**Because I Cannot Get the Internet Everyday I Have Written Multiple Blogs**
1 October 2008 TURKMENISTAN!!!!!
After 3 hrs on a bus, 4 hrs in an airport, 10 hrs on a plane, 12 more hours in an airport, 3 more hours on another plane, Turkmen Customs, and hauling over 150 pounds (give or take) through yet ANOTHER airport I was finally greeted with cheers and helpful gestures as I walked to a group of Peace Corp Turkmenistan Volunteers. What a crazy trip it has been. Between 3 different time zones and probably only 4 hrs total of good sleep (either on a plane, or the floor of the Istanbul airport) and many good meaningful and humorous conversations with my new T-17 counter parts I feel like I have officially arrived (and could use a good night sleep). We got into the city around 3:30am this morning and made it to the hotel to “sleep” for a few hours before we dive into the first part of training. Because we have so many people in our training class we are going to be split up for language training in different villages and should find ourselves together again once a week for a big group training. I’ve got to say even with a few hours of sleep I am exhausted. The time-zone stuff and the lack of a good bed and water led me to what I normally experience when I travel: Dehydration. I had a real hard time sleeping last night because I was shivering and had a massive headache, classic signs of dehydration. No worries though, I have had a lot of water and am starting to feel better.
I have made some really sweet friends thus far on the trip and I feel like I am fitting in well with them. It’s cool because we are from all over the country and have bonded instantly. We laugh at each others accents and have created a few really funny inside jokes, most of them related to bodily functions (you can’t be a Peace Corps Trainee… PCT… without talking about bodily functions). My NYC crew will be delighted to hear that I have passed along FnS and it is now an international competition. Odds are we are going to have many PCTs who will inadvertently be going for the “Instant Win.” Overall, it is a great group and I have even found a few people willing to start up a Bible Study, fire up for that!
Now odds are you want to know a bit about the country. Well, only being here for 6 hrs I really don’t have much to share. I haven’t really gotten out to see Ashgabat, but I do know that the Arch of Neutrality (the gold rotating statue of the former president) is not far from our hotel. We saw it last night. I don’t really know much about it other than it is meant to symbolize President Turkmenbasy rising out of the rubble of a giant earth quack in the 1940s where he was left orphaned. Turkmenbasy also led Turkmenistan away from Soviet control in the 1990s. It’s called the Arch of Neutrality because, to my understanding, Turkmenistan declared itself a neutral country in the 1990s, the Arch symbolizes that.
4 October 2008 “Here meet your host family and 25 other people you don’t know!”
Oye what a day! Today was my last day of full group training. We split off into like 7 different groups to learn language in 7 different villages. We also got to meet all of our host families. That was crazy intense seeing as how I know enough Turkmen to hold a 5-minute conversation… We had a lunch with our “host family representative” and I am fairly certain that the woman who came to pick me up wasn’t even in my family. So we had a very awkward lunch with our language groups and our families because we can’t speak Turkmen and they definitely can’t speak any English. Seriously after like 5 minutes of us asking the 5 questions that we know the rest of the meal was silent and awkward. It was crazy. At first I thought the women that came and met me was my host mother, but it turns out that she was not. My host mom was unable to make it because she was preparing for a huge party that our family is hosting tomorrow.
Allow me to explain a little about my family. I have a host mother Myham and a host father Gurbanmurad, I also have two host brothers Atajan who is 5 and Arslan who is 4 months and I have a host sister Enejan who is 4. Finally I have a host Grandfather, Bayram who also lives with us. Bayram seems funny he was the only man who said hello to me and shook my hand. I really like him a lot. Now for the reason my host mother was preparing for a party… It seems that my brother Atajan is getting circumcised tomorrow, which apparently is a HUGE deal. So when I arrived at my host family’s house today I was greeted by 30 Turkmen men, women, and children all buying to get a look at the American. You can bet it was a little overwhelming. For my Peplinski family, imagine if you will going to the family Christmas party not knowing ANYONE and everyone was speaking Chinese or some other language, oh by the way you don’t speak the language they speak. That’s how I felt; it was very overwhelming at first. After and hour of trying to talk to people the woman who picked me up from the hotel Mahri told me to go lay down for a little bit. I took her advice and just crashed for like an hour collecting my thoughts and trying to organize my Turkmen. After my nap I had a bonified plan of attack and came out swinging with my Turkmen cheat sheet, photo album, world map, and Michigan map. After that life was a bit easier. I was at least able to communicate a little more and was officially the star of the day. I learned to be more animated to express my thoughts and inability to understand and they were very helpful to teach me a few new words after they laughed at me a little bit. I can really see how Peace Corp volunteers are considered celebrities in their villages because it seemed like everyone wanted a piece of me. Even after I said I was going to go to bed and started typing this blog for everyone I had kids breaking into my room and sitting with me as I typed. They were all interested in my computer. Normally, I would have locked my door, but my bedroom is also apparently where they keep all of the dishes and food so I have people just coming and going. That is probably going to have to change; it will be a conversation with my Language and Cultural Facilitator Mayagozel on Monday.
A few other random thoughts. I saw my first camel today; I saw a mama camel and a baby camel. That was fun. I also passed by Turkmenbashi’s Mosque on the way to my village it was huge! I can’t wait to go there. My host mother is apparently a carpet maker so I am going to ask her to teach me how to make a carpet. And my stomach is officially feeling like a PC stomach adjusting to the food… oye… here’s to hoping for no instant wins. Overall, I can say I feel culturally immersed!
Oh I also promised to keep a TP Tally. I brought 4 roles of TP with me and after 3 days in the country my roommate from the hotel and I used 1. So the TP count is at 3. Also… for your information Jess, it is culturally acceptable to use TP in Turkmenistan. They even sell it in the bazaar; most Turkmen don’t bother with it though. Sog Bol (goodnight) Everyone!
7 October 2008 The Circumcised Weekend Update (Plus Language Classes, Funny Turkmen Moments, and Cultural Integration)
Wow a lot has happened since Saturday… it’s slightly crazy. Allow me to start from where I left off, Sunday. Sunday I had my first experience of a “Turkmen Toy” that is, Turkmen party. As I mentioned in my last update my host brother, Atajan was circumcised this weekend. As a part of Turkmen culture and, correct me if I am wrong, the Islam religion boys are circumcised at age 5. So obviously, Atajan, knew this was going to happen (and I can imagine he wasn’t totally thrilled with the idea) and, as it was explained to me, he was bribed to let this happen to him by the party guests bringing him candy, toys, and money. In my opinion, there is no bribe that would con me in to letting someone do that to me when I was 5, but whatever it’s not me. Anyways, so around 10am people start to show up and bring gifts for Atajan and come to take a look at his newly circumcised penis (literally it was on display for everyone to see). I myself fortunately had bought some candy and a toy blue Ford Mustang car (because Tim works there) in Philly incase I had a host brother so I gave that to him. He really seemed to enjoy it; it’s a Mustang… who wouldn’t enjoy it?!
I digress, so a ton of people just started to show up and I seriously felt like I met half of the town. There were probably over 80 people there and all of them wanted a look at the American. All I can say is, Holy Integration Batman! Everything went well though. I eased the tension by showing everyone the pictures that I had brought from home, which they loved by the way. They loved “meeting” my family and friends which really made me happy. After I showed them all of your pictures the kids decided to take me away to play with my digital camera. I was cool with that and they were actually really good at taking pictures. Then we had some lunch and soda, which was really pretty good… it was like a bread soup with beef in it. I must say, for all my worries about the food I actually really enjoy it. Unfortunately, I believe I have a love hate relationship with the Turkmen food… I love the Turkmen food, but the Turkmen food hates me… if you catch my drift. Some of you may remember that I had a similar reaction to the food in Mexico, but this time it’s not just me… everyone in my training group is having stomach issues and it is actually a really good bonding experience. After lunch I again played with the kids and this time they wanted me to sing songs with them. So I sang them my favorite song from CMU leadership conferences: Baby Shark. Oh my goodness did they LOVE IT! They absolutely loved the hand motions and literally had me sing it like 25 times and for everyone at the party… the old men, young women, and old women. Everyone got a bit of Baby Shark that day. It was good times. I was actually having so much fun that I didn’t even realize when my language group and teacher had shown up to take us on a walk around the town. I apparently left a really good impression on everyone because my language teacher told me later that she had 10 women say they would love to host an American Volunteer next year if the volunteer would be like me. That was a huge compliment for the very little language I had had. So in a nutshell, that was the Turkmen Toy!
Yesterday, we had our first day of language learning. Unfortunately, I was really exhausted because I had a hard time sleeping the night before after the Toy; we still had 25 people spending the night. So my first official day of language learning was ROUGH. Fortunately my teacher understood everything and she was really great about it. My language class is actually a lot of fun. We go pretty fast, but because we only have 5 people in our group we all pick it up fairly quickly. It also helps that our teacher, Mayagozel, is amazing. Seriously, she is awesome and I can tell that I am going to be good friends with her after the 10 weeks of language learning. So we did language learning in the morning, had another delicious lunch (it was called montee and was like little hot pockets I guess of beef, rice, and cabbage), then in the afternoon we got to visit the local Mosque, which just so happens to be right outside my front door (I can literally hear the “Call to Prayer” every morning and use it as my own prayer time with Jesus). We went to the Mosque because the 6th of October is what is known as “Remembrance Day” in Turkmenistan. I guess there was a huge Earthquake in Ashgabat in 1948 where the entire city was leveled to the ground and thousands of people died, including the former ruler, Turkmenbashi’s, mother and father leaving him orphaned. If you want to earn more about it I am sure you can Google Turkmenbashi, Earthquake 1948, Ashgabat. If that doesn’t work try something like “Arch of Neutrality” Ashgabat, there might be a story there. Anyways, the Mosque was beautiful! It was very Salome and quiet, but the whole building was just gorgeous. I am going to try to post some pictures, but they might not work. We learned a bit about how people pray there and about the different parts. Overall, it was a very cool experience. So that was yesterday!
Now onto today! This morning our language group got to meet with the mayor of our town, the director of the schools, and the director of the hospital so we could get further integrated into the community. The mayor was really nice and assured us that he and his town were really grateful to have Peace Corps working there and if we had any problems to come and talk to him directly. We also got to meet the school director, who is like our superintendent, and he told us just how pleased he was to have us in the community and working with his school. He said he has a lot of admiration for the teachers that come from Peace Corps because of all the wonderful things PCVs have done over the years. My teacher, Mayagozel, also expressed her gratitude for the TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) Volunteers (which is my program) because she had been deeply impacted by the volunteers who taught here when she was in school. She said that even when she was a little girl she had so much respect for the Peace Corps that she knew she wanted to work there someday. That really stuck with me because it showed me that the volunteers really do make an impact, and if somehow I could impact someone like Mayagozel, then this is all worth it. After meeting with the Mayor and the directors we went over to the school and I got to meet one of my Turkmen Counterparts for training. A Counterpart is a professional teacher that I will be teaming with to work for the 10 weeks of training. After training, I will be assigned another counterpart in a different village to do the rest of my service with. Essentially the goal is to help the Counterpart become a better teacher for their classroom by integrating American educational values into their curriculum. I am really excited to get to start working with my Counterpart and working in the classroom because the kids are just adorable! I will be working with 1st-4th graders during my training; you can’t get any cuter than a 6-year-old singing songs in broken English! After we met with our counterparts we went off to more language learning in the afternoon, then it was time to go home. I had an interesting time tonight at home. I was helping my Aunt, who also lives here (I think), with some of the household chores like washing dishes and she was teaching me random Turkmen phrases. After we cleaned the dishes she asked me to go help her milk the cow! Or at least watch while she milked the cow… Figuring this whole thing was about cultural experiences I went and helped her milk the cow. Fortunately, I didn’t actually have to milk the cow, I just had to watch. Who knows though maybe the title of my next blog entry will be “Got Milk?” or something like that. It was interesting though to see her tie the cows legs up so she doesn’t kick and go to town on the utters. Overall, an interesting experience for sure. I can honestly say that your city girl is turning country, Mom. It has been a pretty good night!
I can see how this experience has its ups and downs. There has been a lot more that has gone on, but too much for me to write here. I really am enjoying myself though. I look forward to getting letters from people because I can’t really get the Internet. PLEASE WRITE ME!!! I know that it is soon going to get very lonely and difficult here and mail will really lift my spirits when that happens. Also, here’s a list of stuff that would be very helpful here:
Baby Wipes (essential)
Hand Sanitizer (trust me Mokma, your sanitizer is GOLD among volunteers)
American Candy (Gobstoppers are my favorite 
Frisbees, Soccerballs, Kickballs, Anything that kids would like to play with…
And of course TP… I have seen some bathrooms with Russian Textbooks and it’s not pretty
Thanks for everything guys. I am not sure when I will get the Internet again, but I will keep writing mass blogs to keep everyone posted. I love you all and miss you dearly, but feel as though Turkmenistan is where I am called to be. Tanry yalkasyn (Turkmen for ‘thank you’ but literally means God blesses you)! Ginjan ranat bolsum (good night)!
11 October 2008 Week 2 Down… The craziness of Turkmen Culture Plus the Real Meaning of Agoraphobia.
Ok so I was hoping to update you all on Wednesday last week, but unfortunately I had technical difficulty. It turns out that the computers in the Peace Corps office have yet to be updated with the newest Office software and my new software on my computer was not compatible with the old version. I was really devastated because I knew there were so many people wanting for updates back home. I really appreciate your patience with the lack of technology in the Turkmen culture.
The week has been a very busy one! I literally have had language classes at least 5-6 hours a day. It is getting really overwhelming. Over the course of this week I have probably learned as much Turkmen as I have learned Spanish in my previous education (and I took 2 years of Spanish in HS and 1 semester in college). We go crazy fast and I really need to study a lot every night. It is really funny though. My group is really great and as I have mentioned, my teacher is AWESOME. On Thursday I got to go back to the school and observe my Turkmen English teacher counterpart teach her 2nd grade classroom. I think that visit was the first time I could really see the need for the Peace Corps in Turkmenistan. The resources that were available were nothing like the resources that were available for our American classrooms. There was literally one book for the whole class to learn from and that is the teacher’s copy. The teacher would literally have to write all of the lessons on the board with the translations for the kids to teach the lessons. Obviously, this took a lot of time out of the classroom and clearly not efficient. It was really sad… That might be a project I take on when I become a real volunteer, but it depends on the need in my community.
This week we also got to experience a lot of Turkmen culture in our class. Today we got to take a field trip (yeah Peace Corps is that cool… we get field trips) to the largest Bazaar in the world Tartuchca, located just outside of Ashgabat. Fortunately, we went of Saturday, which is a work day in Turkmenistan, so it wasn’t “too busy.” Unfortunately, because the Bazaar is so famous it is always really busy! Seriously this thing is so popular it is listed in 1000 Things to Do Before you Die (check that one off for me…). Anyways, the Bazaar literally has wall-to-wall booths and wall-to-wall people to go with them. Before visiting Tartuchca I really didn’t understand why the social phobia that is a fear of crowds, Agoraphobia, literally translated to “Fear of the Market” or “Bazaar” in Latin, now I get it. Visiting the bazaar is literally a full contact sport! People are pushing and shoving you all over the place and you should really wear protective gear, you have no idea how many little old ladies knocked me with their purses in the pursuit of a hot deal. You are also supposed to haggle at the Bazaar, unfortunately, I am not a very good haggler to begin with… throw in Turkmen and I am terrible! Oh well, it’s just a cultural adjustment I have to make. All things considered it was a successful trip to the bazaar; I came out with enough material for a Turkmen dress, a Turkmen headscarf (no I’m not becoming Muslim, they wear them because the sun is so hot that it beats down on their heads), and a delicious cold coke (a rarity here). Overall, it was tons of fun.
Let’s see what else happened… today was a busy day… Oh we also had our first birthday celebration in our group! Today was Eric’s birthday so we threw him a surprise party complete with gifts (toilet paper) and tort (Turkmen cake). He was so surprised and really thankful for our thoughtfulness. He was also overjoyed to get mass amounts of TP. We decided that you know you’re a Turkmen PCV when:
1) Every piece of paper you see you automatically think toilet paper and if you really need to go you grab it quickly and haul tail to the bathroom.
2) The best birthday present you receive is toilet paper.
Ok one more bit about culture before I hit the hay for the night. Tonight I also went to my first Turkmen Wedding Toy. It was kind of crazy. I think the best way I can describe it is it was like being in a really weird Bollywood Movie. Everyone was all dressed up in their fancy dresses and they blocked the whole street off with a huge stage for the band and tons of table for the guests, I guess it was kind of like a block party. What really made me think of it as a Bollywood movie was the fun dancing. Everyone danced by kind of waving their hands in the air in a circular motion and just walked around in a circle. The music is kind of intense… a lot of crazy keyboard with weird drums, it’s fun. We didn’t stay too long because my host Mom isn’t really a party person and we had to get my sister home so we mostly just stayed for dinner. I think she said we are going to another Toy tomorrow so maybe I’ll have more info about it. Apparently, October is a good month for Toys because it is right after Ramadan and everyone is in party mode because you can’t party during Ramadan.
All right that’s about all I got for you tonight. Tune in next time for my crazy Turkmen adventures!
October 24, 2008. The Intensity of PST, Breakdowns, Horses, and Mountains.
So ok it’s been a while since I typed here… sorry about that… I guess I got a little discouraged by the fact that I haven’t been able to get to Ashgabat to use the Peace Corps computers. That and they keep us intensely busy here with language and technical training, I really haven’t had time to update. For those considering Peace Corps a word of warning when they say the training is intense they aren’t trying to scare you… it’s really intense. It feels like we are treated like children sometimes and that can be frustrating. The schedule is nice, but the rules about not leaving your city without your host family is getting a little old, we all have cabin fever. Fortunately on the 28th we are allowed to travel without an LCF (Language and Cultural Facilitator) or our host family to Ashgabat… FREEDOM FINALLY! Or a little bit at least.
Anyways language language language… 4 hours a day of Turkmen 5 days a week is draining. I seriously get home everyday and just crash… I can barely find the time to study it’s so draining. It doesn’t help that I feel alienated from my other group members at times and miss everyone back home; that is emotionally draining. Fortunately, I am really starting to get the Turkmen language, I think, and can make simple and complex sentences. It’s just a matter of remembering the actual vocab. If you could see my bedroom you would see that this language surrounds me because I have posted post-its (Jackie and Crystal… best invention ever) of Turkmen words all around my room to learn through complete submersion. In like 4 weeks I will have my final language test where I will have to tell the Language Director all about myself, friends, and family, all in Turkmen. Needless to say I am freaking out about that, not that they will send me home if I fail, but it’s the principle of the idea… American culture has ruined how I see tests.
On top of language I also have technical training 4 hours a day 5 days a week working at the school. I absolutely love going to the school and a lot of times the technical stuff is enjoyable. My counterpart, Guljahan is in my mind the perfect fit for me in a counterpart because she really has a desire to work with me, learn from me, and teach me to teach at the same time. You couldn’t ask for anything better (I’ve seen some bad counterparts too… ask me about it later…). The best part about working at the school is obviously working with the kids. Guljahan teaches 7th form (grade) and most of those kids are so passionate about learning English and learning about America (the other kids could care less, like many typical 7th graders) they brighten my day. I love the school in my town I would actually like to stay here for my service, we shall see in 2 weeks where I will be placed. The unfortunate thing about the technical training is the overly high expectations the Peace Corps has for us, there literally isn’t enough time in the day to do everything they ask of us. I know the reasoning behind it is they want us to be well trained by the time we get to our permanent sites, but it’s like cramming way too much into a short period of time. I’m just taking it one week at a time.
These past 2 weeks my training group has been working on planning a 2-day Day Camp for the kids in our town and we finished up yesterday. We taught like 50-60 kids grades 3-7th about health and English through a combination of games, arts and crafts, songs, and sports. The kids absolutely loved it. We could have done anything with them for 4 hrs and they would have been happy. It’s so sad because a lot of times the kids here aren’t allowed to be kids. School is very ridged and many of the teachers do not incorporate fun activities in the learning because of the strict educational standards that are enforced by the government. It’s like all of the fun is sucked out of learning and there is no outlet for the children to have any fun, there’s not even time for them to run around at all during school and their parents/teachers rarely play with them (like yesterday for example, I had a group of girls that wanted me to play with them and for them ‘playing’ was literally just running around aimlessly, they couldn’t have been happier). It’s sad, but stirs my passion for them on a daily basis. I love these kids and they make all of the struggles and frustrations of PST worth it.
With all of the struggles of language and technical training and a few other things I had my first of probably many breakdowns last week. Last Friday everything was just becoming so overwhelming that I just broke down crying, fortunately, I found a great person to cry to… my LCF Mayagozel. I seriously, cried to her for about 2 hours last Friday and she was amazing. She told me everything I needed to hear and actually hugged me, I hadn’t had a real hug since the Airport in Detroit, and it was very comforting. She also encouraged me and told me how fortunate Turkmenistan was to have me here because she could see my passion for her people, a high praise. I will really miss her a lot after my PST; I really hope we can stay in contact because she is just that awesome.
Fortunately, Peace Corps recognizes the stress that volunteers are under and they are awesome about providing us with a variety of field trips on Saturdays around our training sites. Last week we got to go see prized traditional Turkmen horses! Wow, were they beautiful and so gentle too. I’ll try to post a few pictures from the outing. This week we finally visited the mountains just outside of our town. All I can say is that today was a perfect day to get out and be active. This morning tensions were running high in our language group for a variety of reasons and we all left for the mountains extremely frustrated and overall pissed with one another. Even Mayagozel was angry and frustrated. As soon as we got to the mountains though that all changed, we got all of our frustrations out by climbing and running through the amazing Turkmenistan wilderness and left laughing and just in a completely uplifted mood. It was everything we needed. I also must say it’s amazing to see what a woman can do in a traditional Turkmen dress on a rock wall with no rock climbing equipment! Mayagozel was climbing like crazy! I think I found out how she stays in such good shape, she rock climbs Turkmen style… Mayagozel translates to “beautiful camel” in Turkmen, but I think she needs a name change to Dalgecigozel or “beautiful mountain goat,” she was hardcore! I told her that and she just laughed at me and said “Abby, I mountain girl, I make you mountain girl too… either that or you go to Thailand” (where they send injured and ill T-Stan volunteers to recover, free of charge… thus implying that I might get seriously injured becoming a ‘mountain girl’) I’d be ok with that. Overall, it was an awesome day because we got our frustrations out and gained a little understanding of one another, hopefully some real friendships and support networks will be formed.
In fact we were in such great moods we are actually planning a get together on Monday (Turkmenistan’s Independence Day) to watch movies and drink a little bit. It’s funny though because drinking here for women is so taboo that we as American women can’t buy alcohol and everyone must sneak it into the house where we have our language learning and hide it if we see a Turkmen coming our way. It’s funny to me because I feel like an 18 year old freshman living in an Alcohol free Res-Hall and have to sneak beer into our room and hide it if we seen the RA coming our way. Not that I ever did that (I promise I didn’t Cathy… 
, but I’ve had to bust my fair share of alcohol situations. It’s like a little bit of Karma I guess.
Well, that’s about all I’ve got for now. Hopefully, I will get to update this thing next weekend… I know you’re al dying to know what is going on over here. Thanks again for your constant prayers and patience. I really appreciate that. Thank you too for everyone who has sent me letters! They are very touching and a sort of bragging rights over here among volunteers. They seriously mean a lot to me, also pictures are a huge bonus. Either colored drawings or pictures of yourself or your children, they are awesome and I love showing them to everyone. Please continue to write! I promise I’ll write back, probably a 5pg letter as that is about my usual. I love you all and miss you, but still feel like this is where I am supposed to be. God bless!
October 28, 2008 When in Turkmenistan do as the Turkmen do!
So yesterday was the Turkmen Independence Day so we got the day off to either go to Ashgabat with our families for the celebrations or just hang out. Our group has been extremely stressed lately and tensions have been running high so we decided we all could use some good R&R hanging out with one another. So we decided to celebrate Turkmen Style… aka bought 2 bottles of Vodka and a bottle of wine and just had a good ole time. Buying the Vodka and drinking it without the community knowing (because women can’t drink in my conservative town) the guys had to buy all of our Vodka and carry it back to our classroom for us. We couldn’t drink in any of our houses for the same reasons. We the proceeded to tape all of the windows with paper so no one could see the inside of the room from the outside and we kept the door closed and locked at all times. I seriously felt like I was back in college hiding alcohol from the RA… again not that I did drink in my dorm room because I didn’t, but that’s just how it felt. It was a lot of fun though to just relax and drink a little and spend quality time with my fellow trainees, it was something we hadn’t been able to do before. At the end of the day we polished off 1 ¾ of the Vodka and none of the wine (it was WAY too sweet). Overall, the perfect way to celebrate Independence Day!
