Pat in the Kyrgyz Republic: Throwing Rocks

Well, since blogger is actually working for me today I figured I'd better write a post up. Things have been pretty relaxed lately. I've been going to school for 3 or 4 days a week to work on the computers we have there and it has been going pretty well. I was supposed to meet with my counterpart to teach her some new stuff with the PCs but the power was out all of yesterday. Instead of doing that I helped my brother throw rocks onto a truck (really). We borrowed our neighbors truck and went down to the lake. The land close to the lake before you get to the beach (and even on some beaches) is pretty much covered in rocks of various sizes. He's planning on basically paving the now dirt ground between our houses with a rock/cement sorta thing. We threw rocks onto this old old old Soviet truck for about 4 hours. It was kind of bizarre and I was just thinking to myself the whole time, "I'm throwing rocks on a truck made in the Soviet Union, in a former Soviet Republic, next to one of the largest Alpine lakes in the world. For four hours." I could have never imagined doing that...ever. Thanks again to Peace Corps for another strange memory.

Anyway, I've just been playing soccer and hanging out for most of my free time lately. The new K18s have arrived at their site, and I guess I'm understandably less excited than I was for the K17s, seeing as I will only be here another 3 months. They are a good group however. A lot of them came to Issyk-Kul this year so it will be interesting to see how the dynamic changes, if it does.

I can't wait for the Lake to warm up so that I can go swimming whenever I want, but it's not quite warm enough yet. I remember last year going in when it was too cold for about 5 or 10 minutes. I got out and my body/blood/brain was so cold that my motor skills were suffering as I walked over the rocks to get to the beach. I was asked by about 3 people if I was drunk. It sure looked like it haha. I don't want to repeat that. Even though I said no, I'm sure some people thought I was.

So T-minus 12 weeks. Hard to believe. I have been day dreaming a lot about American conveniences and cultural things that I actually grew up with. Shoot me an email if you'd like. I get bored with being able to check the internet all the time now and not having letters...

Hope you're all well.

Pat

-------
Finally posting pics from the May 25 last bell ceremony:

My host mom and host brother - he finished high school this year. His banner reads literally "good luck to you 'finisher'" So basically, good luck graduate.