By Chaz Martin
Kazakhstan. The very name evokes childhood visions in all of us. I remember running across a grassy field when I was a boy. My hand clenched a string as my golden retriever chased the blue kite sailing ahead. As I watched the kite fly high into the clouds, I wondered if Kazakhstan would ever be within my grasp, or if it would remain as elusive as the puffy clouds that floated above.
I am sure that everyone can recall the first time they heard about Kazakhstan. For me, it was when my fifth grade class rendezvoused at the neighborhood ice cream stand to watch CNN. I always ordered a vanilla cone, dipped in chocolate. After exchanging witty double entendres about the “Brown Cow,” my fellow classmates would fix their eyes to the screen. The Soviet Union had just fallen. One of the girls in the class confessed that she had a crush on Boris Yeltsin.
Then, the news came that changed our world forever. Kazakhstan declared its independence. Situated between China, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Russia, it had always been tucked in the cradle of democracy. Now that Kazakhstan was free, the chance for us to travel to its steppe became possible.
And now, with an acceptance letter from the Peace Corps under my belt, I know that my boyhood dream will be realized. On June 7, I embark on a two-year journey to the fruited plains of the former Soviet state of Kazakhstan. My assignment is to teach English to the Kazakhs, after a three-month crash course that will bring me up to speed on Russian. Of course, three months is plenty of time to become fluent in Russian. Cyrillic alphabet: piece of cake!
Although I have always been a Kazakh aficionado, I decided to research the country to find out just what the hell I had gotten myself into. Apparently, Stalin had dumped his dissidents and ethnic opposition in Kazakhstan. Anyone who he felt would destabilize his regime or question his authority would be carted off to the mountains in the East. When the Soviet Union collapsed, most of these exiles went home.
It seems that Kazakhstan will once again house the pariah. Perhaps the Peace Corps official who placed me in Central Asia is a girl whom I have dated, working in league with a committee of my exes. They likely examined a globe and placed me as far from Western society as possible (without drilling a channel to the center of the earth). No longer will I be able to stumble across the Bluegrass state. The Kentucky Colonels have shown me the door.
Yet something tells me that I will be at home in Kazakhstan. A professor here at the university informed me that the Kazakhs like to eat gluttonous amounts of meat and drink excessive amounts of alcohol. Perhaps our tastes are not so different after all. As long as I have some vodka and roasted horse leg to keep me warm on a winter night (that can dip to negative fifty degrees) I am confident that I will survive.
Although I spent my childhood drawing in Kazakhstan Koloring books while watching Kazzy the Klown on television, I am a bit apprehensive. Since the War on Terror, the Peace Corps has pulled its volunteers from Uzbekistan and the surrounding area, effectively making Kazakhstan the closest country to Afghanistan that the Corps is still involved in. This is not going to be a jolly mission trip to Jamaica. This will be a two-year gig in terror central.
So I am packing my bags, ladies and gentlemen. Last call for marriage proposals, paternity suits, fan mail, prank calls, and any and all accusations toward yours truly of racism, sexism, hedonism, communism, or autism.
Chaz Martin is a senior history major and opinion editor for The Cardinal.
opinioneditor@louisvillecardinal.com
