We left on Monday morning. In Central Asia the usual way to travel between cities is to find the place where cars/taxis and mini buses leave from and get a spot. Cars usally sit in line and when they get 4 passengers they take off. Our trip wasn't as comfortable, Nazar (the guy who invited me to his village) and the girl we went with didn’t want to pay an extra 2 sumoni (60 cents) for a regular taxi fare and we crunched into the backseat with one other person. Before they settled on that I figured we had 3 people and enough baggage that I was willing to pay for an extra person and take a whole car so we could be more comfortable… But the ride seemed to go fast enough and in no time we were at the front gate of Nazar’s house.
Nazar’s house is a pretty interesting house. It’s not the typical Tajik layout. It is more Russian village house. When Nazar’s grandfather and grandmother (who is Ukranian.. they met in the war) came back from WWII his grandfather bought some land, built a house and planted hundreds of fruit and nut trees. Some of the trees were cut down during the difficult war times, but many trees still survive.
The first day we didn’t do too much. At Nazar’s house they have an Aiwan ( that uzbek/ Tajik platform thing that I have set up at our house) outside that has a roof over it and even has a light for when it’s dark. We sat up there and had some lunch and then I slept for a few hours or so. I think was wiped out from the past few days for traveling and the lack of sleep during the wedding, so I fell right to sleep.
After I woke up we did end up going for a bit of a walk up the mountain a bit to see some more of the property. The whole small town/ village is on a mountain slope so there really wasn’t too much of a flat place anywhere. Each family and home had their own terrace that they planted with vegetables and fruit trees. When we visited different families they would prepare dishes with vegetables from the garden and put a plate of fresh fruit in front of us…
That evening we came home for dinner. A friend of Nazar’s father stopped by. Nazar’s father had called him especially because I had stopped by. He’s a very wise man and we ended up having a fantastic conversation about some pretty interesting things.. history of the US, life in the US (they were amazed that we don’t eat bread with every single meal and at how we find someone to marry.. marriages here are arranged by the parents still), tajik/ English grammar… etc… After a while my head was spinning it was tough to keep up with such a deep conversation with my Tajik, but I feel like I managed it well enough.
We slept outside on the outdoor aiwan as well. It got pretty cold at night but I just pulled the covers over my head. It was nice to sleep outside. One of my favorite things while we were there was before we would go to sleep Nazar’s 4 younger brothers and sisters would pile up on the aiwan with us and we’d play different games before we went to sleep. I taught them how to play 20 questions and it was pretty fun. Even the youngest brother who’s only 6 years old joined in.
Most of the rest of the week passed the same week. We visited difference houses. Nazar was great helping me meet different teachers in the area. It was really good to get to this place and I met a ton of people for my research. I met teachers in two or three different schools in the area. I completed some interviews and I want to return in November when I know that it’ll be cold and difficult for schools (they don’t all have heat or electricity all the time.) I want to have the opportunity to see it with my own eyes.
Oh, I guess I forgot one of the most important things. The name of the small town I was in is called Obi Garm (Hot Water) because it has hot mineral springs. Nazar’s house didn’t really have any place to take a shower, so a couple of times I went to the hot mineral springs to wash up. It was pretty hot for sure. The one place I went had a pool of the hot mineral springs and it was all that I could do to be in there for 2-3 minutes. Another place I went had this funny looking shower contraption. Basically it looked like a carwash for people. It was built form like 6-8 long pipes that stood up at about shoulder length and had holes that sprayed water towards the inside. Basically, you were supposed to stand in there and let all the mineral water hit all over you body. It results in a kind of water massage.
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