Time for a Post about Time

Is it too early for a time has flown by and dragged on at the same time post? At two weeks in, it seems a bit premature, but it’s definitely the way a lot of us are feeling. We’ve crammed a lot into the last two weeks. We went through orientation at the hotel for four days, which seem so long ago now. We’ve had four weeks of language and Youth Development (or TEFL or CED) sessions, and have actually started to be able to communicate needs and ideas to our host families and others in our communities. But then I look online at sports scores or happen across new movie reviews and realize that the Longhorns or the Ravens have only had three games since we left, and I realize that not that much time has passed really (and really, the less said about those Longhorn games the better—some things it’s easier to not miss than others).

The days all seem to go by quickly. I expected that paying attention during language lessons for four hours every day would be the most difficult thing in the world (I blame a certain sloth-like Bostonian Irish-descendant Spanish teacher for instilling in me this misconception about language classes). For whatever reason, though, whether it be the four people in the class, or the way we’re being taught, or some lingering newness of the material, the class goes by in a flash. YD sessions and more recently the practicum time, when we spend time working with an organization in Xirdalan (additional note: we have learned that Xirdalan means “changes”), goes just as fast. Before I know it, it’s 5pm and time to go home.

Already in language classes we can form sentences and conjugate verbs (first the past tense and then the present tense, for whatever reason). Our vocabulary also seems further along than I would have expected for having only been learning for the time we have had so far. I certainly can’t yet speak Azerbaijani in the way I could Spanish, and there are still Hindi and Spanish and even Indonesian words or phrases which come to me sooner than Azeri ones (It’s easy to fall into Hindi especially because there are a few words in common). But we really have done a lot in a little time.

A side effect of this time distortion field around us here in Azerbaijan is that while I have really been enjoying the food my family has made for me, including a dish called dushbera (I think) which was basically miniature dumplings in a broth, I have already begun to crave certain foods from home. My list of things so far includes: milk and Frosted Mini Wheats, cheese fries, Buffalo wings, mozzarella and tomatoes, and stir fry. So, if you love me, you should think of me when you eat these things. Or, better yet, find a way to mail them to me without them going bad. Just kidding. Sort of.