A non-chronological rundown from A to Z of what I’ve neglected to report since I last wrote:
A – Archives, in both Russia and Tajikistan. I have been surprised in the last six weeks to learn just how much bureaucracy and apparently arbitrary and informal adjustments to bureaucratic rules really do differ between TJ and RU. I’m sorry I have to be reminded, but I do often forget that it is wrong to lump these two together into a single category. If you want to be wowed, I suggest you work for several months just trying to get registered and allowed to see documents in the sad national archive of a regressing Central Asian nation, and then go overnight to the beautiful oasis of the main reading room at GARF (State Archive of the Russian Federation), with its computerized index system and terminals at each reader station. But be careful not to faint from shock.
B – Buzkashi. The art of dragging around a goat carcass and fighting over it from your position atop a galloping horse. See photo essay.
C – Cheeses. Twelve of them, packed in multiple plastic bags, ziplocs, and stuffed together with a gift freezer pack in Paris into suitcase #3, only to emerge upon arrival in Tajikistan still cool and smelling wonderful. Now awaiting experimental freezing.
D – Disease. Luckily for Anya, only “angina” which, I guess contrary to our use of the word in English (from the Latin for choking or congestion) in reference to chest constriction and heart disease, in French refers to something like tonsillitis or strep throat. It was the sickest she’s actually been her whole life, but she was still a trooper. And our visit to the French pediatrician in Tonnere, France, renewed our already high respect for socialized medicine – bring on that Obamacare, thank you very much!
E – Embroidery. To my great disappointment, I must admit, the needlework has stalled out! But for a good reason: renewed research inspiration and necessity (much-procrastinated research trip to Moscow) made me turn away from the embroidery kind of right at the point where I was going the strongest on it, unfortunately. But I am really glad to feel the new boost in creativity and production, and the work is fun. Whether to keep up with the crafts in this current phase of Dushanbe life is my next decision…
F – France. Mmmmm, 2 weeks binging in the heartland of duck confit, terrine and paté, fromages hard and soft (especially soft and runny Epoisses and Chablis, my favorite of our discoveries), red wine (Burgundy, to be exact), and escargots (Anya to Dan: “dai mne eshche ulitku! [give me another snail!]”). Throw a few raw oysters – and whelks and winkles – on top and you pretty much have our vacation in a nut (or snail) shell.
G – Grandparents. Had a great time with 2 of them in the French countryside – Anya for 2 days longer than we did, and apparently all 3 of them had a blast.
H – Hotels, good and bad. FYI, in Autun, it's probably wise to splurge on the Hotel les Ursulines up in the old town, with the beautiful enclosed garden, despite the nondescript rooms. The incompetent front desk manager at the Hotel St. Louis et de la Poste downtown (together with the single, yet surely not solitary, cockroach we spied) made that one a bust. And the experience kind of ruined the whole next 24 hours, to be honest.
I – Insects. Fleas to be precise, which are the most bothersome ones that have visited us (and apparently left, during our vacation) over the last few months. But with the onset of spring the aphids on the fruit trees in our yard have also come out of hibernation. We are trying to spray with soap and water, but is it possible that Central Asian aphids are immune to this approach?
J – Jeans. In addition to the fact that the fashion right now is very clearly to tuck these into your tall, but flat-heeled, boots, I gleaned many other fashion tid-bits during my many hours walking from archive to archive, and people watching, in Moscow.
K – Kyrgyzstan. In truth, this doesn’t really deserve to be on this list, since ironically (and probably luckily) we could hardly feel further from the unrest and changes there. That is not to say that it might not spill over – you definitely never know. But so far it really seems not to have one iota of an influence here in Tajikistan, and in a practical way for us that is a good thing. In the larger picture I am not so sure that it is in the best interests of Tajikistan’s citizenry to be so complacent, but I am not complaining right now. The “revolution” – or maybe “coup” – occurred while I was in Moscow, and actually I probably knew more about it learning about it from that location than from home in Dushanbe, since while I was there I had the time and the inclination to watch the news quite diligently (and even discuss all of the very interesting, mainly tragic or disturbing, current events, from Kyrgyzstan to Katyn to the Moscow metro, with my landlady). It kind of felt like I was at the center of a much more connected universe while I was in Moscow, while here in Dushanbe everything typically seems very insular, very isolated from what is happening in the outside world. In any case, I include this mention here mainly since so many people have asked us about events in the neighboring ‘stan.
L – Lady drivers. It seems I’m one of them again. More precisely, for some reason when spring arrives in Tajikistan, not only do the local men do a typical double-take for women walking and perhaps wearing something pretty (a revealing mid-calf kurta, or what have you), apparently they also have a habit of looking twice and even staring when they see a woman behind the wheel. Come to think of it, women and kids will crane their necks to check it out, too. It’s just that shocking a sight to see.
M – Moscow! What a big, bewildering city it really is – I had a great time, and although after two and a half weeks there I was ready to get back to the slow pace of life in Dushanbe (and my peeps), the hustle and bustle was pretty fun to experience. It was my first time really living in the city (and right downtown, in a great location, steps away from Kievskaya metro station) and exploring it myself – the town I know best is Petersburg, and Nizhnii Novgorod I suppose is a close second. (Sorry, Vladivostok, I guess you take bronze.) I think I might not even mind spending some extended time in Moscow in the future (although maybe I’d get sticker shock if we really were to live there for a stint, not just visit short term).
N – Navruz. After a week of sun and warmth leading up to the biggest Central Asian holiday of the year, with people getting positively punch-drunk on the weather, it was a big dud. Rainy and cold. Certainly not inspiring for anyone to wear their new kurta, especially if it is still far from being completed…
O – Other scholars/academics. This spring has brought a lot more contact with researchers here in this part of the world, surprisingly many of them here in Dushanbe. It started with the German grad student, studying Soviet history, whom I met by sheer luck near the end of her 5 year stint here in Dushanbe. (5 years because she is also a spouse and mother raising her small kids here; she wasn’t spending the entire time doing full-time dissertation work.) Then it gathered steam with the grad students I met in Moscow, and now, partly because it is summer (those US based academics are smart: avoid Tajikistan in the winter. What a good idea!), there are 3 grad students here in town whom I know. I also met an inspiring independent scholar from Canada and I hope soon to formally meet the German scholar who was working at the desk next to me at the archives today. It’s gotten to the point that I am seriously planning to have an academic dinner party soon, before some of these folks cycle out of here and the population dwindles again.
P – Potty Progress. Hooray! Big girl undies (thin, no soaker panel) + possibly an unusual time-out from preschool teachers in response to her last real accident = I guess a month or more of dryness and a nearly perfect (I’d say ‘spotless’ but that wasn’t actually our problem…) record with trips to the toilet.
Q – “Quiet time.” This was how I explained to Anya what the side chapels in the several French cathedrals we visited were for. She started wanting to go in them with me to catch some together.
R – Rain. Unfortunately we departed from rainy spring weather in Tajikistan (where it is at least warm) only to be met by rain and half-century record low temperatures hovering at or under 10C in France. And now we've returned to TJ, where the rains are just an annoyance in Dushanbe but have left over a thousand people homeless and camped out in the stadium in the southern city of Kulob. Anya and I tried to make a small contribution to help Monday when we brought 4 bags of things of hers and mine that are either no longer worn or have been outgrown to donate for local efforts to assist in Tajikistan’s south.
S – Spring! and the arrival of the “Season”: the season for produce in Tajikistan, that is. When even the neighborhood bazaar has strawberries (sad and soggy though they may be) for sale, you know the highwater mark of fruit and veg season is just around the corner. Sure, you’re still advised to make the trip to Green Bazaar for really good quality and selection, but the season has arrived, for sho’.
T – Train travel. And the miracle of catching our Frankfurt-Paris train, for which we had planned a layover of 3 hours. Ultimately we had to run for it in the 45-minute interval that Somon Air's delayed arrival afforded us. (Anya to Lisa the night before the return trip, in Paris: “Will we have to run for the train again? I didn’t like that.”)
U – Umbrella. Anya was pleased as punch to be given a Winnie-the-Pooh children’s (hey, they probably make them in adult sizes, so I might need to specify) umbrella, after a shopping spree in the hypermarché outside Autun. (Shopping therapy after our bad experience at the hotel? It’s possible.) It made the trip home just fine packed in a suitcase and still hasn’t broken. Surely better quality construction than the 9-somoni jobbie I bought her at the bazaar in Khujand in the winter.
V – Vaccines. The polio outbreak in Tajikistan has given me reason to renew my earlier interest in polio vaccines, both injected/inactivated and oral/live, albeit from a very different perspective. Anya got her first round of the OPV booster series today. The situation is truly serious, but for kids who have received good quality vaccines so far and are up to date like Anya there should not be an extreme risk. With that firmly in mind, I actually think it might do us a lot of good if more academics had to deal with their topics of heated abstract discussion in direct and concrete relationship to their own or their kids' lives. But I guess that probably isn't a widely applicable or appropriate thing to wish for. The experiences is actually very enlightening and provides fascinating insight.
W – Water, dirty. Spring rains (well, any rains, really) bring “brown baths,” as Anya has called them since her first ever dip in the tub here in Dushanbe, a year and a half ago. The water from the tap used to be brown all the time, but shortly after we moved in the city did some improvements (yes, it happens), and the quality on a typical day improved. But we are reminded right now of how extremely cloudy and dingy that water can get. At least it serves as a good reminder that it wouldn’t be wise to drink out of the tap!
X – Хозяйка. Or khoziaika. That is, “landlady.” I had a really good one in Moscow for the 2 weeks I rented a room in her apartment – it was a surprisingly nice arrangement for me, working for many hours during the day and into the evening at the archives, and coming home to have a bit of dinner or tea in the kitchen with Inna Zinovievna.
Y – Yoga! So glad that Dushanbe has seen a renaissance (or I guess simply naissance?) of it in the last 6 months. I am happy to say I’m back to 2 times practicing per week (when not on vacation – but I did go to 2 overpriced yoga sessions in Moscow!).
Z – From Anya Z. (Vladivostok friend) through the mid-alphabet, mid-Europe Meilak, to Berkeley’s own Z-spot, visited with lots of friends we hadn’t seen in years during the past few months’ travels. It's a good thing to do, since living over here, even in this internet-, Facebook-friendly age, means we still aren't able to keep in contact as often as we'd like with people we care about. Sometimes the isolation here just makes us sluggish and complacent in that frame of mind, and the months stretch on and the messages (and blog posts) don't get written. So it was really good to reconnect with so many friends (and family) over these past 80 days.
Showing posts with label shopping. Show all posts
Showing posts with label shopping. Show all posts
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Tajik Progress
Ҳоло ман бе шумо мехоҳам дар бораи забони тоҷикӣ гап занам. Ё нависам. Ана дар ҳақиқат фарқ дорад? Дар ҳақиқат дорад, лекин барои ман инҷо муҳим нист. Ман мехоҳам нақл кунам, ки ман нӯҳ моҳ забони тоҷикӣро меомузам, кӯшиш мекунам гап занам...
OK, so I continue to try to learn Tajik, taking private lessons two hours per week since right about the start of this year, or about nine months. I continue most of the time to feel as though I am making glacial-speed progress if I'm moving forward at all, although every now and then I feel some positive energy that allows me to think that maybe I actually am getting somewhere.
I always need to remind myself, I have after all studied Russian on and off, in and out of the classroom, since first beginning it in 1988 -- for twenty-one years! I can't expect, er, Dushanbe to be built in one day, right?
I think part of the difficulty is the variation and lack of standardization in Tajik. Especially if Russian is the yardstick, Tajik is really much different: the regions of Tajikistan are so separate, and you're constantly hearing how different from one another in culture and dialect the north and south are.
The written language and the spoken language are pretty far apart from one another, too -- not unlike in Farsi, but this pair with its own Tajik idiosyncrasies. You can't learn everything of course, so I guess if anything I'm trying to build up some basic ability in spoken Tajik, and then I also try to read some twentieth-century non-fiction (hoping that maybe in this coming year I can hobble through a few newspapers and journals) with my teacher.
Still, it's frustrating -- and I know that ironically part of the reason I don't make faster progress in Tajik is that I do speak Russian fairly comfortably, if not always totally fluently. In any of the interactions where I'd otherwise be forced to practice my Tajik and barely muddle through that way, the most obvious answer from the point of view of efficiency is to just switch into (or, really, remain speaking) Russian. Why speak like a 3-year-old (and that is being very generous to me, or very insulting to a 3-year-old Tajik), when I can speak pretty much from my own stage of mental development in Russian?
The one exception remains the bazaar.
This is why I'm so reluctant to ask someone else to take over our routine shopping: I could ask the housekeeper to get things for us, or the odd-jobs guy we are considering hiring since our friends and his employers left Dushanbe... But if I did that, I'd never practice my Tajik outside of class!
Just this weekend, for instance, my visit to the bustling pre-Eid Barakat bazaar was a fun little chance to see the sellers I regularly buy from and practice a little Tajik. (For some reason I chose the Saturday before Eid to set out to out the Green Market again after a long absence, despite oaths that I would avoid it and the parking hell that reigns on the streets surrounding the market. I could tell several blocks before the bazaar itself that this was a bad idea and luckily was able to turn and escape all of the mishigas. I guess what had inspired me go was the news from along the expat grapevine that avocadoes and limes had been available from one of the sellers. My friends bought the guy's entire stock, but I was tempted to see what other goodies I was missing out on. I think post-Eid I am going to try to go once every couple of weeks... In any case, the Barakat pavilion interior in the photo here was from earlier this summer, on a very empty weekday afternoon.)
At Barakat, the older lady who sells chakka (thick, pasty, tart Tajik yogurt) just inside the pavilion greeted me warmly after my absence (with the traffic torn up and redirected in this part of downtown, I haven't gotten to Barakat as often as I used to). We had the typical greeting exchange, asking after each other's health, and then she sold me my usual 2-somoni handful of chakka, and invited me to her house for Eid on Monday. I did what I hope is an acceptable way of not actually accepting the invitation, smiling, thanking her but stopping short of saying I would come. At least this is what I have been doing about once a day with our next-door neighbor ever since we arrived, in response to his everyday invitations of "coming by" and having plov or tea.
The homely potato-carrot-and-onion seller I go to at the bazaar was also happy to see me. He is actually the brother of the usual guy, but normally they are there working their stand together. Originally I chanced upon the brother who wasn't there today, who at least in my experience seems to be the front man of the operation. To my surprise, he came out with shockingly good English the first time I bought my taters from him (surely choosing to do that because it is clear from about 5 miles away that I am not local -- the really naive ones must think I'm Russian). With this pair of brothers, I usually try to speak Tajik to them and the one brother tries to speak English back to me, as a kind of equal exchange. Today the English-speaker was gone, but the brother who apparently has just the typical Tajik and Russian greeted me with a crooked smile and tried to explain to me everything about fasting for Ramadan (like I hadn't already gotten used to the concept for the past month, but whatever -- it's about the cultural exchange, not about the content, much of the time...).
Then I went to the only melon seller on the side of the pavilion where I was (Barakat was a mess of pre-Eid shoppers too, I wasn't going to traipse around any more than I had to), and here I was out of my element and didn't have anyone familiar to go to. These melon guys immediately started out in Russian, which on the one hand I speak better, but on the other already feels to me like I'm down a few chips in the bargaining process and I have to work to clamber back uphill. Unfortunately I think I got a jacked-up Eid-eve price on my sweet melon -- not necessarily because I'm a foreigner, but it probably didn't help matters.
All that really matters is that I had a pleasant, relatively quick, shopping trip, re-connected a bit with my bazaar peeps, and ensured we'd eat at least one last melon before the season ends. And, as an added bonus, the sellers assured me that I was buying the sweetest melon of the bunch: "guaranteed to do wonders for a lady's figure!" I think they stopped just short of offering a "one-time special price" just for me.
OK, so I continue to try to learn Tajik, taking private lessons two hours per week since right about the start of this year, or about nine months. I continue most of the time to feel as though I am making glacial-speed progress if I'm moving forward at all, although every now and then I feel some positive energy that allows me to think that maybe I actually am getting somewhere.
I always need to remind myself, I have after all studied Russian on and off, in and out of the classroom, since first beginning it in 1988 -- for twenty-one years! I can't expect, er, Dushanbe to be built in one day, right?
I think part of the difficulty is the variation and lack of standardization in Tajik. Especially if Russian is the yardstick, Tajik is really much different: the regions of Tajikistan are so separate, and you're constantly hearing how different from one another in culture and dialect the north and south are.
The written language and the spoken language are pretty far apart from one another, too -- not unlike in Farsi, but this pair with its own Tajik idiosyncrasies. You can't learn everything of course, so I guess if anything I'm trying to build up some basic ability in spoken Tajik, and then I also try to read some twentieth-century non-fiction (hoping that maybe in this coming year I can hobble through a few newspapers and journals) with my teacher.
Still, it's frustrating -- and I know that ironically part of the reason I don't make faster progress in Tajik is that I do speak Russian fairly comfortably, if not always totally fluently. In any of the interactions where I'd otherwise be forced to practice my Tajik and barely muddle through that way, the most obvious answer from the point of view of efficiency is to just switch into (or, really, remain speaking) Russian. Why speak like a 3-year-old (and that is being very generous to me, or very insulting to a 3-year-old Tajik), when I can speak pretty much from my own stage of mental development in Russian?
The one exception remains the bazaar.
This is why I'm so reluctant to ask someone else to take over our routine shopping: I could ask the housekeeper to get things for us, or the odd-jobs guy we are considering hiring since our friends and his employers left Dushanbe... But if I did that, I'd never practice my Tajik outside of class!
Just this weekend, for instance, my visit to the bustling pre-Eid Barakat bazaar was a fun little chance to see the sellers I regularly buy from and practice a little Tajik. (For some reason I chose the Saturday before Eid to set out to out the Green Market again after a long absence, despite oaths that I would avoid it and the parking hell that reigns on the streets surrounding the market. I could tell several blocks before the bazaar itself that this was a bad idea and luckily was able to turn and escape all of the mishigas. I guess what had inspired me go was the news from along the expat grapevine that avocadoes and limes had been available from one of the sellers. My friends bought the guy's entire stock, but I was tempted to see what other goodies I was missing out on. I think post-Eid I am going to try to go once every couple of weeks... In any case, the Barakat pavilion interior in the photo here was from earlier this summer, on a very empty weekday afternoon.)
At Barakat, the older lady who sells chakka (thick, pasty, tart Tajik yogurt) just inside the pavilion greeted me warmly after my absence (with the traffic torn up and redirected in this part of downtown, I haven't gotten to Barakat as often as I used to). We had the typical greeting exchange, asking after each other's health, and then she sold me my usual 2-somoni handful of chakka, and invited me to her house for Eid on Monday. I did what I hope is an acceptable way of not actually accepting the invitation, smiling, thanking her but stopping short of saying I would come. At least this is what I have been doing about once a day with our next-door neighbor ever since we arrived, in response to his everyday invitations of "coming by" and having plov or tea.
The homely potato-carrot-and-onion seller I go to at the bazaar was also happy to see me. He is actually the brother of the usual guy, but normally they are there working their stand together. Originally I chanced upon the brother who wasn't there today, who at least in my experience seems to be the front man of the operation. To my surprise, he came out with shockingly good English the first time I bought my taters from him (surely choosing to do that because it is clear from about 5 miles away that I am not local -- the really naive ones must think I'm Russian). With this pair of brothers, I usually try to speak Tajik to them and the one brother tries to speak English back to me, as a kind of equal exchange. Today the English-speaker was gone, but the brother who apparently has just the typical Tajik and Russian greeted me with a crooked smile and tried to explain to me everything about fasting for Ramadan (like I hadn't already gotten used to the concept for the past month, but whatever -- it's about the cultural exchange, not about the content, much of the time...).
Then I went to the only melon seller on the side of the pavilion where I was (Barakat was a mess of pre-Eid shoppers too, I wasn't going to traipse around any more than I had to), and here I was out of my element and didn't have anyone familiar to go to. These melon guys immediately started out in Russian, which on the one hand I speak better, but on the other already feels to me like I'm down a few chips in the bargaining process and I have to work to clamber back uphill. Unfortunately I think I got a jacked-up Eid-eve price on my sweet melon -- not necessarily because I'm a foreigner, but it probably didn't help matters.
All that really matters is that I had a pleasant, relatively quick, shopping trip, re-connected a bit with my bazaar peeps, and ensured we'd eat at least one last melon before the season ends. And, as an added bonus, the sellers assured me that I was buying the sweetest melon of the bunch: "guaranteed to do wonders for a lady's figure!" I think they stopped just short of offering a "one-time special price" just for me.
Friday, September 4, 2009
Change in the Air
I fear the change of seasons is near! Already we have cooler mornings and evenings (very comfortable now), and cloudy skies in the dark evening (beautiful with the moon, a "ghostly galleon" on the waves of fluff up there, which has given us some enjoyable chances to admire the night sky and try to explain the moon to Anya). This morning we woke up to an already-drying rain-spattered courtyard. Only the second rain we have witnessed since sometime in June, when it stopped.
My own personal yardstick for the end of summer is the anticipated End of the Melons. I don't know when this is going to come, but I'm bracing myself. The sweet torpedo-shaped yellow Persian melons have been my absolute favorite part of summer in Dushanbe, and the way they laze about in huge piles on the roadside or in entire sections of every bazaar is such an amusing part of the season for me. It was during the last week of June that they appeared, all of a sudden and out of nowhere, and although they are still plentiful, I am dreading their disappearance. The only potential silver lining to this loss is the arrival of the persimmons, which I missed last year because of our October arrival and my general lack of experience with this fruit.
Fruit and veg was generally the highlight of the season, from my point of view: soft-ripe, deep red tomatoes and bright green hot peppers that made a delicious version of Mexican salsa fresca together with the ubiquitous cilantro, regular onions and lemon juice instead of lime. Fuzzy peaches. Anya's new favorite: green grapes, although it is my deep disappointment that Central Asia has not discovered the seedless variety. (I have been advised that if you seek out the especially small grapes at the bazaar, that these are essentially and accidentally seedless. Will have to try it out, although I'm already used to halving them, scooping out the 3-4 seeds inside, and giving them to Anya, who gobbles them up quicker than I can complete each step on the assembly line.) Sweet little apricots, both orange and yellow. Those long-passed cherries of the late spring. There was honestly so much that I didn't even take advantage of the berries, which generally are only sold in the central Green Market here, and I can't manage to go there unless there is a very essential need, because parking there is a terror and when you go to that market there is a documented change in the space-time continuum that requires that you lose 2 hours of your life and never get it back.
Luckily the fall will still bring us good things, and cooler temps, so that we can get back into the yard more. And right about now is when those ziploc bags and tupperware containers need to come out -- I still have not learned to can, but we need to use the modern equivalent shortcuts to make sure we can enjoy some of the fruits of the warm season throughout the winter!
My own personal yardstick for the end of summer is the anticipated End of the Melons. I don't know when this is going to come, but I'm bracing myself. The sweet torpedo-shaped yellow Persian melons have been my absolute favorite part of summer in Dushanbe, and the way they laze about in huge piles on the roadside or in entire sections of every bazaar is such an amusing part of the season for me. It was during the last week of June that they appeared, all of a sudden and out of nowhere, and although they are still plentiful, I am dreading their disappearance. The only potential silver lining to this loss is the arrival of the persimmons, which I missed last year because of our October arrival and my general lack of experience with this fruit.
Fruit and veg was generally the highlight of the season, from my point of view: soft-ripe, deep red tomatoes and bright green hot peppers that made a delicious version of Mexican salsa fresca together with the ubiquitous cilantro, regular onions and lemon juice instead of lime. Fuzzy peaches. Anya's new favorite: green grapes, although it is my deep disappointment that Central Asia has not discovered the seedless variety. (I have been advised that if you seek out the especially small grapes at the bazaar, that these are essentially and accidentally seedless. Will have to try it out, although I'm already used to halving them, scooping out the 3-4 seeds inside, and giving them to Anya, who gobbles them up quicker than I can complete each step on the assembly line.) Sweet little apricots, both orange and yellow. Those long-passed cherries of the late spring. There was honestly so much that I didn't even take advantage of the berries, which generally are only sold in the central Green Market here, and I can't manage to go there unless there is a very essential need, because parking there is a terror and when you go to that market there is a documented change in the space-time continuum that requires that you lose 2 hours of your life and never get it back.
Luckily the fall will still bring us good things, and cooler temps, so that we can get back into the yard more. And right about now is when those ziploc bags and tupperware containers need to come out -- I still have not learned to can, but we need to use the modern equivalent shortcuts to make sure we can enjoy some of the fruits of the warm season throughout the winter!
Thursday, June 4, 2009
Vladivostok Adventure
I've already been back a week and a half from my odyssey to the Russian Far East, and the question still remains: how to sum up?
The cancellation of my outbound Dushanbe-Moscow flight on Day 1 made it seem like the trip wasn't meant to be, and truthfully I was very nervous for some reason, both about the conference and about leaving Anya and Dan. (All I can say by way of explanation is that we are so far away from home that I guess it just makes even small trips seem big and dangerous in some vague way -- although of course experience has shown that they are not, so in the end this is maybe all just a product of my psychology....)
But in the end, about 24 hours later than scheduled, I took off, had a pleasant four-hour flight to Moscow (being seated in business class on Tajikistan's own Somon Air didn't hurt), and from there it was a real adventure.
Got into Vlad off of the night flight (the time difference from Moscow is a full 7 hours, don't forget), a full day later than planned. I assumed that meant I had to rush to slip into the first day of a 2-day conference that in theory had begun that morning, when in fact it was all more interesting than that. I rushed unsuccessfully to have lunch with the group, and then met up with them at the celebratory awarding of an honorary PhD from Far East State University (DVGU) to Liudmila Verbitskaia, the former rector and current president of St. Petersburg State University.
Verbitskaia was seriously feted by these people: she is not only the president of the Petersburg university but also on the board of trustees of a recently established foundation called "Russkii mir," or, in translation (in which we were assured the name was not supposed to appear) "Russian world" or "Russian peace" -- "mir" can have either meaning. Basically, it is an organization much like the Instituto Cervantes, Alliance Francaise (which, you might be surprised to know, actually has a presence in Vlad), Goethe Institute, and the good old American Corners that the US government supports. I know that especially the latter must just look like big propaganda centers to many eyes, and I should be able to see the same type of activity from Russia in a similar light (i.e., yeah, so it's propaganda, but it's fine and everyone should be able to do it if they want). But in the atmosphere of post-Putin Russia and in the Russian Far East (where it has pretty much always been necessary ever since 1858 for Russians to emphasize just a little bit more vehemently than you might expect how deep Russian political and cultural roots extend in the region), the celebration of Russian-ness took on a slightly different overtone at times for me.
They really did put on the pomp and circumstance: you can see some of the evidence that just about every DVGU student performing group (and, honestly, where do these students find time to actually study if they are spending all their time perfecting their balalaika solos and juggling?) had a short bit in the show. It was quite an experience -- you couldn't help but get swept away by the enthusiasm, even if in the back of your mind you were thinking, what exactly is the target of all of this enthusiasm, and do I feel comfortable with that?
It turned out that our humble 1-day conference was really just a more private event that followed on this big DVGU-wide shindig. (Although we too brought out the press -- some friends even said they spotted me on local TV, being filmed admiring either Verbitskaia or one of the lounge acts)
The conference itself was actually very good -- the thing that of course I was most nervous about, my presentation, went fine (and as I tried pretty much unsuccessfully to tell myself over and over, it was limited to 10 minutes, so how bad could it be?). And this was in Russian! That felt like a real accomplishment to me.
The rest of the time was unfortunately shorter than planned, but really wonderful -- I was able to reconnect with almost everyone I'd expected to, both Berkeley colleagues who'd come from their various necks of the woods and Vladivostok friends, had fabulous weather (since May in Primorye is usually misty and foggy and chilly), and left with a much more nostalgic and positive feeling about the city that we'd called home for about 2 years than I'd had setting out.
The layover I hadn't originally wanted in Moscow was also a fun (if exhausted) several hours, seeing a friend from Dushanbe who's now in the Big Village continuing her research and going shopping. Main score: avocados and limes!
Sunday, January 11, 2009
The Dinnertime Dispatch
Successful cooking ventures since arriving in Dushanbe:
- Beef curry stew with potatoes and peppers (secret ingredient: Kazakhstan packaged spice mix "Karri" [one of my more positive purchases at Sadbarg!]; secret technique: browning the stew chunks after first dredging in flour mixed with salt, pepper and spice)
- Cabbage, carrot and turnip/rutabaga? soup (the squat, roundish yellow root vegetable sold here in the markets remains a mystery to me -- even after scouring the Wikipedia page... I guess this is closest to a rutabaga, although the way it looks when sold really doesn't look exactly like the images I can find online)
- Apple tart -- gradually adapted from several recipes on Epicurious.com; just your basic flour-sugar-butter-salt-icewater dough, plus sliced apples, with cinnamon and honey and some more sugar, arranged on top, raisins optional (unless you are Anya, then they are de rigueur)
- Oatmeal cookies -- from this recipe (with the sole adaptation of substituting anise liqueur for vanilla extract -- thank you, Istanbul Airport Duty Free)
- Simple ground beef pasta sauce (secret shortcut ingredient: letcho [Hungarian stewed peppers] from a jar)
- Roast chicken and roasted root veggies (simple, but good...)
- Marinated strips of chicken breast (marinade ingredients: a whole lotta minced garlic, onions, lemon juice, and kefir and yogurt, coriander, cumin, and cayenne), pan-fried and eaten in a flatbread sandwich or over cilantro rice
- Pan-fried steak (well, it sounds easy, but can you really be confident you won't screw it up?)*
- Sour cream pancakes (quick and easy, and pretty tasty, too; recipe c/o The Big Book of Breakfast, often substitute some combination of kefir and yogurt for actual sour cream or local smetana)
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Babes in Boots
Thank you to a friend from our Vladivostok days for pointing out to me a recent New York Times piece on how valenki (felted wool Russian peasant boots) have become quite the fashion accessory. Apparently Anya is a pretty darned hip little munchkin.
Valenki are a very rare sight here in Dushanbe (and, to be fair, winter here typically is not quite harsh enough to warrant wearing them). When Anya showed up to sadik on the first snowy winter morning we've had in the flowery boots we bought last winter in Vlad, Anya's sadik teachers oohed and aahed very admiringly.
As I remember that purchase, I can't help but think how well that cute little pair of baby valenki illustrates the remarkable distance between Vlad and Dushanbe in economic terms. Those shoes are a good-looking, rather stylish, well-made pair of Russian-made boots bought for a reasonable price in this curiously Russian kids' "super-store" called "Bubl'-Gum" (a funny play on the words "bubble gum" and "GUM," the classic Soviet state department store). I remember having been told when we arrived in Vlad in October 2006 how the first outlets of that chain in town had radically improved local shopping options for toys, kids' clothing, and diapers.
But there is absolutely no store like that here in Dushanbe -- nothing even close. And there are really no comparable goods like that here, either (I know, I made that clear in my musing after a downer of a visit to Sadbarg). Most manufactured goods you find here are depressingly ugly, poorly-made, and overpriced, and virtually nothing is mass manufactured or distributed from within Tajikistan. I remember many times thinking that it seemed like "everything" for sale in Vlad was from China, but here in Dushanbe that seems much more literally to be the case. Anyway, I guess it's kind of interesting that a little perspective can give me a new appreciation of one aspect of Vlad!
Valenki are a very rare sight here in Dushanbe (and, to be fair, winter here typically is not quite harsh enough to warrant wearing them). When Anya showed up to sadik on the first snowy winter morning we've had in the flowery boots we bought last winter in Vlad, Anya's sadik teachers oohed and aahed very admiringly.
As I remember that purchase, I can't help but think how well that cute little pair of baby valenki illustrates the remarkable distance between Vlad and Dushanbe in economic terms. Those shoes are a good-looking, rather stylish, well-made pair of Russian-made boots bought for a reasonable price in this curiously Russian kids' "super-store" called "Bubl'-Gum" (a funny play on the words "bubble gum" and "GUM," the classic Soviet state department store). I remember having been told when we arrived in Vlad in October 2006 how the first outlets of that chain in town had radically improved local shopping options for toys, kids' clothing, and diapers.
But there is absolutely no store like that here in Dushanbe -- nothing even close. And there are really no comparable goods like that here, either (I know, I made that clear in my musing after a downer of a visit to Sadbarg). Most manufactured goods you find here are depressingly ugly, poorly-made, and overpriced, and virtually nothing is mass manufactured or distributed from within Tajikistan. I remember many times thinking that it seemed like "everything" for sale in Vlad was from China, but here in Dushanbe that seems much more literally to be the case. Anyway, I guess it's kind of interesting that a little perspective can give me a new appreciation of one aspect of Vlad!
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Sad Barg
I went shopping today for some more little holiday gifts (Hanukkah? Christmas? who can say...) and left feeling just kind of fed up and depressed with local offerings. "Sadbarg" is sort of like a central department store, post-Soviet style. Meaning that in its interior halls it is filled to overflowing with a combination of little glassed-in storefronts and counters, but the goods on sale leave something to be desired.
They are OK -- I have kind of followed a strange trajectory on them. In the beginning everything just looked like cheap trash. Then I started to distinguish the super cheap from the sorta cheap and the things that were made with some degree of quality. The turtleneck sweater that I bought for Anya, to go together with a little pink sweater dress, for the kids' New Year's party at the Embassy this afternoon, both of Chinese manufacture, actually seems to be better than expected. Others have even commented that they're surprised I found it at Sadbarg. I'm tempted to go back and get another from Dilshod, the friendly proprietor of the glassed-in shop "Fashion Kids."
But I guess today I was on the downturn again, and everything just looked like shoddy crap to me. I think the way everything is crammed together, with very little rhyme and reason (OK, yes, clothing is generally separate, and there are other sections where drugstore-type items and cleaning supplies are sold, but there is still a sense that you might find the category of thing you're looking for or you might not -- I am a little tired of that insecurity and the subsequent need to traipse all over town if I really want to find a particular thing). And no wrapping paper in sight, just little Christmas bags.
*Sigh* Luckily I have a few things bought locally, and a few things bought online, and I think I'll be OK. And I am telling myself to buy some supplies for the future online, as they come on post-Christmas discount, and (as always) to think about this earlier in the year next time around!
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Seen Today in Dushanbe
- Snow: big, fat, wet flakes falling in a beautiful mess, and still falling steadily now, at 3 in the afternoon (and forecast to last into a chilly weekend!)
- Turkeys: 30 somoni (a little less than $10) per kilo, labeled for some reason in Greek, in the supermarket
- A Russian guy buying only hot sauce, and nothing else, at the same supermarket (I guess stereotypes are made to be broken)
- Historically inaccurate bright orange bell-bottoms in the 1976 Soviet film version of Firdausi's Shahnameh, "Skazanie o Siyavushe" (this afternoon's offering on TV Safina, one of the 3 local channels we get at home)
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Market Rounds, Part 2
(Hey, I'm an American, shopping is what we do, right?)
Seems like this is the norm for me: getting to know a new place is apparently tied pretty closely with figuring out where to buy stuff. I suppose that isn't very strange, after all. You appear in a new place, and you need to eat. You need your daily stuff, like soap, shampoo, etc. You need a few comforts that you may not have brought with you. You may have the benefit of a whole container-load of your existing stuff being sent behind you, but while you're waiting you probably need some things that, at packing time, didn't seem essential enough to stuff in the suitcase. DVDs to watch. A toy or two for the kid when the ones you've got are getting old or when she seems to be reaching a new stage. Warmer shoes when it starts to get colder and rain a bit. A hat or a scarf. Tupperware, or what passes for it in Tajikistan. Spices! You get my drift. So where do you find all this stuff?
Actually, it's sort of appropriate too that I'm thinking so much about shopping and "marketing" -- and not because we're in some ancient, bustling node on the Silk Road. Apparently Dushanbe ("Monday" in Persian/Tajik) was the site of a little settlement whose market day was Monday. The modern city, though, is pretty much a Soviet creation, and it dates to the 1920s, when the Red Guards rolled in, put down local resistance to Soviet-Russian rule, and took over the emirate of Bukhara. That was when they started to reshape this area into the republics of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.
The central, older part of Dushanbe is kind of laid out along a roughly north-south axis, along the river Varzob. (If you look at the link, you've got the river pretty clearly cutting through the center of your view; the main downtown of Dushanbe is laid out to the northwest of the hippodrome -- the easily identifiable oval to the east of the river. And all of that sprawl on the river's west bank is comprised of much more recent neighborhoods and prefab construction -- "novostroiki" -- built more after 1970.) We don't tend to venture out too far beyond that basic center of town, but we still seem to do a fair amount of traveling here and there.
In the beginning, it seemed like TsUM and the Green Market summed up our most frequent shopping experiences. TsUM was an obvious place for us to go, working as we were on the post-Soviet model, when we needed basic household things after we moved in, like plastics or kitchenware (we got the interim Minnie Mouse potty chair there, and some random plastic tubs for laundry and other stuff, those sorry excuses for Tupperware, that sort of thing).
Most of the expats or American diplomatic folks we met from the start tended to do their fresh food shopping at the central "Green Market." That place is impressive! And luckily I have already gotten fairly used to the dirty, loud, chaotic market experience and now can do it better than I could at one time. If in Vladivostok it just seemed like the wisest choice, where you ought to go for good quality produce at the right price, here in Dushanbe it seems to me that the Western style supermarkets really are almost not an option for produce. They carry some basics and some things that bazaar sellers just don't apparently bring in (although I'm still learning -- maybe oyster mushrooms really are available at the bazaar), but if you need a good range of basic fresh staples and root vegetables, you've got to just hit a regular open market and save the supermarket for what it's good at.
Without a car, the Green Market -- in the very center of town -- really isn't that great an option for me, so now I tend to go to our local bazaar, up at the north end of our neighborhood (and almost at the north end of town). It's much smaller than the Green Market (which really is defined at its main corner by a funny greenish building in that kitschy Orientalist style -- imagine a built style to match the cheesy "Sindbad" type lettering on the railroad station and the airport, and I think you get the picture). Ironically the Green Market is actually looking a little grey and sooty ever since about the time we arrived. Apparently warring bandits who were vying for control of the selling there set fire to the main building literally on the morning that I was first shown the market. When I walked past it the other day, it wasn't smoldering any more, but it still kind of just looked like charred heap of greenish metal. That doesn't mean the selling in the other parts of the bazaar doesn't continue unabated, though -- the market is really a sprawling entity that sort of starts at that green corner, but encompasses larger structures, smaller structures, outdoor territory, etc.
The Varzob neighborhood bazaar is more my speed, although of course it doesn't have the selection and variety (or the kind of rich-feeling Central Asian-y experience) you get at the Green Market. It's kind of just a plainish corner market -- it has a rectangular permanent building with sellers set up inside, food, housewares, clothes, etc. all piled up on glass-front display cases; several semi-permanent metal kiosk or trailer types of storefronts, each divided up into little cells and each of those with a seller inside; open produce areas, where people set up their wares on old dusty blue metal countertops; and then there are the butcher section, the hardware section, and the cooked food sections.
And while we're on the subject of fresh produce and where to find it (before I take a break and continue my shopping descriptions at a later time), I have to comment on the excellent dinner we had for the second time this week at the restaurant Yangtse Tian (I hope I'm spelling that correctly), complete with green and just a tad crunchy stir-fried bok choi. I don't know how they do it, but these people evidently truck the veg in from China! Some of our friends have named this place as their top restaurant in Dushanbe, and I think I'm close to placing it at the top of the personal favorites I've accumulated so far, too. And apparently a hall full of Chinese people whom I have yet to see on the streets of Dushanbe agree.
Seems like this is the norm for me: getting to know a new place is apparently tied pretty closely with figuring out where to buy stuff. I suppose that isn't very strange, after all. You appear in a new place, and you need to eat. You need your daily stuff, like soap, shampoo, etc. You need a few comforts that you may not have brought with you. You may have the benefit of a whole container-load of your existing stuff being sent behind you, but while you're waiting you probably need some things that, at packing time, didn't seem essential enough to stuff in the suitcase. DVDs to watch. A toy or two for the kid when the ones you've got are getting old or when she seems to be reaching a new stage. Warmer shoes when it starts to get colder and rain a bit. A hat or a scarf. Tupperware, or what passes for it in Tajikistan. Spices! You get my drift. So where do you find all this stuff?
Actually, it's sort of appropriate too that I'm thinking so much about shopping and "marketing" -- and not because we're in some ancient, bustling node on the Silk Road. Apparently Dushanbe ("Monday" in Persian/Tajik) was the site of a little settlement whose market day was Monday. The modern city, though, is pretty much a Soviet creation, and it dates to the 1920s, when the Red Guards rolled in, put down local resistance to Soviet-Russian rule, and took over the emirate of Bukhara. That was when they started to reshape this area into the republics of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.
The central, older part of Dushanbe is kind of laid out along a roughly north-south axis, along the river Varzob. (If you look at the link, you've got the river pretty clearly cutting through the center of your view; the main downtown of Dushanbe is laid out to the northwest of the hippodrome -- the easily identifiable oval to the east of the river. And all of that sprawl on the river's west bank is comprised of much more recent neighborhoods and prefab construction -- "novostroiki" -- built more after 1970.) We don't tend to venture out too far beyond that basic center of town, but we still seem to do a fair amount of traveling here and there.
In the beginning, it seemed like TsUM and the Green Market summed up our most frequent shopping experiences. TsUM was an obvious place for us to go, working as we were on the post-Soviet model, when we needed basic household things after we moved in, like plastics or kitchenware (we got the interim Minnie Mouse potty chair there, and some random plastic tubs for laundry and other stuff, those sorry excuses for Tupperware, that sort of thing).
Most of the expats or American diplomatic folks we met from the start tended to do their fresh food shopping at the central "Green Market." That place is impressive! And luckily I have already gotten fairly used to the dirty, loud, chaotic market experience and now can do it better than I could at one time. If in Vladivostok it just seemed like the wisest choice, where you ought to go for good quality produce at the right price, here in Dushanbe it seems to me that the Western style supermarkets really are almost not an option for produce. They carry some basics and some things that bazaar sellers just don't apparently bring in (although I'm still learning -- maybe oyster mushrooms really are available at the bazaar), but if you need a good range of basic fresh staples and root vegetables, you've got to just hit a regular open market and save the supermarket for what it's good at.
Without a car, the Green Market -- in the very center of town -- really isn't that great an option for me, so now I tend to go to our local bazaar, up at the north end of our neighborhood (and almost at the north end of town). It's much smaller than the Green Market (which really is defined at its main corner by a funny greenish building in that kitschy Orientalist style -- imagine a built style to match the cheesy "Sindbad" type lettering on the railroad station and the airport, and I think you get the picture). Ironically the Green Market is actually looking a little grey and sooty ever since about the time we arrived. Apparently warring bandits who were vying for control of the selling there set fire to the main building literally on the morning that I was first shown the market. When I walked past it the other day, it wasn't smoldering any more, but it still kind of just looked like charred heap of greenish metal. That doesn't mean the selling in the other parts of the bazaar doesn't continue unabated, though -- the market is really a sprawling entity that sort of starts at that green corner, but encompasses larger structures, smaller structures, outdoor territory, etc.
The Varzob neighborhood bazaar is more my speed, although of course it doesn't have the selection and variety (or the kind of rich-feeling Central Asian-y experience) you get at the Green Market. It's kind of just a plainish corner market -- it has a rectangular permanent building with sellers set up inside, food, housewares, clothes, etc. all piled up on glass-front display cases; several semi-permanent metal kiosk or trailer types of storefronts, each divided up into little cells and each of those with a seller inside; open produce areas, where people set up their wares on old dusty blue metal countertops; and then there are the butcher section, the hardware section, and the cooked food sections.
And while we're on the subject of fresh produce and where to find it (before I take a break and continue my shopping descriptions at a later time), I have to comment on the excellent dinner we had for the second time this week at the restaurant Yangtse Tian (I hope I'm spelling that correctly), complete with green and just a tad crunchy stir-fried bok choi. I don't know how they do it, but these people evidently truck the veg in from China! Some of our friends have named this place as their top restaurant in Dushanbe, and I think I'm close to placing it at the top of the personal favorites I've accumulated so far, too. And apparently a hall full of Chinese people whom I have yet to see on the streets of Dushanbe agree.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Market Rounds
Where do we go when we need to buy?
Shahmansur Market, or "The Green Bazaar" -- produce and foodstuffs, also all kinds of manufactured household goods and hardware, right in the center of Dushanbe
neighborhood bazaar "Varzob" -- small produce market (with plenty of other food and other stuff) within walking distance of our house
supermarkets Orima and Paikar, a couple of blocks west of Dushanbe's Opera and Ballet theater -- more imported and higher quality foodstuffs, more reliable freshness, more comfortable shopping experience for the Western expat, more likely to come closer to one-stop shopping, and all of it costing more money
Sultoni Kabir -- a pretty amazing Central Asian open-air Home Depot
TsUM, or the Central Universal Store -- state-run department store conveniently located right in the center of town, a reliable option for plastics, toys, larger manufactured household items, some souvenirs
Sadbarg -- clothes, shoes, toys, toiletries/personal care, stationery goods
the wholesale shops next to the railroad station -- all kinds of food and drink at wholesale prices. We mostly go for the juice, milk, and beer, for the chance to buy a "blok" of 12-20 units all at once and get a ride home, rather than lugging the tetrapaks on foot, piecemeal.
(Where are we? We live in the neighborhood that lies just to the north of the Botanical Gardens.)
Shahmansur Market, or "The Green Bazaar" -- produce and foodstuffs, also all kinds of manufactured household goods and hardware, right in the center of Dushanbe
neighborhood bazaar "Varzob" -- small produce market (with plenty of other food and other stuff) within walking distance of our house
supermarkets Orima and Paikar, a couple of blocks west of Dushanbe's Opera and Ballet theater -- more imported and higher quality foodstuffs, more reliable freshness, more comfortable shopping experience for the Western expat, more likely to come closer to one-stop shopping, and all of it costing more money
Sultoni Kabir -- a pretty amazing Central Asian open-air Home Depot
TsUM, or the Central Universal Store -- state-run department store conveniently located right in the center of town, a reliable option for plastics, toys, larger manufactured household items, some souvenirs
Sadbarg -- clothes, shoes, toys, toiletries/personal care, stationery goods
the wholesale shops next to the railroad station -- all kinds of food and drink at wholesale prices. We mostly go for the juice, milk, and beer, for the chance to buy a "blok" of 12-20 units all at once and get a ride home, rather than lugging the tetrapaks on foot, piecemeal.
(Where are we? We live in the neighborhood that lies just to the north of the Botanical Gardens.)
Thursday, October 30, 2008
We Have Landed
Yes, we arrived in Dushanbe as planned, safely but extremely tired, and everything here is pretty much fine. The hectic schedule of our home leave in the US -- and now the lack of internet connection within convenient reach for me -- have made for a pretty long hiatus from the blog, and I will try to fill in the blanks.
One thing that has impressed me this second time arriving at an overseas post with Dan is how much our processes of getting settled and establishing a routine differ. For better or worse, as the one with the job that brought us here, of course, Dan is off to work pretty much as soon as we arrive in our new home. And, as he may or may not want to report, that comes with its own problems and intricacies.
For me, it seems like getting all the pieces to line up and getting the freedom to move about and work or at least become active at all in a professional way is slower. Even getting myself and Anya organized to go out to the store to get as many groceries as I can carry home can seem like a big undertaking when the logistics are new and we're still sort of operating on the few supplies and clothes that have trickled in to us so far. I know there are pluses and minuses to this side of things -- I'm sure, for instance, that Dan would love to have the freedom to hang around the house with no real schedule and explore the city more than he can from the office -- but for me these beginning weeks can be a little frustrating.
But these beginning steps are also exciting and fun in turns, too, and I think there must be a graph formation, something like a bell curve, that represents the general trajectory of one's emotions during a transition like this. I think the first few days are truly exhilarating: everything is new and interesting, and whatever aspects might soon turn out to be a bit of a drag haven't yet gotten on your nerves. Our initial impression, which hasn't changed in 2+ weeks, is that Dushanbe easily seems like it will be better overall than Vlad was. Yes, some of the material conditions are harder, and you might say we've "traded down" in that regard. But the human situation is much better, with enough more people (expats) and enough of an existing social buoyancy among them that by our first full week in town (after our arrival at 3am Thursday on the twice-weekly Istanbul flight) I already had been included in a "girls' night" viewing of the Sex and the City movie on DVD (OK, so it wasn't a film buff's gathering, but it fit the occasion, and it was a lot of fun); Dan had learned of the existing weekly poker night; and we'd been invited out or in to meals on 4 different occasions with 3 different couples or families. Locals are more friendly, too -- mainly so far that has come in the form of less stressful interactions with taxi drivers and store clerks, but we hope soon to have a chance to do something with a few colleagues and people we've met.
We've been here 2 full weeks now, from start to finish, and we've enjoyed 3 weekends in Dushanbe. At the start of the first full work week (after Columbus Day), I got to work calling and interviewing in order to hire a few people to help us out. Mainly what we need is a nanny, but we also can use (and afford) to hire someone to help keep this rather big house clean by coming in a couple of days per week. We're considering hiring a part-time driver to help us get around in these weeks (months?) until our car gets here. (The news on the bulk of our shipment, the stuff that was not flown in but went "slow boat to Dushanbe," as Anya heard me say many times and now chirps on her own, is slated to arrive in late November... in Antwerp. From there, hey, who knows, but we hope they may be able to get it on a Central-Asia-bound train for arrival by New Year's. Big thanks to the head of General Services in Vladivostok at the time we left, who felt it wasn't necessary to think even anywhere close to the edge of the box on expediting the transport of our stuff. And big prayers that the alcoholic purchases in our consumables, coming according to about the same schedule from the US, will not freeze and/or burst over the wintertime crossing.)
The nanny market here, or at least the flow of market information, is also much better than in Vladivostok. I don't know whether that will ultimately mean our caregiver will be better than in Vlad -- I would be hard-pressed to find someone better than Marina. But after spending a week on the phone, using the Embassy recommendations, and the ads and recommendations published over the last several months in the weekly Dushanbe newsletter that caters to international community, I winnowed down 8 people to 2 good candidates, and we are now in the process of trying them out. Anya got along well with both ladies during the brief initial meetings we had, and in principle I think that either one would be a fine nanny. At this point we just need to work out the smaller details and figure out who seems like the overall choice that will work the best. We're starting out with a similar schedule to the one we had in Vlad, with a nanny in the mornings, a nap and then afternoons with me. If all goes as planned, Anya is likely to start in December at a small informal preschool/daycare that a couple of expats have organized, and at that point we will actually be very well covered for childcare (I even fear too well-covered: part of me can't really imagine spending so little time with Anya over the course of the week and wonders what I'd do to fill the time!).
But filling that time is the very next thing on the agenda. Of course, one thing that can easily fill time freed up from childcare is the domestic organization and errands that concern us as we continue to settle into the new abode and even after we feel settled. A few sessions of washing thoroughly the fruits and veg that I bought at the local market in order to make them usable easily impressed on me how, even more than in Vladivostok, domestic tasks can eat up a hell of a lot of your time here. We're partway through all of those initial errands that need to be run: buying all the cleaning supplies for the household was actually a big one: getting everything from cleansers and various wipes and rags to a mop and a bucket and brooms to sweep the courtyard took a few trips around town. The major thing we still want to find is a few pieces of plastic furniture for the patio area just outside our kitchen window, where we had a lovely breakfast on Sunday, while the sun was out and the generator off, making it really perfect. We may not have too many more mornings like that one, since it has gotten wet and chilly quickly this week, but as long as there are sunny days the 3 of us can still put on a few sweaters and pairs of socks and have a coffee and warm milk out on the deck.
We still need some smaller organizational things like shelving and organizers in the bathrooms and near the front door -- we still lack even some kind of coat rack or hooks for our coats, which are draped over the many dining room chairs (that may be the only good reason for us to have so many!). For some reason here the houses really are not equipped with these kinds of things, and as much as we read about it in the material we received before our move, there still wasn't much we could do about it until we arrived and saw what it was we needed. We haven't seen much on the local market, and it might be easiest and cheapest to order some stuff online.
But ultimately I aim not to be so preoccupied with the domestic and to turn my attention outward: first up is getting my presentation in shape for the annual Aaaasss convention (OK, normally "triple-A-double-S," but some people just can't resist the alternative pronunciation). I am (crazily) going to board that same early morning flight on its return to Istanbul -- after it stops over in Dushanbe it seems just long enough to refuel and tidy up -- and then traveling onward to JFK as soon as the third week of November, all for the Advancement of Slavic (and Eurasian!) Studies. I'll be in Philly for the conference, and truly do expect to have a good time seeing old colleagues and meeting new ones, and have a few days before and afterward to kill and enjoy "real civilization" before I return. Next up after the conference is getting my bearings in the basic historical background and current historiography on Central Asia and Tajikistan, and doing a little more poking around to see what diseases and pestilences might make a fitting comparative case to pair with tick-borne encephalitis in the 1930s-50s in the Russian Far East. I plan to spend some time in the library/ies and will also try to get into the archives (although the paper chase recounted to me by a young colleague here on fieldwork gave me some pause and tells me I need to gird my loins for a possible bureaucratic battle of my own before I can actually sit down with documents). Ultimately I also need to figure out how precisely I'm going to spend the grant money I was awarded in the spring and whether I can really take any more long-distance travel away from family (probably only to Tashkent or Moscow, but still), and I still have to work on getting a few publications! All of that will be plenty to fill my plate from now until it warms up, I think.
Up next (and sorry for all of the mundane reporting this time): a better description of our house and neighborhood, and maybe even the main north-south boulevard in town, Rudaki, which we travel up and down the most.
What We're Saying:
inna BIIIIG Dushanbe -- exclaimed from our first entry into the courtyard, and used to mean just our house, but now there seems to be an understanding that Dushanbe is the broader place where we live
What We're Listening To:
Franco's hits from the 50s and 60s
What We're Watching:
can't get enough of the election updates from Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert! Thank god AFN still carries it.
P.S.: VOTE!
One thing that has impressed me this second time arriving at an overseas post with Dan is how much our processes of getting settled and establishing a routine differ. For better or worse, as the one with the job that brought us here, of course, Dan is off to work pretty much as soon as we arrive in our new home. And, as he may or may not want to report, that comes with its own problems and intricacies.
For me, it seems like getting all the pieces to line up and getting the freedom to move about and work or at least become active at all in a professional way is slower. Even getting myself and Anya organized to go out to the store to get as many groceries as I can carry home can seem like a big undertaking when the logistics are new and we're still sort of operating on the few supplies and clothes that have trickled in to us so far. I know there are pluses and minuses to this side of things -- I'm sure, for instance, that Dan would love to have the freedom to hang around the house with no real schedule and explore the city more than he can from the office -- but for me these beginning weeks can be a little frustrating.
But these beginning steps are also exciting and fun in turns, too, and I think there must be a graph formation, something like a bell curve, that represents the general trajectory of one's emotions during a transition like this. I think the first few days are truly exhilarating: everything is new and interesting, and whatever aspects might soon turn out to be a bit of a drag haven't yet gotten on your nerves. Our initial impression, which hasn't changed in 2+ weeks, is that Dushanbe easily seems like it will be better overall than Vlad was. Yes, some of the material conditions are harder, and you might say we've "traded down" in that regard. But the human situation is much better, with enough more people (expats) and enough of an existing social buoyancy among them that by our first full week in town (after our arrival at 3am Thursday on the twice-weekly Istanbul flight) I already had been included in a "girls' night" viewing of the Sex and the City movie on DVD (OK, so it wasn't a film buff's gathering, but it fit the occasion, and it was a lot of fun); Dan had learned of the existing weekly poker night; and we'd been invited out or in to meals on 4 different occasions with 3 different couples or families. Locals are more friendly, too -- mainly so far that has come in the form of less stressful interactions with taxi drivers and store clerks, but we hope soon to have a chance to do something with a few colleagues and people we've met.
We've been here 2 full weeks now, from start to finish, and we've enjoyed 3 weekends in Dushanbe. At the start of the first full work week (after Columbus Day), I got to work calling and interviewing in order to hire a few people to help us out. Mainly what we need is a nanny, but we also can use (and afford) to hire someone to help keep this rather big house clean by coming in a couple of days per week. We're considering hiring a part-time driver to help us get around in these weeks (months?) until our car gets here. (The news on the bulk of our shipment, the stuff that was not flown in but went "slow boat to Dushanbe," as Anya heard me say many times and now chirps on her own, is slated to arrive in late November... in Antwerp. From there, hey, who knows, but we hope they may be able to get it on a Central-Asia-bound train for arrival by New Year's. Big thanks to the head of General Services in Vladivostok at the time we left, who felt it wasn't necessary to think even anywhere close to the edge of the box on expediting the transport of our stuff. And big prayers that the alcoholic purchases in our consumables, coming according to about the same schedule from the US, will not freeze and/or burst over the wintertime crossing.)
The nanny market here, or at least the flow of market information, is also much better than in Vladivostok. I don't know whether that will ultimately mean our caregiver will be better than in Vlad -- I would be hard-pressed to find someone better than Marina. But after spending a week on the phone, using the Embassy recommendations, and the ads and recommendations published over the last several months in the weekly Dushanbe newsletter that caters to international community, I winnowed down 8 people to 2 good candidates, and we are now in the process of trying them out. Anya got along well with both ladies during the brief initial meetings we had, and in principle I think that either one would be a fine nanny. At this point we just need to work out the smaller details and figure out who seems like the overall choice that will work the best. We're starting out with a similar schedule to the one we had in Vlad, with a nanny in the mornings, a nap and then afternoons with me. If all goes as planned, Anya is likely to start in December at a small informal preschool/daycare that a couple of expats have organized, and at that point we will actually be very well covered for childcare (I even fear too well-covered: part of me can't really imagine spending so little time with Anya over the course of the week and wonders what I'd do to fill the time!).
But filling that time is the very next thing on the agenda. Of course, one thing that can easily fill time freed up from childcare is the domestic organization and errands that concern us as we continue to settle into the new abode and even after we feel settled. A few sessions of washing thoroughly the fruits and veg that I bought at the local market in order to make them usable easily impressed on me how, even more than in Vladivostok, domestic tasks can eat up a hell of a lot of your time here. We're partway through all of those initial errands that need to be run: buying all the cleaning supplies for the household was actually a big one: getting everything from cleansers and various wipes and rags to a mop and a bucket and brooms to sweep the courtyard took a few trips around town. The major thing we still want to find is a few pieces of plastic furniture for the patio area just outside our kitchen window, where we had a lovely breakfast on Sunday, while the sun was out and the generator off, making it really perfect. We may not have too many more mornings like that one, since it has gotten wet and chilly quickly this week, but as long as there are sunny days the 3 of us can still put on a few sweaters and pairs of socks and have a coffee and warm milk out on the deck.
We still need some smaller organizational things like shelving and organizers in the bathrooms and near the front door -- we still lack even some kind of coat rack or hooks for our coats, which are draped over the many dining room chairs (that may be the only good reason for us to have so many!). For some reason here the houses really are not equipped with these kinds of things, and as much as we read about it in the material we received before our move, there still wasn't much we could do about it until we arrived and saw what it was we needed. We haven't seen much on the local market, and it might be easiest and cheapest to order some stuff online.
But ultimately I aim not to be so preoccupied with the domestic and to turn my attention outward: first up is getting my presentation in shape for the annual Aaaasss convention (OK, normally "triple-A-double-S," but some people just can't resist the alternative pronunciation). I am (crazily) going to board that same early morning flight on its return to Istanbul -- after it stops over in Dushanbe it seems just long enough to refuel and tidy up -- and then traveling onward to JFK as soon as the third week of November, all for the Advancement of Slavic (and Eurasian!) Studies. I'll be in Philly for the conference, and truly do expect to have a good time seeing old colleagues and meeting new ones, and have a few days before and afterward to kill and enjoy "real civilization" before I return. Next up after the conference is getting my bearings in the basic historical background and current historiography on Central Asia and Tajikistan, and doing a little more poking around to see what diseases and pestilences might make a fitting comparative case to pair with tick-borne encephalitis in the 1930s-50s in the Russian Far East. I plan to spend some time in the library/ies and will also try to get into the archives (although the paper chase recounted to me by a young colleague here on fieldwork gave me some pause and tells me I need to gird my loins for a possible bureaucratic battle of my own before I can actually sit down with documents). Ultimately I also need to figure out how precisely I'm going to spend the grant money I was awarded in the spring and whether I can really take any more long-distance travel away from family (probably only to Tashkent or Moscow, but still), and I still have to work on getting a few publications! All of that will be plenty to fill my plate from now until it warms up, I think.
Up next (and sorry for all of the mundane reporting this time): a better description of our house and neighborhood, and maybe even the main north-south boulevard in town, Rudaki, which we travel up and down the most.
What We're Saying:
inna BIIIIG Dushanbe -- exclaimed from our first entry into the courtyard, and used to mean just our house, but now there seems to be an understanding that Dushanbe is the broader place where we live
What We're Listening To:
Franco's hits from the 50s and 60s
What We're Watching:
can't get enough of the election updates from Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert! Thank god AFN still carries it.
P.S.: VOTE!
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