Time Flies When You're Busy!

Here it is, the end of April! Time seems to have gone by so quickly! Well, here’s a recap of what has been going on:
· Easter Celebration! Tanya’s mom made each of us a bag of goodies! A few colored eggs, some candy, and a traditional Russian cake that is made especially during Easter. It was like having an Easter basket back home. I also learned that it is a Russian thing, that when someone says “Jesus has risen”, every one responds by saying “it is true”.
It was a wonderful day!
· The following Saturday our team went to the mountains! It was my first visit to the mountains since my arrival in Kyrgyzstan, and the mountains are beautiful! On our way, we drove by rolling green hills with horses and cattle grazing, a winding creek, and the mountains rising up all around you. It was amazing! We pulled off the side of the road and found a nice spot to have our picnic. We had a nice time- played some football (soccer), ate some hotdogs, a couple different salads, and cookies- it was good! Afterwards, we all just hung out on the rocks in and around the creek. I felt like a lizard, laying on a smooth rock, basking in the sunshine! It was very relaxing. As I looked around, I couldn’t help but be in awe over God’s creation! It is comforting to know that such an awesome God loves and cares for me! How great He is!
· Our team also went and visited a home for the elderly. We had prepared a bag of goodies for each of them- with socks, chocolate, and other items in it. When we got there, we talked with some of the people until everyone had come into the room, and then everyone introduced themselves- our name, where we were from, how old we were. Then we all played a game and it was a lot of fun! Afterward, our team sang some songs and Sergey shared a message. Then we had some more time to talk with them, and it is times like this that I wish I knew the language fluently! The home is not too far from our house, so I hope to go back and visit again!
· Back by popular demand- there was another baseball game! Yeah! It was fun- but then again, when is playing baseball not fun? We did not have as many people as before but it was a short notice game and everyone still had a good time!
· English clubs are going really well! Many people are coming and I’ve realized that I am pretty clueless when it comes to grammar. I don’t ever remember learning about present continuous participles, or whatever. But I love to share about idioms! It is fun to explain why and when we say such phrases like: hit the road, grin and bear it, foot in the door, and keep your nose to the grindstone, and how they came about. Though some of them are pretty out dated and I try to think of some more modern phrases. For example, on one of the papers was the phrase “far out”. Then there is always explaining the difference between British English and American English, because here and pretty much everywhere else they learn British English. So things like torch and flat have different meanings depending on which English you are using.

Well, I now have a weekly schedule of activities which is nice, but it is easy to get caught up in the business of it all! So I try to set aside some time for other important things like resting and refueling both physically and spiritually, spending time with people, and of course updating my blog!

Where there's fire...there's marshmallows

Monday, Natasha and I went to the street shops near the Orthodox church. On our way, we passed a gardening store. We have been talking about fixing up the yard now that it is spring and planting some grass seed and maybe some flowers. So we stopped in on our way back home and bought a rake and some grass seed, and I had bought some daisies from a lady on the street. We were so excited to get to work!! It was a lot of work but now things look pretty nice. We can’t wait till the grass starts growing! We also have a bunch of sticks and branches for a fire one of these nights. Katie, a girl from the UK had mentioned something about roasting marshmallows and I am all for that! But it reminds me of a previous conversation I had with two of the girls here when I had mentioned it…it seems that this is not a universal treat. It is often questioned why Americans roast marshmallows. And the immediate conclusion is that they, Americans, are too poor to buy meat to roast. But then I tried to explain that we also roast meat, and then we roast marshmallows for dessert and make smores with crackers and chocolate. But I think that was not very appetizing to them either.

On the subject of fires- It is true that you often bring your cultural rules with you, and thus another cultural lesson which I have learned….our house has a nice courtyard, and so when I was thinking about having nice fires at night, I remembered the metal fire thing we have in our yard back in NY, everyone can sit around it, it contains the fire nicely, because being in town you can’t just have an open fire. So being in a city of 1 million people, I commented to Tanya that maybe I would look for something to have as a fire pit, and that drew a very inquisitive look from Tanya. So I began to explain what it was and why we had one back home and she said it was not necessary. There are no fire regulations of that sort here. Which made me a little concerned, but also made me laugh when I thought what my brother, who is a volunteer fireman, would say. Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve seen anything of a fire truck or a fire station here. Maybe that is why they are building a new house on the empty lot on our street!

Another Saturday Night

On Saturday night I went with Natasha. She has an aerobics/dance class for girls. It was a lot of fun and good exercise. So maybe girls here aren’t into sports, but they like dance! Afterwards, in the same place, we set up for English club, where we watch a movie in English and then after the movie, the people are able to ask questions about certain words or phrases they didn’t understand, or just discuss the movie. This Saturday we watched the movie “End of the Spear”, we talked about the love of the women who went to the tribe after their husbands were killed by the natives, and how love like that is from God; and why the men never shot back when they were being attacked. It was good to hear the responses of the people in the room. Maybe it will be something that they think more about.

The Kyrgyz Bunch

Here’s the story of two lovely ladies, who are serving in the country of Kyrgyzstan,
Lisa is serving in Tallas with the Peace Corps, and I am here in Bishkek.

So how did this girl from California, happen to meet this girl from New York?
They were strangers until this summer, united by Kyrgyzstan.

At a training I sat by a guy named Derrick, and as I shared where I was going,
He said I have a friend who’s there with the Peace Corps,
And that’s the way that we became to meet in Bishkek!
In Bishkek! In Bishkek! Yes that’s the way we became to meet in Bishkek!

For those of you who do not like the Brady Bunch or are having a hard time remembering the opening song, or are having a hard time making my lyrics fit the tune, here is the same story in plain written English…..

Today, Thursday, was a good day, because today I finally met Lisa. She has been here in Kyrgyzstan for over a year working with the Peace Corps in Tallas. We got acquainted over email this past year and she was very helpful about answering my questions and sharing about her experiences in Kyrgyzstan before I arrived. So I was excited to hear that she would be passing through Bishkek and so we made plans to meet. We met at the Philharmonia and headed to dinner at the METRO. The Metro is a restaurant which mainly serves American style food. So it was a very agreeable place to go and eat! We had a good time talking and got to know a little bit more about each other and our experiences here. Plus, we each had a cheeseburger and fries! Yum! Unfortunately her term with the Peace Corps ends this year but I hope to go and visit her this summer out in Tallas, before she heads back to the States. It is pretty interesting how we got connected. At one of my trainings this summer out in Indiana, I sat at a random table for lunch, I didn’t know anyone at the table, it’s good to meet people that way and hear about their ministries. So we were all sharing about where and what we were doing with YFC and when I had mentioned that I was going to Kyrgyzstan, one of the guys at the table said the he had a friend in the PC in Kyrgyzstan. Then he introduced Lisa and I via email and that’s the way we got to know each other, and so it was nice to finally meet face to face!