Dushanbe Spring 2

Our volleyball league started. Finally!! Finally playing!! We only played twice in the end, but we won three times. How does that happen? Neither psychology nor philology showed up. We still had to come to officially win the victory after 15 minutes (in the truest sense of the word!). Unfortunately, we lost the first game against the rectorate. They were unbeatable in terms of fair play and sportsmanship. The Russians we beat were also not in good shape. The way our team dealt with "mistakes" was abysmal. It was like a culture of whipping for mistakes. Really uncomfortable, it was constantly about winning. People were scolded, and there were attempts to cheat, and actual cheating (looking at you, cultural leader!!), and there was always some sort of discussion. Even the referee had a hard time with this attitude. I already know why I didn't bring a frisbee, why I don't talk about Ultimate, it's a concept from another planet. What else happened: Nowruz is almost here. A splendid occasion to force all women to wear traditional clothing (on the 14th, no women at all were allowed on the university campus if they were out and about - of course, the women were double punished because not coming (at least on time) also meant a missing entry. That's how it goes in a patriarchal society. I really like some things and peculiarities here, but the lack of freedom that I (as a woman) am confronted with annoys me more and more every week.