April 28, 2012

I slept badly as the korpachas were too narrow and kept sliding off my body and the cushion as I was using as a pillow was too unyielding under my head. It was a relief to see light coming through the windows and be able to make myself a pot of coffee in Janice’s resplendent Turkish gas stove. Rain was still coming down and low clouds kept me from admiring the magnificent views of the mountains Janice had promised us. Corrie got up shortly after that and offered to fry a couple of eggs for each of us which we had with flat bread and juice. Mr. Sharbat had shown us how to get to the center of town and we had made our way almost to the American Corner when Shamsullo pulled over in his friend’s BMW and gave us a ride the rest of the way.

I had put on another kurta and pants outfit with the camisole underneath and traded my shawl for a very heavy one Janice had hanging on her coat rack while taking pains not to drag it through the mud. My white socks were getting muddy and wet, but I had brought my new sandals to change into them once I got to the American Corner. This corner is located in what is called the “Telecommunications” building and we were treated to piped music from a local radio station the entire time we were there. At nine o’clock, there was no one there but Shamsullo and us. Six college students, all future teachers of English, gathered around us by ten o’clock and we started an introduction activity followed by having them write a portrait using some of Corrie’s photos, which we then discovered were almost the same ones I had collected back home.  

                                   Future English teachers writing a portrait.

Shamsullo took us to one of the two restaurants in the town and we were given the usual choices: salad, soup and shish kebabs. When I said I wanted something more substantial after eating just soup the day before, I was told plov was not on the menu. Shamsullo pulled out his cell phone and called a friend to bring it over right away. When I asked him if the restaurant would not be upset to see customers bring their own food, he said they’d have to accept it because they weren’t serving it. The plov arrived relatively fast and relatively warm. We were given three spoons to eat communally from the plate, something I’m just beginning to get used to. Shamsullo took care of the bill before we even realized it. We then took a quick walk through the bazaar, a muddy mess of small kiosks under tarps that leaked over our heads the whole time. Shamsullo pointed to the public toilet and I just had to hold my nose so as not to lose my lunch while using it as the American Corner does not have one.

The Access students that Shamsullo teaches under contract with the U. S. Embassy were already waiting for us and eagerly set out to do the “Animal, Vegetable, Mineral” worksheet after I forced them to pair up a female to a male. Subsequently, Corrie had them sit face to face and do a quick interview of their partner with the questions that had been handed to them ahead of time. After a brief exchange, the students switched places and started again. It went quite well thanks to fast thinking on Corrie’s part. This group of students was certainly very articulate and appeared more advanced than the group of future teachers we had had in the morning. They sang “Yankee Doodle” to us before we left.

                                                Animal, Vegetable or Mineral?

                                                           Speed Interviewing

We got in a taxi with Mr. Sharbat to go to the second Access program some 25 minutes away under torrential rains. There were two beginner groups and an advanced one, so Corrie took the beginners to one room and I stayed with the smaller group of girls in the advanced one. I did an introductory game, concentration and lastly “Taboo”. I couldn’t think of a word to illustrate this definition that might not be offensive and asked Mr. Sharbat, who had been nodding off by then, for help out at that point. The girls were not able to play the game as they lacked enough vocabulary about occupations to describe them without using the ones on the card. I wrote all the vocabulary on the board and promised his teacher to send him the game electronically so he could play with them again once they had had a chance to go over the vocabulary.

                                Access students introducing themselves.

                                                     Ditto

                                                         

                                                          Playing "Taboo"

Back on the taxi and to the main street where I asked Mr. Sharbat if we could buy some soup and bread to take home to eat later, as obviously, I’d not be coming back into town for dinner. He looked perplexed, scratched his head and said we could look into the few shops still open to see if a suitable container could be found in which to buy the soup from the restaurant and carry it home. More trudging in the rain, going up and down stairs and we ended up in the part of the restaurant where the curtains are drawn so men can smoke and drink in private. There was some kind of a celebration going on and a young woman in a loud neon green gown was dancing rather suggestively while surrounded by half a dozen men. Corrie and I looked at each other, but couldn’t say much as the music, played a band of five musicians, was deafening. We then learned this was a bachelor’s party and the father of the groom was a former student of Mr. Sharbat who then invited us to his table and plied us with food, chocolates, and tea. The soup we had ordered was forgotten and instead, the owner of the restaurant wanted for me to join the dancing group, but there were too many men who seemed completely wasted and I didn’t want to make a spectacle of myself.

This dancer is part of the band and all my Tajik cultural informants tell me she's not a "good girl".

This older woman also danced during the celebration, but I couldn't ascertain her role.

As prescribed by law, the party couldn’t go on for more than three hours, so out into the freezing rain we went. I was in no mood to walk back up the hill and offered to pay for a taxi. Mr. Sharbat accompanied us to the gate and promised to make the arrangements with the taxi driver so we could leave for Dushanbe by 2:00pm the next day. I was already concerned that the inordinate amount of rain might have made the road even worse than it had been coming in.

Corrie tried to arrange an outing with another ex-pat she had met in Dushanbe who lives in Gharm, but given the weather conditions, he later called to cancel. I was happy, now that I full, to just stay home reading and listening to the rain fall. Corrie came to the living room and we ended up talking until ten. I then decided to sleep on the sofa and cover myself with one of the blankets.