March 15, 2013

I had agreed with Anna to meet at nine in the morning to try and get through the remaining CATEC applications so we could send the letter of acceptance or rejection early next week. We spread the applications on the floor for lack of a better working surface and went about dividing them by region to insure every one of them was represented to some extent.

It was then time to call the participants whose submissions had been lacking in some aspect before making the final call. Anna didn’t have enough credit on her mobile phone, so we had to use mine. When it was time for Anna to leave for her classes, we still needed to compile another database by region and I had misplaced my flash drive with the older one. In spite of that, I offered to do it on Sunday when I planned to be home all day.

I had a couple of samsis for lunch while talking to Nargiza and Maria who complained they had a lot of spoiled students in their classes as they came from rich families who could afford to pay for their lessons. These students tended to misbehave a lot and challenge the teachers quite often. Maria indicated a typical day for her entailed working from 8:00 in the morning to 8:00 in the evening.

I emailed Martha, the woman who had hosted the book club on Wednesday, to see if per chance I had left my flash drive there, and she promised to look for it and let me know. I’d really be hurting if I can’t find it as I have all of my latest documents and presentations in that portable hard drive.

While getting ready for my presentation, one of the pre-service teachers came in and asked me about my religious preference. I stated I had none and then couldn’t believe it when she told me she’d only recently learned that there Muslim people all over the world and not just in Central Asia. Wow!

When my session was over, an older participant approached me saying she wanted to talk to me in private only to ask me if I wanted to join her church, a Christian one, located nearby. I said no, but told her I knew someone who might be interested and left it at that.

I went back to the Halal Kitchen and had my usual lagman noodles, salad and tea before returning home. No trolley came by and I had to settle for a marshrutka where I felt out of breath immediately. A couple of blocks before my stop, the driver was pulled over by the police and I just got out and walked home enjoying the fresh air.