October 30, 2011

It was raining once again when I woke up. That will make it three days in a row. Almost felt as if I were back in Seattle. I’d have loved to stay in bed another day, but had arranged with my neighbor Mariam to have a plov cooking lesson at her place and the EFLs had a meeting scheduled at 2:15pm with someone coming in from Washington, D. C. Mariam and I took a new detour behind our apartment complex and walked through alleys where the private residences were hidden behind some very fancy gates. We came out to the main road between the wedding registry place and the maternity hospital where Ryan works. Some unfortunate bride was walking from the car to the steps of the wedding registry building in her gown under the rain and with not even a shawl over her shoulders. The poor woman must have been freezing to death as her party was not even holding an umbrella over her. Took a marshrutka from there to the bazaar expecting that the rain and cold weather might have made the place less crowded, but I could swear it was even more so. Mariam had her particular spots where to get the ingredients for our plov and I gave up on buying anything for my own kitchen so as not to slow her down. Back to the apartment where she lit her gas stove, yes, some people I’ve discovered can buy propane gas here, and Mariam is one of them. She is going to put me in touch with the company that comes every two months to replace her tank. I’m extremely concerned about being without electricity for long spells and not being able to make my coffee. I do realize that I need to obtain the cooperation of my landlord, but fail to see why I can’t have access to a propane tank when Mariam has been living in the same building since 1993 and hasn’t had any problems.

Making plov, the national dish of Tajikistan, seems like an easy affair. Buy two kilos of beef, don’t bother trimming the fat or gristle, add two huge ladles of oil to a cast iron pot and when it starts to smoke, add the meat and cook it until it’s brown on all sides. Meanwhile, slice an onion and add it to the meat cooking it until it caramelizes. Add a cup of chickpeas that have been soaking overnight and a kilo of shredded carrots. Cook until both are soft. Add a packet of the seasoning designated for plov, add the rice and enough water to cover everything. Add some kind of aromatic seed, the name of which I could not pronounce nor remember now, and cover the mixture tightly so the steam will continue to cook the rice. The whole thing took about two hours while Mariam also prepared a delicious salad with only sweet tomatoes, their seedless cucumber and a bunch of cilantro leaves chopped very, very fine. An apple pie was also prepared using a simple dough on a pan, similar to cookie sheet, layering it with sliced apples and walnuts. I hardly had time to enjoy the meal as I needed to be at the American corner at 215pm and it was already five minutes to two. Mariam gave me some plov and apple pie so I could share with Caroline and back into the wet streets I went, watching my breath trail behind me as I worried about being the last one to arrive.  My fears were unfounded, as usual, as no one was there but the coordinator. When everybody got there, we sat in a circle and went around introducing ourselves and talking a bit about our projects or post. I made it a point to complain about the lack of technology at my post and how allergic I was to chalk. I saw the Public Affairs Officer make a note of it. Let’s hope it means I’ll be able to buy a whiteboard at some point soon.

One of the women in the group is participating in very different type of research as she is looking at Tajik dancers in their full spectrum from village traditional dancers, to professional ones and even the ones that might call themselves dancers, but might be involved in prostitution. She commented on need to pay bribes in order to have access to people in the Ministry of Culture who could provide information about the state of dance education in the country. Emily invited us to a performance of “Don Quixote” taking place at 4:00 and our guest had a special invite to visit the Antiquities Museum. We trooped to the Opera Ballet Theater nearby, but found the production so dull that we sneaked out during the first intermission. Although I had read the book gazillion years ago, I could not remember the plot. Seeing the ornate interior of the building was worth the ten somonis we paid for the admission fee as it has the grand scale favored by the Soviet architect that built it and the chandeliers by themselves must have cost a fortune. Bathroom though were disappointing as they were the squat type and quite smelly. 

I declined to use them and waited until we got back to Caroline’s place where we sat to discuss our upcoming series of teacher training workshops making all dates tentative as we do not know if our venue is available, what the best date/time will be for local teachers, how to contact these teachers, when the actual holidays fall or even more important, what they would like for us to present. Information seems to be at a premium here and whoever has it is sure not sharing.

                                     
                                          Dinner at Ryan's

Ryan had been nice enough to invite all of those who had not turned up the night before to come over and enjoy his leftovers. Caroline and Peter declined and Corrie had dinner plans with some Tajik family. Only Yoomie and I showed up. I had purchased a cake and apple juice and could not believe the amount of food Ryan had prepared: fish in two different types of sauce, plov, mung soup (my favorite among all his dishes), flat bread, salad, pickled vegetables, shredded smoked cheese, soft drinks and even Georgian wines he had brought from there recently. I wish my stomach was not in such poor state so I could have eaten a lot more, but cramps were still rumbling through it and decided to play it safe. Ryan and Yoomie indicated they’d be willing to travel with me to Istanbul during the winter break. That’s great news as they are both seasoned travelers and could serve as my guides.