December 1, 2012

I was up relatively early, before 7:00, as Shamir, the landlady’s husband, was coming by to check a leak in the bathroom. It was snowing heavily and the courtyard was completely deserted at that time of the day. I tidied up the apartment and cook a bit of muesli to start my morning right.

Shamir showed up around ten and had to go back outside to purchase a part to repair a pipe that was leaking next to the toilet. Out of caution, he also checked the pipe leading to the washing machine and found this one too was leaking. He returned half hour later, fixed the problem and was gone in flash, but not before I reminded him I needed a place to hang my winter coat and accessories. He had had to dump his own coat on the floor while performing the necessary repairs.

Finished typing my reply to the two letters my friend Stephanie had sent two weeks apart but which arrived at Lingua the same day. Sent a summary of the teachers’ feedback for the training sessions that ended yesterday to the embassy and my RELO.

I headed to Lingua and found almost two feet of snow now deposited on the ground. I have to say that it’s a lot more enjoyable to walk on freshly fallen snow than on the icy platform it’ll become tomorrow. I had to wait a bit for the marshrutka and rode standing again as the minibus was packed. Walking toward the school, I found lots of young people playfully posing for pictures or just enjoying the powdery stuff. I pulled my camera and took some pictures as well.

Once at Lingua, Zarina reminded me of the dinner/dancing event the school is planning for December 29. I asked if spouses and relatives would be invited and she said no, only the staff members themselves would be attending. Sounds kind of dull, but I really don’t have any plans for that date and so I told her to include me on the roster. The cost will be 1300 soms or about $29.00.

The conversation club had only eight members today, a much smaller number than I usually like but relatively high considering what the weather was like outside. I had then ask and answer questions  for the first fifteen minutes and then work on a questionnaire about the best and worst of Kyrgyzstan. There are some students in this club that shouldn’t have been assigned to it as they don’t have enough vocabulary to freely participate in the activities I’m bringing in. We went over the answers and it was clear that they are too young to have opinions formed on many of the questions.

Before going home, I decided to pay the Halal Kitchen a visit and buy enough lagman to last me several days as I’ll be teaching at the Arabaev University beginning  next week and will be going there directly from home. I ordered five fried lagman dishes and patiently waited for them. It was once again a bit tricky to maneuver the marshrutka with my packages and shoulder bag, but I made it home just fine although there was another crush of people in it.

I saw the film “Sliding Doors” years ago when I still lived in Miami, but couldn’t remember much about it except for the fine performance by Gwyneth Paltrow. It was refreshing to see it again and to check out her British English accent along the way. She must have had some voice coach for sure.