A Teacher's Journey

 There is an amazing bazaar down the street from the hotel.  It's a wonderful place to walk around, get lost, smell and hear and have all our senses activated.  Much more than a farmer's market in the US - this bazaar is open all the time, full of people doing their shopping and hanging out.  Here are some pics and a video, with some comments.  I'm not great at formatting, so we'll just go with what we got here. I took this video as I was walking along.  Look at all the bread.  OMG, so much bread.  My students told me it would all be sold by the end of the day.  Bread is revered here in Uzbekistan.  It is served at every meal, crumbs are picked up and eaten (a student told me that practice hearkened back to times of severe poverty/famine, when nothing was wased).  At the end of the video are boxes full of little white balls.  These are called curd .  Salty cheese (like parmesan) with extra salt.  I did actually try on...

 I set three goals for myself for this Uzbek gig: try a lot of new food meet lots of great people break out of my introverted tendencies I don't think extrovert/introvert is a binary.  I feel it's more of a spectrum.  I can totally be extroverted: in front of my class, presenting at a conference, professional stuff like that.  Socially though is a different matter.  It takes some effort and awareness to get my extroverted side to shine through in social situations.  But I have to make an effort, and sometimes I'm not able to make that effort, and other people interpret that as aloofness.  Sometimes I just want to be inside my own head where it's warm and comfy rather than out with other people.   I decided that on this Uzbek gig I was going to really work at getting out of my warm comfy head and go out and be social.  I vowed to actually go out to dinner with my team (there are five of us teachers from the US as well as Jesse the boots-o...

 Being a dumb, middle class Ammerican white girl, I am able to move about the world with a certain amount of privilege, surrounded by conveniences that I take for granted, never noticing them until they aren't there any more. I knew that Uzbekistan would shove me out of my comfort zone, but I didn't really unnderstand how far and how often I would be shoved. So, without further ado, here are a litany of privileges I have in the US that I don't have here.  In the US: I can turn on the faucet and get clean water that I can drink from the tap. I can take a shower with water that is hot. I can walk into a building or a room without breaking my leg.  (Notice in the picture the pipe on the floor across the doorway.  I'm sure you can imagine how I entered the room). I have access to a bathroom with a flush toilet near my classroom rather than down two flights of stairs and across the courtyard. I can go to a restaurant and be given a menu printed in a language I can read. I...

One of my favorite memories of traveling through Greece with my dad was going to church and experiencing the same Liturgy we celebrate every Sunday but this time in a different place.  I have wonderful memories of Vespers at Notre Dame, an evening service at St. Paul's in London, and an organ recital at Hallgrimskirkja in Rekjavik. Tashkent, although Muslim, also has a large Russian Orthodox presence, so I hopped a cab this morning to the Assumption Cathedral.  The doors were open, so I went in, lit some candles, and thanked God for getting me to Tashkent safely.  Several small cases held relics of various saints, including St. Nickolas.  My dad's name was Nick, so here was an unexpected and powerful connection.  They wouldn't let me take pictures of the inside, but here are plenty from outside.  I wish I were here longer so I could attend Liturgy here, but there will be an opportunity in Andijan next weekend. ...

When I teach foundations of multicultural education, we spend a lot of time talking about culture - what it is, what it means, and can we please get past the 4 D's:  diet, dress, dance, and deity.  Or maybe the Heros and Holidays nonsense.   My first full day in Tashkent was a great experience to share with the teachers I work with because when we think of culture we don't typically think of reading glasses.  For reasons I won't bore you with, I need a pair of reading glasses (ok, I am the worst packer on the planet).  I brought 3 pairs of sunglasses, two regular glasses, and mismatched pairs of contact lenses.  I need a pair of reading glasses to use with my contacts. In the US, we just stop in at any Walgreens or CVS, and there's a rack of reading glasses and you try on a few until you find the ones that work for you and that's what you buy. Let's just say that the concept of reading glasses does not seem to exist in Tashkent.  Nor does the conc...

For several decades I have been working toward attaining an overseas teaching assignment. I've been fortunate enough to have landed two back to back. Next week I leave for three weeks of teaching English teachers in Andijan, Uzbekistan through the American Council, an NGO that has a presence in Uzbekistan and many other countries.  I'll have 15 English teachers in class, and I'm excited about working with them, teaching them English and modern teaching methods and learning from them how teaching and learning is done in another country and culture.     I come home from this assignment, do my laundry, and leave three weeks later in mid-September as a Fulbright US Scholar in Kosovo.  I'll be teaching at the University in Pristina, 2 classes of undergrads and 2 classes of graduate students, including a practicum.   I'll be keeping a journal to track my adventure as well as my growth as a teacher and a person.   I know that I will be facing challe...