First Impressions on Tajikistan (A Week In)

So hopefully, by now the situation regarding this blog’s surprise termination has been fixed, and I’m going to be sharing my thoughts on Tajikistan after a week of being here. I’ll break these down into:

• The country
• The host family
• The language (Tajik vs. Farsi)
• The classes

So first off, how does the country compare to where I thought it was? It’s been a bit of a hit-or-miss. On one hand, my description of this place’s infrastructure as a “colder Africa” have so far held mostly true. I’m in the capital, so there is both water and electricity, and apparently I have the ability to take a shower every day (although I’d feel a bit guilty if I did so, I think I’d be the only person in the compound who did), but there are only a handful of paved roads, and much of the country still bears the scars of either the civil war or, more likely, general neglect as a result of Soviet rule. The food so far has been relatively good, and while I’ve been sticking to a strategy of not eating particularly fast or a lot of food, I haven’t gotten sick yet, so there is that.

Now on to the host family: Without a doubt, this has been my favorite part thus far. The house I’m staying in I’d earlier described as a compound, and for good reason. It’s essentially a ring of houses, all connected, surrounding a central courtyard. While my official hosts are the now-retired couple of Bozor and Gulchehra, I feel safe enough saying that it’s fallen on their daughter-in-law, Safarbi, to be my main caretaker while I’m here. And that’s just dandy in my book, because so far she’s proven to be a marvelous cook, and while I’m sure this will change as I settle in, her meals have been far superior to anything I’ve had anywhere else in Dushanbe. The family also has 4 children, ages 4 to 16, which are not only a talkative bunch, but have reintroduced me to the game Uno (and preceded to proof that “Central Asian” rules are simply “We will always win”). No sign of the hedgehog from the initial family letter (he may have eaten, if I understood the situation correctly), but there’s also a dog, named “Booch”, which is making me both homesick, and preventing the homesickness at the same time. As I get to know the family better, I’ll be sure to mention them in more detail.

In addition to the core family itself, there are also several people here whose connection to the family I haven’t been able to place, including the young married couple (with the adorable little baby that can only be a few months old at the most), the British gent who’s working with a local NGO, and the young woman who lives in the opposite corner of the house. Hopefully, as my Tajiki improves, I can find out what exactly is going on around here. (NOTE: By now, I’ve found out the young married couple was the cousins of the children here, and have since moved out. The dog is also theirs.)

Speaking of Tajiki, the language situation around here is a little insane. First and foremost, for the last two years, I’ve been learning Farsi, or the Iranian version of the greater Persian language. While there seems to be a consensus that Tajiki and Farsi are dialects of the same language, the two are dialects in the sense that the various forms of Arabic are dialects. Basically meaning that understanding one hardly guarantees you’ll understand the other. And as my first day of testing proved, my understanding of Farsi in general needs a good deal of work, so this is going to be an interesting year. Making this even more confusing is the fact that, when in doubt, most Tajiks will switch into Russian. This is alright if it’s only one word, I can accept that, after about a century of Russian domination, Tajiki will have a fair number of Russian loanwords. Where this gets to be a bit much is when Tajiks, in the middle of a sentence, decide that they should switch from Tajiki, which is barely intelligible, to Russian, which is not. And then, to make matters more confusing is that fact that a surprising number of people here speak English. Granted, it’s not great English, but my hope that I would be forced to speak Persian because of the lack of English spoken here is rapidly proving untrue. Hopefully this is an issue I will find a solution to soon…

Finally, classes. After a week, and having taken each class that I’ll have here at least once, these are the most mentally draining, yet perhaps the most entertaining parts of my week. The professors are all an interesting and good-spirited lot, who are more than willing to crack a joke when my mind is at its end. And while it’s interesting seeing how I’ve managed to come through two years of Persian classes without knowing words for kitchen appliances, it’s a rewarding feeling knowing that, even when I leave the classroom, I can still apply what I’m learning on a daily basis.

That’s about it for now. Next time a recap of our group’s first excursion outside of Dushanbe and the celebrations for Tajikistan’s Independence Day.