Sorry I took a long break...

We decided to cook food for fun so we took over tommy's host family's kitchen tommy is in the background, kramer is in the forefront smoking hookah typical tajik male behavior lol...he made awesome mint julabs though.

gabby went around and took pictures of everyone...emily on the far left is telling how to prepare the cucumber and dill salads all recipes were hers, kramer again hasn't moved and nona just walked in..new haircut

the whole gang except tommy all of us busy working

in the end the food we made, cucumber sandwiches, deviled eggs, and stuffed tomatoes...since the ingredients were so fresh it was so much better...after we sat down to start eating the power went out but at least we go the food made.

The group after making Persian Osh, not Tajiki and Shrini Puloh which is basically sweet rice and chicken and some other persian salads

tree on my way to school

my host kitty had kittens,she only had three at this point they are couple days old and there is suppose to be white one but she brought him in after i took the picture. also the smallest black one died:(

our trip to the city of Kulob, the nature outside of the city are so pretty....it was sooooo hot that day upper 90's cramed in a mini van...4 1/2 drive there and 4 1/2 back and not all the roads are smooth....during the ride I pretty much slept then would wake up randomly and take a picture and go back to sleep...the cops also slowed our trip down b.c we would get pulled over at every post and the drivers would have to give them "toll" 

This is norak reservoir, there is a dam somewhere....it was so pretty this is where they get most of the power for the country, so they aren't lying when they say that the water is down and thats the reason why we don't have power ...heres proof but most citizens still think they let water out on purpose or sell their electricity to other countries...who knows

a fort we visited on our way to kulob they rebuilt the outside  behind the new walls are piles of rock

english translation of one a signs around the shrine.what are goalies?

shrine we visited, women can't go in but then again our guys couldn't go in because they weren't mulism or pure enough

more pretty nature

So i hope you enjoy the pictures...I have been so busy trying to keep up with my classes that during the week I pretty much just do class and during the weekends we have our excursions which lately we haven't had any. But its super hot here it went from ahhh spring is coming to oh my gosh where did all this heat and sun come from all this week and last week is in the mid 90's its not really humid unless its going to storm.This weekend we are taking a four day trip to visit a couple other cities in Tajikistan, which I am looking forward to a break from class I haven't had one since March.So I'll make sure to take pretty photos. btw not all of these pictures are mine a few of them are from tommy who takes amazing pictures and other students.Oh and I have like 20 something days left  here it going fast

Shaharazad

Same Old Same Tajikistan

So I haven't made a new post in a while not because I have been lazy but because nothing interesting has happened. This past week was midterm week so i had homework on top of studying for midterms for all my classes. I have been alone in my classes because my classmate, Anne, went to France to sign her apt lease.  Over this past weekend we had a group dinner, meaning students didn't have to pay anything for the meals, at an Arab restaurant Al-Sham. The food was great and then they had belly dancers which I think males enjoyed more than the females. The power still goes out at night here now instead of going on at 10 it goes out at 11pm which limits what we can do at night still. We went to see a play last week at the Opera Ballet which is a big theater, it was in Farsi which was nice but it was hard to understand, sound was bad and tajiks think its ok to not silence their phones and answer them in the middle of the production and hold long conversations. They don't really have a theater culture here so its not expected to be quiet during the production. Also a musical Iranian group from Norway came and performed for us, their sound was amazing, I'll upload videos when I get back but I have some photos. Also got some photos from my resident director, jake, of some of our past trips so they are there too, mostly just group photos. Enjoy.....Shaharazad

The guy in the middle is a friend we made at the buzkahsi, he wanted us over as guest and wanted to kill a sheep for us...

Eating osh at our nouroz party, this osh had raisins, garlic, nuts and chic peas which made it taste really good but it wasn't the traditional way of making osh, no one complained though

In the middle its one of the directors here forcing us to dance

Inside the Opera Ballet, the seats were comfy maybe bc they are rarely used

After the Aluminum Factory we went out for Osh some of us got sick after eating there, though the food was good

Group picture in front of the Aluminum Factory

Their sound was nice and the lyrics were from Hafez's poems...very beautiful

The group from Norway, I don't think the drummer was Iranian

inside the Opera Ballet

The Ceiling was really pretty

Buzkashi Match aka Goat Pulling

This is definitely the most interesting sport I have ever seen. It is played with a dead headless goat that has been stuffed with sand to make it heavy. I attended a match with the program yesterday. This is definitely a man sport here no surprise here...every sport is a man sport in this country meaning no woman was spotted in the either place unless she was cooking. This is definitely a dangerous sport...I saw an old man who couldn't get up and run fast enough get trampled by horses...i saw many players and their horses fall or people get thrown off of them. This was a giant free for all.. the point of the game to get the goat and run it past a white flag. each time a player scored he was given a prize the end prizes included brand new cars. We only stayed for a small portion of the game. The entire time we were there we were stared at probably because we were foreign and mostly because we were women. The guys only got stared at when they took pictures. The locals didn't understand why we wanted to take pictures or why we take them in the first place. It was nice being outside of the city where no one knows english so we don't have people yelling random english words at us. When the people around us realized we understood them and could talk back they were nice enough to explain what was going on and made sure we could see the match, the announcer was very hard to hear. Here is a link from wiki to learn more about Buzkashi. It was hard for me to get good pictures but some of the other students got really good pictures with their nice cameras so when they upload them I'll share. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buzkashi

Enjoy the pictures....

The open field before the match

The new cars and the dead goat are over there somewhere

Every single one of these men were staring at us until I pulled out my camera

The people below us are squatting on a steep hill...we are in the back standing

and it begins this isn't even all of the playes

we were relatively high so the horse never came in our direction but we did have a few scares where we ran off

This is a small hill....it was covers with men sitting on it until the horse started charging in that direction one old man couldn't get up and run fast enough after this picture I saw him get trampled. Its bad they have no where to run it was crowded and behind them is a wall its a really bad place to sit but you get close to the game.

Fighting over goat...who is hard to see...it was a black on and the size of a small child

Their helmets are funny

yeah the goat is somewhere in the middle of that brawl

Thats all for now
Shaharazad

Nowrouz/Navrouz Weekend

So below are pictures from my Nowrouz weekend here in Tajikistan. Or Navrouz pronounced in Tajiki. For those that don't know Nowrouz is the Persian New Year's and starts on the first day of spring. It is celebrated in Iran but also in other countries such as Tajikistan and Afghanistan where they celebrations are slightly different. If you want more info about Nowrouz wikipedia it. I felt like here the celebration of Nowrouz was good but most people felt little attachment to the holiday. For example my family didn't really do anything special beside making osh. Luckily my program did a good job of providing us with a traditional experience/celebration of Nowrouz. I think because of the Russia influence most people here do not feel and attachment to the holiday. They might dress up and walk around out side but thats about it. Enjoy the pictures...some of the pictures aren't my own but obviously im using them because I was there or I am in them.

In the center is my teacher the two people next to him are other students and the girl on the end is a tajik student, we were at the national university on friday instead of going to classes , they held a big festival at the university

here is a haft shin table, tajikis do haft shin instead of sin,girls in white wedding dresses represent  "spring girls" she was part of the opening ceremony signifying the arrival of spring

men playing instruments in the national clothes

part of our haft sin table at our office

This is the Tajikistan version , haft shin, shrab-wine, shona-comb, shirini-sweets, shamshir-sword ugg i forget the rest

another table ate the festival

oh this is usually what i eat for dinner or a variation of this, not really filling, of course you eat this soup with bread, by variations i mean sometimes the vegetables and meat are diced or cut and sometimes there are chick peas or noodles..its okay but gets old fast...i brought old bay and may family uses it on meats now and sometimes in soups which is a nice reminder of home

Haft sin table

Mark and I at the National university

Here is the festival....it was so crowded we are standing on a wall mostly people stared at us the whole time

walking up the the national university, this university is definitely calendar material....the river is dry right now but the mountains are gorgeous the university is the yellow building on the left

haft sin table...of course at the end well actually during we were sneaking food off  of both tables

waiting for the festival to start, this photo courtesy of another student, emily

group picture of all the students and some teachers...yeah we are a small bunch

Norouz display at the university...in the back read navrouz mobarack in tajiki Cyrillic alphabet

those use to be real bunnies and birds :(

making osh for alot of people...this one was good bc we added garlic raisins and walnuts, the americans loved it but the locals were like this is not real ..whatever it was really good

this is an old picture....this machine beats rice and the husks come off..very old machine, ran by one motor and was controlled but pulleys and belts very simple design

I want those hanging rug things

this tea pot was cool...there was chocolate tea inside wasn't that great

we were at a wiener (thats how it sounds not sure how to spell it) restaurant...food was amazing I didn't know these people and their foods existed. a small group in central asia mix of chinese style food and central asian

tajik high school students showing us tajik dance

stirring the sumalack.. its made form wheat grain i think this takes almost 24hours to cook and someone has to constantly stir it...its suppose to be sweet. i don't care for it...ever time you make a circle you make a wish...its suppose to bring good luck...believe it or not there was a line to stir this thing

norouz games...the men play tug of war, the women danced and then the arm wrestled which here is usually just between the men but we set up a women's tournment

stirring and making wishes...when it got cold at night we all gathered around this pot

material I bought at the bazaar for my traditional tajiki dresses...i   just dropped them off at the seamstress yesterday and I already want to go out and buy more to get made...i got light materials bc its getting warm

zamira doing spring cleaning...tress in the background cut down but the family's uncle they were fruit tress :(...apparently the uncle wants to remodel that side of the house

host mom loves cactus..we set them outside since it was nice out

 I took pictures of the most interesting variations of the plants.

Gazebo at the Botanical garden, we went there on Norouz to celebrate and it was Gabby's birthday so we had a picnic under the gazebo with hooka and Indian Food

setting up

all the girls wore traditional tajiki dresses except Kathrine but its okay her scarf is Traditional dress material...gabby is on the far left...I am wearing one of Bashira 's dress she refused to let me out of the house with out one on...I am surprised it fit, she is short and tiny and she did my makeup of course

close up of the pattern of the dress it went well with my skin tone

This is a random group of Tajik kids who saw us and wanted to take pictures with us...i think it was the girl's idea bc they only wanted the girls with dresses in the picture

Bettina jumping over the fire...we celebrated charshanbe suri on friday because of rain on tuesday night...basically during this celebration you jump of fire(s) and say this chant and the fire is suppose to give you good energy and take away your sickness

the guys were amazed with the hooka...they all tried it..one guy actual blew into instead of sucking and some of them didn't know if they should have exhaled the smoke...it was nice for one to have younger kids to be interested about us instead of treating us like weird foreign aliens and shouting stuff at us


well thats my long weekend...i have a Buszkashi match to go on one thursday..which is a a game done during norouz i'll be sure to get some juicy pics...btw it means goat pulling


Shaharazad