The End is Near

It's official: My service as a Peace Corps Volunteer is coming to an end.  I will be leaving Azerbaijan on November 16th and am now the proud and happy owner of a one-way ticket.

This news has helped me gather my thoughts about the remainder of my service.  Although it's been difficult through the hot summer months having this actual date is motivating me to make the most of my remaining days in my town.

AZ6 2008-2010 at our Close of Service Conference

Don't get me wrong: there are things and people that I will certainly miss, but there are many things I'm looking forward to leaving behind.  While there's no way of really explaining these things are to the core so that those on the other side of the pond will truly understand, I'd thought I would make a list to sum it up:

What I will NOT miss:
1. the smell of burning trash  I've truly been waking up in the early hours due to the foul smell of burning plastic and other unmentionables
2. the random alarms of roosters going off at all hours of the day including 3 am, 4 am & 5 am
3. marshutka rides  never, ever again, I think to myself. travel in ANY other country feels like a breeze in comparison
4. the roads
5. the oily food
6. the dust in dry seasons/mud in rainy seasons
7. most of my clothes   after being hand washed for 2+ years, I plan on leaving a significant amount of them here as I'm sick of wearing them, they're stained and worn out, etc.
8. the squatting men on any/every corner of the road  they still look so silly to me
9. sunflower seed shells
10. the slow pace of life    the constant waiting...to go somewhere, for people to show up...for everything to start
11. explaining to people that I'm a vegetarian. and then having to explain that means I also don't eat chicken, THEN having to answer questions about what I do eat.
12. the inconsistency of having water/gas
13. people staring/following/yelling at me  there are time it's easy to ignore and then other times not so much; especially when it consistently happens every. single. day. 
14. lack of privacy  and just not knowing who is watching something that I'm doing no matter how mundane it is and then will go on to tell the neighbors all about it.

What I WILL miss when I leave AZ:
1. eating in season   there's really nothing more exciting than seeing eggplants/tomatoes/cherries [insert other fruit or vegetable here] finally come into season and eating them for the first time in 6-9 months.
2. the random alarms of roosters going off at 10 am, 11 am, and any normal hour  I still chuckle to myself sometimes about how funny it is to have all sorts of animals cackling around my town. I'm not in new jersey anymore!
3. feeding my 'adopted' cat on my back steps in the early morning after a run and knowing that at least one cat will have a full tummy for the day  and at least some one/thing is glad I'm here. 
4. the smell of freshly baked bread
5. random huge masses of wandering cattle who crowd even the main roads so cars have to stop and wait for them to pass   still funny and foreign because I can imagine how many Americans have never witnessed such a thing
6. the feeling when I can see the light go off in a student's head and they answer correctly
7. joking with close local friends with expressions like "yag kimi" (just like butter) when describing how wonderful my shower felt
8. my favorite local shop owner who tries to scout out and bring things from the capital for me   mostly this doesn't work but it's nice that he tries. and on hot days when they allow me to sit inside the ACed shop to chat with them since outside is just unbearable.
9. other PCVs who have stuck by me and understand just how bizarre this place can be
10. visiting one of my close local families who sends me home with fresh eggs/ fruits/ herbs pull straight from their garden
11. the simpleness and slowness of life  and thus learning to have more patience, with people, with myself, with the system. not everything has to get done every single day
12. lack of news and media  it's been nice to be away from the negativity that is American media and not constantly being bombarded with meaningless pop culture news like hearing the breakdown of Lindsay Lohan's jail time and what exactly she's eating everyday.  really...who cares?  ( I happily missed out on why she got herself in jail in the first place)  Those things haven't been important the last 2 years and I can't imagine how it will be start having to be around it again. 
13. the freedom on doing my own work  on my own schedule; which has it's advantages and disadvantages
14. speaking another language   while I do wish Azeri would be a useful language once I leave AZ it's still exciting to me to be able to communicate fully with locals or to be able to go back and forth between English and Azeri throughout a conversation with my friends and counterpart. 


All in all, not so bad when things even out.  There are plenty more I could add to these lists but this is what first comes to mind.  There's just about three months left with my time here so I'm trying to soak it all up figure out just exactly I will say goodbye to some people and still try to wrap my mind around waking up in America everyday come December. Any suggestions?