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!