Life as a Peace Corps volunteer is always a bit crazy. They tell you when you begin your journey that you need to work on the “F” word… Flexibility. I feel that has been proven to be true more than I ever thought possible. Just in the past week along I have gone from staying at a friend’s house, helping make lunch for an English camp to being consolidated with all of the other volunteers for five days for safety precautions. Nothing happened, but Kyrgyzstan had a referendum vote on Sunday and many people we nervous that there may be some problems. Luckily, everywhere is safe, people voted, and there was no violence. I feel safe am not worried about anything. Now I am finally back in my village that I just found out is the coldest site in Peace Corps WORLD. Please think good thoughts of warmth and sanity for me!
One of the greatest parts of this country (as I think I have mentioned before) is the transportation. The best part of it is how cheap it is, but I guess you get what you pay for. Many times you can make it to where you are going with no problems what-so-ever, but then there are those hitches in the road (no pun intended). One good hitch that happened to me when taking a taxi into the city was our driver kept wanting to stop for random things. That doesn’t sound like that would be a good experience, but it really was. First, he wanted to stop to get some kumuz (fermented mere’s milk). I loathe the stuff, but one of the other volunteers that I was riding with wanted some so we stopped. He got a whole half liter for free because it was the taxi driver’s family who was selling it on the side of the road. Then as we were driving along our driver was playing with his phone. He then started passing it around and showing us pictures of a waterfall. Apparently it was just off the road. He really wanted to take us there and show us it. My American instincts kept telling me “NO.” I began to list all the reasons why I didn’t want to, I need to get where I was going, I didn’t want to ride in the car anymore, why would any normal person want to just take us to a waterfall? But then I began to think, I need to slow down and take life as it comes. That is one of my reasons for wanting to be in the Peace Corps. We said yes and he took us on this sketchy road that really felt like we were going to drive off the edge. As we turned the corner there it was. This waterfall was coming directly out of the rocks. As it hit the ground it trickled down over jagged rocks and turned into a small stream. It was one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen. Lesson learned: take time to enjoy life and remember that you can say yes to something even though it isn’t part of the plan.
Another interesting part of the transportation is there really are lanes in the road. There are kind of two lanes on the outside and one lane in the middle. They use the middle lane to pass. The only problem is that there are so many pot holes and other things in the road that sometimes they have to go to the other side of the road to miss them. So, taxi drivers here swerve all over the road passing each other and missing the dangers in the road. I have learned to just not watch where we were going because if I do my foot is constantly on the floor trying to push in the imaginary break that we all know is not there, but still use it. The other day when we were riding home from Bishkek, there were several times when the road was completely full of sheep. The driver had to lay on his horn just to get them to move out of his way. Some days I am amazed at how different my life is now and already in 3 months this has all become normal. I wouldn’t change it for anything. Some days are more difficult than others, but when it comes down to it I love this experience and I have been given an opportunity that I am forever grateful for!
No comments:
Post a Comment