You Haven't Lived

Until you've seen a Russian-dubbed version of the Lindsay Lohan classic "Herbie: Fully Loaded." (Note to self: I don't want to live!) To be fair, I didn't actually watch all of it, and I was actually just starting to get into it when the power went out. I don't think I would admit this if I weren't several thousand miles and two oceans away from the nearest American friend or family member. But hopefully everyone I know will forget this comment by the time I move back.

Well, it's Christmas Eve in Kzylorda, and not a creature is stirring, not even the internet connection at Mega-Bait as I wait patiently for four different pages to load. For most of the month I hadn't really thought too much about Christmas, because unlike in America you don't get the bombardment of Christmas songs, Christmas ads, and Christmas decorations to get you constantly thinking about the holidays. There is some of it, but not nearly as much. But today as I was trying to describe to my language tutor in Kazakh some of our Christmas traditions, and especially as I was describing all the food I suddenly realized I'd be missing out on - the oyster stew, the roast beef, the potato-cheese-cornflake dish that I don't know how else to describe - I started to reminisce and it finally hit me all the great traditions I'd be missing (this also may have had to do with the fact that it was 2:00 and I hadn't eaten since the night before). I do think it will be good in the long run to miss a Christmas or two so that I appreciate it more and don't take it for granted, but I do miss being home this time of the year.

A few people have asked me this and yes, they do celebrate Christmas here. Sort of. They celebrate New Year's and have adopted/adjusted a lot of the Christmas traditions familiar to Americans for use on this holiday. For example, Ayaz-Ata (Frost Grandfather, or Santa Claus) brings gifts to everyone on New Year's Eve with his pretty young granddaughter, although I still haven't received a straight answer on how he gets around, whether it's by sled, by foot, or flying through the air like Superman. They also have "New Year's trees," and you do see some decorations around the city. There is a big fake New Year's Tree in the square, the center of the city, and exactly everyone here knows both Jingle Bells and We Wish You a Merry Christmas by heart, and exactly zero other Christmas songs.

It was also a nice Christmas Eve surprise to wake up this morning and see a small layer of snow on the ground, larger than the usual dusting of tiny ice particles that blow all over in the morning and melt by 11:00. I realized as soon as I walked outside though that it was less an early Christmas gift than a cold slap in the face, which is exactly what the wind felt like as it slammed against my face. (Some teachers in my department still said it "isn't that cold.") So my wait for the real winter continues on. Eventually I'm going to have to call them all out on their lie, especially if the calendar switches to February and it still "isn't cold yet."

Not a lot to update in the teaching department, seeing as how I'm not exactly teahing again until mid-January. One student is prepared to sing Rocking Around the Christmas Tree and Jingle Bell Rock for a New Year's celebration on Thursday. Hopefully it will happen and I'll be able to get a video of it; she's got an excellent voice. I keep trying to get other students to sing with her, since these are two more upbeat songs that work better with a group than solo, but everyone else says they don't have good singing voices. Though it's frustrating to repeatedly hear this answer, I can't say I would have been any different, especially thinking back to elementary school when I was one of four students in a group of 120 that didn't participate in the end-of-year 5th grade chorus. How the tables have turned...

Well Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays again to everyone. I'll be heading into school tomorrow, but I can't really complain as I don't really have anything to do right now. All the other teachers are giving exams, and I'm playing snake on my cell phone. So it's less that I'm "working" on Christmas than just showing up. Hope it's a good holiday back home, I miss everyone.

Cats and Kazakhstan

First I'll apologize in advance to Phillies fans for even the possibility of having to see Sidney Ponson fill out a uniform next year. (And trust me it will be full.) I just don't understand what any team could see in him. And I think I'm pretty happy with the Tejada trade- sad to see him go but if you get 5 guys in return, at least one of them has to turn out good. Right?

And the latest blow to Orioles fans in the steroids fallout is Brian Roberts??!!! admitting to use. To be honest, I'm not that surprised though, with him or anyone else. And my two cents, if someone says they "tried" it once or twice, they probably did more than that.

Moving on, my family has obtained a pet cat, whom they've lovingly named "Lapichka," which means "Honey" or "Cutey" in Russian. Which reminds me of an old Tonight Show exchange between Norm MacDonald and Jay Leno:

Norm: "I have a cat now."

Jay: "Oh, I didn't know you were a cat lover?"

Norm: "No I don't love them, but I have one."

Although our relationship started out rocky, with Lapichka running all over and attacking my lesson plans - not sure what they were doing to him besides sitting on the table - and climbing into any plastic bag he could find, and my blood pressure skyrocketing to unsafe levels, things have calmed down a little bit, and we are starting to get along better. For example, he now knows not to enter my room unless he wants to be tossed into the hall, so he seems to enter less often. (I toss him gently.) He also has the loudest meow I've ever heard and sharpest claws I've ever had dug into my thighs. But...(can't think of positive comment to balance this out)

Pete, does this remind you of someone? Maybe someone named Wily?

The President Bush questions keep coming, and I keep saying I don't feel comfortable discussing the issue. He only has a year left in office anyway, so why don't we discuss the upcoming election? Maybe I'll have my agent issue a statement. But I did find it interesting that one time when the students were asking me how I felt about my president, and I said a lot of people don't like him because of the Iraq War, one girl said "but maybe you will thank him for it someday." And another girl said she didn't like his policies. So, after an extensive scientific poll, I've found that Kazakhstanis are split on President Bush, 50/50.

And as for the teaching, it's certainly made me reflect back on how I was as a student, and this has usually made me cringe. I do remember the class Pete and I had together - Discrete Mathematics - where the professor said that if 10 or fewer people came to class on any given day, everyone in attendance would receive 5 bonus points on the next test. As Pete describes it, I would usually walk in about 15 minutes late, usually the eleventh student, and I would hear a collective groan from everyone in the class.

It's difficult, if not impossible, to see things from the teacher's perspective until you are a teacher. I'm hoping that the last 4 weeks have been all the penance I'll be required to perform for falling asleep in class, coming in late, not participating, etc. etc. and that next semester will start anew. But it will be a challenge to make that the case. And on that note, I want to make a blanket apology to every teacher I've ever had. If I go back to school after this, I guarantee I will be a better student.

In case I don't get a chance to post again, Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, Happy New Year, Happy Ait (Kazakh Muslim holiday). I hope everyone in the US has an awesome holiday season.

Thanks for all the steroids updates. It seems to me as though you could juxtapose the Orioles' cumulative record over the last 10 seasons with the percentage of their players that used steroids and make a pretty good case that this steroid thing isn't really that big a deal. They obviously don't work.

I have to say I'm not that surprised with any of the names, seeing as several of them had been leaked periodically over the last couple years. And honestly I'm just happy that Cal's name wasn't in the report- that was my biggest fear. I would have had to seriously re-evaluate my life if that had been the case.

As for things here, Christmas is approaching, although it doesn't feel much like Christmas without Lite 98's nonstop Christmas carols from Thanksgiving to New Year's. I guess I unintentionally filled this void in my life by having all 10 of my classes learn Jingle Bell Rock and Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree this past week. So I heard each of these at least 30 times in seven days. I don't recommend anyone trying this. We also did what turned out to be a fun activity- Mad Libs with Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. In one of my favorite versions, Rudolph became a yellow-legged wolf with a "head so enormous" and had to guide Santa's girl. The students found their Rudolph stories extremely funny and they were all engaged in the activity, so I counted it a success.

Classes I don't count successes- when the students approach me in the hall and ask if they can go home early because they "have no more classes," even when they have a class with me in 30 minutes. The gall some of my students have is pretty unbelievable. But I'm hopeful things will improve next semester as I start to feel more comfortable as a teacher.

A Quick One

After waiting over an hour for internet, I have successfully checked all my emails and facebook. Not much new to report here, except that I've been recruited to participate in the upcoming teachers' athletic competition in January. It looks like I will either be a competitor or coach in the following events: volleyball, basketball, ping-pong, darts, "shooting," and soccer. I'm still not sure what "shooting" refers to, but the way it was described to me was a teacher held up her hands as if to aim a gun. My best guesses are archery or laser tag, but it will probably be something completely different.

Before I leave, I just wanted to say happy birthday to my sister Betsy. It's one day early, but I guess I have to start chipping away at all the years I was late and waited until Christmas to give you a gift. (Sorry!) Enjoy it and good luck on your finals next week, and continued success with season two of the cooking show.

First Day of Winter

I'd like to start by quickly wishing everyone a happy first day of winter. In Kazakhstan, the beginning of winter is celebrated on December 1, and they absolutely refuse to hear any arguments about the winter solstice, so it's easier to just go along with it. So happy winter, and what an exciting time of the year it is! The temperature is dropping rapidly, the wind is blowing harder, the heat has been out in our apartment for the last few days, icicles are forming on my clothes as they "dry" outside. It's the most wonderful time of the year.

I'm exaggerating a little bit, although soon I probably won't be. I was walking to the bazaar talking to my host sister the other day, and while I was trying to shield my face from the whipping sub-zero winds she started telling me about "when it gets cold." I tried to ask her to clarify what she meant but my lips had frozen shut, so I could only make a few quiet sounds.

Teaching is going fine, and I haven't gotten any hard-hitting questions since the first week. I gave a 100-minute lesson to my cross-cultural classes about the history of the US Educational system this week. And I think everyone knows how much of an expert I am on this topic, so it went great. In all seriousness it did go okay, because since the students don't understand everything I say, I have to repeat myself often and make sure they are understanding. They seemed particularly interested in the topic of segregation in education (and in the US in general), and didn't really know much about it, so it was interesting for me to talk on that subject.

I only have about two weeks left of teaching before the students take their exams, and then there is a 3-4 week break, so for roughly 6 weeks I will not have a whole lot to do, and I haven't decided yet how I will fill this time. I'm pretty sure though that whatever it is it will involve a lot of rubbing my hands together next to a heater.

In other news I now spend my weeknights watching a Korean romantic comedy/sitcom that is dubbed into Russian, and translated for me into English by my host sister. Some things I think get lost in the translation though because I end up hearing a lot of lines like "You are permitted to try to date me" and "You are a stupid hen!" The name of the show, after being translated from Korean into Russian into Kazakh into English by my language tutor, means "Hot Nest," but the translation that the show uses is "Full House," which is fitting because this was my favorite show growing up. And the only thing this show is missing is a Korean Danny Tanner. I hope to find a DVD copy dubbed into English soon and eventually bring it back to the US, mainly to find out if other people think it is a good show too or if I am just crazy.

That's about it for now. I'll try to post something again this week- hopefully there will be something worth posting!