.russian roulette is not the same without a gun

Housing search, the remix. (Bum-chicka-bum-chicka-uh-uh-uhhhhh.)

My counterpart texted me the other day to say that she had an apartment option for me to see. Her sister had found it. I was excited because this was actually the first option I've had that has worked out in a relatively concrete way. Not to mention, it's smack in the part of town that I wanted to live in - maybe a five minute walk from school.

The microrayons of the town I'm going to live in are actually pretty nice. Since training was there I'm very familiar with the town's center and all the "hot spots" (of which there are few, but enough to live very comfortably on), but the microrayons are much more towny. Most of them are courtyard-type clusters with broken down old Soviet-era playground equipment that is usually used to inadvertently hurt children or dry rugs on in the middle. Some even have well-tended flower gardens. The area of town I'm going to live in is populated mostly by old women living alone and children playing on the dangerous playground equipment. I rarely see people between the ages of twenty and fifty puttering around, but that's fine with me. It means that the area must be safe-ish if all these old women are living alone and the children are killing themselves on the jagged metal slides unsupervised.

Obviously, if I was looking at this through the untrained American eye, I'd think it looked like the projects. This is because Soviet-style apartment buildings are actually based off of the projects. Seriously. They're cheap and easy to build, mostly because all apartment complexes are the same. Unless the owner's done some serious remont (renovation), Kyrygz apartments have about five different styles, and the entire apartment complex has the same style of apartment. But now that I've eased into life here, I can recognize nice apartment buildings for what they are.

And the one that my counterpart had to show me was nice. It's a first-floor one-room (meaning that there's one main living room, a bathroom, and a kitchen) apartment that has a balcony opening straight onto a beautiful garden with tasteful tall grass, cornflowers, daisies, and some hollyhock. I have no idea who maintains the garden, because when I went in to see the place there was obviously a funeral party going on, and the owners said that the grandmother who lived in the apartment had died a couple months back. The garden was looking way too well pruned for that.

Another malady with most apartments in the area that I want to live is that none of them have been well-furnished. I don't know why, since in every single other area in Kyrgyzstan, even village apartments, they've come decently-equipped. One of my friends (who ultimately ended up moving to Bishkek) lived in a huge, new three-room apartment with a kitchen. His furniture count was thus: one kitchen table, two chairs, a small sofa table, a small cabinet, and a bed without legs. All of his furniture could have easily fit into one room. Half a room. My other friend has another newly-remonted apartment in the same town with two giant rooms that doesn't even have a bed. It has a kitchen table, two chairs, and one upholstered chair. She sleeps on piles of tushuks.

But the apartment that they showed me was definitely well-inhabited. There's a divan, a bed, a large table in the main room, a table in the kitchen, a clothespress, a free-standing shelving unit that takes up most of the wall, several small cabinets, and four kitchen chairs. There's two stoves: a gas and an electric. And a large refrigerator. And a washing machine. And all the plates I could shake one of my billions of forks at. (The washing machine is Kyrgyz-style, but hey. It means I can wash my sheets.) They said it came with all of the furniture. And it has hot water and a SHOWER and an INDOOR TOILET. And heat in the winter.

And it was only 3000 som a month. Usually you get reamed for apartments where I want to live. Sold, sold, and sold.

The only thing about it is that there aren't bars on the windows, and since it's first-floor apartment, Peace Corps will pay for it. I just have to get it done. The landladies said that they didn't mind if I put bars in as long as they didn't have to pay for it, so it's cool.

And I get to look out at a nice garden when it's the season for it. Quite idyllic. I'm within five minutes of both my work and a supermarket and a small bazaar. I'm a twenty-minute walk from the center of town where there's bigger supermarkets and bazaars. And there's constant transportation everywhere.

As good as my extended vacation in Bishkek has been, it'll be nice to have my own place. I don't want to impose on my host here too much longer. He's got dates to go on. And to be able to not have all my shit spread out all over the resource center will be a pleasant change.

Here's hoping that something stupid doesn't happen this winter and I end up losing it again. I've been on a semester-by-semester basis here in Kyrgyzstan: three semesters of school have eclipsed since I've been here, and I've had three sites. Very neatly divided, in my opinion. But it would be nice to break with tradition for this last year. I don't think I'm going to want to move again.

When I look back on my Peace Corps experience, at least I can say that I got a true understanding of the nomadic aspect of Kyrgyz culture. I'm more nomadic than most of them will ever be. For better or worse.