October 15, 2011
Started the day browning and cooking the lamb while tidying up my place. Caroline came at noon to lend a hand and we walked to the supermarket once again to get more glasses and drinks. While cutting the Children’s Park, an old man approached us and insisted on ushering us into a building behind the supermarket. He used the fingers of his hand to indicate he spoke Russian, Tajik and Uzbek, but not English and sent for someone who did. Firuza had been sent to Pittsburg for a year on a grant from the State Department to study community development and had created a proposal to get Tajiks to compost fall leaves instead of burning them as is the current practice. A delegation from Pittsburg was scheduled to arrive in minutes to take a look at her work. The building houses an after-school program, some sort of scout troop, for children 5-15 and they offer many types of classes. The students had dug a hole in the courtyard and were ready to start gathering leaves from the park to start their compost pile. Firuza confirmed that composting is not a widespread practice and it’s only carried out in private homes.
Snacks for the participants
Coming back to my apartment, I knocked on my neighbor’s door, as I had promised, and she was apparently taking a nap along with her daughter, Nilufar, who spoke some English and offered to trade phone numbers so we could arrange for a visit at a more propitious time.
I’ve had no choice, but to become adept at texting since our cell phones don’t have voicemail. It takes me forever, but I’m doing it. My guests kept sending messages regarding the specific time for our gathering, whether additional guests were welcomed and what to bring. Peter arrived first with a mouth-watering chocolate cake, then Hilola and Rusheta (two young women I had met at the park my first night in Dushanbe) bearing chocolates and wafers, then Ryan and Yoomie, and finally Dariush, the Afghan who is studying to become a doctor, and who brought a pot of rice pilau and a gorgeous pair of blue earrings for me. We were expecting Sam, a British guy from Couch Surfing, and his two Afghan friends, but they didn’t make it.
Food was served on a plastic tablecloth spread over the carpet Tajik style
Yoomie managed to bake a carrot cake in a cast iron pot; Ryan cooked noodles with hot dogs, Caroline provided the flat bread and Peter went out to buy beer and vodka. My downstairs’ neighbor sent her daughter with a plate of delicate looking bars filled with apples and apricots and covered with powdered sugar. I served coffee while we were regaled by Ryan’s tales about serving in some twenty countries as an infectious disease doctor for the U.N. All in all, a very pleasant experience.
Hilola and Rusheta
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