halloween!!

Blog

Now if you're anything resembling the average veemo, you love Halloween with your whole being. To you it is the sum of all American holidays and your birthday combined into one special time of year when everyone feels as silly and mischeivous as you do. I LOVE HALLOWEEN I really really do, who cares about the other holidays as long as I can celebrate Halloween!! (Anyone who remembers the debaucle of last year knows how "into the Halloween spirit" I tend to get)

Now you may ask, "But vy, you're in Azerbaijan, do they celebrate it there?" To which I say, "YES! Halloween is definitely celebrated in Azerbaijan!" if you pay attention to the 3rd goal of the Peace Corps, and realize it's also for local culture to learn about Americans. Halloween this year comes in several parts.

Part One: The PCV party
In Lenkaran we had the gracious hosts of Tom & Ash along with their other lovely sitemates Joyce, Jane and Tim for the weekend. By the time I arrived Friday people were already getting into the spirit of Halloween. The next day we all wake up at 8 a.m. (after dancing til 3 or 4) thanks to someone announcing loudly "it's cold, I'm sick and I've got shorts on..." or something to that effect. Foraging for food in Tom's kitchen turned into a good buzz that got most of us into costume by 3 p.m. in the afternoon, where more tomfoolery, dancing and shenanigans took place. My buddy Nate and I dressed as Gwen Stefani and Harajuku girl with homemade costumes!

our hosts
rikki who dressed as a Mexican
pcv girls
a bulgarian flavored taco
gwen stefani and I before we started...well before it got dark
the night wore on
you can take girls out of seattle but you can't take skepticism out the seattle girl (yay for mariko!)
seriously one of my favorite moments of the night (when I could still remember things)

There'd be more pictures, but since PCV parties are usually nice breaks from the conservative culture we live in, being selective of pictures being posted is always a good life choice. Hands down my favorite costume of the night was Jason who dressed as the Charlie Brown ghost, a sheet with eyes cutout. It still makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside a few days later despite the lack of central/indoor heating in AZ. Best of all he kept making that "oooooooo" ghost noise all night and imbibed on Jim Beam under his costume. I seriously had the time of my life and it was probably the best Halloween party I've been to yet.

Part Two: Siyezen learns (more) about Halloween
Getting back to site I decided to do a Halloween lesson for my students at school and Will's and my English club for non school #3 students who don't have access to the Americans in town otherwise. The lesson at school was shorter since I plan on doing an America Day next year and having a bigger celebration for all of school #3. But at the English club we bobbed for apples and one student even brought her own Jack-O-Lantern she carved (she attended the school where the previous Siyezen PCV taught, before my time). It was a lot of fun and the kids seemed to enjoy it, passerby adults were definitely curious what the Japanese girl and non-Azeri speaking Azeri (my sitemate Will gets mistaken for a local all the time) were doing with the local kids.
ibrahim, my local azeri friend with a jack o lantern
my sitemate and I
this is our english club
I got an apple!

Part Three:
Hasn't happened yet! But should be a great time. I'm helping another volunteer with an "America Day" to show the Azeri school kids how Americans celebrate Halloween in a rayon on the other side of Azerbaijan (yay for taking the night train on Friday). I'm particularly excited since I plan on having an America Day next year for Halloween at my site, I'll be able to see what's successful and what isn't.

===============================

In other news, the reality of living in a Muslim country has been hitting me on a few fronts this week. The U.S. Embassy and Peace Corps office were closed earlier this week in response to a terrorist plan being uncovered with American targets in Baku. I understand there's some risks involved being a PCV but to be honest, I don't feel any less safe than I did in the States.

There are articles out about groups that support violent actions rising where poverty and lack of opportunities/education exist. It makes me feel like what the PC does is especially important in places like this. If anything, if we can give people a face, a voice, a smile to what an American is compared to abstract ideas sold by the media or anti-American ideologies...we're succeeding in humanizing one another to each other which builds peace. The Azeris are really good, kind and warm people (would you let an obviously lost foreigner who barely speaks the language wandering the neighborhood use the bathroom in your home, offer her some tea and then walk her to where the American boy lives? Yeah I didn't think so) so it really surprised me when I was made aware of the situation at hand. Everything is returning to normal tho so no worries.

Life here is good. School has its highs and lows, my 7th form kids are my reason for rolling out of bed in the morning. My English club is already in it's 5th or 6th week and I've only been at site since mid September. I've already got a few more ideas for other community development projects but taking my time to get to know people and making sure I am not alone in seeing the needs that can be potentially addressed by a silly PCV like me. I've got dreams of some youth development since we didn't get an official volunteer yet and some environmental stuff...I had a shower with water completely heated by burning styrofoam a few weeks ago. My environmentalist sensibilities were shocked to the core and I kept telling myself, it's a hot shower vy, it's a hot shower, it's a hot shower your conscience isn't clean but your body will be.

We've got Thanksgiving coming up soon. My mom finally sent me some warmer clothes and my next care package will even have a new charger for my Nintendo DS I haven't been able to turn on since June!!! Thanks Mom! Really there isn't much to complain a lot about, especially now that spinach has come into season. Now if only I had a proper bowl of rice (basmati doesn't count to me, being vietnamese, it doesn't stick together and is partaken with butter) and chopsticks to go with my leafy green veggie goodness. Or better yet, some viet-style carmelized salty sweet spicy catfish...living next to the most polluted body of the water in the world means I haven't had real fish in months ::sigh:: if you're reading this, please, go enjoy some sushi for me, and the real stuff, especially of the fatty tuna variety. And I'll leave you with some random photos of Azerbaijan. Til next time!
a cake I made for my host sister's 18th birthday...tasted much better than it looked
nearby villages at night from my sitemate's house
the road to a nearby ancient castle
neighboring rayon to the south, it's entrance
this is the main road that runs through my town