Joined the Peace Corps. BRB.

It Snowed Again

Two weeks ago, I had to roll up my dress shirt sleeves because it was so warm. Today, I had to toss on my ICE AGE gear just to walk to the store. The weather fluctuations in Kyrgyzstan are the most ridiculous I’ve ever seen – and I used to live in Kansas.

My students think it’s because of global warming, but they also think that Moscow is the biggest city in the world.

Animals Again

My kids like animals. I mean, they’re eighth graders, so of course they like animals. Now, they want to argue with me about which is faster: pigs or cows. Obviously it’s pigs. Obviously they chose cows.

After the whole elephant fiasco, I think they just like to screw around with my knowledge of the natural world. Come on. I used to be a Biology major, son!

We’ll ignore the fact that I bombed so many science courses I had to switch to History.

Boys

The boys in my classes complain that I like the girls better than them. I don’t argue with them about that. It’s easier to make the choice when you imagine having all boys or all girls in one class. One class of boys throwing everything in reach at each other, wrestling, and asking me if I like 50 Cent versus one class of girls paying attention and telling me that I’m awesome?

Easy. Hey, I like to be complimented too.

Man Camp

But I’m making it up to the boys. We just submitted our Peace Corps Partnership grant proposal for a Boys’ Leadership Camp in June, so hopefully we’ll have the grant online pretty soon here.

It’s going to be great. Trust me. We’re going to have some great guest speakers come in to talk to the boys about leadership, career planning, healthy lifestyles, and how a young man should act towards women.

In our early notes, we titled that last one, “Hit other boys, not girls.”

55 Boys Running Around

There are 5 of us heading up the Man Camp project. We’ll each bring 10 students from our schools to the camp. In addition, we’re bringing 5 orphans from the capital to the camp. We’re classy like that.

I’m not exactly sure which 10 boys I’m going to bring. I’ll probably have them arm-wrestle.

Everyone Knows

It’s funny, nobody wants to help work with pounding out the grant, budget, or materials for the camp, but all these volunteers want to come to Man Camp.

I’m not a mean guy, but I keep it short with my answer: “No.” I like to play, but I’m taking this project pretty seriously. It’s game face all day when Man Camp prep is on tap. Man Camp will be fun, but it will not be a party for volunteers.

One volunteer talked excitedly about how she was going to come to the camp and bring her mom as well. Her mom.

I won’t even begin.

Those K14s

K14s want to come to Man Camp too. This is great actually because I want two of them to come, observe, and then carrying on the project again next year. But, like I said, I will not allow volunteers who see this as a party to come.

After rejecting a few K14s who wanted to come to Man Camp, they pouted and told me they were starting their own “Man Camp” on the lake next year.

That’s fine. Just stop hijacking our name.

But They Won’t Stop Crying

I offered to give all our materials to these K14s seeking to start their own Boys’ Leadership Camp next year, but I was turned down. Instead, they criticized our camp behind our backs as if this were some sort of competition.

What more can I say? Peace Corps, baby. Peace Corps.

This Blog

It’s been about a month since I wrote anything here. I ran out of interesting stuff to say.

I actually read a lot of Peace Corps volunteers’ blogs. Honestly, they’re boring. Maybe it’s because I’ve been here for a year and a half, but reading about cows, chickens, sheep, and culture clashes between host families and volunteers stopped being funny about a year ago.

I reread my blog too. Lots of whining.

By Sean Thompson

I think I tried to be too much like a writer early on. Eloquence and overly verbose passages are great for fine literature, but not for a Peace Corps blog.

Blogs are fun for practicing writing techniques, but too many people want to be Faulkner, when they’d be better off imitating Hemingway.

Or just not writing blogs.

It’s Sunny Outside Now

It wouldn’t be right to end on a sour note. I used my salary from school to buy new basketballs for the school recently. In honor of March Madness, I’m planning to throw challenges to all secondary schools in Osh for a basketball tournament to be held later next month. We’ll have two boys’ and two girls’ teams so that all ages and skill levels can participate.

It’s the homestretch in my Peace Corps service now. Strange how quickly time has passed.