So this week has been pretty normal. I really like being in my village. Although I was freezing my butt off, I guess I have just dealt with it. It is fine now. I use my little heater that Peace Corps gave me. Let me tell you how. So, in the morning, I get out of my bed, which is warm now thanks to the addition of my sleeping bag. I usually sleep with some fleece pants on and a long T-shirt. So when I get out of bed, the room is still pretty cold. There is ice on the windows, inside and out, and I can see my breath. I run over to my little heater and turn it on. Then as it is sort of heating up my room, I get my long underwear out and put it over the heater for about fifteen seconds to warm them up and put them on. I do that with the rest of my clothes and then put on my huge down coat. The same thing happens at night. My heater cord isn’t long enough to reach my bed so I have to jump into my bed and freeze for 5 min to heat it up. After that, its fine. All attempts to look “fashionable” or at least not look stupid have flown out the door. There is one, and one thing only that I concentrate on... keeping my body heat close to my body. I drink tea about 4 times a day. Its amazing how much warmer you can feel after drinking tea or eating hot soup. There is still snow on the group.
As I say this, today was the first day that I have been able to wear just my fleece with nothing else. I wouldn’t say its warm, but I got a chance to open my window and get some fresh air in my room. Also, I did my laundry. First time in about two and a half weeks. I had a good amount of clothes to wash and I prepared myself for it. As I started, my mom came in and asked “do you want to use the machine washer”. I looked at her with a look of “what the hell are you talking about... a “machine washer”. So apparently this whole time the family had a machine washer. Now I have heard through other volunteers that Peace Corps tells the family to make the volunteer hand wash everything for the first four months. Well, I certainly did that. The fact that there was a machine washer was like making a fire with flint and steel for months and then being given a lighter. My clothes were so much cleaner. The whites actually looked white, and not this weird grey/green color. I don’t think I should mention how dirty the water looked. Here’s a clue... black.
So, there is this lady at the culture house who is the librarian and she called me and asked me if I wanted to come to her house. I didn’t really want to go and told her that I had work to do. She kept badgering me, so I eventually gave up and I went. It was an interesting experience. When I got there I found out that there was a table with place settings for ten people. It was a party. So while the Librarian was preparing everything, I was left in the living room with the sister. The sister was Deaf and Mute. Well this was perfect because I don’t know Armenian anyway. Ok, thats not true, I think I have a pretty good mastery of the language now. All I have to do now is learn the vocabulary and learn the village language, or the village slang. Anyway, we somehow communicated. That is one of the greatest feelings in the world to be able to communicate with someone in that way. Hand gestures, facial expressions, etc. It reminded me of the time I was working at Dorthea Dix Mental Hospital. There was a lady there named Vicky who was deaf and mute. Somehow we managed to talk to each other for about 45 min. I remembered the sign language that I had learned when I was a cub scout years ago. It was great. So, with all that said, I will conclude this paragraph with this thought... language is overrated... (that is a joke).
I love my village. I don’t know how to specify one thing but I don’t really like to leave. I was going to go to Yerevan this weekend, but I decided against it. There was a meeting with American Council this Sunday, but the guy I was corresponding with wasn’t going to be there, so I decided that I didn’t want to make the two hour journey there and two hours back. I completely dreaded it. I am not really looking forward to going to my meeting this upcoming weekend but I actually have an active role in that one so I have to go, but I am really turned off by that whole idea. I think the big reason was the week that I was in Yerevan for the All-Vol conference. Everyday I was sick with either some cold or a stomach thing with 9 hours of conferences everyday for 6 days. I mean really who would like the city after all that?
There’s only 3 more weeks of school left before this semester is finished. Didn’t we just start?
Here’s a funny story. So my Grandmother here really wants me to get married. She saw a picture of Ani and assumed she was my girlfriend and she keeps asking me when we were going to get married. I frankly reply with a stern, “we’re not”. So she takes this to mean that I don’t like Ani which then she says, “well I know other girls and Ill bring them over to the house to meet you”. Can we say “awkward”. I know she is doing it out of good intention and it really is funny because she has this whole scheme in her head. This is what she says. “You can meet a nice Armenian girl, get married and then your parents will have to come here and we can meet them”. I looked at her laughing in my head because I can just hear my Dad saying, “yeah, we’ll see you two after the wedding when you get back to the states... we have dogs to take care of”.
Now this isn’t the first time this has happened. I don’t know. Maybe i already said this story before, but its worth repeating because its really awkward. I went to the post office to see if I had a package. I have a friend that works there so I usually stay in there and talk for a little while. Well, the older lady in there is really nice and she looks at me and she asks me if I am married. I said no. Then she asks me if I want to marry her daughter. I say no thank you. Little did I know that her daughter was sitting on the other side of the room. Then she tells me that she is sitting “over there” and points at her. Her daughter is just smiling at me. I mean really. What do you do in that situation? I told her that I had a girlfriend in America, which she responds with “that’s ok, she is over there”. She laughed as she was saying that, but you could tell there was some truth behind what she was saying. Oh the life of a Peace Corps Volunteer.
My little brother has been up in Ijevan for the last week where my sister lives with her husband and her little son, or my nephew. They are coming back tomorrow. I am excited for two reasons. One; they are coming back and I actually miss my brother. Two; because the baby will be here, that means the heater will be on fulltime and the house will be really warm. They are staying until New years. Thank God. That means that I will be warm for the next month and then I will leave soon thereafter to go to Dubai and India. Both places that don’t have snow or freezing temperatures.
I am leaving in about thirty minutes to go to Hector’s house. Oh Crap. I haven’t eaten at all today in order to prepare myself for the ingestion of 40 pounds of food.
Last thing that I want to say. This might be a little gross but maybe a bit entertaining if you want to read this. So, this week, there has been no water. They are fixing pipes or something. The water comes on for an hour a day. I usually usually use the indoor bathroom which looks like any bathroom back in the states. Well... no water... no flush. So I have to go out and use the outhouse. The thing about it is back in my first village there was an outhouse but with a chair with a hole cut out. So it was basically like a toilet. Well, the one here... there is no chair. There is just a hole. You have to squat. Well I have never done that before. So I went in there and stood there looking at this hole trying to figure out how to do my deed. I mean if you drop trou then you crap into your pants. Also guy’s thingy’s are not as close to the exit hole as girl’s thingy’s to that presents another problem. So I squatted, then stood up learning as I went along. So this is what I learned. 1) you do not pull your pants all the way down. 2) you squat with your heels touching the ground. 3) Guys have to tuck their thingy between their legs. If you don’t pee will go everywhere including on your underwear.
I guess I can’t leave here saying that Peace Corps taught me nothing... Don’t worry. I am a pro at it now... That’s all I got. I don’t even care anymore if the water turns on because everytime I go to the bathroom its like an adventure.
Until next time...
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