Silver Linings

I have hesitated to post about this because of how what happened might reflect poorly on my community and my experiences here. But recent developments have made me happy to post about a misfortunate event that happened while I was in training. About a month ago, two weeks until swearing in as a Peace Corps Volunteer, the trainees in our village organized a community event on the local soccer field (which I talked about in this post). We arranged a number of games and succeeded in bringing in about 25 kids to the event. We were having a great day until I lost track of my iPhone for a few minutes—just long enough for it to go missing. I’m happy to say, a month later, that the local police successfully retrieved my iPhone this week!

At the time I was devastated. I am a very careful person and not careless with my things. Though I was disappointed in myself for getting too “comfortable” in the village I called home for my first two months in Armenia, I was most upset that it happened in my community and the potential that a community member took it. We exercised every morning at the soccer field, the local kids knew us and it was just a big blow to think that someone in the community would have done something like that.

Though it was awful to have lost my phone, in my final two weeks I truly felt a part of the community. Within minutes my host brother was out with his friends trying to find anyone who might have seen my phone or anyone take it. My host dad spent days out on the main marshutni (public transportation) stop that serves as the town square and information exchange. My host mother and sisters made me eat tons of food and candy and drink lots of coffee—my favorite. When I’d walk around the streets close to my home neighbors—even those I hadn’t formally met—would ask me if there was any news.

I consider myself a fairly independent person and like the anonymity of living in a big city. However, after this experience I’ve learned the importance of community and how wonderful it feels to know that everyone is looking out for me. I might not have realized this as fully had I not lost my phone and it made me think of some challenges I might face in my permanent site, the third largest city in Armenia. I was initially, and still am, happy to be placed in a large city where I don’t have to worry (as much) about having water, indoor plumbing, gas/heat and grocery supplies. But after this happened I knew that living in a larger city would make it more difficult to build the community ties that I had made in the village. Not that I will never feel part of the community, just that it might take more work to get there.

At the suggestion of my host father, I went to the police to file a report about the incident. As most would think about the legal/justice system in transitional countries, I wasn’t too confident going to the police would help my case. Things like this are dealt with within the community and going to the police can just make things more complicated. If something doesn’t come up within the first few days, pretty much all hope is lost. However, I went and filed the report. They took the serial number of the phone so if anyone were to use it the police would be alerted and could retrieve it. Aside from that they would question the community to see if anyone could provide information about what happened.

So you understand how happy I am to hear that the police system in Armenia successfully retrieved my phone a little more than a month after the incident occurred. Not only am I happy because I have my phone back—which doubles as my camera and triples as my lifeline to the ones I care about most—but I am happy that the police here worked so efficiently and effectively to get the job done. In America we take for granted the service the police provide the public. Often in developing and transitional countries, when something happens no one thinks to call the police because they are so ineffective—for many reasons which I won’t go into. So it is a breath of fresh air to see the local police work so well!

On that note—expect more photos of my permanent site up soon! I’ll also be posting about some experiences I’ve had so far. I did finally manage to put up photos from the end of training and swearing in, so make sure to check those out here: http://s1150.photobucket.com/albums/o605/lizinarmenia/.

What we don’t learn in language class

I’ve been wanting to post for a while about funny language things I’ve come across while learning Armenian. Having had an interest in languages for as long as I can remember, two things that I enjoy most about learning languages are the knowledge gained about English, and the idioms and sayings picked up from living in the culture. Here are some things that seemed funny to me when we learned it because it either seemed strange to not have another word for it, or it just seemed like a roundabout way to say something when actually it’s the same in English. And then some interjections that just delight me and make me realize how funny the expressions I can’t help but produce probably seem.

Market: in Armenian, the market where you buy produce is called a “shooka.” When talking about the economic or business market, in Armenian you also say “shooka.”

The day after tomorrow: In Armenian you say “varragh che, myoos ora,” which is literally “not tomorrow, the next day.”

The day before yesterday: Likewise, you say “yerek che, arrajcheen ora,” which is “not yesterday, the day before.”

Vaaaaaay (oops, ugh, oh my, jeez): When to use it: “Oops, I dropped something”; or, my sister asks me to bring something from the next room even though she’s sitting right next to me and it’s just as easy for her to get it; general disapproval; “I can’t believe it”; or, my favorite, a 2 year old walks in to see someone reading her book and she says “MINE! VAAAAAY!” with a very grumpy face.

Eeuuugh (huh, ugh): When to use it: “You’re being ridiculous”; or, “How could you ask me to do that”; or, “I don’t want to, you do it”; or, strong disapproval, usually with disgust.

Ba (oh, wow, huh, hm, well): used to start any sentence in casual conversation; or, “But, how/why?”; general reaction of surprise.

Blub blub blub blub: used to mime talking, like our “yadda yadda yadda.”  I thought it was just my host-father’s way of making fun of me, but it’s actually used in serious conversation as well.

Mmhmm (ok, I see, settled): It’s hard to explain when to use this one, and the tone in it is very important. It’s not mhmm like we have in English, like “I agree” or “Yes.” It’s something we all have gradually picked up without realizing it. It’s fun to point it out when an American uses it in a group of other Americans.

Of course all of these require verbal demonstrations, which I am happy to provide over the phone on request!

By the way, there are some new photos up from my last month in the village during training and our swearing in as Volunteers.

From Trainee to Volunteer

Well! I finally made it through Pre-Service Training and have arrived at my permanent site, Vanadzor! As Armenia’s third largest city, it’s been quite an adjustment from village life and I’m enjoying seeing what all the shops and markets have to offer. My eyes are tired from all the looking and I’m enjoying being tired from walking around the city all day! Since I lived right next to the kindergarten where we had our language classes and most of our trainings, I really missed walking every day. Hopefully the extra walking will help me burn off those few extra pounds I’ve picked up since I’ve been here!

Our swearing-in service was a lot of fun and I got to re-live my best high school memories singing with a group on stage! Peace Corps filmed the ceremony, which you can see here: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/a-20 . If you fastforward to minute 33ish you can see me walking across the stage to receive my certificate and if you zoom to minute 56ish you can see me singing (in Armenian!) on stage. The quality isn’t the best, but it’s something! There is also a news clip here:  http://news.am/eng/news/116290.html and a link to photos taken by the media here: http://news.am/eng/photos/sessions/peace-corps-volunteers-take-an-oath/. I was also interviewed (in Armenian) and they played the clip on the news, but I have yet to find it—which might be better anyway!

I’ve been in Vanadzor for five days now and finally feeling like I’ve done enough relaxing and settling in to tackle some things that I enjoy doing, but haven’t been able to do yet—like writing a blog post! Once my internet becomes more reliable I will also organize/add more photos. I’m trying to borrow some of my friends’ photos as well since I am now lacking a camera.

These past five days have been a little drama-full due to some much needed improvements in the water system of Vanadzor. When I was dropped off at my host-mother’s house half the street had been dug-up and pipes were being laid. By the next day the trench was past our house to the main street, leaving just a tiny space for us to pass and a 2×4 to walk over one of the trenches leading up to the neighbors’ house.  The funny thing is, it took me a couple days to say—wait a minute, this is ridiculous! Everybody living on this street has to hug the wall to get through and no cars can pass. Nevermind when it rains (usually every afternoon) the soil is so loose it begins to fall into the trenches and at night it’s very dark. Of course there is no roped-off sections, no guard rails, nothing. I guess it just shows how I’m integrating—or just being numb to things like this. But I do have to say that I am impressed with how quickly the workers have been able to lay the pipes and get them working—they work until 6 or so in the evening and were working this weekend even though it was a holiday. Mind you the workers do most of the work with hand shovels and only have a back-hoe to do the big digging. Now we have a water schedule, but once the pipes are laid we’ll have water all day I believe, which is great! Unfortunately while they’ve been working on the pipes the water availability has been unpredictable so I’ve been cold-bucket bathing, but soon it will be just fine. Welcome to Vanadzor!

Other than that, I’ve met with my two organizations and we’re starting to tackle a community assessment and an organizational capacity and needs assessment. One of my counterparts is on vacation until the end of August so I’m using the time to plan and gather my wits to start working. My other counterpart is eager to start and eager to learn how to do the assessments which is great to see. 

My host-mother has been great to spend time with. I was concerned she might be a little over-protective, but she lets me do what I want/need and trusts me to be safe on my own in the city which is refreshing. In the village I hardly ever went out alone, so it’s great to have a little more independence. She’s also letting me do some cooking, which is surprising considering it took me nearly a month to get to make my own breakfast during training! She really wants me to stay with her while I’m in Vanadzor, but I’m looking forward to being on my own again. No matter how much “freedom” she gives me, I’ll always feel like a guest and will find it hard to completely relax. My co-workers are going to help me find an apartment and they don’t think it’ll be too hard as a woman. The two volunteers who have lived here for a year already had a hard time finding a place because they’re both men. The perception here is that men (and American men) don’t know how to take care of themselves, so a man living by himself will surely starve!

That’s it for the big update, I’m here safe and sound and looking forward to getting to work!

A New Beginning!

So here is a quick wrap-up of PST (Pre-Service Training) since my site visit to Vanadzor, where I’ll be moving in just three days!

After the site visit, our language and technical training sessions were bumped up to every day, six days a week—which is part of the reason I haven’t been posting! We’ve been crazy busy and when I have down time it’s hard to even want to recap the week I had! On top of language and training, we also took a few field trips to tourist sites in Armenia. We saw beautiful ancient churches built in the 4^th century and a 700 year old oak tree! We (tried) to dance traditional Armenian dances in the center of Yerevan, where they have lessons and group dancing every Friday during the summer.

In our technical trainings we visited the offices and staff of one of Peace Corps’ partners, Counterpart International, which is contracted by USAID to implement USAID projects. We also organized a community event for our village to practice mobilizing youth and using our network to get the word out about events. We all were surprised to get about 25 kids to the sport day, having only lived in the village for two months. Our final presentation to our practicum organizations was last week as well. Our organization wanted to take us to Lake Sevan to relax and get to know their volunteers, so we did our final presentation at the lake! We also had our final language test last week and I did very well! I’m glad for my score, but I know it will be difficult to keep up with my language learning since most of the people in my organizations in Vanadzor speak English. However, I think living alone with my new host-mother will help me advance more quickly, as we only have each other to make conversation with!

I’m excited to get to work and to have more control of my schedule, but I’m nervous about starting again with a new family, new people and fewer of my friends nearby. I’ve gotten used to the routine with my family here and they have gotten used to me. I promised them that I will visit every time I go to Yerevan, as it is an easy trip. They’re already planning weekend overnight stays!  It’s been a great experience to integrate so much into a family and feel like I fit in with their customs and values.

However, I do feel that I have the cultural awareness and language skills to be more direct with my new host-mom from the start. It took me a month to get to make my own breakfast here and another couple weeks to make lunch as well, but I think since it’s just us two in Vanadzor, she’ll be more open to letting me do more of the cooking/chores and having more say in what we eat. Not that I couldn’t do that with my current family, but it is hard to change the way things are done once everyone gets used to doing things a certain way.  I’ve enjoyed my stay here and have liked all the food and hospitality, but my waistline is begging me to take over some control of the cooking!

And then of course I’m excited to get to work, but nervous about what that work will look like. I’m grateful to be placed with one busy organization that has programs going all the time. I will definitely have plenty to do with this organization but I’m still unsure about where/how I will fit in to their everyday activities. The other organization is smaller, so my schedule with them will likely be more irregular. I’m trying to not have any expectations, but planner that I am it is difficult not to try to think about what my schedule will be like for the next few months! Whatever happens, I know it’ll be an adjustment from the jam-packed schedule of PST so I’m trying to fill my free time with some new hobbies or taking back up some hobbies I’ve not been able to continue during PST.

One of those hobbies will be blogging! I’ve been jotting down some interesting cultural notes to blog about once I have more free time. So be looking for posts about Armenian sayings, core values and working environment!

 

Love and miss you all!