Feeling very tired today. I chose to blame Monday for it. I’ve been feeling tired a lot lately, though. I worry that it’s Turkmenistan that is tiring me, the constant fear of the government and general paranoia. Being here is hard, and not in the ways I expected it to be difficult.

Also feeling grouchy today, so do not be surprised if this entry is eviler than usual.

Spent the weekend driving around in the newly purchased car, and making travel plans. Kir goes to Tashkent for three weeks tomorrow; to work on a paper so he can finally get his degree. After that we both go to Istanbul for a few days. That’s when things get stupid.

We’re going to Istanbul for financial reasons – the way my contract is written, I have to leave Central Asia every so often so that I get my full salary. So the trip to Istanbul will actually be profitable for me. And as long as it was basically free, I decided that Kir should come with me and we’d have a mini-vacation.

And then, since I am absolutely the world’s best daughter-in-law, I said to Kir “Why don’t we invite your parents to meet us in Istanbul?” I would have preferred my own parents (and so I suspect would have Kir), but they have both been to Istanbul umpteen times and they can’t travel simultaneously because of the dogs. So Kir emailed and invited his parents, expecting that they would say no.

Instead, they said yes. Kind of. They said yes, only it had to be the week after I needed to go. So we figured out that Kir could stay in Turkey after I left, have a say to himself, and then meet up with his parents. And since life in Turkey is no more expensive than life here, there was no problem with Kir staying in Istanbul. I mean, if he’s going to be unemployed, he should get something out of it.

The next day they called at nine in the morning, woke us both up, and said they wanted to go to Paris, not Istanbul. Apparently they had found cheap tickets to Paris. They offered to pay Kir’s fare to Paris so we wouldn’t lose any money. And, groggy as he was, Kir said he’d think about it. By that afternoon, his parents had their hearts set on France and there was no stopping the trip.

We ran the numbers (actually created an excel spreadsheet) and now know that having Kir go to France will cost us about $350 more than Turkey would have, even if we let Kir’s parents pay for his ticket to Paris. In addition to that, the other thing we forgot was that just meeting Kir’s parents in Turkey would cost about $200 more than it would have to just go ourselves.

So now we’re paying an extra $550 so that Kir can go to Paris and he doesn’t even really want to go. Especially since his parents also seem determined to go to EuroDisney. Both of us were feeling seriously disgruntled by the time the France plans were settled, and we figured out why. We didn't really want to go on a vacation with them. We wanted to show them Turkey. Turkey is enough like Ashgabat for them to have a little taste of what our expat life is like, and it would have served as a warm-up for an eventual trip to Ashgabat. It would also have prepared them for Kevin’s sister’s visit here next summer. France is nothing. It’s a vacation with his parents and we don’t really have the money for stuff like that.

Having said that, I am thinking of insisting that we pay for Kir’s ticket to France ourselves. I feel like making the point that we are not kids any more, and they can’t just rearrange our plans for us and make it okay by giving us cash. $413 is a lot of money to make a point with, though.

I could us advice on that, actually. Email me – Tashkent@diaryland.com or sign the guestbook (link at top).

It’s weird. I am much more willing to stay connected to my parents in terms of wanting a close connection with them in my life – wanting to live near them and talk to them a lot, and Kir is much more willing to remain financially dependent on his parents. He has no problem letting them pay for things like plane tickets or restaurant meals, which really bothers me. I feel like as long as people are giving you money, they expect to tell you what to do. Rearrange your vacation plans, for example.

Kir feels wretched about all this. It all happened a little too fast for him to figure it out and stop it, and now he’s feeling guilty. I’m the one who is working, and he’s the one who goes to France, on a trip we can’t really afford. I’ve been trying to put the best face on things – we’re stuck with the trip now, Kir might as well enjoy it and not spend the whole time feeling like carp because of the circumstances. He’s never been to France, and he’s been to Turkey before, so it’s not a total waste of time.

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USAID is one of many donors for the project I work for. The views expressed herein are the author’s own views and do not necessarily reflect those of the author’s employer or especially those of the United States Agency for International Development or the United States Government. And I mean it. I probably give the US government heart attacks.