Summer's Gone in Ismayilli

Yes, summer’s officially over, both physically and metaphorically, here in Ismayilli.  The last few days have been rainy and cold.  It’s officially September.  Summer’s over.

But the larger summer, the one that meant that worries about the future were still far away, is over, too.  The AZ8s (and two extended AZ7s) just returned from our Close of Service (COS) conference.  The conference was held at a water park/hotel on the northern coast of the Absheron peninsula, north of Baku, and on the Caspian Sea shore.  We spent just about all our possible free time going down water slides in definitely unsafe numbers (we got a 23 person centipede once, but even we acknowledged there were some health risks there), and dancing and swimming in the sea.  I can now check off swimming in the Caspian off my pre-COS bucket list.  There were also some sessions about post-COS medical issues and how to readjust to life back in the US, and probably some other stuff, too, but we were too excited to get back out on the slides.

The conference was also the last time we would all be together.  After this, we’ll see the PCVs nearby, or the ones we’re closest with, but there are a large number of PCVs we won’t see again.  Even the PCVs who are nearby here, the realization becomes more and more concrete, will be a bit further away in the US.  We’re going from a country the size of Maine to the entire USA. 

Back from COS and now that it’s September, November doesn’t seem that far away any more.  As long as it was August, November was still ages away.  August is summer, and November is almost December.  Ages and ages.  But now it’s September, and COS is right around the corner.  It’s time to actually plan and think about and act on plans for what happens next, whether it be graduate school or work, or something else entirely.  Applications need to be filled out, letters of recommendation need to be requested, and statements of purpose need to be written. 

There are plenty of PC paperwork and administrative work to be done.  It is a government organization, after all.  Doctor and dentist appointments have to be made.  A final language assessment, and interviews with our program managers and country director.  We have to write final reports on our projects, sites and organizations.  And find time to get in to Baku to return the PC-owned sleeping bags, water filters, and dictionaries.

On top of all those plans, we all have to decide how to wrap up and end our services in a meaningful and satisfactory way, both for ourselves and our communities.  Two months of school isn’t enough for another big project or a club to have full progression.  But there’s still plenty to do.  At the end of the school year, I ran a week long Earth Week celebration, with each day’s activities based on a different theme (I helped different teachers lead each day).  The week was planned by the PCV Environmental Committee, and culminated in an art contest.  Our students won, by creating a robot statue out of recycled bottles and cartons, a 30 manat grant for another environmental project.  So that will be one of my goals during the next few months. 

I have slowly been organizing my classroom into a resource room for the school, and finishing that will be another goal.  The walls are now covered with posters and maps from National Geographic (thanks to a wonderful grandparental contribution), and the room is slowly becoming stocked with books, magazines and arts and crafts supplies.

Finally, baseball continues!  Ismayilli had a very strong spring/summer season.  After renaming ourselves the Dragons and making team shirts from a homemade cardboard stencil, the boys have won all of their in-conference games and only lost two games total.  The boys are getting pretty big for their britches, but are extremely excited at the prospect of an overnight championship tournament in Baku in early November.

One of the things I’m most looking forward to is not work-related.  One of the last nights I’ll be in Ismayilli will be for my birthday, which I’ll get to share with my host family one last time.  Seems like a pretty good way to cap off two years.