November 5, 2011

Agreed to go to the Green Market with Ryan and Carlos, a Couch Surfer from Spain. We first stopped at Volnas, the appliance store, and I finally bought a small blender so I can make smoothies with the abundant supply of fresh fruits they have here. The market was mobbed with people shopping prior to the Little Eid holiday coming up on Monday and we had a hard time maneuvering through the crowds. With Ryan’s help, I was able to buy most grains, seasonings and some meat and by the time I got the fruit and vegetables, there little room in my shopping bag or the one he had lent me. I needed to make another trip, but had enough to cook for several days. Carlos was gallant enough to help me with bags back to my apartment.

The weather was gorgeous and I was able to ditch my heavy coat to join the guys again for a trip to the Korbon Market on the outskirts of the city. The ride took 45 minutes and everywhere you looked you could see people loaded with packages and shopping bags in preparation for the holiday. Despite the warmth present in the air, the bus driver kept the heating on and we practically roasted on the way there. When we told the fare collector that it was quite warm and he could turn off the heat, he simply opened the vent on the roof.

                                       View of the mountains on a clear day

The market itself resembles more of a strip mall than the open air bazaar I had anticipated. The first entrance we approached appeared to specialize in men’s fashions and we had to walk quite a bit before I found a place to buy a few winter sweaters. The label on the turtlenecks said “The Gap” and they were made in Turkey. When I asked to see the sizes available, the vendor replied that “one size fits all” was what he had. I prayed that this was indeed the case for I know that returning the items would be out of the question. At the house wares area, I was able to find an elongated baking pan that should suffice for my cakes, tarts and flan and a pair of tongs. The cast iron pan I want to cook plov was too large and heavy to carry, so I’ll look for it closer to my house.

Corrie came by and picked her luggage as she finally found a place she likes. Yoomie had asked to use my oven and washer since Ryan had people over at his house. In exchange, she offered to bake a pizza for dinner. Yoomie used the local flat bread as a pizza crust and I helped prepped the rest of the ingredients so we could have a salami, tomato, pepper, mozzarella cheese pizza. Ryan and Carlos came over and we chatted while a pear cake baked, in my new pan, in the oven to be enjoyed tomorrow at Yoomie’s housewarming dinner.

November 4, 2011

The tree outside my kitchen is totally denuded and now different birds are flitting among its branches, smaller ones and not as loquacious as the tenants of just a week ago. More rain splashes on the roof as people make their way through the muddy alleyway, carefully skirting the rivulets forcing their way down the slope. Took half the melon I bought at the market and brought it down to Mariam along with her dishes. She was babysitting her grandson while Nilufar ran some errands

                                     
                                                  Student wearing the Tajik flag

Met at the dean’s office with Tahmina and Sandy, who had never visited the institute before. As usual, he was affable and agreed to make one of the teachers accessible to which one of my classes so they could explain any point that was unclear to the students. When asked for a key to the classroom with the whiteboard, he immediately handed it to me. He did not apologize for not having made an attempt to introduce me to the rest of the faculty or providing a simple tour of the place so I’d know what was available. Sandy tried to sound upbeat about the possibility of teaching in the Resource Room even when I showed it to her in all its desolate splendor and felt that the students could be entice to come over after class to clean and repair the place. The students attend classes six days a week and I’m not sure they would want to spend their only day off cleaning a classroom.

                                             
                                                   Another brilliant display of color

Had lunch at the Morning Star Café where I had to return the corn chowder to the server by pointing out it looked more like split pea soup. She returned with another soup of the same consistency, but this time it was yellow in color. The poor server probably has never seen a corn chowder in her life.

Asked the students to help me rearrange the furniture in the tiny classroom to see if I could accommodate all the tables in a U-shape format facing the whiteboard after they let me know in no uncertain form that they did not want to walk to the Resource Center for their classes. When a female student wouldn't listen to me and continued shouting to other students, I asked her to leave the classroom. She did so after much fussing and I could hear muttering something and then "chorni" or Russian for black.

Stopped at the Megaphon office to find out what was wrong with my Internet connection and was told the money I had paid through the ATM did not go to that account. From now on, I need to come in person to their offices to make my payment. After some waiting, and talking to the manager on the telephone a couple of times, they were able to switch the payment to the right ledger and reassured my connection was as good as gold. What a relief!

November 3, 2011

No Internet access this morning and I cannot even get my Chinese phone to send text messages. Not the best way to start out the day. Abundant sunshine this morning and relatively warmer temperatures greeted me outside. Made my way to the embassy to cash a check, use their Internet and hopefully see Tahmina about my frustrations at the institute. The mini-van driver was stopped by the police and a heated argument ensued, nature unknown, but apparently the driver held his ground and the officer let him go. The van would not restart after that and two male passengers had to get out to push it. Vali, the cashier at the embassy, greeted me warmly and was delighted with the CD I gave him containing merengues, bachatas, salsa and reggaeton. He gave me his cell phone number and asked to call him if I needed anything.  

Tahmina indicated she had just called me, not in response to my previous calls, but to inform me that another appointment had been made with dean to finalized the Memorandum of Understanding and that Sandy would be present at this meeting. When I related the incident at my apartment and my many attempts to reach her, she just replied that her husband has prohibited from picking up the phone after certain hours. She called Dilia and seemed appalled when told that I had been so angry that I had yelled at Dilia on the phone. I asked her what she would have done in my place since no one seemed to care that I was sitting in a cold and dark apartment while everybody else in the building had power. She refused to acknowledge this point. I proceeded to outline my many concerns regarding teaching at the Pedagogical Institute and she just nodded her head and said conditions were what they were because of the lack of funding and the low salaries teachers receive. Her suggestion: request that the dean assign me to teach at the Resource Center as it has a whiteboard and good heating during the winter. I reminded her that the room was three buildings away from the English Faculty classrooms and students only have five minutes between classes. She didn’t seem concerned.

Sandy came by at this point and asked if everything was all right. I was about to explode at that moment and said no. She asked me to follow her into her office where I broke down crying from pure exhaustion and impotence. When I related my feelings of not being taken seriously at the Institute and the lack of cooperation by the dean, she indicated she would be requesting a formal introduction to all faculty members and a tour of the facilities so I would know where to find what I needed.

Pariso had not called me to let me know if a key had been made to the classroom with the whiteboard, so I just knocked on her classroom door and notified her I’d be at the Resource Room if she wanted to send the students there. Someone must have held a recent workshop in the room and the whiteboard, previously sitting on the floor, had been propped on top of two chairs. I realized then that there was no way for me to accommodate 27 students in the room as it’s lined up with old listening stations along two walls and bookcases on the third wall. The control booth for the listening stations occupies the fourth wall along with a desk and computer. My mind tried to imagine how the furniture could be rearranged so as to make the room workable, but that would not happen without some infusion of cash for new desks and chairs, as the ones there are broken. The whiteboard had layers upon layers of old markings as no one had taken the trouble of buying some cleaning agent for it.

The students from the first class got in late, but found their way and could not have been happier with their surroundings. They wanted to be told that this would be a permanent arrangement while the second class begged me to reconsider going back to their regular classroom so as not to make the trek there on a regular basis.

Ryan texted to invite me to dinner at his place and I was more than glad to accept as it was on my way home and I had no idea as to what I was going to eat that evening. He was making a rice and chicken soup when one of his outlets in the kitchen caught on fire and started burning the collection of photographs he had pasted onto that wall. I advised him to throw a wet rag at the wall to put out the fire and it worked. Ryan remained unfazed and when the outlet cooled off simply removed it from the wall and threw in the garbage. He made no mention of calling his landlord to report it. His neighbor on the second floor, zha, came in and I learned she is an alumna of the PedInst having graduated in 2002. She hardly speaks English and teaches at a secondary school nearby. She related how difficult it is for her to try to explain grammar points to her 11^th graders and how much she wants to get out of the profession. She agreed to have me visit her classroom next Wednesday and requested my help with updating her resume to see if she can get a job with an NGO in the area. She works from 8:00 to 5:00 and comes home to a husband and two rambunctious boys. I cannot imagine such a life. For the first time, even Ryan’s cooking was bland. I went home relatively hungry.

November 2, 2011

 I sat down at my computer this morning only to realize that I didn’t have Internet access. I was operating under the mistaken belief that since the service had started on October 2 that I‘d be entitled to complete month. Got dressed and trooped to the nearby shopping complex in the hope that a branch of Megaphone, my Internet provider, would be located in the area. The first man I approached informed me I could pay for Internet in the same I had done for the cell phone and pointed to what looks like an ATM. This is one was not accepting bills and the security guard for the store nearby walked me in so I could use the one inside. It’s indeed a very simple system as you just punch in the telephone number associated with the account, slip the bill in the slot and get a receipt.

The classroom that the dean had assigned me the day before, with the small, but usable whiteboard, was locked as was his office. Went to Pariso’s classroom and she told me to just wait for a few minutes as the dean was most likely finishing one of his classes. I let her know in no uncertain terms that I getting sick of waiting in the hallway for access to classrooms. She told me that as an alternative I could walk to the Resource Room, three buildings away, and wait there. I could not hide my displeasure and walked away sulking like a child.

Twenty minutes later, the dean was nowhere to be found and no key seemed to be available. I reiterated to Pariso that we had made an agreement that I was not going to teach in a classroom with a blackboard. At this point, the students were milling around wondering why class was being held up. Some of the guys asked permission to get a snack and I gave it to them. As furious as I was, I could not cancel class in front of the eager students and muttering under my breath agreed to go back into the one classroom with the worst blackboard, the one full of indentations and so smooth the chalk slides right over the surface.

Met with Caroline at the stationery store and bought another extension cord as the one I had blew up the other day. They didn’t have a deck of card which I want to use to disband the groups already formed in the classroom and assign them randomly according to whatever card they are dealt. At the next stationery store, they didn’t have it either, but the young man walked us to yet another store where I was able to purchase one for about $6.00 or 30 somonis. To think that such a deck of cards only set me back a dollar in the States.

My apartment had no electricity when I walked in, which was inexplicable given the fact that the light on the landing was on. I called my landlord and he was able to say he was at the office and would come by the next day, which of course, was unacceptable to me. I called the realtor, Dilia, and she agreed to contact the landlady. I sat in the hallway, the only place where a bit of light from the landing could be see, waiting for a call back. My main concern at that point was that maybe the landlady had failed to pay the bill and power had been disconnected.

In the meantime, I had made plans to attend Nigina’s birthday dinner at a restaurant within walking distance of my apartment and waited for Ryan and Yoomie to come by. Ryan was carrying a pretty bag, obviously a present, and Ashley, a guy in this case, from the U. K. had brought chocolates. Yoomie didn’t seem to be carrying a present and I felt slightly better. I had met Nigina online through Couch Surfing and this was our first meeting in person. Still, it was thoughtless of me not to pick up a box of chocolates while walking along Rudaki Avenue.

                                     
                                                                    Nigina and Ryan

The restaurant in question was large, well lighted and tastefully decorated. All servers wore maroon uniforms and we were taken to Nigina’s table, which was already laden with plates of fruit, a variety of salads and drinks. I was famished and wondered how to proceed. After the proper introductions were made, I asked Nigina how I should proceed to place my order and she told we were her guests and she was footing our bill in its entirety. This time I felt even worse for not having brought a present. Ryan reassured me this is the Tajik tradition and I should acquiesce. Baskets of flat bread and tea were brought over and finally a menu produced, but I had forgotten to bring my reading glasses and could not make out what offerings were. Ryan suggested something that was not chicken and I went along while noshing on the salads, fruits and bread. It was a good thing I did so for my dish, cubes of brown beef with some cocktail onions and bits of carrots served with a side of white rice, was beyond bland and the presentation simply pedestrian. I only ate a couple of tablespoons before giving up on it.

Nigina had to return to her house where her parents were waiting for her to continue the celebration. I called Dilia again and she told my landlady had not answered her numerous calls. Ryan offered his place for me to stay the night, but I wanted to sleep in my place. I sat once again in the hallway, keeping the door open, and waited for Dilia to try once again to reach my landlord, who I came to find out is an employee of my landlady, and not her husband. One of the tenants on my floor saw there and asked me, in Russian of course, if there was a problem. I pointed to the ceiling and mimed “no lights” and he mimed back “wait a minute”. He went downstairs, where the main electrical box is, and came back asking me is everything was “OK” now. No, I didn’t have power yet. He came back upstairs and counted with his fingers to confirm my apartment number. I said #32 and back down he went. Power was back on and none too soon for even with my coat on, I was beginning to feel cold. I thanked the guy profusely and went into the bedroom to turn on the space heater.

Jamshed showed up a few minutes later to inform me that from now on I needed to call Dilia with any messages as he could not understand me at all. I wanted to respond that his boss should not be renting apartments to foreigners if she has no intentions of responding in a crisis or has an intermediary to communicate through. To add insult to injury, the electric bill had been left at the door and he requested that I pay the 19.80 somonis immediately. 

November 1, 2011

Still more rain this morning and a very chilly kitchen in which to make my coffee. Retreated to the living room and caught up with the news online in the absence of my usual sources, the BBC and Al Aljazeera. I was surprised to find the trolley relatively empty and instead of riding standing up, as I usually do, there was a seat available for me. The cafeteria across the street from the PedInst had longmon noodle soup today, one of my favorites, and I had a bowl and two slices of bread with it. My first class contains 27 students sitting at miniscule desks in equally sized chairs in a dark almost oppressive space. The students on the right side of the classroom are unable to see the blackboard and must get up periodically to copy whatever I have written on it.

                                              Intricate mosaic work advertising a disco club

During my break, Pariso and I went to the Human Resources office to clarify exactly what kind of documentation I needed to provide in order to continue teaching at the university. The first requirement: I needed to buy the black folder within which my personal documents will be archived. At 15 somonis, it’s not an onerous purchase, but does seem a little silly. I was told once again that I needed to provide letters of recommendation, copies of all my college diplomas and a letter from my landlord, someone with whom I cannot even communicate. All of this paperwork is needed if I want collect my salary of about 50 somonis a month, or about $12.00. The dean, who seems not to have the slightest sense of humor, laughed when I told him I had been kept awake at night thinking about the possibility of losing out on such lucrative source of income.

Managed to convince the dean that my allergies to dust made it necessary for me to use a whiteboard and he finally made the decision to assign classroom #3 as my permanent classroom. The whiteboard, the only one I’ve seen at the institute, is really tiny, but better than the scarred blackboard I’ve been using so far. Only one light bulb worked, some broken chairs were pushed against the wall and the bookcase had broken doors and was full of dust. When I asked about getting the light bulb replaced, Pariso answered that I needed to collect the money from the students to buy it.

I stopped at the stationary store and bought the binder, some markers and a new eraser for the whiteboard. I’m not sure yet if I can claim these items as expenses related to my teaching. Met with Caroline and Peter to try out a new restaurant only to find the place full of smoke. I refused to go in and we proceeded to try another place nearby, which was smartly furnished and quite cozy, but once again the cloud of smoke made us turned it down even when the waiter tried to convince us that the non-smoking section, behind a flimsy curtain, would suit us just fine. With few options open to us, I suggested trying out one place I had seen earlier in the week which had an open sitting porch up front. Peter was familiar with it having been there once just for a beer. The place in question offers an English menu and purports to make New York-style pizza. The dining area, very small and containing only five tables, was still smoky despite the “No Smoking” sign on the wall, but there was only one other table occupied and they were not smoking yet. The pizza Margharita we ordered did not contain mozzarella cheese or basil, but at least the crust was thin, there were slices of tomato and some melted cheese along with some herb that tasted like cilantro. Eaten along with a cold Baltika beer it was passable. 

October 31, 2011

As adage goes: “Careful what you wish for. You might get it.” My wish for a lot of rain that would remove the tons of layers of dust has become a reality or maybe a nightmare as I encountered another day of rain, packed trolleys and muddy streets. Took a taxi to make it to work on time and found out I’ve been assigned to another class. A student kept staring out the window and refused to make eye contact with me. When given the assignment, she didn’t take out her notebook or pen. The student in front of me kept lowering his eyes and wrote nothing or answered any questions. This is the class of third year students about to begin their practicum in two weeks and they can’t utter a complete sentence in English. A 90 minute class can seem to last an eternity under these conditions. I thought I had another class immediately thereafter, but was informed the class had already left. Had my usual soup and salad combination at the Russian restaurant and ran into Zainura, who seems to be a regular there, and discussed possibly getting together next Saturday.

                                                   Tajik couple

Following Peter’s suggestion that I try to get funding to buy my students a regular English grammar textbook, printed in either the United States or England, and do away with stilted Russian one they do have, I walked to the only bookstore in town that stocks this type of material. I settled for the Headway student workbook for beginners as it contains lots of colorful illustrations and comes with a CD for listening activities. It only costs 36.00 somonis or about $13.00 each and they could have the entire order ready for me to pick up in 2-3 days. While there, I was approached by a young woman who wanted to practice her English. She gave me her business card and promised to help find someone to design and print one for me.

The seamstress finally had my outfit ready and a skirt I had given her to shorten. It had only taken her three weeks to complete the task.

Desperate for the use of a bathroom, called Caroline and found out she was just reaching home at that moment. We both had received a call that morning from Tahmina inviting us to a Halloween party at one of the embassy employee’s home who was hosting the children participating in the MultiKids program. I had declined thinking I’d be teaching at the time, but also because I was not familiar with the location and didn’t feel like venturing out there in the rain. Caroline had the same feelings and so we went back to my apartment so she could have some of the plov and apple pie Mariam had made the day before. It was the perfect afternoon to spend it chatting over apple pie and coffee. Although Peter had promised to join us, he called saying he had to work late.

Spent the rest of the evening secluded in the living room, the warmest part of the apartment, until it was time for bed. I’ve been unable to watch the news, the only program I can find, since the rain started on Friday. I only have access to it through the satellite system and it plain does not like rain.

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.