Highlights of a day's work:

“Sasha, I am sorry I am late for class, I was arguing with Hamana Muellim (Teacher) over grammar.” It’s how they release sexual tension, arguing grammar rules. “Read this: I work the most of all. Would you say this?” “Sure. What’s wrong with it?” She’s dying to tell me. “You do not use the here. It should be ‘I work most of all.’” “Why? I would say,” and I write, “Of all the students, she is the best singer.” “No, it is not the same! ‘Best’ is an adjective here.” “Yeah, it doesn’t matter—” “It does matter! But Hamana said that words there are some verbs that act as nouns, and are treated as nouns in this sentence.” “Well, yeah, but—” “I don't really understand what she is saying. I have not learned this. If it is true, I must tell all my students about this adverb.” “I don’t know, it’s what we say—” “You would say, ‘She sang worst of all the students.’” “No, I would say, ‘Of all the students, she sang the worst.’” She literally threw the pen on the desk. I will hear about this tomorrow, in a “See, I told you” kind of way.

“Sasha, come to my house to teach me computer,” so I did, and she was like, “I want to know about English grammar. Are there grammar games on here?” “No, I don’t have any grammar games, but you can get them from the internet.” “Ok.” “Ok. Do you have internet?” “No, but you do. You have computer.” “Yeah, but there’s no internet in the computer. Do you have a telephone line?” “No.” “Then you can’t have internet.” “But you have computer.”

“Sasha, light the petch. Don’t be scared.” “I’m scared, Yusif.” It’s a fucking torch. “I will light it, don’t turn it off.” “What if I have to leave?” “Keep it on.” “When I go to bed?” “Keep it on. Tomorrow, what time do you come home from school?” “Twelve o’clock.” “Keep it on…If you need to turn it off, turn it off here, here and here, or it will explode, Kapppewww!”

1. The temperature in my apartment has been dropping a degree for four consecutive days. The gauge currently reads 6 degrees Celsius. If it continues at this rate, I should awake to a white Christmas on my face.

2. Kelsey on how to check if I turned off the stove: “Put your detector next to it, if it doesn’t beep then gas isn’t leaking, or your detector is broken.”

3. “Eat! Eat!”
“I’m full! I can’t!” I’d shouted back.
“Sasha, eat!”
The puke is coming, I know it. I can’t tear off fat from the goose meat, or sip more oil-salt based soup.
“Eat bread, Sasha!”
Now putting the spoon down. Host mother will be offended.
“I can’t, Sevda!”
“Sasha, eat!”
“I’m full!”
“Do you want tea?”
If I have tea I have to have cookies. But if I say no, she’ll be offended.
“No, I don’t want any.”
“No?! But you must! Drink tea!”
“I can’t!”
“Just one cup, Sasha.”
I felt like a toddler, crying when I wanted food, screaming when I didn’t. Explaining I have to wear leggings to school to cover my tattoo, defending why I have one in the first place. Insisting I can walk to school on my own, and travel to Baku on the bus, even with the language barrier. Trying to communicate I want to be alone, when in reality I never will be, not Azerbaijan.
In the first weeks with my training host family I couldn’t convey my displeasure for bosbocht again, or my discomfort with blaring midnight mugam music for the fifth night in a row. So I’d shut myself inside my room, inside my sleeping bag, with a headlamp and a book that would take me back to green, warm valley.
When we’re sad, this is what a lot of us Americans do: take a time out, and maybe cry alone, internalizing pain but reflecting on it to forge ahead.
When Azerbaijanis are sad, however, they huddle together and talk.
We open the window for fresh air and color, and they keep the drapes shut from their neighbors (or the KGB).
We believe in medicine, they in the rituals of the Persian Empire.
Americans eat the meat part, and Azerbaijanis the fat.
We write story, while they retell it.
Muddy flip-flops, spotless boots.
Blue jeans, black slacks.
One hour, one week.
Coffee, tea.
Cold, hot.
Ask, tell.
“Sasha, drink tea, and then we will eat. Here is an apple and persimmons and a banana. First eat this.”
At the dinner table last night Nativan filled the deep bowl with bosbocht, and passed it to my placemat with several pieces of Baku bread.
“Sasha, eat!”
I ate the loaded bowl, pulling out seeds from alcha, cherry pits used as a bitter sweetener in this soup.
“Sasha, give me your bowl. You must eat more.”
“No, Nativan, I’m full.” Three small children loitered, spooning imaginary soup into toothless mouths. “Eat, Sasha! Eat!” they mimicked their mother.
“Sasha, you are our guest, eat!”
“I know I’m you’re guest, Nativan, but I am full. I am finished.”
“Eat bread, Sasha!”
“Nativan, I will eat however much I want. I can’t eat any more. I am finished.”
“Why, Sasha? Eat!”
“Because I am full, Nativan. I will not eat more. In America this is not nice. You cannot tell me to eat more. I eat will what I want.”
“But Azerbaijanis like to feed their guests! You are a guest, Sasha, you must eat!”
Americans are taught that we can do and feel what we want, when we want, and express our opinions on any platform, indefinitely.
Azerbaijanis are not taught this. It is why they are astounded when I simply say, “No, I will not eat any more.”
Americans are raised to know what is best for the self, and to let others discover what is best for them.
Azerbaijanis are taught that the group matters. They are told guests should be given more than anyone at the table, even if the guest says she is full.
Host country nationals do not experience the awkward, scary, fragmented, liberating growth that PCVs do. Even if they did, they’d probably end on the same side they started, just as I have, but with more graceful ways to communicate it.

4. Cooked pad thai using ketchup yesterday. Don’t do that.

5. My counterpart’s daughter is more in tune with American culture than I ever have been. Like most Americans, Azerbaijanis live on credit, and here, they have satellite television to show for it. I had heard from PCVs that Brittany is back, and last night I saw her new pop video, which I swear is the same one that’s been airing for the past decade. “Madonna is helping her,” winked Altunay. The secrets of Hollywood, disclosed by a 14-year-old living in Azerbaijan.
Altunay was also the first to inform me news of the Iraqi journalist. She reported, “Man throw shoe at Bush.” After googling it, I realized there was no need to decode that one.