Break

BLOG #12

Sept. 29

The past couple of days have been the longest most exhausting days yet! (As much as I appreciate the lunch-after-church invites... I just can't keep getting home at 5 on Sundays...) We are at the school from about 8 to 5... like normal, except we don't start Kazakh class until 1 or 2 - which is about the same time everyone is hitting their attention limits. We teach during the morning/hang around the school until it's our turn for tutoring or teaching, then after lunch begin with Aigul. It always amazes me how exhausting it is to be idle lol. Tempers are breaking and people's patience are wearing out... there have been tears, hurt feelings, and frustrations and a deal of miscommunication - yikes! All on top or our already hectic schedule.

But, anyways... this type of thing always happens when you're with the same group of people 24/7. I'm fine and have no hard feelings whatsoever. We had our interviews yesterday for our sites. Mine was with Ekat(erina), who I love. She's the type of lady who loves cracking up at her own jokes lol... super cute lady. I really felt like she listened to me (especially since she remembered my rough start here ha). She also kind of looks like Grandma Zalar, which I like. :) I feel really good about how our talk went. The only thing I forgot to mention was that I want a dog. The PC staff have the final meeting on the subject on Thursday. It's quite a funny feeling - feeling like my PC adventure is over. I mean after Thursday, my site will be determined. It's like this PC mystery is over. The decision will be made. No more wonder, no more dreaming lol , no more anxious excitement. I'll know where my 2 years in the PC will be. Weird.

I made my family pizza for dinner. (I think my host mom didn't want to admit that she really liked it haha) I'm ok with that. - The only thing is that they insisted we put "salami" on it... by salami I mean an oversized hotdog-like tubular meat. (I call it Spam... ) I was not excited about this by any means, but decided this wasn't a battle I wanted to pursue. If this family is going to get me to eat the mystery meat... I'll generally succumb to the pizza venue.

Tomorrow is our first day of English Club with a purpose lol. The previous English Clubs have just been random silly games done in English... some lacking any language at all. We are putting on a community talent show for our community project. (With a secondary tech project on the side). We have art, drama, music, and dance areas that our English Club will focus on - giving the participants a time to practice a group act. I am focusing on the drama area with Anna (made the commitment before these other areas were formed...) I think I'll try and help with the art and dance sectors if I can. Depending on how many kids are interested in drama, Anna and I are thinking about having our students perform Cinderella.

There was an craft fair in Almaty this weekend (lol Sunday), which was very cool! Rugs, jewelry, dolls, clothes, instruments, pottery... all by local artists were for sale. Very beautiful things - apparently they do this every final Sunday of the month. I wanted to buy everything haha... but I decided to wait - give myself something to look forward to in the future here. I may go back on the last Sunday of October to pick up some things to ship home :)