I made a mistake today.

I was at a specialty grocery store, hunting for some peanut butter, when a bottle of coffee-flavoring syrup caught my eye. As I examined the bottle, a fellow shopper smiled at me, speaking quickly in Russian and gesturing towards the shelf. 

"Что?" I asked.

He repeated himself.

"извините," I apologized, "я не могу говорить по-русски." I had already said this several times over the course of the day. I waited for him to shoot me a comprehending smile, nod, and then walk away, as had happened several times over the course of the day.

But then, with no hint of an accent he ask, "You speak English, then?"

I was dumbfounded. "Yes! Of course! What were you saying?"

He reiterated, in English, that he was wondering if the syrup was any good, and asked me where I was from. When I told him the States he said, "Ah, you're a mssnary?"

"Um, I'm a teacher," I clarified, simultaneously vamping and wondering who the heck this guy was. And he asked me a few more questions about peanut butter, learning Russian, and then hit me with an invitation to have coffee or drinks. "Well, I can't right now," I told him, grappling for an excuse, "But that's very kind of you." And THIS is about where I made my mistake. The second I realized he was not just a friendly local chatting with the weird foreigner I should have been clear that . . . well, actually, that what? I wasn't interested in getting to know him? Kinda harsh. That I don't date strangers I meet in the supermarket in foreign countries? I mean, I never consciously made that rule, but it seems reasonable rule to have. 

But this isn't my home culture, and, I'm always so desperate to affirm and avoid letting down complete strangers, and, I screwed up. He told me we could meet whenever would be comfortable for me, and I said okay, and then I took his phone number, and then he called his phone from mine. In what seemed like the very blink of an instant I was past the point of no return. 

"When do you leave?" he asked, just before walking away.

"In June," I told him, feeling relieved, as this answer had worked the last time someone tried to pick me up in the supermarket.

Instead he smiled, "It's plenty of time." 

After all this transpired, I wanted to 1) hide (which I did, over by the soy sauce, where he saw me again and showed me the pastry he had bought for our meeting, which I declined, but he handily shrugged off) and 2) slam my head into something thick and hard. I could scarcely believe 1) that this had even happened, and 2) that I had gone along with and participated in the whole exchange. I think I even smiled.

This experience is just one of many that prove to me that my feelings guide my actions, not my thoughts. If I had been rational about this whole thing when he asked about having coffee I would have said, "Thanks but no thanks." But for whatever reason I didn't feel like I had the power to turn him down. Communicating my discomfort felt impolite. I didn't want to let him down, I wanted to affirm him, so I went along with something that made me uncomfortable to the point that I wrote a check I didn't intend to cash. I never crossed my mind at any point until it was too late to just say, "Sorry, no."

I'm reminded of that time Sarah nearly got engaged on the train to Astana. She spent three and a half hours feeling acutely uncomfortable while I tried to buffer this guy's advances. It was not the most fun train ride for her, but we couldn't ask him to leave or stop, so she bore the discomfort in silence. (Hopefully in retrospect it's loads funnier, though!) Talking about it with Stuart afterward I was struck by his perspective on the whole thing: if you feel uncomfortable, say so. So the guy wanted to come to dinner with us, no big deal; all we had to do was say no. 

It's like, that honestly never occurred to me. 

Lightbulb: You're allowed to shoot people down. You're allowed to reject people. You're allowed to not be interested. Or, I mean, those are all rather harsh ways of thinking about it, but what I mean is, if you don't want to have coffee or drinks with the random guy you meet in the supermarket, you're allowed to say so. Saying "Sure!" when you don't mean it is far worse than a sincere "No thanks." And this is the big mistake I made.

The guy called this evening. I had told Bet my tale of woe so that if he called when she had the phone (we share) she would know not to tell him I'd call him right back. And I told Teka because it was kind of a funny story. But, oh, then he called, and David said I needed to answer and be straight with him and tell him I'm not interested.

(I mean, "not interested" are not the words I would use. "Creeped out" are the words I would use. "Morally opposed" are the words I would use. But I can see how that might but considered an uncharitable way of putting it.)

Instead I just let it ring and ring and ring. If he calls again I'll probably have to answer and tell him I won't be meeting him for coffee (I mean, I fleetingly considered it, banking on the likelihood that after one conversation he'd quickly become disinterested, because I would rather go through with an uncomfortable situation than break the news that I'm not interested) because, I don't know, it's the right thing to do, and the consequence of my mistake. 

So if you're wondering what I'm doing overseas, contributing to stereotypes about how American women are flirts but flakey is just one of many things I have my hand in. Gotta let my mistakes all hang out so that at least others can learn from them. 

Dear young Chr!stian women.

Are you starting to feel funny that you're now of marriageable age and have no prospects in sight? Do you feel like you must be odd because you've never been asked on a date? Are you feeling doubt about your future because the childhood plan of grow-up-and-get-married isn't quite panning out like you had expected? Do you feel like you stand alone, a kind of modern nun, the only girl who is unattached, who must be, maybe, unwanted?

And there's a lot that's been written about seeking Him instead of seeking a him, or on using singleness as preparation, and that stuff's not bad or anything.

And there's a lot that's been written about what's going on with the boys and how their generation needs to step it up, and maybe there's some truth to that. 

But I'm not super concerned with the what or the why. I don't know about the future and if we're looking at a generation of Chr!stian single ladies. I got no advice on any of that. Absolutely none. But let me just tell you, you're not the only one. 

You are one of countless kind, beautiful, smart, funny, mature, and godly young women in the same boat. You are not defective. You are not bizarre. You are not repulsive. You are one of the many girls who love J3sus with an inspiring passion and who are enormously talented with amazing gifts, but who have never honest-to-goodness been wooed. There are many, many, many of similar such Chr!stian single ladies. Droves. Shining paragons of eligibility who have somehow never have had a suitor. 

It's a bizarre phenomenon. 

But let me assure you it is a phenomenon. You're not alone in feeling like this.

If you feel like all of your friends are getting engaged and they're looking at you like you must be so lonely, you're not the only one.

If you watch the birthdays tick by and see your hopes to have family by a certain year get pushed back and pushed back, you're not the only one. 

If you're worried that the gift of singleness is not returnable, exchangeable, or refundable, you're not the only one. 

If you feel directionless or purposeless because you've been waiting to wrap your destiny with someone else, you're not the only one.

If you feel walled in by expectations or assumptions that you must be damaged or dysfunctional because you're single, you're not the only one. 

Lies isolate people, don't they? In isolation people wither. And it tugs at my heart when I see these girls withering, believing they are wallflowers, that they stand alone as the last one picked. Nothing is farther from the truth. Don't let comparison tell you that there must be something wrong with you. Don't let the lies that tell you that you're in some way defective take root in your heart. You're lovely. 

Whether you care that you're single or not, you're lovely. Whether you feel judged by marriage-oriented Chr!stian culture or not, you're lovely. Whether you've been waiting quietly for a life partner or not, you're lovely. 

You're not repellent, maladjusted, or unloveable. And you're not alone. You're lovely. Don't forget it.

Roomates a.k.a. Hayley is learning to not be selfish

My sister brought a jar of peanut butter from the USA. Bet received some peanut butter individual servings in a package from her mom. I've been using my peanut butter. So has Bet. 

This has been driving me crazy because I'm really bad at sharing.

I want to say to Bet, "Since you have your own peanut butter, do you mind not using mine?" Like not said in a snarky way or anything. Just calm and reasonable. I'm sure she'd understand. If she didn't have any peanut butter of course I would share mine. But she does have her own, so I'm sure it's equitable to ask her to use hers instead of mine. 

But I'm too afraid. I think I'm being petty. It's just peanut butter, right? I should share, right? Who cares if she has her own. My stuff should be her stuff, right? I shouldn't be so selfish.

I've had a roommate for almost my whole life. But I'm realizing how different it is to have a roommate who isn't related to you. I'm not as confrontational. I'm more intentional about letting things go. Sure, I would pick my battles with Maggie and Sarah. It got to the point where I stopped bugging them about taking their hair out of the drain and just did it myself. It ceased to annoy me.

So how do I get to this point where Bet eating my peanut butter ceases to annoy me?

Actually, it's likely the peanut butter will be gone before I get to this point. Maybe this is the real reason this is bothering me so much. I mean, I was annoyed from the moment I opened the peanut butter four weeks ago, but my irritation is coming to a head now only because 1) I just remembered she had her own peanut butter, and 2) my peanut butter is almost gone. Good-bye sweet peanut butter.

Gotta stop being selfish! Must stop! Sharing is caring!

This is the blessing of roommates. You know? They show you how many areas you have to grow in. Bet and I have a lot of fun. We have our nights in and our inside jokes. And we have our fights over the proper vernacular use of the word "bookbag" and whether marijuana should be decriminalized. We've never openly argued, but we have our moments of skirting silence. The rough parts of our personalities and our character rub up against each other, and while this doesn't always cause friction it alerts us to our defects. This peanut butter thing may be a petty and silly example, but it shows me how I don't want my soul to stay the same!

This is one of the reasons I came here, to be transformed and made more like Jesus by doing something difficult. Living with others is difficult. But for the soul that doesn't want to stay the same it hurts so good. 

And fingers crossed we can find peanut butter at an imports store. ;)

Thundergrace Five-fold

You know what gets me so mad?

Every time I try to pour into another person, I end up getting blessed double what I have tried to give. 

This is just so infuriating. 

I’ve been not necessarily in a funk, but I’ve been terrible homesick. I know I have no reason to be; I had a visit from home, for goodness sake. I have all the comforts of modern living, I want for nothing, and I really do love this place! Sincerely! 

So each morning, I laugh at my sleepy face in the mirror, I play my happy music, I greet the day with a smile, and I hope that this will be the day I stop counting the weeks until I can walk around the reservoir woods or squint my eyes at Block Island on the horizon. Maybe this will be the day I am one-minded to the icy ground I stand on.  

It’s funny that the only time I’m not thinking about how many weeks are between me and Logan airport is when I’m teaching. He knows the depth of my pansy status and He is intimately familiar with my flabby resolve, so He’s been raining His grace to abound that much more over my mopey homesick outlook. And He’s been doing it in the place I love most, the classroom.

Thundergrace One: This week, in each of my classes, my students asked (completely and entirely out of the blue, seriously, all I was doing was sitting quietly, staring at my fingernails, because I have a commanding classroom presence, yo. #sarcasm), “Teacher, are you a Chr!stian?” And some variant of this conversation replayed with different students: “Do you believe in G0d?” and “Who is Chr!st?” I was baffled, completely flummoxed, as to why these kids were so suddenly asking these questions. It’s illegal to prosthelytize to minors, particularly from the authority of the classroom, so when I recovered from my shock I answered laconically to keep the questions coming. “See here!” it’s like He’s saying, “Of course I am on their minds!” And to be one who is given the chance to speak the powerful name of J3sus is a shining hot privilege.

Thundergrace Two: I have this one class, eighth graders, and I’ve been struggling to win them over. Each class is a bumpy ride and I leave feeling “meh” and a little bit defeated, like I have failed to do well by them. I’ve felt, a bit useless in this class. Like I’m letting these students down. At the end of one such class this week, their local English teacher tells me how she’s noticed improvement with these students and their speaking abilities since starting my class. “Thank you,” she said to me. “They are not so nervous to speak because of you.” She is a reserved and enigmatic woman, and so her praise was a delightful surprise. I think I floated out the door, I was so happy to hear this. 

Thundergrace Three: I was nevertheless dismayed because my favorite class ended this week. They were my first class ever, business English, and by some stroke of good fortune they became the most fun and cohesive classroom I’ve ever beheld. They made me look forward to the school week because I could go to class and laugh with them, and I didn’t want this semester to end. What blew my socks off though, was the realization that they had enjoyed our time together as much as I had! Our last class they brought me to tears because they presented me with a framed sketch drawn by one student and a bouquet of white roses. They took me out to dinner and promised me we were not saying good-bye, and that we would continue to meet together for fun. 

I was so humbled by their thanks and this gesture; their regard I didn’t deserve. 

Thundergrace Four: So now that business English has concluded, I’ve kicked off the new semester with my very first class of public speaking students. There were butterflies in my stomach as I stood in front of them and began to speak. What if they thought I was lame? What if they thought I was wasting their time? What if they couldn’t understand me? What if they didn’t like each other? But an hour and a half later my fears were all but quelled. I beamed as the students joked with and helped each other. I did a silent cheer when they laughed at my jokes. I was relieved when they followed my instructions with complete comprehension. It was an awesome first class, and I’m brimming with optimism over what this course could be come. 

Thundergrace Five: I went for coffee with a friend of a friend I met back in the fall. When I met her I felt as thought I was supposed to talk to her, and so we exchanged contact information and made those sallow promises to meet, and, I never followed through. At my sister’s prompting (slash awesome kick in the pants speech) I . . . answered her when she texted me, and how many months after our first meeting we finally sat down and talked for hours. I left our conversation positively buoyant. This sweet girl bought me some real coffee and gave me some of the socialization I had yet to be able to find.

It makes me mad, because the infernal pride that’s slick through my soul feels as though I did nothing to bring about these good things. I’ve been a homesick stick in the mud who has only reached out to others in the most feeble and anemic sense. It’s not equitable. I should be blessing others, not be blessed by them! But there’s the small sliver of sanctification in me that is smiling with that knowing smile, murmuring, “To give abundantly is His prerogative.” I am still foolish enough to have the audacity to be surprised when I am blessed by Him. As though blessings are only earned. As though I am too accomplished for grace. 

Bet and I were talking, “We should go shopping tomorrow.” 

“Yes,” she agreed, “I could really use some retail therapy.”

“Me too,” I sighed. 

Bet laughed at this. “Why?!” The implication being that I had been having a fantastic week and ought to have been in no need of any sort of catharsis, retail or otherwise. And in that moment I saw how greedy and needy and adverse to feeling bad I am. I did not want to be cheered or comforted by the blessings I received this week.

I confessed to my Father at the start of this week, “I know You love me, but I’m struggling to accept something I’m so grossly unentitled to.” I left it at this, weakly resolving this week to bolster my faith and meditate on the truth. Instead I got hit with a tidal wave of affirmation from people (acquaintances! precious strangers!) who I thought I came here to validate. Of course I don’t deserve the support of my students and people I’ve only just met. But that’s what makes it grace, eh? Undeserved favor. And He’s dousing me with it. 

Brendan Manning writes, “The gifts are not determined by the slightest personal quality or virtue. They are pure liberality.” He gives good things, because that’s what He does. Goodness is His very nature. So I guess what I want to say is, look at all the cool things He did for me. Ebenezer. He's making it rain grace out there.

I will go

A year ago this time I was in a post-Urbana funk. I was spending my mornings in a social justice class and my afternoons cuddling a crazy little baby child and was positively panicky about how I would find a way to serve G0d in the upcoming year. I felt burdened by all I had heard about the need, and burdened by all I had received as a blessing of my upbringing. It was smothering, this sense of urgency; I was so afraid of wasting my time just living for myself. 

At Urbana I had stopped waffling over whether it was more sensible to stay home and work before going to law school. I drank the Kool Aid and checked the box; my gap year would be spent overseas. Doing what, only He knew, but the commitment was made. Sixteen thousand people around me sang with earnestness, “I will go, send me!” The people on either side of me, my sister and one of my best friends, both stood at the call to give their lives to cross-cultural work. I remained in my chair, wishing I could share the same leading and conviction they felt. I didn’t, and still don’t, feel that call to spend my life overseas. But I envied the simplicity of such a life. 

I got hooked up with TeachOverseas impossibly fast. I filled out the application in a day, was interviewed the next day, offered a position two weeks later, and had signed on just shy of a month from when I first stumbled across their website. It was something simple, even easy, something that I felt I could manage. I didn’t really think, I just did, and that suffocating urgency lifted from my head. I was finally doing what I had said I would do, I had made good on my commitment. My parents saw it differently, as an unstrategic diversion from my career goals, and perhaps they were right. Being here, doing what I’m doing, it doesn’t make much sense outside of “I wanted to go and here was a need.”

And it’s amazing how rewarding it is to fill that need. Even when I get discouraged about how few faith conversations I get to have or how few people I’ve befriended, I’m buoyed by those small successes when students use a vocabulary word I taught them months prior or when students email me and thank me for our classes. There are still many, many ways that I fail my students or lessons that I completely bomb, but to see progress and to feel effective in the position I came to fill, it makes me so happy. I really enjoy what I’m doing, and the love I feel for these people and this place is both nonsensical and unabating. My time in Karaganda has been a loofah for my soul, rubbing away at those jagged parts and showing me His heart.

But now I need to decide if it’s time to head home or not. Should I continue the work here, or continue with the plan that’s been maturing in my heart since I was a senior in high school? I bemoaned to Bet, “If I stay here I’ll know that at least outwardly I’m doing m!nistry.” That’s my favorite thing about overseas work: even if you’re not doing exactly what He’s called you to, at least you’re halfway there. You’ve put yourself out there. You’ve taken that risk. And for many people that’s the hardest part. But I can’t help feeling like a fraud, because the choice to come here was not a hard one for me to make. As it turns out, I’m struggling with a different kind of “I will go.”

So I got a phone call from Michigan State College of Law. They wanted to give me a full academic scholarship. I was pumped about the ego boost for just a few seconds and then utter despair washed over me. Michigan. No, I do not want to go to Michigan. No, I am not going to leave this city that I love and return to the United States just so I can spend three years in Michigan. Nope. Not Michigan. And I was so confused, doubting the call I thought I felt. At Urbana I believed I had found confirmation and blessing on this plan, a green light from the Almighty to set my hands to serving the immigrant community in Rhode Island. I felt peace to pursue this plan. I thought He had blessed it. 

So why was the best offer on my plate for Michigan? 

As I vented to Bet late one night, “It’s just so dumb because deep down I just have this intuition that this time next year I’ll be at Michigan, and I hate that!” But it was at the moment of this ugly confession that peace began to seep in. I imagined Him telling me, “Little girl, I know you’re confused and surprised, but if you think this is My will, why are you fighting it? Don’t you believe I will give you only My best?” And I kicked back a bit, asking why now, why Michigan, why did I come to Karaganda at all, why the call to Rhode Island? Why don’t I understand? And then He was like, “Why don’t you trust Me on this.” And man, the peace that comes with that is positively narcotic. 

Knowing the will of G0d is tricky business because He gives us so much freedom in following Him. It’s strange to me that the decision to come to Karaganda was much more easily made than this struggle over law school. How do I know with such assurance that I’ll end up at Michigan State? I’m not sure I could even explain. There is no Twelve Step Plan to Pleasing El Shaddai. There is no follow the yellow brick road and you’ll reach the promised land. There is only loving Him. There is only relationship. There is only drawing nearer to Him and following His heart. 

I am still waiting to hear from a few law schools. I am still searching for confirmation that I should indeed leave Karaganda. I am still keeping an open mind that this time next year I will not be in Michigan. Maybe He will yet provide the sacrificial lamb for this decision. (Because apparently I’m Abraham and Suffolk Law School is Isaac? I need to rethink that metaphor . . .) And maybe I’m mistaken about the draw to MSCL. But I’ve cashed in all my angst over this choice for a refocused perspective. I must hold loosely to comfort, quibble not over clarity, and accept His leading eagerly. Where He says, I will go. For my delight is to serve my Father. 

Managing the Missing

This morning Bet and I Skyped with a girl potentially looking to teach in Karaganda. She asked us plenty of great questions, and it was joy for me to take the opportunity to remind myself how rewarding and exciting it is to be here. But then she dropped this question on us.

How has it been being away from home? she asked.

Hum.

It’s strange how my homesickness has warped these past three weeks. It was rough right before we left for Bishkek: I was distressed that I wouldn’t see Sarah and Stuart until they’d already been in the country three days, I was disappointed that the Christmas vibe was elusive and couldn’t be conjured, I was discouraged that summer seemed so, so far away. I poured so much anticipation into Sarah & Stuart’s visit, and I told myself that so long as I could make it to that reunion, I would be fine and the homesickness would dissipate. With tunnel vision I waited for my visitors. 

And when they were here it was a little bit like home was here. 

But when they left it felt a little bit like something had died. 

I just hadn’t thought that far ahead. I hadn’t prepared for their departure. I hadn’t accounted for the possibility that their leaving could and would intensify my homesickness and that I needed to look for relief outside of connection to home. My head keeps telling me that June is not so far away. I’m halfway there. I’ve spent more time here than stands between now and my departure. This second semester is going to fly by. Nevertheless, it sounds positively horrendous that I’m counting the months until I’m homeward bound, I mean, that’s not becoming of a girl who came here trying to die to self and serve others. 

But I love my home and I don’t think this is bad. 

It’s a happy homesickness, you know? Like, this hurts so good, it’s proving to me that I’m doing what I’m supposed to be doing. I’ve been missing the dumbest things, like chocolate chips (because chopping up chocolate bars is such the inconvenience) and thick aluminum foil (as opposed to the tissue-thin kind here) and lines. Like I really miss standing in a line and not having a dozen people ask me to hold their place or try to cut in line or flat out ignore the presence of a line because they’re old/pregnant/pretty/important/in a hurry. The quirks of this place that charmed me at first are beginning to make my teeth grind.

But when I reprimand myself I also realize I’m living the dream. Working part time, living for free, experiencing a different culture, and learning to lean on Him who sustains me in so many new ways. The landlord came to check our water the other day, and she chattered at me in Russian when I answered the door, and I was surprised I understood her when she asked why I wasn’t wearing any house shoes when it was so cold. These are the little happinesses I experience every day, the triumph of giving someone directions or cooking a new cut of meat or seeing the vibrance of His glory on display in the sparkly crystals of decimated snowflakes or the messy devotion of His willing servants. 

The greatest irony is the quiet knowledge that when the clock runs out and I leave for the summer, I will miss Karaganda and its aluminum foil and its lack of lines and its astoundingly wonderful people with as unrelenting an intensity that I miss my home now. Missing is a blessing, because it offers itself as proof of love.

What's it like living in -35 cold?

It’s not so much that the quality of the cold is any different. Cold is cold. It’s not a different kind of cold, there’s just more of it. It’s the cold you know and love, just with the intensity turned up. So instead of being able to tolerate the icy air on your seven minute walk to the bus stop, you hit the outside air for five seconds and you feel like you’ve been out there for an eternity. 

The feeling of snot frozen inside your nose is a sensation unlike any other. Usually in the cold my nose runs like a faucet, but once you hit this kind of cold cold your nose gets bone dry because the second you step outside any liquid in your body turns into a solid. When you inhale the coldness of the air freezes all of the precipitation in your throat. 

It’s a perpetual state of not being able to feel your extremities. When you’re out in this cold you’re not even really sure you still have a face because you can’t feel that it’s still there. You yank to open the heavy metal door into your apartment building and your fingers burn like you’ve scalded them on a stove. Your toes feel like little logs.

Weather is not so much of an issue when you’re on break from school and can spend endless hours working from home, or more importantly, inside. But when you’ve eaten every edible thing in your house the hunger compels you to make the frigid walk to the market. It’s funny how the store that seemed to delightfully close in summer is now obnoxiously far away in the winter. I fleetingly considered riding the bus around the block just so I could get out of the wind. The cold makes you irrational like that. 

For a few weeks there it was worse back home than it was here in the tundra. It was hitting negative three some people’s thermostats while we were enjoying the balmy twenties. But in a flash it changed; you could watch that mercury fall and we’ve been shivering ever since. With the polar vortex hitting the northeast hard, just know that I feel your pain. Or rather, I empathize with your icy numbness. What’s it like living in one of the coldest places in the world? It’s an adventure.

Undocumented, aka Our Brush with the Law

One of the many benefits of partnering with Educational Services International instead of teaching on an independent contract is the support and training you receive throughout the year. It was at training in July when I first heard the murmurings that the fall conference would be hosted in Turkey. Don’t let anyone tell you that being a cross-cultural worker doesn’t have its perks. 

The whole thing started off sounding just a bit too good to be true. It was a comfort saying good-bye to new friends at training because we knew we’d be seeing them again in the fall. Once in country I formulated an informal list of short-term goals, the chief of which was, “Survive until the fall conference.” Even the day before leaving I just couldn’t imagine what it would be like 1) to visit a place I had long wanted to see and 2) being in a place that wasn’t Karaganda. Despite the frequent reminders from our director that THIS WAS NOT A VACATION, I could barely contain my excitement. I didn’t know what to expect, but I knew it would be good.

We left straight from the language center, which meant I carried my luggage all over Yugovostock and Daryn and Centre, and the melting ice on the ground meant wet socks through the first two legs of our travels. The Karaganda airport was dark and empty when we arrived, giving it the eerie air of a bunker guarding the apocalypse, but we checked in, passed security, and boarded the plane to Almaty with no problems. An hour later we touched down in the Alma-ata, got a bite to eat (Parenthetically, goldfinch soup is chicken broth with potato starch in it. This is not delicious.), and found a bench on which to lay our heads to wait out our eight hour layover. 

This layover was pretty uneventful, except for the brief run-in I had with a resident of Shymkent who tried to converse with me through the language barrier and kept trying to touch my nose with a spit-covered finger. We parted ways when he started saying, “Money! Sex!” over and over. 

Two hours before our flight was scheduled to depart, we got in line for passport control. We each went to a different booth, and thus each had different experiences. I got yelled at by a devastatingly beautiful Russian woman, the young Kazakh officer in Bet’s line just pointed at the date on her registration card with a blank look, Teka sailed through customs no problem and waited for us past security, and David spoke with an older Kazakh woman who attempted to explain the situation with the little English she had. We stood in our booths for half an hour while our three officers made phone calls and conferred with each other. “I think there’s a mistake,” I kept saying. Apparently there was a problem with our registration card, but I remembered being registered when we arrived in August. We had five-year visas and letters of invitation, for goodness sake.

There was nothing they could do for us though. The date on our card showed it to be expired. We had overstayed our time in Kazakhstan by ten weeks. We were illegal immigrants. They put their rejection stamp on our registration cards, confiscated our boarding passes, and showed us out of the terminal. “Can we re-register? Is it possible to catch a later flight today?” we asked with some hope and desperation. “Go to the immigration office,” they told us. “You will not fly today.” The disappointment I felt was heavy. 

The team just moments after we heard, "You will not fly today."

We didn’t really know what to do with ourselves. We were stranded seven hours away from home in a city we’d never visited. Our director from ESI was asleep. Our administrators at the language center (who had taken care of our registration when we arrived) were also asleep. (It was five in the morning, after all.) We weren’t sure what the penalty was for overstaying one’s visa. A fine? A night in jail? Where was the immigration office? What papers did we need? Would the migration police speak English? Should we stay in Almaty and try to get legally registered? Should we go back to Karaganda and get registered there? Should we throw in the towel on this whole Turkey trip? We had spent the whole night bumming around the Almaty airport and could not think clearly enough to resolve this issue.

Things turned a corner when David was finally able to get in touch with our administrators from the language center. They strongly recommended returning to Karaganda. If the migration police had made a mistake on our papers, it could be taken care of. So instead of boarding a flight to Istanbul, we got on a plane headed back to the very place we had just flown from. Our administrators met us at the airport, gave us some food, told us to sleep and then spent the day working magic for us. 

This was the issue:

1) It turns out our five-year visas require us to leave the country every thirty days. Because this visa is brand new (and also maybe because it says so nowhere on the visa itself), neither our administrators or ESI or anyone at all really knew that this was the case. Our administrators felt awful that they hadn’t caught this mistake when they registered us the first time, and now that we’re back from Turkey we have to get these visas voided and apply for new ones so that we don’t have to leave the country every 30 days.

2) Teka was fine. Because she’s Brazilian, her visa was different from ours, and she scored the standard one-year visa that the other ex-pat workers also have. And so at the airport she was waiting for us on the other side of security for half an hour, nervous that we had been taken into custody and she would never see us again. 

3) I wasn’t even in the database. When our administrators went to the migration police to investigate, insisting that there had been a mistake, the police had scoffed at them . . . until they went to pull up my record and saw that I was nonexistent. Considering I had a registration card with their stamp on it, that was kind of embarrassing for them. 

I don’t know what sort of voodoo magic (or bribing) was done to square things away, but once our papers were secured our administrators booked us another flight back to Almaty, and rescheduled the other two legs of our journey: the Almaty-Istanbul flight and the Istanbul-Antalya flight. 

And we thought that was that. But the three flights were spaced out over three days. We’d be arriving at the conference on Friday afternoon, when it was already halfway over and after Thanksgiving dinner. Our director thought the expense was too much, and suggested we stay in Karaganda, but when we found out that our language center was covering the cost of 1) the cancelation fees, 2) the two extra flights to and from Karaganda, 3) a place to spend the night in Almaty and Istanbul, and 4) the taxi to get there, we made the call. The Turkey trip was still on. 

I cannot even describe how indebted we are to our administrators from the language center. From 5:30 in the morning when they got our call until 10:30 in the evening when they put us on a plane back to Almaty they were working on a way to get us to our conference. They shelled out over a thousand dollars getting our flights sorted and booking us hotels, and I shudder to think what they paid in registration fees and punitive fines to make our legal problems go away. They took us to and from the airport and they gave us food to eat while we waited in our flat for a verdict. They even bought us chocolate and tea while we waited for check-in to open. We spent Thanksgiving Day in bewildering transit, but thankfulness for them was my greatest sentiment that day. Katya and Olyessa and Sergey did us a solid. 

Eight flights. Four airports. Five of our six days were spent traveling. A night in Almaty. Then a day in Karaganda. Then another (more pleasant) night in Almaty, this time in an apartment in Arbat instead of the airport. A night in Istanbul. Two nights in Antalya instead of the four originally planned. And then a night in transit through Istanbul, Almaty, and finally home sweet home in Karaganda. Never a dull moment.