Today was permanent site announcement day. Of course, PC made us wait until the end of the day to tell us. Until then we had to endure more shots (I think I’ve gotten seven or eight by now), an informational session on hepatitis and tuberculosis, a session on the FLEX test, and a visit from a representative of the U.S. embassy. Finally we were all ushered to the balcony where they had drawn an outline of the country and its welyats (regions) in chalk on the floor. As each person learned where they were going, they stood in their welyat. My site is Balkanabat in the Balkan welyat. Balkanabat is the regional capital. According to previous volunteers and my LCF, there is more gender equality there and I would be able to live alone after three months if I wanted. The T-17 who is there now continues to live with her host family because they’re rich and she likes the arrangement. Balkan is the wealthy region of Turkmenistan as it is where the oil and natural gas money is. It’s also supposed to be being built up for tourism (which is kind of a joke considering the difficulty involved in obtaining permission to visit Turkmenistan). My host family is a 38 year old mom and her 14 year old daughter. Andrea and I were hoping to be placed in the same region, but she’s in the Lebap region. Still, I think the Anew groups will meet up occasionally. It may be harder for us when we go to permanent site since we’re so close. We hang out every day after lessons and usually get together on Sundays for ultimate or soccer. Case in point: after site announcements, when we got back to Anew, rather than go straight home, we went to the café and ordered șașlik (kebabs) and hung out for a few hours. It was really nice because we ordered lamb șașlik and it was really good. Plus, I had told my mom I’d be later, so I was able to stay as long as the others, which I normally don’t do. We had some good conversation.
Permanent Site Visit
For the past four days (Nov. 6-9) we’ve been at our permanent sites, visiting in order to meet our families and counterparts and orient ourselves with our areas. The day before site visit, my host family was changed. I was bummed because my new family had a dad and two sons with only the mom as a female presence. But there wasn’t anything I could do about it, so the next day I crowded into a taxi with two other volunteers and a random Turkmen and we headed up to the Balkan region. I was the last of the volunteers to be dropped off because I’m most north (except Phil, who got to fly to Turkmenbashi). The taxi ride was long and harrowing. The road is in really bad shape so we were jostled quite a bit. It’s about five hours from Ashgabat to Balkanabat. When I arrived at my school, the T-18a health volunteer, Lindsay, was there to meet me. She had a welcome packet with a map of the city she had drawn for me. It was super helpful. Then she and the T-17 volunteer, Megan, whom I’m replacing, took me to meet my host family. I love my host family placement! My host mom is very kind and soft-spoken and my two host brothers are eager to learn English. My host dad seems nice, though I didn’t interact with him as much as the others. They have a shower and washing machine and microwave. They send their older son to a private school, so it is obvious that they value education.
Balkanabat has an internet café, several interesting statues and monuments (including a camel statue), three bazaars and an import grocery store (imports from Russia and Turkey), and several cafés and restaurants. One of the restaurants has decent pizza; it’s where Megan hosted her going away party. It’s laid out on a grid so it’s an easy city to navigate. My house is in walking distance from just about everything, so I’m looking forward to having a healthier lifestyle there. Plus, they have a “health walk” up the mountain.
The school where I’ll be working is only two years old, so the facilities are nice (and there’s a bathroom right across the hall from my classroom). My counterpart has worked with PCVs before and is excited to work with me, as are a couple other English teachers there. The students are tickled pink about me being there as well. The school is only open in the morning, so I should be able to use a classroom in the afternoon for clubs. I’m hoping to have a club for adults as well. I was already approached by two who were interested in learning English.
There is a Russian Orthodox church near my school and I tried to figure out what time services are. That was an interesting experience, because I spoke broken Turkmen and the caretakers spoke Russian, so I had to resort to drawing a clock on my paper. I hear I will benefit from learning Russian as well, since there is a heavy Russian population in B-bat and all Turkmen there speak Russian, but not all the Russians speak Turkmen. Still, I need to get my T-men down first because Megan says it really helps with building relationships and integrating into the community. She said she often gets free taxi rides when she uses her T-men, because the drivers are so impressed that an American is speaking it. I did get a couple Russian phrase books from the PCV library to work with though. Even my T-men host mom wants to teach me Russian. The family likes Russian, especially Russian television, which is understandable because it IS way better than T-men TV.
Basically, B-bat is all I hoped for in a permanent site and more. I’m sure once I get there, I will have days where I’m down, but I definitely get a good vibe from it. Saturday, on my walk to school, I heard the bells of the church and looked off to the mountains as I meditated on their music. It was a very zen experience for me, akin to running in the rain. In that moment, I knew B-bat was the place for me! Thanks everyone for your prayers in this matter.