and a few family friends I mean massive. They had a tent set up in the road out front that blocked the entire road making people turn around and find a different street. In the tent were three rows of tables about 30 meters long. Then the massive courtyard was filled with rows of tables, and there were people spilling out all around the tent.

You would think it would be difficult to feed all these people. I have to tell you Azeri Women are amazing, they would put any military chow line to shame. Everything was family style on the table and things that needed to be hot were hot and things that needed to be cold were cold, which is pretty impressive for a 100+ degree day. Then after everyone was done all the dishes were collected washed and about an hour later I was called back to the table and we ate again. This happened over and over again all day long no joke. We went through 1 cow, 2 sheep, and more cheese, vegetables and bread then I’ve ever seen. In between the rounds we would drink tea and eat this stuff everyone says is “very very healthy for you” it consists of oil and sugar! And no they weren’t being sarcastic.

Something kinda funny about this stuff. I was sitting next to someone that spoke about as much English as my Azeri. Between our language abilities or lack there of I was trying to figure out what it was made of and for about an hour I had thought I had just eaten a cremated nana! He told me ah sugar oil and pointed at it and said nana and shook his head and then everyone at the table shook their heads and said ah, nana as they pointed towards the mystery substance. Finally someone with better English skills showed up and assured me that no I had not just eaten our dead grandmother but that this is a dish you only eat when someone dies and they were trying to tell me the reason we were eating it was because nana had died. Assured but still a bit freaked out I stayed away from it the rest of the day and night.

I’m still having a great first week with my family. It’s hard to believe I’ve only been in my town a week tomorrow! It feels like it’s been a month. As I think about it though I’m happy it’s seems so long. In the big scheme of things when life is easy time seems to fly by and you wonder where it went. I’m happy things are uncomfortable enough to help me realize that I’m alive every day. I hope and wish everyone can experience life like I am in there own way. I challenge each of you to go about there and do something outside you comfort zone everyday I think it will help you live a richer life.

Ok I’ll get off my soapbox now. I did warn each of you in my first post that things could go anywhere. These are just some thoughts and feelings I’ve had the last few days.

Other interesting things:

4th of July my site got together at one of our host families house and they made BBQ chicken and BBQ beef spare ribs with a couple of beers for s to share. It was a great gesture on there part to make us feel welcome.

I found out that I’m already 30! In Azerbaijan they count that when you are born that is your first year and so on! Not sure I know how I feel about that yet! I thought I had one more month more to come to terms with that one!

Well I hope all is well back home,

Donny

THe Other Side Of The Wall

2007-07-06T07:04:00.000-07:00

July 3, 2007

I’ve had a couple really good days. Last night I went to my Uncle’s house for dinner. We had some great food and tried unsuccessfully to communicate. When I got there I greeted them in Azeri and told them my name and that I was from America, which is the extent other than a few random words of my language abilities. However, I think because I said a few words in Azeri they thought I could understand everything they were saying to me. When all they got were blank stares they tried to talk louder and slower. After still receiving blank stares we all had a good laugh. It really reminded me of my family when we had exchange students and of how our conversations went the same way, if they don’t understand just talk louder and then they’ll understand. It didn’t work then and I can attest that it still doesn’t work today.

What I really enjoyed though was that I accomplished literally not yet figuratively one of the reasons I joined Peace Corps. In all the different places I’ve traveled I’ve seen the outside of peoples worlds. You drive by in an air-conditioned bus at 60 mph and say “wow that looks like a dirty or hard place to live, how do people live like that.” But you never really see inside. The place I went to yesterday and where I live would look like that from a bus. The dirt streets are littered with garbage, animals picking through the trash for anything edible, and all these bare walls with modest homes inside them. However as I was sitting in one of the most beautiful clean courtyards surrounded by a picturesque fruit and vegetable garden I realized I was on the other side of the wall. I know I’m not even close to knowing these wonderful people and I look forward to that day. I am just glad I was cognitive enough to realize the moment. It’s amazing where your mind will take you when it’s not filled with mindless chatter.

Today we had our first cluster meeting. This is where all the Youth Development volunteers, three groups of five from different sites, come together. We learned a bit more of what we’ll be doing as YD Volunteers and I couldn’t be more excited. For the next 9 months we’ll be directing English-speaking clubs in an attempt to earn trust in our communities while we learn the language. During this time we will develop relationships to find where our skills can best be used. I’m really excited and optimistic about the potential for our program I could tell our permanent PC staff person responsible for YD really has her heart in the program.

I hope all is well at home,

Donny

Sumguyat

2007-07-06T07:00:00.000-07:00

July 1, 2007

Today I woke up well rested. I had worried that I wouldn’t sleep at all the first night. However I fell right to sleep and then never woke until a few minutes before my alarm went off. After waking I went out and my Ana (mother) had breakfast waiting for me. It was the same spread I’ve eaten every morning here. It had bread, hard-boiled eggs, tomato, cucumber, basil leaves, cheese, and tea. I really like it and it was all fresh from the garden or freshly made. After breakfast my host brother walked me to school.

At school I met up with the other four volunteers in my site and we jumped on a bus to go to Sumguyat to get some supplies and a cell phone. It’s interesting how in many areas of Azerbaijan they don’t have running water and electricity 24 hours a day but they do have cell phones and satellite television. The new technology has leap-frogged the need for some of the infrastructure. Peace Corps has made it mandatory for each of us to get a cell phone, and while I was proud I didn’t have one while I lived in the states I am actually happy Peace Corps provides it for our safety.

Sumguyat is great it’s the second largest city in Azerbaijan and a suburb of Baku the largest city. In the bazaar you could get just about anything just in a different way then most people in the US are used to. For those of you from the Portland area think, Saturday’s market but huge and with things you actually need on a daily basis rather than just things you would give away as gifts. It’s a bit overwhelming at first but I think after getting your bearings a city like this would be fun to live in someday.

We first went to the cell phone store, which our LCD Vafa got us to before the rest of the AZ5’s (Azerbaijan class 5) she rocks. We got our phones and then headed to the Bazaar where we got power regulators, shower shoes, money exchanged and saw all sorts of cool little shops I want to go back and explore through. Then we headed to the Internet café, which I only had the chance to leave my address here and send a quick email to my mom. I had written my last post but as I was copying it to my memory stick my battery died. After that we went and had lunch and then headed back to our town about a half hour away.

When I got back I had another great meal and played real life charades. I really feel fortunate to have been placed with such a great family. We have no idea what each other is trying to say but we all have a good laugh.

As for the address and mail please don’t feel obligated to send anything it’s kind of expensive, but if you have nothing else to do, a fair bit of cash, and would like to send me something from home there is a flat rate box you can get that costs about $34 and you can send anything you can fit in it up to like 70 pounds (kinda funny because when you look at it, even if you filled it with lead it probably wouldn’t weigh 70 pounds) I haven’t been heard how much it costs to send letters but I’m sure much cheaper so feel free to send just a note or even an email would be great just to hear how everyone is doing back home.

I hope all is well,

Donny

First Night

2007-07-06T06:54:00.000-07:00

June 30, 2007

Holly Cow today was so crazy! But, first I’ll start with a brief wrap-up from the last time I posted. We landed in Istanbul, Turkey had a three-hour layover and then we were off to Baku. After clearing customs and getting our luggage we walked out of the airport to a cheering group of PC staff and a few volunteers. We were loaded up on busses and taken up to a town a few hours north of Baku to an Olympic center where athletes live and train. For the next three days we learned very basic survival language, cultural skills, and a general welcome to PC Azerbaijan.

Today we loaded the busses again and took off for our new host families. Leading up to this I hadn’t been nervous just anxious to get started. However, as our bus pulled up to my new town I was finally feeling a nervousness words could never describe. As it turned out it was very chaotic (in my non Azeri speaking mind) as we got off the busses my LCD (Language and Cultural Director) told me she couldn’t get my family on the phone so I may go with another volunteer and his host family and they will drop me off at my new home. This made me even more nervous thinking how is this going to work with zero communication between us and the host families as neither of us speak each other’s language. And how was I supposed to tell my family all the things my LCD was telling the other families. Then all of a sudden she grabbed some people hanging around a car at the end of the road and talked to them in Azeri and told me here they will take you to your home. As I was riding in the car I felt the Oh crap what have I gotten myself into moment. We pulled up to a home got out and there was a group of people all smiling and motioning come come. At this point all I could remember from my crash course in Azeri language was Salom (hello). Everything turned to a blur as they brought me inside and to my new room. They brought out pictures I showed them pictures of my family and we began the hilarious attempt at sign language.

As it turns out the people I was sent away with were in fact my brother and cousin. At my home I was greeted by my mother brother and cousins. My family on paper said I would be living with a Host mother, grandmother and two brothers 16 and 18 years old. I was told that one brother was gone in the army and the other works in Baku most of the time. I found that my grandmother had died a month ago and my younger brother will be around I think (it took me awhile to understand through sign language that nana had died and wasn’t asleep in another room).

After the blur of meeting they left me in my room to unpack. All I could think was holy cow what have I gotten myself into, this is so crazy. But as I got myself situated my Ana (mother) came in and motioned to her mouth that we would be eating I went out and ate some delicious food and as time went some of my limited language started to come back and I carried my notebook which I had written other phrases and words in. After dinner they showed me how and let me shower. Then for the rest of the evening we sat in the living room looking at more pictures and I tried to explain how I have so many brothers and sisters and how no my dad doesn’t have two wives and then even more excitedly no my mom doesn’t have two husbands. This was a conversation I began to think should have been done when I had a better grasp of the language but then all of a sudden it clicked and they remembered the PCV they had last year had parents that divorced and remarried and then all the blank stares were gone.

As I sit here tonight in my room I know I will never forget this day for the rest of my life. It is hard to describe the feelings I have. I feel more alone then I have ever felt, but that’s exciting and exhilarating at the same time. I couldn’t be happier this is exactly what I was looking for. By that I mean the total chaos and never knowing what’s around the next corner. I have that feeling again that I’ve been searching for ever since I left the trail that every day is a new day.

I hope everyone is doing fine and please know I couldn’t be in a better place right now.

I hope all are well,

Donny

just a quick post

2007-07-01T01:25:00.000-07:00

I'm here at my site for the next 3 months i don't have any time today to tell you all about it but i will as soon as i can if you would like to mail me anything my address till sept 12th is:

Donald Stevens
c/o U.S. Peace Corps
PO Box 77
Baku, Azerbaijan
AZ 1000

Staging

2007-06-27T00:40:00.000-07:00

I’m on a plane again. This time I’m somewhere over the North Atlantic watching the sun rise only an hour and a half after it set. Staging went really well for everyone we learned a few things but more importantly we had a chance to spend time in a comfortable setting while getting to know the 54 people who we will come to depend on over the next two years.

When I arrived in Philly I had a great plan to save a few dollars and take the public transit. I thought $5.50 on the train sounded much better than a $30 cab or $15 shuttle ride and hey I’m a PCV (Peace Corps Volunteer) and I need to start living on a limited budget. However, what I didn’t take into consideration is that the hotel is a bit closer to the train station on a computer than it is when your lugging a backpack on your back with an overly stuffed daypack on your chest and a full duffel with the strap strewn over the backpack allowing the duffle to hit you in the but every step of the way while walking in a much more humid climate right through the center of a college campus. Needless to say I received a few glances, and by the time I got the hotel I was dripping wet.

After I took a cold shower and changed I went down to the bar and watched the beavers beat NC State in the first round of the College World series. (for those of you that are wondering I can root for the beav’s in baseball since the ducks have no baseball team Yet!! Hopefully Killkenny will change that) After the game I was heading up to my room and ran into some other west coasters who came in a day earlier and we went out to check out the town.

After a much later than expected wake-up I went down stairs and met up with a bunch of other volunteers. That afternoon we had registration and then the start of the staging program welcoming us to our PC adventure. That night I went down to the hotel bar again and watched what turned out to be the final College World Series game as the beav’s swept the best 2 out of 3 series. A note on how spectacular this was the beaver’s lost all but two of their position players from their national champion team from a year ago and then barely even made it into the series after having a losing Pac10 conference record. But when the series started they hit a streak and didn’t lose a playoff game.

The next day (Monday) we had classes all day and then a big group of us were led by our Rockstar Vietnamese volunteer on the subway into Chinatown to some great Vietnamese food. All day Monday I was trying to figure out how I was feeling. I am really excited but I haven’t really had a true oh crap moment. I guess that’s good but just thought it would feel a bit different. I think I may still be in that preparation stage and inside feel like this is just another step in getting me to country. I think the first oh crap moment may come while I’m trying to fall asleep the first night at my host family’s.

Today we woke up loaded the busses and drove 3 hours to the JFK airport. I really enjoyed the chance to drive through New Jersey and then New York. I’ve never been to this part of the country and liked seeing the difference in landscapes from home. When we got into New York it was pretty hazy and hard to see Manhattan I could only pick out a few buildings but did find the empire state building. It was interesting going through the Bronx and seeing people living in such high density. It is much different than what I’m used to the sprawling west coast, which was predominantly built after the automobile.

I learned that the next few weeks I’ll be out of contact with everyone. We are going to be getting into country and then spending a few days at an in country orientation then we’ll meet and move in with our host families. They tell us we will be split up into small clusters of 5-6. We will do most of our training within these clusters and then when needed get together with the other people in our program area to learn more specific program information. Then occasionally we’ll meet with the entire group. We will do this and if everything goes as planned swear in as official PCV’s in the middle of September. During this time they say we should have access to the internet about once a week. I will try to update this as often as I can.

I hope all is well at home,

Donny

Leaving on a Jet Plane

2007-06-27T00:37:00.000-07:00

I’m on the plane heading to staging right now. For the next few days I will be in Philadelphia meeting the other 50 or so volunteers going to Azerbaijan with me. I’m surprised at the feelings of calm I’m having. I thought I would be freaking out a bit more right now. I don’t know if it’s the early wake up, the fact I was running late, or the chance that I might actually be ready for this.
I’d like to give everyone a brief synopsis of the last few months leading up to today. I first started the application process in September. I had my first interview up in Seattle the first week in January. About a week later I had a second interview over the phone. About a month later I received my nomination from my Peace Corps recruiter. This began the long process of getting my medical, dental, and legal clearances. After proving I am healthy and not a criminal I received an invitation to work in youth development in Azerbaijan. Throughout the process there were many set backs and frustrations which made me think Peace Corps made it this hard to weed out anyone who wasn’t really serious about this, but now as I sit here with all that behind me it doesn’t really seem to have been too bad.
I want to thank everyone who came to my going away party last night especially my mom who put so much work into it to make it run so smooth. I couldn’t think of a better way to spend an evening before I leave than with friends and family with a good ole American BBQ.

Here We Go

2007-05-11T06:46:00.000-07:00

Welcome everyone! Where do I ever begin? I have accepted an invitation to serve in the Peace Corps for the next 27 months as a youth development facilitator in Azerbaijan.

I've started this blog as a way to share my experience with my family and friends. Many of them are Married with kids and have all the responsibilities of life and can't take two years off to travel to the other side of the world so I want to allow them the opportunity to experience it through me.

I debated for a long time if I wanted to journal online. When I thru-hiked I decided not to because I was scared I would write for the audience rather than write my true feelings so I kept a personal journal instead. But I realized afterward my family and friends didn't get the full experience from a few e-mails and phone calls. Dave who hiked with me for a hundred miles and Mom who was my resupply, support person, and rescuer from the unrelenting rain got a closer idea but many of you only got a glimpse of what the experience was.

I also think this is a way to achieve the third goal of the Peace Corps. Peace Corps' mission is to:

1. Help the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women.

2. Help promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.

3. Help promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.

As a note of forewarning I'm not writing this blog as evidence of my extensive literary abilities so there will be many misspellings, grammatical errors and I'm sure many times will make no sense at all.