Yesterday we saw a fight on the bus. It was kind of strange and I'm not sure exactly what the fight was about (my Russian-lanugage eavesdropping needs some improvement). Anyways, there was a woman breastfeeding in a fairly unabashed fashion (there is discreet breastfeeding and then there is flashy breastfeeding, which I typically reserve for home and le leche league meetings). Then there were words exchanged between the mother and the woman who collects the bus fare. I was assuming they were discussing the appropriateness of public breastfeeding, but that may be in the eye of the beholder. I'm not sure what the laws are (if any) on the issue. Words apparently weren't enough, and the women started hitting each other. It was so crazy, and it happened right in front of us... literally 1 foot away from us. Malcolm was really kind of freaked out. Of course, we kind of were too.. but I was actually extremely interested in what was going on, so I was trying to gather all the info and observations I could. Then this man a few seats back said something like, "quit fighting in front of the foreigners!" and someone broke up the fight.
I'm not even going to offer any potential explanations for this set of events, especially since I didn't fully understand what was going on. The researcher in me wanted to sit everyone down for a full on interview after the fact so that I could really get to the bottom of things. The mother in me just wanted to make sure Malcolm understood it's not nice to hit people. In the end, I think stuff like this can happen anywhere, so it's not a particularly Kazakh phenomenon and I won't pass judgement (though there could be an interesting discussion about the variable effectiveness of nurse-ins versus just beating the crap out of people who tell you you can't nurse in xyz location, but I digress).
On a different note.. sorry for the lack of postings. Life here is kind of exhausting as we adjust. But we'll try to ramp it up!
Wow sounds like the wild west or something! you are truly on an adventure!
ReplyDeleteI was also interested in what was worth fighting over, but I tried to keep a straight face so that I didn't look nosey. I was surprised to look over and see Caress smiling and interpreting for me (for which I'm thankful).
ReplyDeleteI'm intrigued by this story because it could have been an altercation between two ethnicities. Russian looking conductors usually are on the busses going out to the university. If this were a Kazakh mother, then there could have been words exchanged as you suggested. However, it could have been two Kazakh women and the conductor might have been older and so it would have been expected that the younger mother kowtow to the elder. Host of different things going on, but it could be a socio-economic thing where the mother didn't have anywhere to go so she just stayed on the bus.
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