When one guest asked me who was the most fascinating author attending that night’s dinner I didn’t need to think for a second. I had idolized him since high school referencing him like other tee ...

Subject: God = mosquito? Hi gang! Well you are in luck: since I have reading ennui I've taking to writing a lot more.  I'm not especially happy about the lack of interest I have with books now b ...

Day 3 – 4/7/10: I first encounter the silkworm. We are expecting the arrival of several Peace Corps staff members and my host brother says “Kelsey! You have to come and see the gurçuk!”. Th ...

Aylanmak: to take a walk stroll or travel around.The carpet man aka Serdar lives just outside of Ashgabat and makes good money selling Turkmen and Afghan carpets to foreigners both in Turkmenistan ...

Friends! I'm back from vacation and ready for action!!!  Which consists of me lying in my room and reading all day.  I do lead a stimulating life.  So here we go for today: Zohre and I went ...

Hello all! So if you remember all the way back to February I told you all about how my host brother was going through the process of getting married. At that time my family had just received the dowry list to begin purchasing items for the new bride. So I’ll pick up where we left [...]

Way back when one of my Russian tutors was from Kazakhstan and the other was from Turkmenistan. My tutor from K-stan explained what the suffix -stan means. Her explanation included a story told by ...

My training village was a tiny dot off a bumpy road leading into the desert. It was so small that there was no need for street names let alone paved roads. Everything was dusted in a thick layer or f ...

Ignorance is BlissJune 5thA common topic of conversation between volunteers is the good and bad sides about being able to understand the local language. As 2 years closes in on us most of us have go ...

The Village at DawnIf I get out before 6 am I don’t usually see anyone until I turn around and make my way back home. After 6 there are occasionally a few people outside working – openingup the ...