Sunday, August 31, 2008
Favorite thing
This is Joshua my favorite thing about Baku is...shoping in bazares they have Fruit,Vegis , Meat,Cheese Too but my Favorite part is the games and puzzles.We get to walk together almost every day too a market.
Me what I'm doing and all that good stuff! =D
Hello world!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It's Jonathon! What are you peoples doing, if you're up in the middle of the night on a monday I'm at school on a Tuesday! If your reading at noon DO NOT CALL ME (even though I have no phone) 'CAUSE I'M SORTA' KINDA' ASLEEP!!! Now that you are certain that we are on different ends of the world , I will tell you about Azerbaijan. It is a country that has almost no people and is poluted. Now to ACTUALLY tell you what I'm doing. I go to school! Funny isn't it? I usually go to school in two more weeks, but over here they don't care about long summers it's all go to school at an awesome school sort of thing. Yes, I like school. We have math in the morning and we just do every problem by ourselves no waiting for anybody and our textbook for the whole year , I think , is all stuff I have done! Language Arts and reading in my three person class with an awesome teacher who actually sits down and journals or observes with us! P.E. for 50 minutes yes our P.E. teacher does everything with us too. Then my cultural studies teachers... I feel like I know them well... oh wait I do!!! They're my parents!!! So yep that is pretty much what I'm doing now, but there is more coming another day! See ya!
U.S. History class
Thursday was the first day of school. Things went quite well in terms of teaching. I have 50 minutes with each of my classes. I told them that when I used to teach, I often wasn't even warmed up until I hit the one hour mark.
On Thursday, the middle and secondary school students had an assembly to discuss some of the new school rules. This took place during the 2nd period. That's when my U.S. History course meets. So, I didn't have U.S. History for the first time until Friday. I had a starter activity for them - a list of 20 events from U.S. History that they needed to put into chronological order. It was just an icebreaker activity, to get them talking to each other. There were three groups and they were competing to see who could get the closest.
I watched and listened while they worked and got to hear things like "What was the Mayflower?" "Who were Lewis and Clark?" "What was Pearl Harbor?" You see, I have 9 students in my class. None of them are U.S. citizens, nor have any ever lived in the United States. A couple of them visited the U.S. once, though! While a few of the students are Azeri, one is Polish (father works for the Polish embassy), two are Scottish, one is Japanese (father works for the Japanese embassy), one is Turkish, one is Russian. Not surprisingly, their history courses have not included long units on the Pilgrims and Thanksgiving Day, the Lewis and Clark expedition, etc.
I believe this will be the most interesting class I have ever taught.
On Thursday, the middle and secondary school students had an assembly to discuss some of the new school rules. This took place during the 2nd period. That's when my U.S. History course meets. So, I didn't have U.S. History for the first time until Friday. I had a starter activity for them - a list of 20 events from U.S. History that they needed to put into chronological order. It was just an icebreaker activity, to get them talking to each other. There were three groups and they were competing to see who could get the closest.
I watched and listened while they worked and got to hear things like "What was the Mayflower?" "Who were Lewis and Clark?" "What was Pearl Harbor?" You see, I have 9 students in my class. None of them are U.S. citizens, nor have any ever lived in the United States. A couple of them visited the U.S. once, though! While a few of the students are Azeri, one is Polish (father works for the Polish embassy), two are Scottish, one is Japanese (father works for the Japanese embassy), one is Turkish, one is Russian. Not surprisingly, their history courses have not included long units on the Pilgrims and Thanksgiving Day, the Lewis and Clark expedition, etc.
I believe this will be the most interesting class I have ever taught.
Finally catching up
As some of you have emailed or posted on the blog, we haven't been keeping up for the last week or so. We've been trying, but it's been very busy. School began on Thursday, 28 August. We had meetings at school Monday through Wednesday, tried to set up our classrooms and had to get our curriculums all figured out. It has been a whirlwind. We've been leaving the house by about 7 each morning and getting home a bit before 6 most nights, trying to get some dinner cooked, spending some time with the boys, then hitting bed around 9. The temperature outside has been hovering around 90-95 each day, with 70-80% humidity. Just walking around the school, I have sweat dripping off of me. The classrooms are airconditioned, but many of the hallways and other sections of the school are not. The high school and middle school students are in a section of the building that had previously been offices leased to an NGO doing anti-drug education. After 2 years of negotiations, the landlord finally gave in and leased the rooms to the school. Exactly 1 week before school began, the school officially took possession. During that week, they tore out tiling, scraped walls, did lots of repair work, repainted, laid carpet, etc., etc. The airconditioners were wired up about 12 hours before school began on Thursday. It's amazing how well they did. Doing our setup of the classrooms on Wednesday, though, was incredibly draining.
There are only four teachers for the middle school and high school (not counting language instructors). I teach all of the history and cultural studies courses (This year, that's 10/11 year old Cultural Studies, 12/13 year old CS 2 - from the Fall of Rome to the Age of Exploration, 14/15 year old Modern World History, 16/17 year old AP World History and 16/17 year old US History), as well as a drama elective twice a week, overseeing two senior research projects and serving as the upper-secondary homeroom teacher (class advisor). Brian teaches all of the middle school and secondary science courses. Emily teaches the Literature and Writing courses (she is not an English teacher, however... in a school like ours, that implies something completely different! There are many elementary students who receive intensive instruction in English. Not "English as a Second Language," however... because for many of these students it's their third, fourth or fifth language!) Hal teaches all of the math for 10/11 year olds and up, as well as science for the 10/11 year old class.
So, things have been very busy! We'll try to get more posted on a regular basis now.
There are only four teachers for the middle school and high school (not counting language instructors). I teach all of the history and cultural studies courses (This year, that's 10/11 year old Cultural Studies, 12/13 year old CS 2 - from the Fall of Rome to the Age of Exploration, 14/15 year old Modern World History, 16/17 year old AP World History and 16/17 year old US History), as well as a drama elective twice a week, overseeing two senior research projects and serving as the upper-secondary homeroom teacher (class advisor). Brian teaches all of the middle school and secondary science courses. Emily teaches the Literature and Writing courses (she is not an English teacher, however... in a school like ours, that implies something completely different! There are many elementary students who receive intensive instruction in English. Not "English as a Second Language," however... because for many of these students it's their third, fourth or fifth language!) Hal teaches all of the math for 10/11 year olds and up, as well as science for the 10/11 year old class.
So, things have been very busy! We'll try to get more posted on a regular basis now.
Field trip
Originally written 23 August
The Turkmenistan group and the new Baku teachers took a field trip out to see petroglyphs. An area about an hour outside of Baku has a collection of cave paintings and cave carvings, along with a small museum. There are thousand of these carvings and tens of thousands of stone age tools that were found in the area. Some of the carvings and tools have been dated to about 50,000 B.C. There is also a carving in Latin that was made by the army of one of the Caesars, sometime in the first few centuries A.D. We had some very good views of the Caspian Sea during the drive and from the mountain with the carvings. Our tour guide was quite funny. He spoke English fairly well. The memorized speech was clear, but when he was in conversation he seemed to struggle for words a bit. His standard line was "Do you know why...?" If anyone tried to actually answer the question he would say "No, you don't know. I know and I have not told you yet." After about the fifth time, we got the picture that we weren't supposed to answer.
Once we got back from the field trip, we headed off for downtown Baku. We met the school director, the director of instruction and their families at the Old City. This is a section of downtown Baku that has walls and other buildings that are nearly a thousand years old. We ate in one such building, an old Kavanassary, where the caravans on the Silk Road from China used to stop. We had an authentic traditional Azeri meal.
When we arrived, there were already the starters on the tables. A selection of various meats, a plate of spices, herbs and vegetables, a stewed eggplant dish, and bread. While I enjoyed the beef tongue quite a bit, there was one piece of meat on the dish that was probably the worst thing I've ever tasted. It was chewy like a piece of carmel, sticking to my teeth and it had a salty, bitter taste. None of the people I asked seemed to know what it actually was.
The main course was kebabs or sashlik. Azerbaijan is known for its grilled meats. The beef and chicken were both excellent. The chicken was similar to Indian tandori chicken. Later they brought out some grilled sturgeon, too, which was very good. The sturgeon came with a pomegranate sauce that was very thick and sweet, like syrup. All in all, quite tasty.
Throughout the meal, they had Azeri singers doing some ancient road songs. Lots of wailing and discordant sounds. Jonathon especially did not enjoy that. A bit later, the belly dancer came out. After she had danced for a while, the school director leaned over to me and said, "This is about the time that she picks out someone to embarass." Of course, without fail, about 30 seconds later she locked eyes on me, came over, draped a veil across my face and pulled me on stage with her. I wasn't quite able to match her moves, especially as she made parts of her anatomy shimmy. She'd point at her chest, move around a bit, then point at mine and want me to do the same. It wasn't happening. I was able to shimmy my stomach a bit like hers, though. I just took the sides of my gut in both hands and shook it all around. It worked quite well.
She finally let me sit down, then embarassed two of the male teachers from Turkmenistan and then, much to my joy and relief, picked Scott, the Baku school director. So, he joined her on stage and plenty of pictures were taken by my colleagues. In Baku for one week and we already saw our boss belly dancing!
The Turkmenistan group and the new Baku teachers took a field trip out to see petroglyphs. An area about an hour outside of Baku has a collection of cave paintings and cave carvings, along with a small museum. There are thousand of these carvings and tens of thousands of stone age tools that were found in the area. Some of the carvings and tools have been dated to about 50,000 B.C. There is also a carving in Latin that was made by the army of one of the Caesars, sometime in the first few centuries A.D. We had some very good views of the Caspian Sea during the drive and from the mountain with the carvings. Our tour guide was quite funny. He spoke English fairly well. The memorized speech was clear, but when he was in conversation he seemed to struggle for words a bit. His standard line was "Do you know why...?" If anyone tried to actually answer the question he would say "No, you don't know. I know and I have not told you yet." After about the fifth time, we got the picture that we weren't supposed to answer.
Once we got back from the field trip, we headed off for downtown Baku. We met the school director, the director of instruction and their families at the Old City. This is a section of downtown Baku that has walls and other buildings that are nearly a thousand years old. We ate in one such building, an old Kavanassary, where the caravans on the Silk Road from China used to stop. We had an authentic traditional Azeri meal.
When we arrived, there were already the starters on the tables. A selection of various meats, a plate of spices, herbs and vegetables, a stewed eggplant dish, and bread. While I enjoyed the beef tongue quite a bit, there was one piece of meat on the dish that was probably the worst thing I've ever tasted. It was chewy like a piece of carmel, sticking to my teeth and it had a salty, bitter taste. None of the people I asked seemed to know what it actually was.
The main course was kebabs or sashlik. Azerbaijan is known for its grilled meats. The beef and chicken were both excellent. The chicken was similar to Indian tandori chicken. Later they brought out some grilled sturgeon, too, which was very good. The sturgeon came with a pomegranate sauce that was very thick and sweet, like syrup. All in all, quite tasty.
Throughout the meal, they had Azeri singers doing some ancient road songs. Lots of wailing and discordant sounds. Jonathon especially did not enjoy that. A bit later, the belly dancer came out. After she had danced for a while, the school director leaned over to me and said, "This is about the time that she picks out someone to embarass." Of course, without fail, about 30 seconds later she locked eyes on me, came over, draped a veil across my face and pulled me on stage with her. I wasn't quite able to match her moves, especially as she made parts of her anatomy shimmy. She'd point at her chest, move around a bit, then point at mine and want me to do the same. It wasn't happening. I was able to shimmy my stomach a bit like hers, though. I just took the sides of my gut in both hands and shook it all around. It worked quite well.
She finally let me sit down, then embarassed two of the male teachers from Turkmenistan and then, much to my joy and relief, picked Scott, the Baku school director. So, he joined her on stage and plenty of pictures were taken by my colleagues. In Baku for one week and we already saw our boss belly dancing!
It's a Small World
Originally written 23 August
This week we've had orientation meetings at the school with the other new teachers in Baku and with a group of new teachers from the school in Ashkabet, Turkmenistan. These meetings were supposed to include the teachers from Tbilisi, Georgia and from Yerevan, Armenia. When the invasion of Georgia began, all the teachers from the Tbilisi school were evacuated to Armenia. After the shooting stopped, they were brought back to their school and, at this point, still intend to start school as scheduled. Many of the students, however, are still in Yerevan, and may start school there, then move back to Georgia in a few weeks. Needless to say, both schools are scrambling at this point. So, the Tbilisi teachers couldn't come to Baku. The Yerevan teachers are trying to accomodate a number of unexpected students. Additionally, there is no border crossing between Armenia and Azerbaijan since they are technically at war with one another (even with a 10-year ceasefire), so travel is through Georgia... which wasn't the best idea.
There were five teachers and the director from the Turkmenistan school who came for the meeting. So, here's my prize winning small world moment. One of the teachers from Turkmenistan is from El Cajon, California (part of San Diego County). Not only that, she graduated from Grossmont High School - the same school my mom graduated from. Not only that, she had Don Henderson, one of my best friends from high school, as one of her teachers at Grossmont high. Not only that... I heard from Don Henderson for the first time in about 20 years on the day before I met Bethany, the teacher from Turkmenistan. He found my email contact via facebook. I am literally on the other side of the planet from San Diego (really... it's a 12 hour time zone difference between Baku and San Diego) and I meet someone who knows someone I know. Add in the odds that I just happened to get email from Don within 24 hours of meeting that person. Wow.
This week we've had orientation meetings at the school with the other new teachers in Baku and with a group of new teachers from the school in Ashkabet, Turkmenistan. These meetings were supposed to include the teachers from Tbilisi, Georgia and from Yerevan, Armenia. When the invasion of Georgia began, all the teachers from the Tbilisi school were evacuated to Armenia. After the shooting stopped, they were brought back to their school and, at this point, still intend to start school as scheduled. Many of the students, however, are still in Yerevan, and may start school there, then move back to Georgia in a few weeks. Needless to say, both schools are scrambling at this point. So, the Tbilisi teachers couldn't come to Baku. The Yerevan teachers are trying to accomodate a number of unexpected students. Additionally, there is no border crossing between Armenia and Azerbaijan since they are technically at war with one another (even with a 10-year ceasefire), so travel is through Georgia... which wasn't the best idea.
There were five teachers and the director from the Turkmenistan school who came for the meeting. So, here's my prize winning small world moment. One of the teachers from Turkmenistan is from El Cajon, California (part of San Diego County). Not only that, she graduated from Grossmont High School - the same school my mom graduated from. Not only that, she had Don Henderson, one of my best friends from high school, as one of her teachers at Grossmont high. Not only that... I heard from Don Henderson for the first time in about 20 years on the day before I met Bethany, the teacher from Turkmenistan. He found my email contact via facebook. I am literally on the other side of the planet from San Diego (really... it's a 12 hour time zone difference between Baku and San Diego) and I meet someone who knows someone I know. Add in the odds that I just happened to get email from Don within 24 hours of meeting that person. Wow.
Hiring help
(Originally written Sunday, August 24th)
Heather and I were talking yesterday or the day before. It feels as though we've been in Baku for a month or more - not because time is dragging by, but just because we feel so at home here. We've learned some basic Azeri and we're picking up more each day. Shopping in the markets and bazaars feels almost natural. Walking through our neighborhood, I think I say hi to more people than I did when I walked through the neighborhood we lived in in Lynnwood.
Some things that have happened since the last update. We had a meeting at school that included a chance to interview some potential drivers, nannies and housecleaners. We wanted a driver, simply because it will take us a while to get a car if we decide to go that route. I'm leaning towards not getting a car at all, though. There were only a few drivers to talk to. One was looking for something very close to school and decided to work with a group of single female teachers. The other had just bought a brand new Audi and was concerned about driving into our neighborhood (dirt roads with very big potholes). He was hoping for around 800 Manats (written 800 AZN) which is around $1000 per month. However, he knows a guy (there's lots of that here in Baku. Juan Tovar would fit in great!) He brought his nephew to our house. His nephew has a 3 year old Lada (a Russian car, very boxy like a Volvo, but pretty small. We'll get a picture). We negotiated with the nephew and our deal is this: Monday-Friday, he picks us up at our home at 7:30. He drops us off at school at about 7:45. Then, every day, we tell him what time to pick us up - it can change every day. Some days, we're done around 3:30, others not until after 5:00. We can even call during the day if we need to change the time. A couple of times per week, after he picks us up, he'll drive us to a market or bazaar. Then he waits while we do our shopping, then drives us home. One or two weekend days during the month, we will arrange to have him drive us if we want to go downtown, to the sea, etc. Then he'll drive us home when we want. If we need extra weekend days, we can set that up, but we'll pay him overtime. For all that, we're paying 300 AZN per month (about $360). Gas here is about $1.40 per gallon (.60 AZN/liter) - diesel is about $1.10 per gallon and most stuff runs on diesel. The only "drawback" with our driver is that he speaks about 30 words of English, while his uncle spoke fairly decent English. However, the uncle told us that about 4 years ago, he didn't speak English at all. He started driving for Americans, though, and studying on his own, and that's how he learned his English. So, that's his hope for his nephew. As we're driving, we point at things and say the English word, then he tells us in Azeri. He'll also ask how to say things. He's also practicing at home. He picked us up yesterday morning. When we walked out he had a huge grin and said very clearly "good morning." We have his uncle's phone number, and the plan is that anytime we try to explain something but can't get understood, we call the uncle and he translates for us. We've only done that once so far, though, and that was just the first day to confirm that we were going to contract with him (we took a test run to the market the day we met him, just to make sure he could drive and that the car would be comfortable enough.) Otherwise, we know our Azeri numbers through twenty and we know the words for home, school, market, etc. which gets us pretty far.
So, we got our driver and we're happy with him. The boys think he's really nice. He's actually a lot less aggressive than a lot of the other drivers we've ridden with or seen on the roads, which is very nice. I'd rather get there 3 minutes later than sit there with white knuckles the whole ride.
We had no intention of getting a nanny or housecleaner. However, our director and the director of instruction were talking about cleaning to give us a sense of what prices we might be looking for in negotiating with people. To have a cleaner come three days a week for 5-6 hours each time, they thought that between 250 and 350 AZN per month was reasonable. If there would be some nanny duties as well, then perhaps another 50 - 100. They both have women who come five days per week, who clean and do nannying, and they pay about 500 AZN per month. Heather and I looked at each other and thought "Hmmm..." So, we talked with a few women, found one who speaks excellent English (as well as perfect Azeri and Russian), and hired her. She'll come Monday, Wednesday and Friday at about 9:00 a.m. and stay until around 2:00 p.m. She'll clean, do laundry, iron our clothes (we line dry everything - there is no clothes dryer - they're pretty uncommon here). Additionally, we've arranged to have her cook a normal/common Azeri or Russian meal for us each Friday. She'll leave it in the fridge with heating instructions and the recipe. Then we can have it Friday or Saturday. For all that, we will pay her 300 AZN per month ($360 US) - that's about what we paid to have someone clean for us in Lynnwood twice each month for 4 hours at a time. If we need to, we can have her babysit the kids in the evenings for just a few manat each time.
That's our story of getting a driver and housekeeper.
Heather and I were talking yesterday or the day before. It feels as though we've been in Baku for a month or more - not because time is dragging by, but just because we feel so at home here. We've learned some basic Azeri and we're picking up more each day. Shopping in the markets and bazaars feels almost natural. Walking through our neighborhood, I think I say hi to more people than I did when I walked through the neighborhood we lived in in Lynnwood.
Some things that have happened since the last update. We had a meeting at school that included a chance to interview some potential drivers, nannies and housecleaners. We wanted a driver, simply because it will take us a while to get a car if we decide to go that route. I'm leaning towards not getting a car at all, though. There were only a few drivers to talk to. One was looking for something very close to school and decided to work with a group of single female teachers. The other had just bought a brand new Audi and was concerned about driving into our neighborhood (dirt roads with very big potholes). He was hoping for around 800 Manats (written 800 AZN) which is around $1000 per month. However, he knows a guy (there's lots of that here in Baku. Juan Tovar would fit in great!) He brought his nephew to our house. His nephew has a 3 year old Lada (a Russian car, very boxy like a Volvo, but pretty small. We'll get a picture). We negotiated with the nephew and our deal is this: Monday-Friday, he picks us up at our home at 7:30. He drops us off at school at about 7:45. Then, every day, we tell him what time to pick us up - it can change every day. Some days, we're done around 3:30, others not until after 5:00. We can even call during the day if we need to change the time. A couple of times per week, after he picks us up, he'll drive us to a market or bazaar. Then he waits while we do our shopping, then drives us home. One or two weekend days during the month, we will arrange to have him drive us if we want to go downtown, to the sea, etc. Then he'll drive us home when we want. If we need extra weekend days, we can set that up, but we'll pay him overtime. For all that, we're paying 300 AZN per month (about $360). Gas here is about $1.40 per gallon (.60 AZN/liter) - diesel is about $1.10 per gallon and most stuff runs on diesel. The only "drawback" with our driver is that he speaks about 30 words of English, while his uncle spoke fairly decent English. However, the uncle told us that about 4 years ago, he didn't speak English at all. He started driving for Americans, though, and studying on his own, and that's how he learned his English. So, that's his hope for his nephew. As we're driving, we point at things and say the English word, then he tells us in Azeri. He'll also ask how to say things. He's also practicing at home. He picked us up yesterday morning. When we walked out he had a huge grin and said very clearly "good morning." We have his uncle's phone number, and the plan is that anytime we try to explain something but can't get understood, we call the uncle and he translates for us. We've only done that once so far, though, and that was just the first day to confirm that we were going to contract with him (we took a test run to the market the day we met him, just to make sure he could drive and that the car would be comfortable enough.) Otherwise, we know our Azeri numbers through twenty and we know the words for home, school, market, etc. which gets us pretty far.
So, we got our driver and we're happy with him. The boys think he's really nice. He's actually a lot less aggressive than a lot of the other drivers we've ridden with or seen on the roads, which is very nice. I'd rather get there 3 minutes later than sit there with white knuckles the whole ride.
We had no intention of getting a nanny or housecleaner. However, our director and the director of instruction were talking about cleaning to give us a sense of what prices we might be looking for in negotiating with people. To have a cleaner come three days a week for 5-6 hours each time, they thought that between 250 and 350 AZN per month was reasonable. If there would be some nanny duties as well, then perhaps another 50 - 100. They both have women who come five days per week, who clean and do nannying, and they pay about 500 AZN per month. Heather and I looked at each other and thought "Hmmm..." So, we talked with a few women, found one who speaks excellent English (as well as perfect Azeri and Russian), and hired her. She'll come Monday, Wednesday and Friday at about 9:00 a.m. and stay until around 2:00 p.m. She'll clean, do laundry, iron our clothes (we line dry everything - there is no clothes dryer - they're pretty uncommon here). Additionally, we've arranged to have her cook a normal/common Azeri or Russian meal for us each Friday. She'll leave it in the fridge with heating instructions and the recipe. Then we can have it Friday or Saturday. For all that, we will pay her 300 AZN per month ($360 US) - that's about what we paid to have someone clean for us in Lynnwood twice each month for 4 hours at a time. If we need to, we can have her babysit the kids in the evenings for just a few manat each time.
That's our story of getting a driver and housekeeper.
Meetings from 22-8 - 23-8
We've been writing a bit offline for the last week and just haven't had the time and energy to get it posted online. We have Internet working well in our home now and a wireless network for all of the computers, so we should be able to stay on top of this a bit more.
Our meetings covered a lot of the basics of QSI including the philosophy, curriculum, etc. The more that Heather and I heard, the more excited we got. The methods they use and their overall mindset is so different from traditional education. It's going to be a bit more of a challenge for us as teachers, but it will be a lot more rewarding I think. In fact, the first night we came home and we called the boys in. We told them that after what we heard, we'll be rather hard pressed to ever put them back in a traditional classroom setting... so they're stuck here until Joshua finishes high school. Since they're both adjusting so well, that actually didn't phaze them. The only real question they had was if we'd stay in Baku or move to another QSI school.
Our meetings covered a lot of the basics of QSI including the philosophy, curriculum, etc. The more that Heather and I heard, the more excited we got. The methods they use and their overall mindset is so different from traditional education. It's going to be a bit more of a challenge for us as teachers, but it will be a lot more rewarding I think. In fact, the first night we came home and we called the boys in. We told them that after what we heard, we'll be rather hard pressed to ever put them back in a traditional classroom setting... so they're stuck here until Joshua finishes high school. Since they're both adjusting so well, that actually didn't phaze them. The only real question they had was if we'd stay in Baku or move to another QSI school.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
A few comments
We're back at school today for a while to talk with the school's IT guy about getting Internet at home and to meet with possible drivers (it will take at least a few weeks before we get a car, but I don't want to get one for a lot longer than that. It is incredible how dangerously people drive here!)
We have a few minutes before our meetings start, so we can get a few things down. We have an adapter for our computer so we can plug in at home now, so we can try to actually write these at home, then post them when we have a connection.
A few high points. Jonathon and Joshua have made a couple of friends in the neighborhood - Najaf and Murat. They are both Russian (I think), but they speak Azeri, too. Najaf speaks some English, so he and Jonathon have talked a lot. Jonathon is already my translator at stores! (He knows his numbers and a few other words in Azeri already). The two boys wait outside our house until they see one of us then they say "Jonathon - game?" to ask if the boys can come outside to play. We send the boys out to play in the street for an hour or two at a time. (It will make more sense once we get the pictures up.)
We've been to a few different markets. There are some that are the equivalent of an American supermarket, including some Turkish and Indian chains (Ramstore, New World Market, Neptun Market) then a bunch of stores that are smaller than an AM/PM or 7/11 store. There are also fruit markets that are set up all over that are like farmer's markets with dozens of different stalls. We also went to a bazaar on Sunday - it was a huge sprawling area built on a hill - probably six levels or more with at least a hundred and fifty or more stalls. I bought two kilograms of tomatoes (4.4 pounds) for 1 manat (about $1.25). Today I got a pound of red peppers at a store for about $1.50. Meat is expensive, and meat means chicken, sausage or salami - I haven't seen much other meat.
And... now our meeting. We'll write more later.
We have a few minutes before our meetings start, so we can get a few things down. We have an adapter for our computer so we can plug in at home now, so we can try to actually write these at home, then post them when we have a connection.
A few high points. Jonathon and Joshua have made a couple of friends in the neighborhood - Najaf and Murat. They are both Russian (I think), but they speak Azeri, too. Najaf speaks some English, so he and Jonathon have talked a lot. Jonathon is already my translator at stores! (He knows his numbers and a few other words in Azeri already). The two boys wait outside our house until they see one of us then they say "Jonathon - game?" to ask if the boys can come outside to play. We send the boys out to play in the street for an hour or two at a time. (It will make more sense once we get the pictures up.)
We've been to a few different markets. There are some that are the equivalent of an American supermarket, including some Turkish and Indian chains (Ramstore, New World Market, Neptun Market) then a bunch of stores that are smaller than an AM/PM or 7/11 store. There are also fruit markets that are set up all over that are like farmer's markets with dozens of different stalls. We also went to a bazaar on Sunday - it was a huge sprawling area built on a hill - probably six levels or more with at least a hundred and fifty or more stalls. I bought two kilograms of tomatoes (4.4 pounds) for 1 manat (about $1.25). Today I got a pound of red peppers at a store for about $1.50. Meat is expensive, and meat means chicken, sausage or salami - I haven't seen much other meat.
And... now our meeting. We'll write more later.
Saturday, August 16, 2008
We made it!
We made it. We arrived right on time into Baku on Thursday night (local time) - Thursday morning back in Seattle. Getting all of our bags and boxes together was a bit of an effort, but eventually we got them all loaded into the school's vans and were taken to our new home.
It looked a little dubious pulling into our neighborhood - dirt streets, garbage all around, but once we opened the door to the house, we were amazed. It is beautiful - we'll get pictures put up when we're able to. Two stories, beautiful wood floors in the entire house (no carpet at all). A huge kitchen, a living room, a bath room (and a separate toilet room) all downstairs, with a door out onto a nice size cement patio. Upstairs there are three bedrooms (actually, one is supposed to be a living room, but Heather and I have taken that one. It's huge!) Then there's a large hallway area that will actually be where the boys' desk and computer will be. It is truly amazing.
We met our fellow new teachers on Friday, were given a tour of the school, then went to a few stores to get some ideas of prices. Food is definitely not cheaper here than in the US. Some things are pretty similar, but some prices here are a lot higher.
We went to dinner with everyone at an Indian buffet near the Old City of Baku on Friday night.
Today (Saturday), we met up with our new teacher friends and went to get cell phones. Cell phones here are much more reliable than the wired lines. Email us if you want the phone numbers (but it'll cost you a lot to call us!) Then we came back to the school and got to plug in to the school's wireless internet.
So, just a quick word here to let everyone know we're alive, that we're settling in, and that everything is good.
We love you all -
Tim, Heather, Jonathon and Joshua
It looked a little dubious pulling into our neighborhood - dirt streets, garbage all around, but once we opened the door to the house, we were amazed. It is beautiful - we'll get pictures put up when we're able to. Two stories, beautiful wood floors in the entire house (no carpet at all). A huge kitchen, a living room, a bath room (and a separate toilet room) all downstairs, with a door out onto a nice size cement patio. Upstairs there are three bedrooms (actually, one is supposed to be a living room, but Heather and I have taken that one. It's huge!) Then there's a large hallway area that will actually be where the boys' desk and computer will be. It is truly amazing.
We met our fellow new teachers on Friday, were given a tour of the school, then went to a few stores to get some ideas of prices. Food is definitely not cheaper here than in the US. Some things are pretty similar, but some prices here are a lot higher.
We went to dinner with everyone at an Indian buffet near the Old City of Baku on Friday night.
Today (Saturday), we met up with our new teacher friends and went to get cell phones. Cell phones here are much more reliable than the wired lines. Email us if you want the phone numbers (but it'll cost you a lot to call us!) Then we came back to the school and got to plug in to the school's wireless internet.
So, just a quick word here to let everyone know we're alive, that we're settling in, and that everything is good.
We love you all -
Tim, Heather, Jonathon and Joshua
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