Dumb ex-pat

The other day in a tiny little cluttered shop, I whacked something with my backpack and heard it crash to the floor, turned around, and saw I'd just destructed a statuette. I picked up the pieces, put them back on the shelf and snuck out. Then I felt horrible. Here I am a rich person in a poor country--I probably wiped out their profits for the week. So (raised Catholic) my conscience bothering me, I asked one of the admin. assistants at the school to translate a note: "I broke something on Friday. I would like to pay for it now." The translation was five times as long as the English--lots of polite terms and formal sentence structures in Azerbaijan.

Big smiles from the clerks when I handed over the note. The pieces were immediately retrieved and offered to me. Price: 60 manats, but no, not, 70% (shown on calculator). I'm sure I've been a topic of conversation for the past few days. I like this shop--now I'll be able to go back to it.

Another birthday somewhere else

I spent my 50th birthday in Kyiv, at my first overseas teaching job, and I'm so happy to spend my 54th here in Baku! I love my friends in the DC area and the traditional Dec. 4th gathering at the Four Provinces in Arlington, but it's a stimulating change to have a party (for the first time here) with people from London, Melbourne, Harare, New Mexico, Auckland, Manchester, Ottawa, Istanbul, Madrid. I love hearing their stories.

And now that I've hosted one party, I'll do it again (esp. if I hire a housecleaner, as everyone else seems to have done).

Sheep-slaughtering holiday

Today and tomorrow the school is closed for the Muslim holiday of Gurban. This school is closed for all Azerbaijan national holidays--I learn about them as they come up.

Last week I asked the eighth-graders exactly what Gurban commemorates. The local students explained that it's a day when you kill a sheep and give away pieces to your neighbors, particularly neighbors who are poorer than you. "And if you're poorer than your neighbors?" my co-teacher asked. "Then they give you pieces of their sheep," was the response.

So a day to trade around pieces of sheep; basically, a day of charity. (I looked up Gurban online, and it does have to do with Abraham and Isaac and the ram that Abraham killed instead of Isaac.)

I was wondering how I, age 13, would have explained the Feast of the Assumption to a Muslim. It would have sounded even more whacked out than Gurban.

Fall break in Deutschland

I just returned to Baku from Germany via Vienna. It was nice to be back in the west for a few days. Germany now feels almost as familiar as the US, compared to Azerbaijan. I had a good time supporting the German economy and buying stuff that's not available in Baku (peanut butter, dehydrated soup mixes, salad dressing packets..pretty much anything full of chemicals and preservatives).

Patty and Manfred and I watched parts of a documentary about two guys who go on a motorcycle trip from London to NYC via Ukraine and Kazakhstan and Mongolia and Russia--it's called "The Long Way Round" with Ewan McGregor (actor) and a friend--it's astonishingly entertaining! Get it on Netflix if you can!

The other day Patty (GOD BLESS HER) spent almost the entire day at a travel agency w/me helping to arrange flights from Baku to Frankfurt to Minneapolis for Christmas and New Year's. It involves four airlines and connections in London, Paris, Amsterdam, Chicago, and Moscow. I'm sure absolutely nothing will go wrong, no glitches, no lost luggage, no missed connections, nobody wondering if I'm a terrorist because I live in a Muslim country...

The two young women at the travel agency put a lot of work into it. We kept hearing one or the other on the phone saying something like "Baku. in Azerbaijan. I know, we never heard of it either!" (I don't speak German, but even I could understand THAT, esp. since there was a lot of laughter going on at both ends)

Kai and Mac had their school break this week as well, so it was great to spend some time with them. Kai is about ten feet tall, Mac not quite, but getting there...they're delightful nephews and I was so happy to be on the same continent w/them for a while.

Small world cliche, but fun

On int'l day I met the father of one of my German students, stilted conversation, but he warmed up on hearing I was off to Deutschland for the break, near Mannheim, where he grew up!

"My sister and her family live near Speyer."

"In Speyer?"

"No, a village near Speyer. Bohl-Iggleheim."

"Bohl-Iggelheim? My brother is in Iggelheim! a doctor! ear nose throat" (so jubilant that he forgot the words and pointed to his ears nose and throat) "It is a small world!" the dad said.

So in the next few days we'll be going for a walk along the street where this uncle lives. Manfred looked him up in the phone book and wants to knock on the door and say hello. With him, I won't look like a stalker.

International Day at school

International schools host an "international" event every year. Kids dress in their national costumes, play native games, perform dances and sing songs from their countries. Parents bring in regional foods to share. When I was in Ukraine, the school had an "International Night" so regional beverages were served as well as foods (that was fun!).

Here at my school in Azerbaijan, International Day was on Friday, during the school day, so no beverages. It was a wonderful day, with fantastic performances by both adults and kids: a Korean drumming dance, Indian bridal dance ritual, the singing of the Azerbaijan national anthem, Haka dance from N.Z., salsa and tango, "We Come from a Land Down Under, " on and on.

The ELS dept. ran a games workshop--the M3s/grade 8 kids played bingo in three languages and alphabets. It would have been four if Ling from China hadn't gone on vacation a day early.

Rumors and visas

Azerbaijan doesn't have a free press (the country is #97 on a scale of 100, according to a map I saw at the Newseum this summer). In a country without a free press, people rely on rumors. It's the same way at my school, unfortunately--we hear rumors about things going on in the larger community that affect us personally, but we hear nothing officially.

Azerbaijan has been issuing 30-day tourist visas to visitors at the airport. A rumor went around that the 30 days had been decreased to 7, but the school wouldn't confirm or deny. "It's a rumor," was all we were told.

Well, it's true. And it affected a lot of teachers who were expecting family and friends to visit during fall break. My friend Eileen's parents were coming from Ireland for 9 days. They were forced to leave within a week or pay $600 each to stay the extra two days. It was cheaper for them to pay to change their flights and leave sooner. (and while Eileen may be READY for them to leave after 7 days, it's still a disappointment!) Some friends and family cancelled altogether.

The latest rumor is that Azerbaijan will no longer allow visas to be obtained upon arrival at the airport, no exceptions. No one can come in as a visitor/tourist without an official letter of invitation. This is allegedly because of upcoming elections--the government wants to prevent outside observers from monitoring the elections in November. (In Ukraine, observers regularly come from other countries to monitor elections, and a good thing, after what happened to Yushchenko in 2004.) But...that's another rumor.

Oh, these wacky ex-Soviet countries! Fall break begins on Saturday and I have a flight to Germany at 7 a.m. Because I came in on a now-expired tourist visa and still hadn't received a resident visa, I might not be able to get back to Azerbaijan from Germany after the break. Frankly, I wasn't that worried about getting back IN, it was the getting OUT that concerned me. (I just read an amazing book "The Forsaken", about Americans who believed Soviet propaganda during the depression and emigrated to the USSR, some to work in Henry Ford's plant. They all ended up in the gulag.)

On Monday, the business office took my passport (or "confiscated" it, as I'm now thinking), claiming it was needed to obtain my resident visa. And I would have my passport back, along with the resident visa, by Friday. Friday afternoon at latest. Maybe Friday evening. But before flight Saturday morning. Yes, will have it. Driver will bring to flat. Stay in flat, don't leave.

Okay, whatever you say. The woman in the business office is a lovely person and she's not the one causing the problems--it's systemic.

It was an enormous relief today to receive my passport along with my resident card. I'm now here legally! and I can prove it if a cop stops and questions me! although that's not likely because of my skin color!

So I'm off to Germany on Saturday, should be able to get out and in. No updates on what's really happening with visitors and visas, just rumors.