Obama

Due to the presence of Russians, there are plenty of white people in Zhezkazgan, but nonetheless the three volunteers in the city stick out like a sore thumb -- in part because we may comprise the entire ex-pat community. Our obvious foreign-ness was summarized yesterday when I went to the post office f0r the first time. I walked up to the desk in the P/O box room and said hello to the lady, who obviously had never seen me before. Instead of questioning my identity or even asking what box, she reached into P/O box 18, handed me the contents, and resumed what she had been doing, all without saying a word. Well, that was easy. According to Robert, P/O box 18 gets every piece of English-language mail that comes to the city; if it is clearly labelled for another box, it is assumed a typo and given to us anyway.

When more talkative Kazakhstanis recognize that we are foreign, which happens frequently, there is usually a pretty standard set of questions whose lack of variety is limited by our language ability more than a lack of imagination on their part. It usually goes like this:

"Where are you from?"
"What are you doing here?"
"Where do you live?"
"Do you like Zhezkazgan?"
"Obama...he's good. What do you think about Obama?"

Talking American politics is a whole different ballgame here than it is in Europe. Kazakhstanis don't have a ton of knowledge about domestic American politics in part because they don't have the same international links that European society does, but mostly because the USA does not play a huge role in Kazakhstani foreign affairs. From what I can tell, most people know that (a)he's black and (b)he's not George Bush -- but most are unaware that he's not currently president. It's an interesting exercise in psychology that he can get universal approval from a society despite that society knowing virtually knowthing about him or his policies. I think Kazakhstan is far from unique on the world stage in this respect. I'm an Obamaphile but it's still slightly troubling to see the complete lack of reasoning behind a belief.

On the other hand, it's miles ahead of what it was like on the European hostel circuit during the Bush administration - especially because I've spent a fair amount of time in Eastern Europe when American travelers were more likely to be isolated. There's nothing worse than listening to a chorus of hypocritical coffeehouse Europeans bitching endlessly about everything under the sun. I became personally responsible for every decision and action of the US government and therefore became subject to knee-jerking groupthink of the worst kind -- even though I voted for the glorious John Kerry (sorry dad). Another one of my favorite things from this period were the Canadians who, to a man, had a maple leaf patch on their packs. They called it patriotism but it was clearly the "I'm not American so please don't even start with me" patch.

In any case, in over three months in Kazakhstan, I have yet to face even mild hostility over my nationality or anything else. The people here could teach most of the world a thing or two about hospitality.