valerie
February 10, 2024 - another volunteer and I hosted a community English club at his school this morning. He lives pretty close to me, less than 10 minutes by car, but I have never walked down that road before (it’s a road that goes through the middle of potato fields) bc people rarely walk down it
February 8, 2024 - reading more Kyrgyz children’s books with my Kyrgyz teacher. took a picture of this page for a couple vocabulary words. this book was about a day in the life of 2 kangaroo teachers and their 22 kangaroo students
February 5, 2024 - SWOT analysis completed by teachers during a meeting today regarding our school community. I kind of wish I made an effort to invite staff and community members who aren’t necessarily teachers. oh well. 4 posters like this and want to translate them for myself
February 3, 2024 - inside the Central State Museum of Kazakhstan when I was in Almaty a month ago. They have a mix of modern art and traditional handicrafts displayed
February 2, 2024 - if it comes as any surprise, northern Kyrgyzstan in winter is neither the best place nor time to try a mangosteen for the first time 😂 it was still good, but not as good as I feel like it should be. and it was a pain to cut open
February 1, 2024 - construction on indoor toilets starting at my school (project was already planned before I got here). Coteacher said toilets will be built on the 1st and 2nd (out of 3) floors and that the work will finish in 2 months. don’t know anything about building, but feels too optimistic
January 30, 2024 - in 9A’s classroom. I teach this class (but not here - in my English classroom), and they are active and enthusiastic about learning English. Their homeroom teacher is my Kyrgyz teacher. They decorated their classroom themselves. One of the boys painted the picture with the family
January 29, 2024 - helped my host mom and sister fold buns yesterday. this was before they went in the oven, but they turned out soo good
January 27, 2024 - went back to the iced-over lake that I skated on on New Year’s Eve, but there were a lot more large cracks than last time. I wonder if it’s because of the earthquake that we had last Tuesday
January 26, 2024 - чөбөгө, a kind of Kyrgyz spread made from sari mai (yellow butter) and kaimak (sour cream which is made from milk). You can eat it with bread. Tasted pretty good, but I didn’t want to eat too much because of the dairy
January 25, 2024 - thought my Kyrgyz teacher would have less to do after a regional academic competition last week. Now she has to help students prepare for the ОРТ, the national test for Kyrgyz students to get into university (kind of like the gaokao 高考 in China). Pic shows some Kyrgyz questions
January 24, 2024 - today I learned what a feedbag is
January 23, 2024 - there was an earthquake not too far away at 12:09 am this morning and the shaking woke me up. Luckily, everything seems to be fine, even for the volunteers who live closer to the epicenter. I didn’t feel any aftershocks. I saw that the actual magnitude was updated to 7.0 later
January 22, 2024 - yesterday my sister and her friend tried to bake a cake but it didn’t bake evenly. this also happened the very first day I moved in because they set the oven too hot & the outside cooked faster than the inside. no idea about this time, was in a different room when this happened
January 19, 2024 - discarded cigarette pack on the ground outside our house. pretty sure it was my host dad because he smokes. Google translates the Kyrgyz text as “a painful death”
January 18, 2024 - lunch break during a regional English speaking competition that I was a judge for. Despite how chaotic it was (especially by American standards), I enjoyed getting to hear local students speak English. And I’m excited to work with my school’s participants to prepare for next year!
