Body Language is Universal

June 24, 2010

This week has flown by! We, my site mates and I, went on a day trip on Monday and Tuesday to a near by town to have a couple of classes on TEFEL for NON-TEFEL. Basically that is where we briefly learned how to teach English as a second language. Those two days were a lot of fun because we go to interact with some PCT’s (Peace Corps Trainers) who we don’t get to see too often. The rest of this week has also been very busy with language lessons, CYD Sector meetings, and Cross Culture meetings. AND tomorrow is going to be a very very exciting day because WE get to GO to the BIG city!!!! My sitemates and I are going to UB! (Ulaanbaatar) We are all very very excited!!!!! Not only do we get to go to a big city, but we also get to meet some very important people whom we will be working with in the next two years. We are visiting several agencies that we will be working for in our sector. AND we are going to ABAF!!!!!!! That is American Burger’s And Fries for you non-Mongolians!!!  I am so excited to have yellow mustard…I can’t wait. I might not even get any sleep tonight because I am that excited!!!!! (Seriously)
HA, anyways…this week has also been eventful in my growing with the Mongolian culture. First of all I wait FOUR days till I took a tumpin bath! I think that might be the longest I have every gone with out bathing. Let’s just say I felt a tad bit gross! Oh and I FINALLY milked the family cow! That was an adventure!!!! It is so akwkard trying to hold the bucket, while sitting on a bucket, while crouching under a cow, while milking. But I did it…even if it was only for five minutes, I can now say I’ve milked a cow. Umm what else…today the power was out for most of the day. I think my mom was trying to tell me there was some sort of damage…I’m really not sure. BUT this comes into play when I tell my next story.
So today was extremely warm. I mean I was sweating up a storm all day long. SO when I got home for lunch the last thing that I wanted to drink was hot tea. I decided I would teach my family how to make sweet tea. I was so excited about this. I even found ice cube trays in the freezer, which just made my day!!!! I put on a pot of water to boil while I cleaned out the ice trays. As I am waiting for the water to boil I explained to my mom that I was going to make ice tea. (I think she understood me) Finally I looked at the water pot (which is basically a water heater) and realize that it is not on……then my mom informed me that the power was out. Let’s just say I was a tad bit disappointed!! BUT I am going to try again another day.
To continue on the subject of a hot day and my sweating, I have to say that body language is universal. All who know me well know that my feet sweat. I mean whose doesn’t? But I suppose on a sweaty day like today it was to the extreme. So in agreement of trying to follow the culture here today I realized that in my family’s house they take their shoes off when going into the living room/bedroom. I just realized this today. Now I knew that it prolly wasn’t the best idea to take my shoes off at this point but I wanted to be respectful. I took by black flats off against my better judgment. As I sat on the floor with my feet out stretched my brother came over with his machine. (Toy truck) At this point I was thinking to myself well maybe he won’t notice. He didn’t…for a bit. But as he was driving his machine around the living room floor he encountered my feet. Let’s just say I think y’all can image his reaction. He covered his nose while saying something in Mongolian and proceeded to run out of the room. So when they say that Body Language is universal, it’s true.
Hope y’all enjoyed that story! Lol.
Love,
b