2002-10-01 - 12:49 p.m.
Cotton! Most HS student in UZ. are required to take to the fields in October to pick cotton. This is an economic requirement for the country to stay in business. I arranged as my self directed learning project to take the fields with a group of students from the local high school. They had been there five days before I arrived last weekend. Peace Corps drove me the one hour to the small village just east of where I am currently living in Baytqurgan. I went solo after a failed recruiting effort at our weekly training meeting. I arrived at 10 am Sat. I brought a sleeping bag, and food and water becasue I was told no water, food or shelter. But the studetns sleep in the local school, in cots jammed together like you might imagine in a war movie barracks. I put my stuff in the directors office, which had a table, tv, and two make shift beds, and roaches to boot. The director and those in charge wore army fatigues, despite being the equivelent of HS pricipals. They were very warm to me and were weary of actually allowing me to take to the fields, but Peace Corps had given instructions and I was given my cotton sack. An assitant led me on a half mile walk out a dirt path into the fields. I saw no students. Thankfully, after emerging beyond a tree line, i saw the dots of color amongst the green and white rows. The assistant, a short thick haired man with a stash wsa very kind. He explained the procedure, showed me how to wrap the sack around my back, and how to pick the cotton. I was given my row, picking both the row to the left and right. The students were at first shy, but quickly opened chatter with me. No one spoke any english. The ripple of information was hilarious to watch. My neighbor might ask me about me family at home. I would tell him/her that i had a mom and dad and two brothers. The a ripple of swiveling heads leading through the fields. "two brothers and a mom and dad" all the way down the line. Three hundrend students in all. And so it went for two days. The work was grueling because of the sun. We wore long sleeves and hats or head coverings for the girls to keep the sun off. It reminded me of my great days at ASW given a push mower and a football field of tree high weeds. Go to it! The same attitude exists everywhere in the world. The first day I picked twenty three kilos and the second day 12 ( a half day). The locals were impressed when they asked me on my lumbering walk back to the school after working. Lunch in the fields also had an aura of army style. The men in charge all wear fatigues, although they are kind and harmless. The students line up in the shade of a tree line and a mule let wood cart with three barrels is unloaded. The studetns pull their own home brought tin cups out and cabbage soup, tea, and bread are made available. Water also. I brought my own. Dinner at the shcool had an feel of summer camp with the kids dancing to music and the boys playing sports. I was unaware of my sleeping arangement and a floor would have done nicely. but at ten thirty, exhausted, i was led into the pitch black night by the assistant director. we walked along a dark road, illuminated only by the moon. After perhaps twenty minutes, we stopped at what i now realize was the first house light on. He knocked. A farmer and his wife were in their courtyard bagging onions. They were onion farmers. The assistant explained that I was an American who came to help- had picked 23 kilos that day of cotton, and needed a place to sleep. The farmer motioned for his wife to make up a place. As it ended I was laying on padded blankets in the tv room with their son of 12 years. I think he thought it was a sleep over. I was exhausted. I closed my eyes. I opened them. Ten children sit staring at me. Questions flew at me. I stumbled through my language and let them know what I could say. I even met the farmers daughter. The next day I discovered that Kevin was the first American ever to visit the village of Kaytmas. The farmer served me home boiled milk and onion bread in the morning. I hit the fields again. I returned home via PC van in the evening. It was the best thing I have done so far in Peace Corps Uzbekistan. And the work was miserable to boot. Imagine that. Here is my address currently in UZ.
Uzbekistan, 700015 Tashkent 15
4 Turkestankaya Street
c/o Halqaro Pochtamt
Tinchlik Korpusi
Attn: Kevin m. Griffith
Later
