Tuesday, January 28, 2014

HICCUPS

Have you ever watched a baby with the hiccups?  She just lies there.  She doesn’t even know that something unusual is happening.  Her body might twitch – I’ve seen some hiccupping babies who qualify for the word “convulse”, as their diaphragm muscles move nearly the entire contents of their torsos during a bout of hiccups.  But she’s not bothered, she just lies there, and the hiccups eventually subside.

A typical NIS elementary classroom.
And if you watch a schoolchild hiccup, you know that they take great enjoyment in the process.  I worked in a second grade class a few days ago, and the entire group giggled and smiled as one classmate continued to hiccup for about 20 minutes.  Even the “victim” enjoyed it.  He just grinned when his speech was interrupted, and chuckled when a hiccup actually turned his word into another word.  Hiccupping did not slow his participation at all – he volunteered questions and answers, and he read aloud when asked.  No one, including his teacher, considered his hiccups a disruption to the education of the class.

Why is it, then, that I (a supposedly mature adult) am so annoyed when I get the hiccups?  In those cases where I am close to a source of sugar, I can take a small spoonful and let it melt on my tongue for a sure cure.  But my point is that I am aggravated enough in the first place to seek out the sugar.  What is so aggravating about a case of hiccups?   If babies accept hiccups calmly, and children see them as a source of entertainment, why are hiccups irksome to me?

I have considered three possible reasons.  First, that I am embarrassed by hiccups, mostly because my mouth is more often open than closed as I hiccup, so the volume of my hiccups carries the sound well beyond anything considered “personal space.”   Second, that hiccups somehow demonstrate an incompetency, that hiccupping proves I lack refinement and social grace in the presence of others.   And the third reason is that I recognize that when I have the hiccups, I am not in control. 

Those who know me best know that the likeliest reason is number 3, since I am, after all, something of a control freak.  I have suffered embarrassment enough times to realize that I am not going to die of embarrassment.  And I acknowledge that there will be many more embarrassments before my time on this planet ends.  And as far as what others might think of me, that has never been a huge consideration for me, and the older I get, the less I care about social “stamps of approval” from People Who Supposedly Matter.

No, the fact of the matter is that hiccups show that I am not in control.  And for me, a teacher/leader, an aging diva, that is hard to accept. But the lesson here is to accept the fact that I’m not in control.  I haven’t really driven a car in more than two years, and I haven’t missed it.  I haven’t felt a loss of control from that.  Because Jim and I are isolated from our church community, we have attended church only four times since last July (and two of those times were in the US, during the Christmas holidays).  But since we have our own version of church every Sunday morning in our living room, I have accepted the loss of control that a regular schedule and a specific responsibility (referred to as a calling) has given me in the past.  Why then do I feel the need for control in other areas of my life, like control over an involuntary muscular response?


It’s a little funny how the things I can control are not the things that frustrate me.  If I enjoy a piece of pineapple cake in the school cafeteria and then notice I’ve gained a pound or two, I accept that as a natural consequence of my choice.  If I spend too much on a pair of boots, I’m willing to cut back on other stuff for a few months, in order to get back in line with our budget.  If someone comes to me for help with an issue, I will do whatever I can to help them address that issue – I can choose to have a greater or lesser degree of involvement with that person as the issue progresses.  I can handle that.

But the things I do not control are the things that frustrate me and make me crazy.  If I see teaching time being wasted, I want to improve it – I know how valuable time is in teaching.  I want to change the schedule of classes here so time isn’t wasted.  If I sit at my computer in the evening and yawn thirty times in a row (which I have been known to do), I get irritated, telling my brain it has enough oxygen thank you. 
 
You must understand, it’s not my job to schedule classes here.  I can bring my suggestions to my supervisors, but then it is up to them how those suggestions will be handled.   I can curse the potholes in the road, but that won’t fix them.  Years ago, my doctor told me that my yawning “fits” are caused by something like a short circuit in the sleep center of my brain.  No harm, no foul. So why do I still let things like these frustrate me?




I remember an old TV show that began “Do not adjust your television…We control the vertical, we control the horizontal…."  If I can remember that Someone Else is in control of my life, perhaps I will be more willing to put down the remote that I want to use to control my life, and surrender control. Let go of the steering wheel. Hand the reins over.  Then, although my life’s road will still be full of hiccups and potholes, I will be more likely to enjoy the ride. 

Wednesday, January 15, 2014

HOME IS WHERE YOUR HEART IS, PART TWO


Some years ago, Allen Say wrote a children’s book called “My Grandfather’s Journey.”  In it he describes his grandfather’s two loves, Japan and America.  The grandson telling the story also falls in love with America, and moves back and forth between the United States and Japan.  But his biggest problem is that while he is in one place, he longs for the other. 


This is my experience.  I am happy here, but I still long for my friends in the places where I have lived before.  I miss my wonderful Japanese friend Okanosan, who helped me with my housekeeping and became an honorary grandmother to my boys when they were very young. She was a classical music lover who almost fell down the stairs laughing when she walked in on my boys watching Elmer Fudd and Bugs Bunny’s version of Wagner’s “Ring of the Nieberlüngen.”


I miss my Primary (LDS Sunday school for youngsters) class in England, where one eight-year old  perfectionist used to sing “the Lord can depend on me” and then added “sometimes.”  That boy set the bar high for himself!






I miss my little sister, with whom I had a wonderful visit over the holidays.   She has endured many things and hopes to be able to endure all things, and teaches me to be a better person.  I am grateful for her influence in my life.



But I love Kazkahstan as well.  I love the sense of safety here.  It is safe to be a child here in Kazakhstan – they are shielded from the ugliness of the world by their parents and teachers alike.  It is safe to show affection for a child – nearly every student of mine greeted me with a hug on the first day back at school.  It is safe to greet a child – in fact, most children greet us first, whether or not they know us.   I am safe as I walk to and from school.  It’s only the distance of 6 or 7 city blocks, but in many places in the world, that is more than enough distance to be risky. 



I love the sense of calm here.  Yes, a blanket of snow definitely contributes to that feeling, but winter here seems to have the additional effect of slowing people down.  People are not in a hurry to accomplish tasks.  Yes, there is a lot to do, but the pace seems more relaxed than it did in October or November.  People work with fewer complaints, and students understand that we can succeed if we help each other, and we are ready to work again, even while we celebrate the “Old New Year” – the celebration of the New Year following Russian Orthodox Christmas.  
This year, that celebration came on January 14th, our principal’s 50th birthday.  Quite a momentous occasion, New Year and a culturally significant milestone birthday.  Jim and I were part of a not-quite-spontaneous celebration and enjoyed our time in singing, clapping, and listening to the good wishes teachers had for each other and for our principal.



I am grateful for the loves of my life – the United States, France, Sweden, Japan, England, Netherlands, Korea, Italy, Tonga, and now Kazakhstan.  Each love has enriched the other, and although I sometimes long for the green of Tonga, or the trains of Tokyo, or the nearly endless fields of daffodils near Feltwell, England, or the awe-inspiring scale of history in Italy and Korea, still, I love where I am, and I am grateful for the lessons I am learning here.  Many happy returns from the wintry calm of a noble land and people. 

Thursday, January 9, 2014

HOME IS WHERE YOUR HEART IS - PART ONE

A scene along the road here in Kazakhstan.


A typical classroom at our school.  Yes, those are
teachers, not students.  Oh well.
Living in Kazakhstan is both very ordinary and very unique.  I spend my day working with teenagers, like millions of other teachers.  But after a lesson, my students come up to me to hug me  – I’ve even received applause for a counseling lesson.  I watch students who put their arms around each other while walking down the hall, talking and laughing like brothers and sisters.  I watched one girl who held the hand of another girl who has trouble walking, supporting her to help keep her balance. (Neither was a student of mine.) I congratulated them both and they were completely taken by surprise, since it was second nature to them.  Then I took the helper’s arm and said, “Here, help me too,” and we all laughed together.  I never would feel comfortable doing that to an unfamiliar student in an American school.  But here I am family.


Our school faculty and staff had a dinner party in December, celebrating the end of the second quarter of school.  There was music, dancing, and even silly games, and I watched a wonderful camaraderie in action, as some of the men played a game of musical potty chairs and the women trying to count how many rocks were on the seat of the chair where they were sitting – without looking, of course.  And at dinner, as I have seen many times in the school cafeteria, teachers laughed and hugged as they visited, alternately teasing and reassuring each other of their friendships. And when they danced together, they celebrated with a joy I have seldom seen in a group of teachers.  It was marvelous to be a part of a celebration of brothers and sisters.

Jim and two of the teachers here at NIS
My three co-teachers and I.


























We got back from our stateside Christmas holiday trip on Wednesday the 8th of January, and January 9th was our first day back at school.  Even before I got into the school building, one of the teachers saw me coming and threw her arms around me, telling me how happy she was that we were back.   Kazakh women greet each other with a hug and a kiss on the cheek, but the hugs and kisses today have been especially sweet.  Kazakh men shake hands with their right hand, but draw each other in by clapping each other on the back, and Jim’s been welcomed back a few times today as well.  We've  also had happy greetings from our fellow international teachers, and our supervisor came to check on us before the day even started, because he was concerned about us, since we had lost our luggage on the way back. 

Sunrise from our bedroom window.
Cold is a way of life here...no polar vortex needed


In all our years of marriage, this is only the second time the Szokas have lost luggage.  We got to the city of Almaty, the largest city in the nation (1.5 million), and zhok!  No bags! It made it easy to come through customs, as we really DID have nothing to declare!  But waiting for us outside the customs doors were the Carters, a missionary couple who have befriended us.  They are assigned to help the small LDS congregation in Almaty.  They gave us bags of brown sugar and ranch dressing mix, since we can’t find those items in Taldykorgan.  (We brought them a couple of bottles of vanilla extract from the US.)  No worries about the luggage, though - after we got to school, our Kazakh international vice principal Alisher (say Ah-lee-SHAIR) traced our bags through the airlines,  and provided a driver to go get them and bring them to us (about 8-10 hours round trip - whew!).  We had our bags delivered by Alisher at 9 p.m. that night - he wouldn't even let me come downstairs to carry one bag up.  He is younger than both Jim and me, but we call him Papa, because he cares for us as though we were his own sons and daughters.  We're happy to be home, where our hearts are.  We're with family - even though many other members of our family are far away.