Two Stops Past Siberia

Just as the French word for seal led to the expression, “pardon my French,” so too might the Kyrgyz one day say, “Pardon my English,” thanks to our word, sick, which carries a similarly unmentionable meaning. That being said, just in case any Kyrgyz people out there are reading, I’ll put it softly: I feel ill.

I woke up Sunday morning with a headache, a powerfully sore throat, and oscilations between feeling hot with cold chills that made my skin tender to the touch, and feeling cold with incredible sweating. In this state of illness, I have been allowed to make new observations about living abroad.

While I find myself generally quite enamored with life here, while ill, those feelings change dramatically. I find myself wishing only for a hot bath and warm soup. I want a toasty bed room and family or close friends to watch over me. I don’t want language barriers. I don’t want dried bread, black tea or dried meat. I want to be home.

This, I think, is a laugh. These are not feelings I get very often. I generally like the bread, I like  the tea, and I just love the meat. The language barrier usually makes my little brain tingle. But it underscores an important point about life out here: when things get hard, the safety net we’re used to largely just can’t be there.

I spent most of the day at my girlfriend’s apartment. Her little, well kept bastion of Americana made things easier. When I didn’t want to eat, she understoof exactly what I was saying, and why I was saying it, so she didn’t pressure me. Instead, she got me American soul food that is usually too expensive to indulge in: bananas, oranges, fruit juice. Later, another friend came over and we had grilled cheese sandwiches with tomato soup. At that point, though, I still wasn’t even in my own bed.

When I got home, my host parents weren’t around, and my host sisters, at 13 and 14, did their best. They gave me tea, and insisted I keep my bedroom door open, so that the heat flowed in. It was warm and loving and caring. But all in all, it still wasn’t my America.

And that to me, a stalwart lover of simply being abroad, spoke more to me than anything else. While everything was good, and everyone around me helped in such wonderful ways, it was still foreign. And when feeling so so bad, foreign just can’t cut the mustard.

That all being said, I’m largely better now. The Peace Corps doctors helped me out in the most American way possible: lots of drugs. Thanks to a well timed holiday and a veritable cocktail of pills, I’m back on my feet. In the words of Roger Rabbit, “Thank goodness for modern medicine.”