First Guest – Առաջին Հյուրը

The first guest to my house arrived on a bicycle, and had just finished cascading down the 2483 m high mountain pass from Kapan to Meghri. His large, brown beard was frozen.

I was startled at about 8pm the day he got here by a knock on my door from some of the men in the village. They explained to me, in pretty excited voices, that a man had arrived in the village, that he didn’t know a single word of Armenian, and that I needed to come out and translate. I walked out my front gate to find a very thin, bearded, spectacled man on a bicycle surrounded by 10 to 12 Armenian men from the village, all trying to help/understand him at the same time.

“Hello,” he said to me in clear English when he spotted me. “My name is Sven, are you a Peace Corps Volunteer?”

I told him I was. He said he’d been travelling by bicycle through Armenia and needed a place to stay. He also dropped the names of Austin and Katie, two volunteers he had stayed with in a town about three hours north (by car), and so between his unimposing demeanor and acquaintance with other people I know, I felt just fine taking him in.

I explained to the other men watching us talk that I’d be putting him up for the night, helped Sven put his bike in my storage room, and started heating the water tank so that he could get a hot shower. The first thing he asked for was not food or coffee or tea, but just straight up hot water. I heated some up on the stove and handed it to him. He guzzled it down, sighed, and said something like “you have no idea how nice that is after biking over that mountain.” His beard wasn’t frozen anymore.

I started whipping up a stew with veggies, lentils and potatoes as well as hot coffee for both of us. This was the official first guest at my new place, and I was really feeling the hosting mood. Could be the Armenian culture rubbing off on me…

We got to talking. Sven, it turned out, had been biking non-stop all the way from his home in Germany. He had crossed through the Czech Republic, the Balkans, Turkey, Georgia, and was now entering Iran through Armenia. His ultimate goal was to reach India, and he claimed with confidence that he would even be biking through Pakistan to do it. He had stayed with at least three other volunteers on the journey in Armenia and Georgia, and likely some other ones in the Balkans too.

Sven was 31 years old, was taller than me, leaner than me, was extremely talkative, had a huge smile and the air of someone who had been alone with only his thoughts for perhaps a bit too long (although this probably had been one of his goals anyway). He said he had worked for an IT firm, crunching data for several years, until he one day had the revelation that what he did was pointless and decided that traveling the world on a bicycle would be much more fulfilling. The people in my village told me later that they thought he was insane. I kind of admired him in a way, if only because I would never have the nerve to do what he was doing.

His first night at my place, after we feasted on stew and black bread and Armenian matsun, he slept on the extra bed in my living room, which, unlike my bedroom, has no wood burning stove and is only heated by a small PC issued radiator that hardly does anything. I felt sort of bad about this, but he said he didn’t mind at all, and that in his sleeping bag had slept in far more frigid conditions.

In the morning, after breakfast, Sven asked if he could stay a second night. I had kind of figured he would want to, and was happy to have him an extra night. He carried his weight just by being good company, and to top it off when I got home from teaching English that day, it was to the smell of a huge pot of borscht that he was cooking up. Turns out he was also an awesome cook. That night was spent eating more borscht, playing speed (a card game I hadn’t played in forever), and playing harmonicas (I have one I brought to country and hardly ever use and Sven travels with one as well).

When he left the next morning, it was kind of a funny feeling. I can’t say I’ll miss him. I only knew him for about 48 hours, but it was nice to have the company. Also, it’s a pretty certain bet that I’ll never see the guy again. We shook hands and he cycled away again, leaving early so that he could make it over the mountain pass just over the Iranian border before nightfall.

While my current occupation is sort of that of a wanderer, I still live and work in this country. I have other Americans living and working near me and I live in a community where I see the same people every day and am recognized. It takes a lot of willpower for sure, but to do what Sven is doing is another level of wanderlust altogether. To go it alone, without planned places to stay or knowing any of the language or people to meet, to be very often dependent on the kindness of strangers and also very often alone with just you and nature, that takes willpower and then something else too.

First Signs of Integration?

It’s the ultimate goal of just about all of us expat volunteer/worker types – to become fluent in the language, the culture and the very spirit of the place. To know and be known by everyone you see, to be respected in the community you live in and perhaps most importantly to have people from the host country that you can truly consider family. I’m not fully integrated, at least I wouldn’t say I am, but I am starting to feel more and more at home around here.

While visiting my training village, Nurnus, over a break recently, my host father from last summer, Andranik, gave a toast (one of many) exclaiming: “Menk ko arrachin hai untanik enk,” – We are your first Armenian Family. This is very true, and something I won’t ever forget,and not just because he also told me repeatedly not to forget it. They were the first Armenian family I got to know and lived with, and also the first people to care for me in this country. By “caring for me,” I mean truly caring for me. Over the summer, they did everything from doing my laundry for me and making all of my meals to putting homemade yogurt on my sunburnt arms (an apparently common Armenia remedy) and during my first few weeks there even cutting my own food for me during dinner time. Most importantly they made me feel like I was part of their family. Unfortunately, they are also far away from where I live and work now – a good 9 hours by crowded minibus or taxi over mountainous and outrageously bumpy roads. Such is life when you sign up for a large, bureaucratic service organization and tell them that you will go work literally wherever they tell you to.

On my way home from break, I was retelling what Andranik said during this toast to Hrach, my landlord and friend, as we were travelling on the way to my village. I was travelling back south, and he needed to stop by there and gather his dried persimmons, or “chir,” that he had stored there at a relative’s house, so he gave me a ride. Also in the car were his wife, Anahit and 5 year old son, Mikael. He paused when I retold the story, chuckled a second, and then said “We are your third Armenian Family, then (including of course the family I lived with before I got my own place in the village).

Once I arrived in my village with Hrach and his family, I had, for the first time, a sensation of this village really being my home, and of being happy to be back. It had been a mildly long break filled with conferences and seminars with the Peace Corps staff and other volunteers, and I had honestly missed the place a bit. I stopped into my neighbor Karen’s house, whom I had left the keys to my house with, and he immediately uttered “Ari hats enk utum,” or basically “come over here we are eating” (a favorite phrase in Armenian households). I joined Karen and his family at the table, ate an odd oniony dish I hadn’t tried before and which I forget the name of, and had an obligatory toast or two with them as well. After this I stopped over at my friend Artak’s store. Artak, who is 22 years old and has recently finished serving in the Armenian army, has a roadside store where he buys and sells everything from beer and cigarettes, to dried fruit and walnuts, to gasoline. He’s a good guy, and also knows lots of people traveling to and from the area that stop at his store and so can sometimes hook me up with a ride heading north. I popped in to say hi, had a couple cups of coffee with him, and ended up going home with a plastic bottle filled with oil that he gave to me for free for starting fires in my wood-burning stove.

I got home, started myself a fire to warm the place up, brewed some tea and kicked back. I’ve already been living here in this village for four and a half months and I can hardly believe it.

New Place - Նոր Տեղ

Doing favors for people whenever you can is usually a good idea. Awhile back I helped out my friend Hrackik Markaryan, a local English tutor/translator here, on a project he’s working on. We subsequently became pretty good pals, I told him I’d been looking around for a place of my own to move into in the village, he told me he had a summer home that his family never uses, and a few small hurdles later (agreeing on rent/buying wood to keep myself warm for the winter/fixing broken windows with my neighbor/knocking down thousands of cobwebs within the home) I've now found myself with a reasonably comfortable pad, which I’ve been living in for already around two weeks.

Amenities include:

1) Wood burning stove in my bedroom, which equals fast, easy heat for the winter(maybe not the easiest ever, but I'm into the rustic-ness of it, plus there's just something great about falling asleep next to the sound of a fire going)
2) Bookcase full of Russian books that I cannot read (maybe someday?)
3) Large living room that I’ll probably never use (too big to heat efficiently) except when I have guests
4) Three extra beds (the Armenian style that sag hardcore in the middle)
5) Sketchy electrical outlets
6) Some cookware, and Armenian Khorovats skewers (fully intend to use these)
7) Large balcony
8) A toilet that flushes (serious bonus)
9) A hot water tank that can heat water to a comfortable temperature in about 3 hours
10) Other things I have not yet discovered, be they good or bad

And here's a picture of all the wood 60,000 drams can buy, which will be keeping me warm this winter, and which I'm currently in the process of chopping on my own, a fact which is blowing the minds of some of the villagers around here.



To give a little more background, I met Hrach, the landowner, very soon after I got to Lehvaz in August. He showed up to the school one day, unannounced, on one of my first days there. I’ve since come to find out that he is very fond of arriving at places without telling anyone, or at least does it all the time. He introduced himself and told me in fluent English that he was a translator in Kadjaran (a mining town to the north of me that we volunteers are actually prohibited from staying in due to certain environmental/health hazards). He told me that he was excited I had arrived, and wanted me to help him with a project he was working on later. I said of course I would help however I could. He took me up on it pretty quickly.

A few weeks later he showed up at my host family’s house, unannounced, with a laptop and voice recording gear, asking me to help him make some recordings for the English language learning website that he was building. I hesitated a moment, more just taken aback by the nonchalance of his arrival than anything else. Also, I had just finished having a few toasts with my host-father, and so wasn’t sure if I was in the right state of mind to work at the moment (this time I think his reasoning for the toasts had been that his grandson had gotten new shoes, and I of course had agreed that we had to throw back a few). Anyway after a second or two I told him I’d be happy to help, and all it really involved on my part was reading from a script he had already written while he recorded my voice, so I can’t say it was a large request by any means. I read from the script, he recorded and saved it to put on the site later. With my voice and the voices of a few other volunteers, he’ll have a variety of native speakers speaking on the site, which should be a really nice feature. The website will also be free, and he’s making it without any pay of course. The man even taught himself flash and html in order to build it, which is impressive given that Hrach, at an age close to 50, has already worked as an accomplished engineer, English teacher, translator and private tutor. And that’s just to my knowledge.

After recording, we spent the rest of that night sipping tea and I listened to Hrach and my host father reminisce about the old days, or rather the soviet days. Both men grew up in the village. Arto talked of his time in the Russian military when he was posted in East Germany. Hrach talked of working as an engineer in Russia during soviet times as well. They talked of the soviet-built train that used to run from our village all the way to Yerevan, how they used to be able to hear it whine every night from their homes. The train’s now defunct because its tracks are cut off by the currently hostile borders that it used to unite. Since the war with Azerbaijan, folks now have to go by car to get to Yerevan or anywhere north of here for that matter. There’s only one road, and it winds up and down two huge mountain passes that often get snowed or frozen over during the winter. Armenians talk highly of soviet times often, and sometimes it’s hard to tell what’s fact and what is embellishment, but there’s no question that a train, running daily, would have done wonders for the economy of the villages around here. The basic reality seems to be that their quality of life was better back then, and so naturally they wax nostalgic at times.

After that night, I ended up helping Hrach record a couple more times, and found out his family had a summer home in the village that they hardly used. I worked up the nerve to ask if I could stay there, indefinitely, and after a bit of persuasion, mostly directed at his wife who was the big hold out, I was given the go ahead. Hrach also later told me that my neighbors were calling him at odd hours imploring him to let “Mr. Tom” live next to them. Nice to know that my neighbors wanted it as much as I did!

So yeah, my days living with an Armenian family have drawn to a close, possibly for the rest of my service. It’s a bit more lonely, and I have to do things like chop my own wood, hand-wash my laundry, and cook for myself, but the independence is fantastic. We Americans, we love that stuff, myself included. Also, since I’ve been moved into the place, neighbors and other teachers at the school have been giving me stuff like pickled vegetables (not a huge fan), Armenian yogurt and even a lamb stew (huge fan), as house warming gifts or perhaps because they are still not sure that a man of 23 can cook for himself.

I feel I’ve reached an in-service milestone here.

Road to Kuris - Կուրիսի Ճանապարհ

Your mood and energy can shift unsettlingly fast in a place like this, and usually it’s got a lot to do with perception. Massive questions like “why am I here,” and “will I actually have a reasonably positive impact here,” and even more mundane (but still very important) ones like “will my host family serve me a heaping bowl of greasy, bland soup again for the 7th or 8th night in a row” can fill mind until you just feel tired. Another level got tacked onto that already mounting fatigue recently because my counterpart, the Armenian woman I teach English with every day, left very suddenly for a two week stint, leaving me to teach 20 classes a week, grades 3 through 12, on my own. I felt up for the challenge, happy that they trusted me enough to do it and daunted as hell be the task of teaching all of these kids using a language I’m still just learning (their English is still not nearly good enough for me to rely on that entirely).

So yeah, my counterpart had to leave to go take classes in preparation for some state mandated test, since she will be replacing comrade Mirzoyan as the school’s director next year. The lovely people giving these required classes gave her about two days notice when they were taking place, which meant I found out the day before she was leaving. I headed over to her house after school on the day I found out. She was already packing her bags and her hair had been newly soaked with a large quantity of red dye, which was starting to seep down onto her forehead a bit, which made her look, well, very funny. She brewed a pot of coffee, sat down across from me, and, in her obnoxiously unfailing calm tone, gave me two pieces of advice. “Teach them reading...[pauses to sip coffee]…and just have fun.” I decided I would take the latter portion of her advice in particular to heart.

That was it, no time for laying out what subject matter I would cover with the students for the next weeks. Without leaving me with even a modicum of a game plan she was gone. The upside became apparent to me pretty quickly. Two weeks of being able to teach English the way I think it should be taught. I could use the poorly written Armenian English textbooks as often or as little as I like, and I didn’t have to worry about another teacher doing stuff in the classroom that I wasn’t really a fan of for the time being. The chance to work on my own a bit sounded great…

The experience had its trying moments for sure, like the 12th grade taking the new teaching situation as a sign that they could pay even less attention than normal, or when all of the boys in my third grade grappled onto my arms one day as the end of class bell rang, jumping up and down and yelling “goodbye, goodbye, goodbye Mr. Tom” over and over and not allowing me to move an inch let alone attempt to leave the classroom (this was actually just more hilarious/ sort of cute than difficult).

Overall the experience went well and helped me get some more credibility at the school, which is always good. The hard days were, well, damn hard ones though, and by the end of the first week at it I was wiped, stressed out, sort of fuming… So I went for a walk. I had heard there was an old abandoned 17th century church about a 40-minute hike from the village, and the weather was gorgeous on this particular day, so I decided to find it. I headed up the winding, upward climbing road that runs through my village, past the cemetery which marks the village’s outer limit and continued through a path that runs between the village’s grape vineyards for some time. After this the path continued along the mountainside and I just continued to take it, not really sure if I was going the right way or not. Eventually, I ran into the paved road to Kuris, a mining town west of my village that lies high, high up and right on the border with Nakhidjevan, the Azerbaijani territory that, although cleanly separated from Azerbaijan by Armenia, is still somehow an Azerbaijani territory. I passed a few camping sites and eventually was stopped by a family eating khorovats on the side of the road.

They hailed me in the usual, extremely warm Armenian fashion. Already in a better mood from my hiking, I obliged when they asked me to come and sit with them. Realizing that I could speak decent Armenian, they started hitting me with dozens of questions about who I was and where I was from. I was introduced to the whole family: Henry, a man of about 35, his two brothers, his wife and son, and his mother. They told me that I should stay in this country and marry an Armenian woman (this is actually an extremely normal thing for Armenians to say to you). They also told me that I should eat lots of the walnuts they had out, because if you eat lots of walnuts you get married sooner (these sorts of superstitions, especially dealing with marriage and children, are also super common). They started piling fish and chicken onto my plate and asking me about America and about why I work here and also if I could tutor their daughter English. Answering their questions between mouthfuls, I was reminded of one of the things I love most about this country. The people are disarmingly kind and warm to strangers. It makes it that much easier to be a foreigner and also to connect with people.

After chatting with Henry and his family for a good hour, he told me he’d take me to the abandoned church I was looking for, which was just another few minutes up the road. Walking would have been fine, but Henry insisted we took what he called his “jeep,” which was really more like go-cart, could seat two people comfortably, had a crossbar running along the top of it and no ceiling, had to be push-started to run, and was painted an appropriate camo-green. Where this thing came from I have no idea, but I was happy to now be riding to my destination in style. We reached the church in less than two minutes (really, walking would have taken just about the same amount of time), and Henry showed me the entrance and, once inside, a secret passage that Armenian Christians used to use during wars and times of persecution. As he explained to me, the passage was no longer open, but used to run under the mountains and, if I understood correctly, the entire 40 minutes back to my village.

We took the jeep back to their picnic site, and I decided to say my goodbyes and head home. They told me that I was welcome to visit them in Kuris anytime, and that if I did, they would “show me a really good time.” I told them I’d take them up on it, and I really do intend to do so eventually.

I headed back home feeling worlds better. For whatever reason this family from Kuris had made me really happy to be in this country again.

Waterfall - Ջրվեժ

This last Sunday I went on a little voyage with my new, quickly becoming good, good friends, and not only because they are the only other Americans here in the southern extremity of the country, although that’s got something to do with it. Also invited was my friend and fellow-teacher at my village school, Yeghish, who is our Phys Ed teacher and also the man behind the great spectacle that is “morning exercises” mentioned in the below post.

Our objective for the day was to find a very pretty, secluded place, a waterfall to be exact, near the village of Lichk, which is about 28 kilometers to the north. And we did find it, eventually, but not before having a few misadventures first.

The morning began cool and calm. I woke up around 8 am, ate breakfast with the host fam, called the girls to see if they were ready for the trip—they were— and then called Yeghish to see if he was ready to meet up at the time we had determined the day before, 9am. He wasn’t answering his phone, though. An hour went by, and we still hadn’t heard from him, so we decided to just go without our missing Armenian friend and at 10:30 we called a cab to take us north to Lichk.

We arrived in Lichk at around 11, and took in the majesty of the place – a village of some 60 residences sitting in the midst of sheer mountains, homes and cottages balancing on the slopes, forest and greenery climbing up above the village until stopping abruptly at the visible tree-line, and then bare, stunning rock-faces continuing up after that. We took a peek into the local Khanut (shop), which, in small villages like this, are the social epicenters of the community, and were greeted by the owner, his friend Harutyun (I always love meeting Armenians with this name because it literally means “the resurrection”) and their friend Benik. They were delighted to meet these four Americans who had come to visit their home and who could also speak Armenian pretty well—Shayna and Ruby in particular, who have been serving for a year and have some serious chops. Around this time, Yeghish finally called, was for some reason shocked that we had already left, and promised that he was on his way, in his Dad’s Lada, a couple buddies in tow.

Waiting for him seemed no problem, especially since the gentlemen at the store were now in full Armenian hospitality mode, having busted out a box of chocolates, some peach juice and a bottle of cognac from the store’s shelves. Toasts were said, to our health and one I think to friendship between our two countries. Soon a few more village men started to come up to the store to see what the commotion was about, including one who I think was the mayor and another dude who showed up on a horse, wearing a long blue jacket an old-military cap and seemingly fully aware of just how cool he looked. At this point Benik also stepped outside to bring over his horse, which was tied down just behind the shop, and which he had apparently ridden down before we arrived. At this point also, Yeghish called once again. Apparently, the Lada wasn’t working today, so they’d be taking a cab. Once again, he promised to arrive promptly. It was now about noon.

So now Yeghish was sort of pissing us off a bit, and we were anxious to get to the waterfall and spend some time relaxing at this–so we had heard—very beautiful place. The resurrection offered to take us to the waterfall, and we had no idea when our friend was actually going to show up, so we decided to take him up on it. If Yeghish did show up, he could just meet us at the waterfall anyways, or so we figured.

Harutyun, however, proceeded to lead us on a fairly ridiculous escapade, to the wrong waterfall. We walked along what was at first a fairly doable path which ran alongside the river, until that path became non-existent, and we were pretty much scaling up and down an increasingly treacherous riverbank, every moment doubting more and more this man’s foresight in guiding us. The scenery was great, and there were actually some small waterfalls cascading down the river up ahead, but it was becoming clear that this was not the way to the calm, relaxing place we had heard about. He led us onward until we finally arrived at an a very large, seemingly impassable boulder, which Harut, a 48 year old man, decided to try and scale anyways. Hannah and I watched in mild shock as he began climbing up it, made it almost to the top, and then suddenly lost his footing and plopped feet first into the freezing water below. He muttered a few Armenian curse words that I had never heard before and then briskly climbed back onto the riverbank. Fortunately he was no worse for the wear, except that his pride may have taken a slight blow, and also he was definitely bummed that his cigarettes were now soaked through.

This was the last straw for our day’s first adventure, and we decided to turn back toward the village and abandon whatever it was that Harut had intended to show us. I don't mean to slight Harut in any way here, he was a really nice man seemed to have good intentions, I just don't know where he was trying to lead us. This is Harut, picking some Masur for us, a red berry that grows wild here and that, although a bit tart, is pretty tasty:




Now on the way back, we called Yeghish and found out that he had arrived, and was waiting to take us to the actual waterfall. We met up with him about a half hour later, on a nice wide and well-tended path that Harut had for some reason thought we wouldn’t want to take earlier. We continued on it until reaching an old abandoned church that we were told dated back to the 17th century, and stopped inside to check it out. Such places are a fairly common site in Armenia and are beautiful to take in.
Here's photos of the church's entrance/interior:















After this, we continued upward past a small open area with picnic tables, khorovats pits, and of course grazing cattle until the path became narrower and more wooded. Fifteen minutes later we stopped at a resting area in the woods with cool rushing water to rinse ourselves and boulders to sit on. Another of Yeghish’s friends was waiting here for us, and we stopped to build a fire and make our own khorovats. A great thing about Armenian khorovats is that it can be prepared anywhere, and this is probably my favorite places I’ve seen it done so far. We let the fire burn down to coals, prepared the meat and vegetables on the skewers Yeghish and friends had brought, grilled it over a few logs, and then proceeded to chow down. It was quite the feast.

Our bellies full, we finally headed out on the last leg of the trip to the waterfall, which was about another 15 minutes up the path. When we arrived, we were not disappointed in the least. Water cascaded down a beautiful, mossy rock face into a very tranquil looking pool that had stepping stones for one to cross back and forth on. It was the sort of removed, beautiful zen-like place that you usually hope to find on hikes but rarely do, and I definitely felt now, if not after that fantastic khorovats, that the trip had been completely worth it.

Unfortunately the peaceful moment passed a bit too quickly, and I began to take notice that Yeghish and friends were now pretty aggressively hitting on the three American girls that had come with me. We perhaps should have seen this coming, and honestly the place we were currently sitting in was up there on the romantic scale - high in the mountains, secluded, etc. Also, there were three of them and three American girls. The dynamics were no good. After exchanging some strange looks and a few muttered agreements in English with the girls, we got up to head back to Lichk and cut the party short.

The 40 minute hike back down to the village was filled with more advances from the men — arms around the shoulder, giddy whispering and joking around, etc.—which at first seemed funny but by the end of the hike became downright obnoxious because of how absolutely persistent they were. By the time we reached Lichk again and our taxi had arrived, we were grateful as hell. We said goodbye to the now downtrodden trio, and also to the men in the Khanut who had so warmly welcomed us in the morning, and headed back to our sites. It had been a beautiful, eventful, and enlightening day.

First Weeks at Site

I’ve been here nearly three weeks now, in the deep south of Armenia, surrounded by borders and the Armenian language and new acquaintances in this village where I’ll be living for the next two years. The days are flying by, I’m already in the middle of my second week as a volunteer English teacher, and I’m feeling pretty good about my work and what my role is here. I’m getting to “shpvel” the place pretty well, you could say, which is the verb Armenians use for getting acquainted with a place. A friend also pointed out to me that if you look this word up in the dictionary, the literal English translation is apparently “to rub oneself.” So yeah, I'm rubbing around this village right now and enjoying every bit of it.

Here’s a day in the life so far…

Woke up from a solid sleep, had a large cup of coffee, and then made small talk with my host family on the patio before getting ready for work. Before heading out, I blasted Radiohead’s “Bones,” because it was in my head when I woke up, and then headed off down the winding, sloping road to my village school (my village is set on either side of a very steep valley, so walks to and from school are pretty vigorous undertakings).

A delightful activity, which my school calls “morning calisthenics,” takes place every day at 8:45 just before class starts, and so far I’ve taken to the routine pretty fondly. The entire school assembles outside in the courtyard, and then our Phys Ed teacher, Yeghish, leads the teachers and students through a series of awkward body movements that I would describe as some sort of cross between stretches and interpretive dance. There is arm-flailing, clapping, toe-touching, hopping, neck-rolling, squatting, and finally a hilarious exercise in which we all place our hands on our hips and swivel our pelvic areas around shamelessly. My school’s director – a short, stout man who talks in a fast, vigorous manner that reminds me sometimes of barking (although I would never tell him that) – always takes part whole-heartedly in this last exercise, and it always puts a huge grin on my face before first hour starts.

My counterpart and I had the first hour free, and then taught the 6th, 7th, 11th, and 12th grades for the next four consecutive hours. It’s all going well, and I feel like I’m getting more accustomed to and comfortable being “a real teacher” every day. I also noticed my counterpart actually giving attention to some of the slower students today, which was heartening to see, since the strategy I had seen previously up to this point had been more or less letting the smartest kids just own the classroom and get most of the attention while the slower ones get farther behind. We are two teachers in a classroom that is never larger than fourteen students and on average is more like 8 or 9, and so I am very excited about what we can do and how far we might be able to go with the kids with a ratio like that.

During our 12th grade lesson, I gave a presentation on Chicago, described the nuances of a Chicago hot-dog (which they were shockingly not all that interested in), and led them through a text about the city’s history and landmarks. It went fine, especially considering it was sort of an ad-libbed lesson due to the fact that the 12th grade does not actually have English textbooks yet. (Word from other volunteers I’ve talked to is that their 12th grades also do not have English books yet, so perhaps they just don’t exist this year. It’s a possibility). During this lesson, I also tried, unsuccessfully, not to laugh when one of the girls started talking about “Michelle Jordan” instead of “Michael.” My counterpart also at one point got upset enough at the students talking in the back to say, in Armenian, “Do you want me to get angry? I do not want to get angry near Tom; it would be shameful.” Sort of a strange thing to say… This was also only our second day teaching the 12th grade together, so I’m sure it will happen soon enough. Shame will ensue.

The event of the day, and maybe of the week, took place when I got home from school. I was in my room, doing nothing in particular, when my host mother said I should come outside because somebody wanted to meet me. I came outside to meet one of the only people in country so far I’ve come across that was actually taller than me, not that I’m all that incredibly tall, at least in America, but here I’m close to giant status. I shook hands with him and took stock of his military regalia, heavy boots, camo and all, and also his Russianness. We sat down, and he explained that he worked for the Russian military. (The Russian military maintains the border with Iran in Armenia, so there is a fairly large base nearby).

He was not, however, showing up at my doorstep to get a profile on me or find out if I was a spy, at least I don’t think so. Turns out he just wants to learn English. He had heard I was around from one of the teachers at my school, Elvina, who apparently knows him and who showed up with him to introduce us to each other, and he just wanted to see if I could give him some tutoring. With my host family, one of my fellow teachers, and another dude in a camo uniform with him all watching our conversation in broken English, I wasn’t about to turn the guy down. And I actually genuinely would like to help him. Not the first person I’ve met in my first weeks here that has asked me about English lessons, but definitely the most interesting. We’ll see what happens.

~~~

I went for a walk the other day just outside the village and discovered that this place is even more beautiful than I had first thought. I followed an upward climbing trail past the village cemetery and into a path lined by gardens and orchards and a few grape vineyards on the left and right. The trail eventually opened up a little bit more and signs of mankind begin to disappear the farther I went. Right now it’s gorgeous, and I intend to take full advantage of it before the winter comes and I’ll be more or less holed up for several months. This really is a gorgeous place.

Khash - խաշ

Had easily my most interesting culinary experience in country so far last Saturday, with a formidable dish known as Khash.

What is Khash, exactly?
Khash is cows feet. They boil them, hooves and all (or maybe it’s only hooves), in a large pot for 24 hours until those tough, unrelenting feet finally give way and become a hot gelatinous glob. I’m not making this up.

How do you eat such a thing, you might ask?
With a grizzly constitution, iron will power and the aid of a little fresh garlic pressed directly over the soup, dried lavash to soak up all the grease, and some homemade vodka to help purge your pallet every now and then. Also time. It takes time to digest this stuff, so you can’t be planning on going to work afterwards or going out for a stroll or anything really at all. My host dad and I both passed out after eating (I think he was pretty proud that I polished off two bowls), and I woke up about an hour later with what I can only describe as a “khash hangover,” a feeling of lethargy and also a sense of supreme manliness.

Was this gross?
No. I actually kind of liked it. I think… It’s not something I’d want to eat very often, for sure. But it was definitely an experience worth having, and also a time to bond with my host family and my neighbor Hovik who came over to eat with us. It’s a very traditional dish here, a cause for bonding and comradery, especially during the colder moths when things slow down and apparently there won't be much else to do but dig into a bowl of Khash with some friends and spend the rest of the day digesting it. If I get the chance to try it again, I probably will.

The end of pst

“Never, never, never quit,” – Winston Churchill.

This is the quote on a paper weight my big sister gave to me a while back, and which I figured would be good to bring along for inspiration every now and then. It turns out that Winston Churchill was known for drinking exclusively Armenian Cognac, a piece of historical trivia which Armenians are quick to point out to you, and which I’m sure is valid. From what I’ve experienced so far, the stuff is very, very tasty, so I can’t blame him. Churchill apparently drank the stuff to extreme excess though, and in his more advanced years, when asked how he remained an energetic, healthy and enigmatic leader despite his effusive penchant for drinking and smoking throughout the day, he paused, exhaled what I can only imagine was a massive cloud of fine cigar smoke, and said: “No sports.”

You tell me which quote is the more inspiring one…

Either way, I’m thinking this is the sort of mentality and iron will power that I’ll need to get through the next two years with flying colors. I’m not saying that I’m planning on picking up a serious cognac and cigar habit. That wouldn’t really go with the whole mission here and what I’d like to get done, at least I don’t think so. I also might play some sports from time to time.

So now, as of three days ago, August 16th, I’m an official Peace Corps Volunteer. We were sworn-in at Yerevan’s Komitas Opera House, had one final night with our training host families after the ceremony, and on the morning of the 17th were shuttled off and scattered to the far ends (particularly in my case) of the country. PST (pre-service training) is over. We graduated, and now that we’re all at our sites it’s time to start hitting the ground running, hopefully. Here’s a list of some things that happened along the way.


Things I did or that happened to me during PST (in no particular chronological order)

1 - Lived in a village of 700 individuals on top of Armenia’s Zangu Gorge for 10 weeks
2 – Learned how to pick cherries in a cherry tree
3 – Learned how to catch a runaway chicken (grab by tail and toss back into coop)
4 – On the 4th of July, gave a speech about the celebration of freedom in extremely shoddy Armenian to the residents of my village while my friend Ben lit off equally shoddy fireworks for “dramatic effect”
5 – Finished a book of Murakami short stories
6 – Learned how to shoo chows away from places they are not supposed to be, like the garden (aggressive gestures and yelling in English or Armenian works)
7 – Acquired a taste, pretty much immediately, for straight vodka toasts during dinner time
8 – Learned that rubbing yogurt on your body is an acceptable remedy for sunburns
9 – Discovered that two bowls of yogurt, a shot of cognac, and some Peace Corps issued anti-diarrheal pills can cure you of “the loots” in less than 24 hours
10 – Fell in love with Armenian culture
11 – Experienced at least two, possibly three not-so-subtle attempts by my host family to pair me up with a woman in the family near my age
12 – Fell for someone else
13 – Found myself in outrageously embarrassing or humbling situations more times than I can count
14 – Went to publicly held dance lessons in Yeravan’s Republic Square in June and July, loved them, and am determined to master haikakan dancing by the end of service
15 – Taught 6 practice English courses to Armenian children aged 10 to 17
16 – Gave an interview on Armenian national television during my swearing in ceremony using broken Armenian and am not quite sure what I actually said to them
17 – Climbed Aqunk’s Hadis twice, a 8294 ft mountain, which was gorgeous, although both times resulted in pretty severe sunburns
18 – Had to say goodbye to a lot of good friends and a wonderful host family whom I’ll probably not be seeing very often due to the very long, mountainous road to my village

~~~~
So now, after that, I’ve arrived, and my head is still spinning just a bit.

After the swearing in ceremony, I had my final night with my training host family, during which I said two toasts to Ando and Tanya and my tateek, thanking them for all of their hospitality and acceptance and making promises to visit sometime in the future (add “learned how to give a toast in Armenian successfully” to above list). They in turn said about four toasts to my health and luck with my work in the future. Then after sipping coffee and beer and eating sunflower seeds and watermelon in the windy starlit Armenian night with them for the last time, I muscled the rest of my clothes into my suitcases, talked on the phone to an important friend for an hour or so and fell asleep by around 2am.

In the morning we loaded all of my belongings into Ando’s Lada and then drove over to the Mayor’s office, where Peace Corps vans were waiting to take us to Nor Hajn. We said goodbye to our host families, and to all the residents of the village we have grown accustomed to seeing and talking to every day. I gave and received a bunch of hugs and kisses, said “haijo” (bye) and “lav mna” (stay well) over and over, the women were crying a bit and the men were smoking, and then it was over. We were shuttled off to Nor Hajn, where we said more goodbyes—that I think were even harder to say—to the rest of the volunteers from the other villages. Then Hannah and I, us being the two volunteers going the farthest south, hopped into our taxi and headed off to our sites. On the 8 to 9 hour ride (neither of us seemed to paying a great deal of attention to the time or how long it took exactly) I slept about a third of the way and chatted with Hannah and our driver for most of the rest. The drastic and repeated increases and drops in elevation as we went over the mountains were a little more tolerable this time around without a cold.

Upon reaching my site, my new host father, Arto, insisted that we accompany Hannah to her site as well, and so we boarded the taxi again and drove to her village, helped her unload, drank coffee with her family, of course, and then finally headed back to our village. This I think technically made me to last volunteer to finally arrive at my site and be settled (with the exception of Kelsey perhaps). I ate with my host family, hit the sack around midnight and slept for about 10 and half hours straight, my longest stretch since I arrived in country. It was awesome. Guess I needed it…

Vardavar

I’ve got about two and a half weeks left of pre-service training, and I’m in pretty deadly good spirits. Also, today is August first, which means I left America exactly two months ago. I’m writing to The Kinks.

Yesterday was a pretty special Armenian holiday, called Vardavar. The once pagan holiday was adopted into Armenia’s Apostolic Christian cannon a long time ago, and apparently corresponds to the Transfiguration in Western Christian calendars. On this day, and this one only, it becomes perfectly acceptable to douse your friends, neighbors, and most importantly your family with cold water. There is no set time, and the more random the moment the better. So from the moment you wake up until the sun goes down, you need to be on guard, unless like me you are melting from the heat (it was over 100 degrees in the capital this Vardavar) and are just waiting excitedly to get a blast of cold water when you least expect it.

In the morning we ate a breakfast of Dolma leftover from the night before, which are rice and ground beef and greens wrapped up in grape leaves and cabbage. I ate an innumerable amount of them. We also had a half shot of vodka during breakfast, which is extremely rare here, and my host mother, after struggling for a good reason for the toast, simply muttered “bolorin,” or to everyone. Satisfactory.

It hit my Armenian studies for the remainder of the morning, and then hung out while family started showing up for the holiday. Andranik’s sister, Anahit, arrived from Hoktmberyan with her son. Andranik’s son-in law’s family also showed up from Bueregavan, and then finally another of Andranik’s sisters, Rosana, showed up with her husband, daughter, daughter’s husband and their two children. Tanya’s sister-in-law and her three children, who have been staying here for most of the summer, were also present. I’m pretty sure I’m getting all of this straight, but it’s disorienting. It also doesn’t help that there’s special possessive cases in the Armenian language for most family-related words (i.e. sister’s daughter) instead of the perfectly consistent apostrophe followed by “s” that we have in English. There are also special words for specific family members, such as “hars” for son-in-law, and different sets of words are used depending on which side of the family—mother’s or father’s—that you are talking about as well. It’s complicated, probably way more so than it needs to be, but I also I think it’s indicative of just how important family is in this culture. So anyway, if there is a holiday like Vardavar, any family who lives nearby—no matter how far the ties—will come out to celebrate as one.

By mid-afternoon, we were quite the crowd, and I figured the moment I had been waiting for was near. Sure enough, within minutes of everyone having finally arrived, the kids started filling up buckets and plastic bottles from the garden hose and bathroom sink. I’m not sure who hit me first exactly, but I think it was a combination of my host sister and Tanya’s nephews, George and Mikol. A battle royale ensued, with aunts and uncles joining in the fray. I got my host mother pretty good at one point, and minutes later she had snuck up behind me and gotten her revenge with a huge cooking pot filled with ice cold water. I don’t know how long it lasted exactly, and all we were doing was repeatedly filling up buckets and bottles with water and picking out new people to soak, but I don’t think I’ve laughed so hard since I arrived in country. When you’re in such a foreign place, and are still struggling to communicate basic ideas in the language of those you live with, an event like this is incredibly refreshing. No language is needed to participate. One of the family members, my friend Vruyr, explained to me that the water on Vardavar is seen as a symbolic cleansing of the spirit, a way to break from any evil and transgressions of the past. It certainly felt rejuvenating.

After all were thoroughly soaked, we headed inside to eat together. The standard Armenian village feast was laid out on the table, with fresh cheese, cucumbers and tomatoes, pickles, something a lot like coleslaw, lamb, boiled potatoes, and more dolma. Three shots were taken at the meal: the first to the blessings of the family and that good things will continue to happen, the second as a measure to prevent evil from happening in the future, and the third in acknowledgment of all the parents in the family and of God. From what I’ve gathered so far, the number and order of these toasts is consistent and an important tradition. Also, after eating such a huge amount of food and having the requisite post-meal cup of coffee, you feel not even remotely drunk.

I spent the rest of the afternoon chatting with Andranik, Vruyr (who speaks perfect English and translates for me when he’s around) and other men in the family at the patio table in the shade. Finally people started shuffling out around five. I took my cue as well, headed up to my room to get some dry clothes and notepaper, and headed over to Ben’s, another American and friend in my village with whom I’ve been team-teaching our practice classes for TEFL training.

Just as I rounded the corner of the road his house lies on, I heard the familiar voices of some of the village kids playing.

“Tom is coming!” they called out to one another, their eyes getting huge, full buckets in their arms. Their attention now turned fully away from splashing one-another and entirely to me. Resistance was futile. Also, water—if you weren’t already aware, as I wasn’t—is super hard to dodge. They swarmed on me and in seconds I was totally soaked again. Pretty cute, I thought. The day wouldn’t have been complete without it. I thanked them for the bath and entered Ben’s house soaking. His host mother, Gayane, first laughed at me and then helped me hang my clothes out to dry. I threw on some of Ben’s threads, and then we got to planning our lesson on idioms, which I was truly pumped about. They are a creative way to work with language, come with built in visuals and mental images, and after having taught this group of kids the day before, we were pretty confident they’d be able to understand it just fine.

I got home, ate a quick dinner of leftovers from the afternoon with my Tateek, showered, finished making a handout for the lesson, and hit the sack hard.

On Monday, which for Armenians is mostly a day of rest and recovery from Vardavar, we had the now familiar routine of learning Armenian in the morning and then practicing teaching English in the afternoon. The idioms were a hit with our kids, many I’m pretty sure walking away with a full understanding of all 18 that we taught, and for the first time I felt like an actual teacher, or close to it.

In the south

I think this Arto and I will be pretty great friends. The entire weekend there, I think he was always smiling, must have uttered the phrase “problem chka! (problems there are not!)” to me dozens of times, and more than once even moved in on me for a gigantic man hug/kiss that caught me totally off guard. This is my new host father I’m talking about by the way. His stature, even at 61 years old, is still pretty imposing. He’s just shy of 6 feet tall, with a heaving chest and gut and kind eyes. He greeted me as I exited my 8 hour taxi ride from Yerevan, ears still ringing with pressure from the repeated altitude changes, and bear hugged me with all his mass. To be greeted so warmly by someone you’ve never met before is something you don’t get used to, and it’s a great feeling.

We walked together from the village’s social epicenter with its two shops and the school where I’ll be working for the next two years, all eyes now fixed on the new American walking with Arto, and ambled up the village road to his home. The deep south is set upon two sides of a valley, the homes and each home’s accompanying garden rising up on either side, and the grade is steep enough that I should be in damn good shape during my service. At the moment Arto was panting pretty heavily, but mostly because I think he was trying to talk so fast that I don’t think he was giving himself proper time to breathe fully. He talked rapidly, waved his arms as he spoke, and chuckled and patted me on the back when he realized I wasn’t understanding more than 5% of what he said. At first I thought it might just be nervousness that made him speak so rapidly, but as my stay drew to a close I still had yet to see it subside.

He opened the green, slightly rusted gate to his home and ushered me in. Passing a garden with cherry trees, cucumbers, and tomatoes growing among other things, I stepped onto a large, long patio area with wooden rafters overhead. Seated at the dinner table was a welcoming party comprised of Arto’s wife, Carmen, his son-in-law Vahram, Dayna, the currently finishing up volunteer I will be replacing, and Varsik, the 51 year old Armenian English teacher who I’ll be working with side-by-side with during my service. Perhaps most anxiously awaiting my arrival were two of Arto’s grandchildren, Artur and Vahe. “Hello,” they greeted me with deeply inflected English. These were two of the three boys belonging to Arto’s daughter Armine, married to Vahram. Three more boys, belonging Arto’s other daughter Haikoor, live in the village as well, bringing the grand total to six male grandchildren for Ardo. It was plain to see that they were his pride and joy. Couple that with the fact that he had had only daughters himself, and that, particularly in Armenian culture, boys are so prized as future bread-winners and defenders of the country’s borders, and the man was stoked on them beyond all measure.

I was shown my shower, complete with wood-burning water heater, which was across the patio and to the left, through another small garden area of pomegranate trees and grape vines hanging overhead in the rafters. I’d now been here about 10 minutes, I hadn’t even gone inside yet, and this seemed to me like the most beautiful home I’d been to in Armenia so far.

We ate together, a formidable meal of dolma (grape leaves or cabbage usually stuffed with rice, greens and beef), tomato and cucumber salad, lavash, and other delightful stuff. Dinner was rounded off by tea and sweet bread with apricot jam and chocolate butter. Stuffed and feeling very, very lucky, I showered up and hit my bed.




Flies are pretty prevalent in my new village. And if you eat your meals outdoors, which my new family does, you are open to attacks. Fortunately, Arto has a time-tested method for dealing with this problem which I discovered during my first breakfast in the deep south. At each meal, the table is set also with a long, fresh branch from one of the garden’s grape vines. Throughout the meal, Arto continuously picks up the branch, and while talking in his usual animated, rapid manner, waves the branch with surprising grace above the food, generating small puffs of wind and scattering the flies asunder. He also will often use the branch to swat one or two his grandchildren on the head each time (very lightly). Not as any sort of reprimand really, but just because he for whatever reason seems to get a huge kick out of it.

After breakfast Arto and I got ready to take a walk to his larger garden that lay across the highway on the other side of the valley. Once there we rolled bales of hay over to let them dry in the sun, picked apricots off his trees and ate them on the spot, and picked some green beans for our lunch later on. On the way home, I figured I had now seen two things in his life that fill him with pride, his six healthy grandchildren and his garden. I felt much obliged.

Arriving back at his home, it appeared a bit of rain was coming in. Arto spoke with assuredness that rain was indeed coming later in the day and that it would be a very welcome shower. When I mentioned something about looking the weather up on the internet, he responded simply, “I am the internet.”

After a quick lunch with the new family I headed over to meet Danya, who had called a taxi for the two of us to get down to the nearest substantial town, which I’ll refer to as “the town,” with a population of over 5,000 people, a cell phone dealer, Marshutni service to Yerevan, and lots of other amenities one needs every now and then. It took us about 10 to 15 minutes to get there by taxi. A currently serving volunteer, was having me, Hannah, a few other currently serving volunteers from farther north and their Fulbright friend over for tacos. Basically, I think she had wanted to have a little get together for Hannah and I, seeing as we were the new American blood in the deep south of Armenia. And I gotta say it was great. We had some drinks, and the amazing tacos that she made for us. I inhaled the tacos as we listened to The Band and The Kinks playing off of another volunteer’s iPod and for a moment there I felt almost like I was back at home. That is until I went out onto her balcony, looked out, and saw what were unmistakably some of Iran’s mountains in the background. They weren’t too far away.

A final important item for the weekend was the visit to my school the following morning. The school where, once again, I’ll be working at for the next two years is almost brand new. I’m no connoisseur or anything, but the place is impressive. There is a computer lab with apparently working internet, a printer, an assembly hall with a piano, P.A. speaker and a snare and hi-hat in the far corner for what reason I cannot possibly imagine, soccer nets, basketball hoops, the works. For a village of around 600 people, such a nice learning environment hadn’t registered to me as a possibility. I’m stoked on it.

Before the school visit, I had been a bit apprehensive. I had woken up late, thrown on my best shirt and pants and told my host mother I’d be back for breakfast after the meeting. Right now there was no time. I walked down to the school with Varsik, the Armenian teacher I’ll be working with or my “counterpart” who also happens to live right next to my host family. When we shuffled into the director’s office (Jora is his name), he was waiting patiently. After showing me the school, they seemed surprised that I wanted to have a quick Q and A with them about what my responsibilities would be, but I insisted. We sat back down in his office, and all they had to say about their expectations of me was that I should always “work hard, be active” and that’s about it. Nothing more specific was said, and they seemed totally comfortable with that, so I guess I was too. This meeting, like everything else I had been anticipating during the weekend, ended up being far easier than I thought it might be. This place was laid back. Hangist.

The night before I left, I got a phone call from Vahram, Arto’s son in law who I had met the first night I arrived. We had exchanged numbers over dinner but I had not expected him to call me so soon, much less at 11:30 pm at night just as I’m hitting the sack. He said he just wanted to call to wish me safe travels back to Yerevan the next morning, he had been very happy to meet me, was excited for me to return for good in August, and also said something that I’m pretty sure translates roughly to “God will bless the work you do here.” What a nice guy. The deep south is alright.

About how I'll be living on the edge of the map for the next two years

I’ve just come back from visiting my site, or the village that I will be living and working in for the next two years, and I can say I’m not totally let down. In fact, I’m downright giddy about it. Let me begin…

This particular adventure began last week when they took the 41 of us volunteers-in-training out to the large local community school/current PST headquarters and led us to a large, freshly painted map of Armenia on the parking lot blacktop. Red dots with corresponding cities written in Armenian were marked like coordinates waiting for their payload. We gathered around the map, names were called out, applause filled the air, and volunteers began occupying the dots one by one. This was how the Peace Corps – after at least a year’s worth of work culling volunteers-to-be, choosing appropriate work sites, and double checking on the safety and suitability of each location—had chosen to reveal the results to us. It was quick, a bit messy and came with an intense rushing sensation that left me pretty dazed or excited or something else I’ve never felt before. My name was called last, as the fates had it, and I found myself in a very small village that is very close to Armenia’s southern border. For safety and protocol reasons, I’ll be referring to my site as “the deep south” in this blog from here on out.

So the countries that will be my close neighbors in the deep south may be mildly shocking to some people. It certainly took a good deal of reflection on my part for me to get a bit more comfortable with the idea. The night after the announcement, I lost substantial sleep for the first time in a long time (I don’t mean to brag, but I’m normally very good at sleeping). I called a good friend, a fellow trainee, and felt loads better.

What’s frightening about this placement is that it’s extremely close to a border that our country is not on any sort of good terms with. There’s also that horror story of those hikers who recently got mistaken for spies and abducted after accidentally crossing the border. The village itself is also remote, around 600 or so people live there. I’ll be the only American in town for sure.

What’s good about this placement is that Iran is actually one of the friendliest, if not the friendliest border Armenia has. With Turkey and Azerbaijan being closed off, hostile borders (particularly the latter), Armenia apparently relies on their southern neighbor for the trade of just about every sort of good imaginable. This placement also means an adventure in every sense of the word, sort of the essence of the vague ideas I had in the back of my mind when I first decided to apply to be a volunteer abroad. It’s a tiny village, it’s a totally foreign place, it’s a dramatic landscape, it’s on the edge of the map, and so I think it suits me just right. It’s also beautiful.

After receiving the news, I had about 24 hours to digest it, pack my bags and prepare for a weekend-long visit to see what it was actually like. Departing on a Saturday morning, it took us about seven and a half hours to get from Yerevan to the deep south, which is actually very, very good time. Our cab driver hauled ass the entire way, passing cars in a two-lane during tight bends, seemingly playing chicken with trucks far more massive than us in the oncoming lane of traffic, and just pulling generally insane moves whenever possible. Anyway he had an air about him that made me trust him completely, that all great drivers have I think. The landscape changed drastically and often. After passing through large iron gates marking the beginning of Armenia’s Syunik Marz, we went from the relatively flat and arid fields laying in front of Ararat’s gigantic peak to rolling alpine meadows. I had a cold, and the frequent elevation changes were making my ears build and release pressure like mad but the view made it all alright. As we went deeper into Syunik Marz, we passed treeless meadows filled with wildflowers, then lakes, then forests, all while climbing up one mountain and then coasting back down into an adjacent gorge more times than I can remember.
Myself and Hannah, the other volunteer who actually got placed a bit farther and closer to the border still, bless her, chatted excitedly and ran the conversational gamut of where you went to school, how many significant others you’ve had, why you decided to be a volunteer in the middle of nowhere etc. for just about the entire time.
Finally arriving in the southern extremity of Armenia, the landscape now resembled semi-desert, with green shrubs and trees coloring the dry, rocky hills and valleys. We pulled into my village and I exited the cab to find my new host-father, Arto, waiting impatiently to meet me.

Dsenund

Yesterday was easily one of my favorites in this country so far. But not due to how it started. A more grueling than average Armenian class lasted from the morning until 1pm, during which I was at one point falling briefly asleep, then being suddenly called upon by the teacher in Armenian to answer “what day of the week Tuesday is” I would force the wheels in my head to turn and respond “Tuesday is the third day of the week,” (Yerkooshabtin shabatva yerord orn e) and then slowly drift back out again. Dono know why I was so tired. It comes and goes here like the tide rolling up and down a beach and tries to swallow you in. After classes a discussion with the other volunteers about what to do for the Fourth of July finally made some headway. There was enough positive energy in the room to determine that we’d be buying 10,000 drams worth of fireworks (i.e. the entirety of the budget the Peace Corps gave us to hold this event), have cake and candy and games for the village kids, do some American factoid trivia and then give a speech about what Fourth of July means to us before firing off our modest explosions into the night. Should be pretty great. Two volunteers who have been a bit overwhelmed of late were being consoled in the next room and were not part of the discussion. Hopefully our shenanigans the coming evening will cheer them up.

I came home and started trying to help my family out a bit in preparing for Harutyun’s big dsenund (birthday), for which a ton of family would be coming over in a couple hours. The large, open concrete room which usually houses only Parandzem’s small shrine of Christian icons in a far corner was now filled with tables and benches draped with linens. They were set with cold salads: one of cabbage, corn, carrots, another of cucumbers, tomatoes and peppers, and another fresh dill, basil, green onions. Bottles of vodka, mineral water and soda were being set. Really, all I needed to do at this point was kick back. They had done all of the leg work while I was at class.

Folks started showing up around four and five. One of Harutyun’s uncles brought over a huge, plastic sword with lights and sound effects, but no batteries, or as they call them “element.” Eager to help/communicate/do anything at all really, I ran up to my room, grabbed to double A’s and a screwdriver (which has come in handy multiple times already) and placed them in the sword. It now lit up and made obnoxious laser sounds at the slightest push of a button, and Harut went nuts with it. A good deed done, I think.

The men who had shown up so far and I played cards with my American deck, which they commented on as being very, very nice. I’m pretty sure I picked it up in the checkout lane at a walmart right before I left, for mad cheap. Geras, a man who I had just met, schooled me in Doorak, a game which I’m still picking up the finer strategical points on. I shook his hand and accepted my defeat. The men then attempted to show me another “Haikakan” game to me to no real avail. There was a round of some sort of out of turn wagering before each hand, a number would be written down, and then cards would be laid down in a fashion similar to Hearts, but this was totally not Hearts. I was baffled by it, but the way I see it, I’ve got two years in this country to get awesome at whatever it was.

Finally, we all shuffled inside to start eating. As seems to be customary, I sat at one table with the men, while the women populated another. Around me were Andranik’s sisters’ husbands (he has five) and their sons. Tonya and Parandzem came around with dishes of lamb and potatoes. We feasted, and we toasted.

I should mention that the toasting of vodka shots is an affair that happens multiple times at almost every dinner I eat with my family, and the nuances of the toasting, while always there, are particularly pronounced on occasions like this. Before taking a single bite of food your shot glass is filled for you by one of the men at the table. This continues happening until the meal is over or you make it absolutely clear that you do not want to drink anymore. A man will raise his glass and begin uttering his two cents, and all others follow his lead and raise their glasses in unison as he speaks. All then clink their glasses together, each one making sure to touch everyone else’s glass to his before drawing his glass back toward himself. At this point another man will often pipe up, offering his piece on something that he feels should not be forgotten. Glasses are then clinked once again in approval and drawn back in. A general muttering ensues, finally someone puts the glass to their lips, and all see this and take down the shot together. A quick, one speech, one clink and then take the shot toast almost never occurs. At least two and some times three or four rounds of speaking and clinking the glasses before drinking them is more common.

A really great part of Armenian drinking culture is that these toasts, whether they are with wine, beer or vodka, are pretty much the drinking that is done, and they are only done during meals. In other words you can only get as drunk as the length of the meal allows, during which time you are also stuffing yourself with lamb and chicken and greens and potatoes and lavash and other absorbent stuff. And then you’re done. By the end of the meal you should feel a little light headed, maybe buzzed, but not sloshed by any means at all. And that’s exactly how I felt on Harut’s birthday.

I exited out into the fresh air and sat down for a long, hilarious conversation in broken language with three of Andranik’s nephews around my age. We were brought coffee and one of the nephews, Geras, started very excitedly asking me what coffee was like in America and how I drank it there. I told them I drank it black, and they nodded in approval. This conversation sounds like it would last about 30 seconds, but it actually took about 10 minutes or longer because of repeated miscommunications and laughter. We were getting pretty silly. A lot of other side talk ensued and they complemented me on my improving Armenian skills. I told them it was because of the vodka, which was totally true. Drinking, to a point, is probably the most effective language aid I know of.

A godsend showed up now in the form of Vrooyr, Andranik’s neice’s husband. A man of about 30, he manages two hotels in Yerevan, had lived in California for four years, and spoke perfect English and Armenian. He came over, sat across from me, introduced himself and then in so many words asked me what the hell I was doing in Armenia. I’ve gotten pretty good at answering this question. We got to talking and he pretty quickly warmed up to me, to the whole idea of this American living and learning amongst the people in this village, picking up their language and becoming a teacher in the fall.

Since more family had now arrived, we headed back into the dining hall for round two, not even two hours after finishing the previous meal. The tables had been re-stocked. I ate a bunch more lamb and lavash and greens and cheese, and drinks were poured. Andranik made one toast to the men of the Armenian military, past and present. For another one, I took advantage of having Vyooyr next to me and had him express my gratitude –much more eloquently than I would have been able to—to Andranik and to his family for being so blindly welcoming to this wandering American. We toasted to my translated words and I have to say it was a great feeling. I wasn’t with any Americans at the time. I had no one to relate with really that had had any similar life experiences at all. I just felt like I was actually at home in Armenia and immersed and content. I was proud of myself, I guess.

Arevik, Andranik’s 21 year old niece who has multiple times dropped some really unsubtle hints about getting married (I was warned this sort of thing would happen here) was smiling at me coyly from across the room at the women’s table. She had no idea that there was matsun (Armenian yogurt) on the outer edge of her bottom lip. I smiled back, almost laughing, deciding not to let her know.

I exited the food kingdom again for the fresh air and started chatting it up seriously with Vrooyr. I don’t usually take a liking to a guy so quickly, or vice versa. I told him he was a smart dude for mastering English so completely without much formal instruction at all. He told me I was smarter, but I think he was just being Armenian. We had more coffee, of course.

The night rolled on. I was in a deadly good mood. We were done drinking, which was just as well because any more and I would have passed on from the “I’m actually better at speaking Armenian right now” phase and moved into the “I sound pretty dumb right now” phase. We drank coffee and chatted, Vroory translating for me flawlessly. The stars came up. The pleasant wind that hits Nurnus every night during the summer nights like clockwork came in like clockwork. Arevik kept giving me looks, except that without yogurt on her face it made me a bit more uncomfortable. I danced with the kids for a song and as some of the last guests were leaving I said my goodbyes and said goodnight, saying something to Andranik that sounded along the lines of “This Birthday…very good!”

I wanted to hit the sack, but not before calling someone from my own family. Michael picked up, and we rattled away about our lives for 700 dram or so’s worth of time, which was something like 40 minutes. The nice day with my Armenian family had left me pining for my own, and talking to Michael really rounded me out. He’s having a good summer. I think I am too.

Hadis

Yesterday morning, Sunday, I took a rundown bus to Abovian from Nurnus. The machine had the appearance of some once proud soviet engineering crossed with a sketch out of the Beatle’s yellow submarine artwork. Large red tanks lined the top of it, containing what was apparently the gas (Benzine, I think) that it runs on. Brown chips and cracks ran along its pale yellow coat. Iron doors creaked shut behind you after entering. The aged machine crawled along the first hill side we took, seemingly about to lose all momentum and begin falling back down. But it was just getting warmed up; soon we were rumbling up and down the mountain sides at a steady pace. The driver wore a face that seemed as aged and yet reliable as the ancient machine he drove. He kept a floral rug over engine hub next to him and had hung a collage of very slutty looking Russian women over the bus’s front entrance. The fact that to my American eyes this bus could not actually be a working, functioning mode of transportation added a sort of magic, surreal element to the whole trip.

We bounded out of my village and I soon found out that the bus also functioned as a traveling market or delivery service as well. The bus was stopping at random intervals on the roads, at which point men waiting patiently on the roadside would exchange empty bottles and a few hundred dram for full bottles of matsun (yogurt) or milk that women who had boarded in Nurnus had brought along. I’d say that’s efficiency for you. Also I’m sure the driver and his superiors could care less that a miniature economy is thriving along their bus lines.

I struck up conversation with the tan-faced woman next to me to get some vital information. What I said I think went something like this: “you know…when….this bus….comes from Abiovian to Nurnus…later today?”

“Amen yerkoo sham galis e,” she responded kindly. Every two hours it comes.

“Very good,” I said.

“Yeah, “she said. “You can catch it at 1pm, 3pm, 5pm and the last one at 7pm.”

“Many thanks,” I told her.

She smiled and said no problem.

The bus clattered on to Abovian’s public transportation hub, a large parking lot filled with white marshutni vans going every which way. I asked the driver of my bus as I was exiting which of these white beauties would take me to Akunk, he pointed to a van and said the number “48.” I spotted her, said my thanks and strode over to the crowded, smelly marshutni number 48. Before boarding, I decided to stroll around the lot and just get some bearings. The driver of my bus, seeing that I was not walking directly into the marshutni to Akunk that he had so kindly pointed out to me, hollered at me that I was going the wrong way. I tried to explain that I was just walking around before I boarded, but I don’t know how to explain that at all, so it got a bit confusing. Anyway, I think he could see that I was alright. Nice guy though…

The ride to Akunk took maybe another half hour. A large Armenian woman in a sun dress sat next to me. Her arm was totally sweating on my arm, which was sweating on her arm. It’s just something you’ve got to get used to if you want to use the transportation around here. Even though I had proudly announced to the entire marshutni that “I’m going to Akunk!” (my way of verifying that we were in fact going to Akunk and not somewhere else I had never heard of), we rolled right past Akunk before I realized about a half mile outside the town boundaries that I had missed it. I hollered some nonsensical Armenian; the woman across from me understood my problem and told the bus driver to stop right away. I got out having delayed myself only a 10 minute walk back into town.

John and Ashley were waiting for me at the Akunk’s center, and we lost no time in heading up for Hadis, which rises up mightily right above the village. We took a food break right before making the final push up the very steep, rocky area right before the peak, but other than that kept up a really brisk pace and summitted in just over two hours. At the peak a surprise friend was waiting for us.

As I clambered up a last boulder and cheered myself on to the peak, I saw a man striding down toward me in sunglasses and an athletic t-shirt. “Hey Tom,” he said with what seemed to me a ridiculous amount of nonchalance. It took me a good 30 seconds to force my dazed, ‘just-defeated-this-mountain,’ mind to remember who this guy was.

“Hey Nick,” I said finally. Nick, one the Peace Corps Armenia staff, was at the peak. We got to talking, commenting on how absolutely beautiful it was up here, and what a coincidence it was that he was up here today as well. It turned out the guy wasn’t just ‘hanging out’ on top of the mountain, waiting for his trainees to summit the peak because he knew exactly where we were at all times and wanted to teach us some sort of lesson, although that was sort of my first suspicion. He was apparently getting ready to go para-gliding off this bad boy with some of his friends. He was helping some friends set up their “wing” and then was going to perhaps have a go at it himself later on. Right on, Nick.

The three of us bid him good luck and had our lunches at the peak and basked in our wicked good success. Wanting to share in our glory but not wanting to deal with the whole hiking bit, another trainee living in Akunk—another Ashley—and her host father drove up in a Russian jeep and met us about a half hour later. The host papa was quite a character, had heard that some Americans were climbing up his village’s mountain and just wanted to see it for himself I think. He had apparently served in the soviet military and had actually been stationed in Cuba way back when. I feel that if we were just one more generation back, we would be pretty shocked, perhaps angry at meeting a man who had been stationed in Cuba near the time of the missile crisis. But now, in 2011 in a tiny Armenian village, our reaction was one of mild interest bordering on “whoa that is really cool.”

So now we had a little party on top of this mountain. Nothing major, but pictures were taken, we cheered a bit, we sat in a cozy, cool cave for awhile to get away from the heat. When it got a bit later and the crew wanted to head back down, John and I decided to stay a bit longer on the peak and walk back down the old-fashioned way. The Ashleys and host papa bid us adieu and roared back down to Akunk in the black Russian jeep. John and I spent the next couple hours just talking nonsense and baking in the sun. Pretty great.

Making the trek back down, I realized that my body was altogether wiped. The 2 hour voyage back to my village of Nurnus via Marshutni and taxi went by in a blur, I felt more or less like a zombie, and I arrived home to a tateek that was very concerned at the now very visible sunburn I had acquired over the course of the day.

“Come, come,” she beckoned to me as we entered the kitchen. Apparently she had some sort of cure or remedy waiting for me. Aloe? Probably not…

I watched as my wonderful tateek pulled a giant bucket of matsun out of the refrigerator, which is Armenian yogurt. I loved eating the stuff, but had not experienced it being rubbed on my body just yet, believe it or not. Wasting no time, she began lathering in on my arms, and neck, and face. I figured it couldn’t hurt, and I spent the entire two or three minute long experience sort of outside of myself just trying not to giggle. A very old, kind woman was rubbing yogurt on me. After eating, I went to bed smelling like dairy and was out in seconds.

Week One

I’ve now been in my ‘training village,’ just shy of a week, and it is indeed a village – with every charming, rustic stigma that you could attach to it. Roosters crow throughout the day. Cows come home at night. The roughly 700 residents here know exactly what one another are doing at all times, and they especially know what myself and the other seven volunteers, who have so briskly descended on their otherwise much more predictable lives, are up to. If I go on a walk with a girl from the village, the rumor mill will begin churning away at full speed with speculation. Already this has happened, caught me a bit off guard, and is something I’ll need to be wary of. But our goings on are monitored on a much more mundane level as well. If another volunteer is taking a nap, a Tateek (Armenian for grandmother) will go over to another tateek’s home for coffee and share this news as if it were quite imminent. Soon enough the whole village is aware this person is taking a nap, and by the time the napping individual wakes up, wherever he/she goes people will ask how the nap was. This has also already happened at least once.

This is not to say that the folks in the village are all gossips and voyeurs. I’ve been trying to take the experience of being spotlighted in stride so far, seeing it as more endearing than rude in any way. These people are genuinely interested in what we do, and I suppose it’s understandable. If I had grown up in a village of some 100 residences in the middle of the mountains, with only one pot-hole ridden road connecting me to any form of civilization, I would be deadly curious about eight individuals from an ostensibly super-rich nation who suddenly decided it was a good idea to live little old Nurnus.

My first day here, my host father Andranik – a very kind, powerfully built man with a rug of grey hair on his arms and chest who offers me at least one shot of vodka every time we eat dinner together – showed me his garden and orchard, something that I think is not just a point of pride but also a tangible symbol of how life works here. Our crude communication of pointing and broken Armenian eventually revealed to me that he has – among other things—apricot trees, apple trees, tomatoes, cucumbers, and strawberries all growing back there. My host family has cows, chickens and goats as well. They also keep bees. As far as I can tell, nearly everything that I’m eating comes right from the backyard. Cheese, eggs, honey, tomato and cucumber salad, bread from hand rolled dough, barbecued chicken roasted above a toonirh (a fire pit in a small enclosed area), it all seems to have come from right next to me, and I’m pretty floored by it. In these ten weeks of training we are expected to learn a lot about the Armenian language and about teaching methods for non-native speakers and how to be an effective and credible volunteer, but a lot of other lessons will be instilled just from being immersed in this culture of an Armenian mountain village. I feel pretty lucky right now, and I already feel my perceptions of wealth shifting a bit.

During our first few days of orientation, another volunteer shared a quote that had been passed down to him before he and his group went out to serve: “go out and live wildly uncomfortable lives,” it went.

It’s a great line. I walk up and down winding roads to school every morning, dodging cow shit and glancing nervously at the stray dogs or occasional herd of cattle or sheep that may accost me on the way. In the past week I’ve had to rely heavily, almost completely on people I’ve only just met. I can’t speak with them hardly a single word every time we eat together, which is three times a day, yet they feed me ridiculous amounts of food. Andranik offers me “oghi” (vodka) every dinner time until I make it totally clear to him that I’m done toasting. We manage to communicate one way or the other, and despite my slight discomfort, each night before I sleep I look out from my house’s balcony and see Mt. Ara staring back at me serene and gorgeous beyond the deep valley that the village sits on. While I can’t yet fully communicate with the people I live with, they manage to make clear how much they accept me and see me as their own. This is already kind of fun.