Twitter

Without doing too much background, new groups of PCVs come to Azerbaijan every year.  That means that there’s always a new group, and there’s always one that’s got a year’s worth of experience.  I’ve gone from the new group to ‘veteran status’ over the past few months.

One thing that used to crack me up about the old group, who has been back in America for about 6 months, is that a lot of them had never seen a Wii.  I had put my fair share of time in on Wii Tennis and Zelda, not to mention Wario Ware.  Wii is a hit, and everyone knows it.  The idea that one could just be yanked out of pop culture for two years seemed funny to me, until I realized that it’s going to happen to me as well.

I think twitter might be my group’s Wii.  I think I get what it is, but I have no idea how people are using it in America.  It’s got some cool potential, but then again, it could just be another thing to pass some time.  I guess I’ll see when I get back to America.

‘Til then, here’s my twitter page.  holler.

Also, the ultimate technological deficiency I’m going to have when I get back to America is the first time I see an iphone.  I’ve never seen one before.  I think i’m going to freak out when I see one, which is really going to weird everyone out because they will have been out for two years

Peace Corps on Obama’s Radar

I came across this article by the LA Times, which looks at this historical relationship between the Peace Corps and Indonesia:

The last time Indonesiaallowed Peace Corps volunteers to work here, they weren’t sent into villages to teach English or build schools. The Americans were assigned to whip athletes into shape for the 1964 Olympics.

The peculiar aid to reluctant hosts didn’t work out: Jakarta ended up boycotting the Tokyo Games, and thugs from the Indonesian Communist Party, which accused the American coaches of being CIA agents, ran them out of the country in 1965, less than three years after they had arrived.

More than four decades later, when Islamic extremism is considered the biggest foreign threat to the United States, the Obama administration hopes to persuade the government of the world’s most populous Muslim country to let the Peace Corps return.

Apparently on SoS Clinton’s visit to Indonesia during her Asia tour, she tried to convince the government to open back up to the idea of having volunteers come to its country.  From a diplomacy standpoint, it seems like the right message to send the world’s largest Muslim country.  Then again, I know first hand that when it comes to development, people have to want it.  I like the idea of expanding Peace Corps to new posts, but this seems like it’s more about softening America’s image than it does with development.

Azerbaijan in Links

Here’s Ujar’s 4 newest residents. I’ve never heard of quadruplets in ‘Baijan before. Ujar is on the map.

There’s also some interesting poll numbers from Gallup:

…only 21% Azerbaijanis responded positively to the question “Is religion take an important place in your life?”

The highest number of atheists live in Estonia. It is followed by Sweden (17%), Denmark (18), Norway (20), Czechia [Czech Republic?] and Azerbaijan (21), Hong Kong (22), Japan and France (25), The 10th and 11th places go to Mongolia and Belarus.

If you were to ask what Estona, Sweden, Azerbaijan and Hong Kong all have in common, I probably wouldn’t have said a high rate of atheism. Then again, the question, “Is religion take an important place in your life?” doesn’t necessarily mean atheism. For me, it’s more indicative of a passive attitude towards religion. I have definitely sensed that over the time I’ve been here. I’d say it’s the result of the Soviet Union, but I don’t want to speculate too much.

Even though I haven’t seen any around here, apparently tourism in Azerbaijan is up as a whole.

The number of tourists to Azerbaijan in 2008 increased by 39 percent and reached 1.5 million peoples.

…

Tourists are mainly coming to Azerbaijan from CIS countries- from Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Georgia, from Asian countries – Iran, Jordan and Bahrain, from Europe – Germany, Austria, Bulgaria, Finland and other countries. Roughly 364 tourists visited Azerbaijan from Columbia in 2008…

2009 will probably show an increase in tourism as well, seeing as Baku has been named the Islamic Cultural Capital of 2009. I’m not exactly sure what being the cultural capital means, but it seems like as good as an excuse as any to have some festivals and cultural events. Kind of ironic compared to the links above about atheism though.

International Book Project

I gotta plug the International Book Project. I’ve been working on a English Resource Room for my school, and I sent in a request to get books from the IBP. A few months later, we got 79 great kids-books in English. They vary from books for beginning readers to teen novels. Most of them seem are going to be too tough for a lot of the kids, but more important than having these kids understand everything in the books is that it gets them excited about learning English.

We’re set up a small English library for the kids to check books out so they can take them home and read them at their leisure.

Part of the requirement for the IBP is that we write thank you letters and submit pictures so that they can promote their organization and continue to receive funding from donors.

Here are a few pics I took of the 7th grade kids getting their books

a nice little twist

After a frustrating trip to the post office, I felt like I had to blow off a little steam. Usually, I do this by walking home as fast as possible in order to go back into my own little world where I can listen to my own music or zone out on a TV show (and i had season 2 of Dexter sitting at home, waiting for me). This time however, my walk home was interrupted by two punks walking down the street who decided that it was a good opportunity to make fun of me. They must not have realized that I was already irrationally angry at poor customer service. Bad time to try to have a laugh.

So I’m walking down the street, minding my own business when two kids (who are walking down the street I just crossed for a visual) see me walking away and yell out some gibberish. I mean gibberish in the literal sense, as he just threw out random syllables at me. It was like he was saying “You are a foreigner. When you speak your language, you sound like an idiot.” This has happened to me several times before, and I usually let it slide, but considering the experience with the post office, I needed revenge.

I turned around and gave them a stare that let them know they just made a mistake. They kept walking, but as soon as they got out of site, one of them booked it down the street. The other kid, who didn’t really do anything wrong, simply kept walking at his normal pace. Unfortunately, he didn’t know that I’ve started taking hostages.

I walked up to him and grabbed him by the collar. He told me that he didn’t do anything. “I know you didn’t,” I said, “but your friend did. Who is he? Where does he live?” The kid spilled the beans. Once he told me, I gave him a simple “Let’s go.” People were looking at us strangely, as it’s not everyday they see an American holding on to a little Azerbaijani kid by the scruff of their neck.

We were near the mosque when I got an idea. What was I going to do when I got to this kids house? My idea was to talk to his father and tell him about his moronic little son, but then again, his dad might not be home. Or maybe he wouldn’t even care.  I stopped walking with this kid and I got some more information. I found out that they both go to my school. I got their names and their homerooms which is certainly enough information to give to the director. I saved myself a trip to wherever this kid lived and I will unleash a fury when I tell the director about this kid disrespecting a teacher. “Alright,” I said, “I’ll see you tomorrow,” and I let him go.

Just as I let him go, though, a couple of old women walked up to us. I see them all the time, as I live near the mosque. They’re always out in front, chatting it up or just hanging out. They asked the kid if I could speak Azerbaijani, and when he said that I could they walked towards me and introduced themselves.

They gave me the standard, “What are you doing here? Where did you learn to speak Azerbaijani? How much money do you make? Where do you live? Are you married?” I aced the quiz, and they were pretty impressed. I had seen them in front of the mosque before, so I asked them if they worked there.

“Yeah. We clean it. America is a Christian country, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.” I told them, not wanting to talk about religious plurality. “Lots of Christians. We don’t have the call to prayer. I’ve never been in a mosque.”

“Be our guest. Come inside.”

I’ve walked past this place a hundred times, and I’ve always been curious about what goes on inside. I wasn’t sure if I was allowed to go or not, considering my status as a non-Muslim. They told me there was no problem.

Inside was really cool. It’s a simple, two-story building, with rugs everywhere and a fireplace in the middle. The room was spacious and colorful. I asked if women and men came to pray together, and they said that the women go upstairs, and the men go downstairs.

There were Arabic flags and posters everywhere. Obviously, I couldn’t make out the Arabic (or Farsi, I suppose, I have no idea how to distinguish them), but there were somethings written in Cyrillic that I could sound out. I don’t know what they meant, but a lot of them were a dedication to Imam Hussein.

After looking around for a bit, they told me that I should come back at the call to prayer. I told them that I wasn’t a Muslim, so I didn’t know if it was alright. They said that I was a guest, and that I could come any time.

It was a great experience. I had been waiting to check that place out for a while. Not only did I get to ease my curiosity of the place, but I was shown great hospitality.

It never would have happened if post office was an efficiently run place and those little brats decided not to make fun of me. It was a great situation that exemplifies PC service. There are great moments and there are frustrating moments, and they are often tied together.

Click on the thumbnails below to see a couple of pictures I took in the mosque.

7 months to go

I’ve decided that I’m going to write one of these “X Months” posts as each month passes. In some ways it seems like I’m just watching the clock tick by, but these are serious chunks of time.

With seven months to go, I find myself swamped for the first time in a while. One of the things about Peace Corps, which I felt prepared for, is that there are quite a few chunks of time where there isn’t much to do. Now, all of the sudden, I’ve got deadlines all over the place, and I’m in panic mode to get all of this stuff done. All of this, of course, is a real pain, because by the first week of March, I’ll have turned all these grant proposals in, and I’ll be back to having a bunch of time on my hands.

It’s also different looking at these deadlines with such little time left. Last year, I always felt like if something didn’t work out, I could just do it during the second year of my service. This time around, there is a lot of pressure to get things done because this is going to be my last chance to do it. I’m not mortified by it, but I am worried that I’m going to go back to the States thinking I could have done more. Now is the time for me to roll up my sleeves and get some things done so that I won’t be worrying about that in seven months.

And, for those of you wondering I have 74% of Peace Corps Service completed. This means that I have 213 days left. That number seems laughably small. I remember remarking to someone, “Dude, we’ve got less than 600 days now.” Time can fly.

Azerbaijan and the new administration

Right after the Georgia-Russia conflict over Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Dick Cheney did a Caucus Tour to assure them that the United States had their best interest in mind.  Of course, in Azerbaijan, Cheney met with BP and Haliburton execs after he met with the president.  To me, that message read “we’ve kind of got your back as long as the oil and gas keep flowing.”

Now, it appears David Plouffe, the Obama campaign strategist is coming to Azerbaijan:

His trip to Azerbaijan is scheduled to include a speech today at Gerb University in the capital of Baku, followed by a meeting with President Ilham Aliyev and the speaker of the parliament, Oktay Asadov, according to Radio Free Europe, which first reported on the trip.

“Plouffe is coming as a private citizen,” Terry Davidson, a spokesman at the U.S. Embassy in Azerbaijan, told Radio Free Europe. “The embassy is not in charge of his schedule.”

Still, it’s interesting that someone who probably has access to Obama’s blackberry coming to Azerbaijan.  It’ll be interesting to see if America’s foreign policy shifts toward Azerbaijan.

Postponing a Goodbye

Last week, after one of my classes, on of my 8th grade girls came up to me after class and told me, in English, “Mr. Jeffrey, I don’t think I can come to my conversation club tomorrow.”

“Why? What’s up?” I asked. She told me that she was moving.

I was floored. I’ve written before about how I’m becoming attached to these students and that leaving them at the end of the year is going to be difficult. For this to happen four months early really took me by surprise. On top of that, this girl is great. She is passionate about learning English and she has a great sense of humor. I was really surprised, so we sat down and started to talk.

I asked her why her family was moving away, and she started to fill me in on the details of the situation.

“My family is staying here. I am going to live with my grandmother.”

“Why would you do that?” I asked

“Sometimes I think that my parents don’t love me.”

“I’m sure that they love you. You’re a great person. Why would you think that?”

She talked about her desire for independence, about how she doesn’t feel like she fits in here, and other, normal problems that 14 year old girls face all over the world. We discussed whether or not moving would be the answer to these problems. I told her about how I think of America as being a wonderful place now that I don’t live there, but that once I get back, I’ll be reminded of the reasons that made me want to leave.

We made up a list of the good reasons for staying and the good reasons for moving. While I really care for this student, the reality is that there might be more opportunities for her in this other town. There is a more progressive culture there, and I think that it would allow her to more freely pursue her ambitions. It’s hard for young women to do that in Ujar.

We went back and forth on the topic, and suddenly, out of now where, she stood up, smiled, and said, “I’m going to stay.” This knocked me back as much as her saying she was going to leave did. When I asked her why, she didn’t give me any more information. She just shook my hand and walked away. I stayed in the classroom alone for the next ten minutes just thinking about what had just happened.

I don’t really know what changed her mind, but I think it had to do with our discussion. I don’t think it was really anything I told her that persuaded her, but rather, it was the interest I showed in her, and how I told her, “This decision is up to you, but let’s talk about it.” I don’t think that people show that much confidence in her ability to make decisions about herself that often.

I was still a little weirded out about the heavy conversation we’d just had, when she came and found me and told me, “Don’t tell anyone about what we talked about.” (I know putting it on the world wide web isn’t exactly keeping it a secret, but everything is anonymous). I told her that of course everything she told me would be kept between us. Then, as she walked away, she told me “You are my best friend.”

I know I’ve written about it quite a bit over the past few posts, but the relationships I’m building with these kids is absolutely special.