The Impact of Living Cross Culturally

by Brad & Rachel Fitzgerald, Field Staff, Uzbekistan

A Normal Day? Rachel’s Perspective

People sometimes ask us what a normal day here is like. Actually, we have yet to figure out how to answer this question. As we settle into life here, every day has its own flavor. So, for now, let me tell you about today.

My husband, Brad, started the day teaching Foundations of Electrical Engineering to a group of second year students at Samarkand International University of Technology (SIUT). He worked with them on Kirchhoff’s Voltage Law (the sum of the voltage differences around any closed loop in a circuit must be zero), which proved to be a challenging concept for them.

Brad teaching at SIUT

While Brad was at school, one of our neighbors came over to help me with our girls. Our oldest daughter, Jane, is almost two years old now and is growing in the local language, due to the time and intentionality our neighbor gives her.

Afterwards, Brad came home from the university and worked on preparing for our language lesson that happened this afternoon. Our language teacher arrived at our house just as we were putting down Jane for her nap, so we handed her our youngest (Ellia, 5 months old now) to hold. After Jane was down, I grabbed our language notebooks and set some snacks on the table.

After two hours of language learning, our brains were spent, and Jane was awake. It was time to make dinner and then bake cookies for our team leader’s cookie decorating party she planned to host for students from SIUT. Hosting parties like this is just one of the ways we try to invest in the students holistically.

So, there you have it – a day in our life!

Rachel looking out at her neighborhood street at sunset

For me, some days involve visiting friends, running errands or learning how to cook a local dish. Other days include Brad’s lesson prep and practicing Uzbek flashcards. Nearly every day, we take walks around our neighborhood as a family. We do dishes, read stories, make mistakes and learn from the people around us.

We do real human things with real human people and in the process, learn more what it means to be human. An experience that crosses cultures. Each day, we move closer towards assimilating to the culture here, but many days, still feel like we’re saltwater fish in a freshwater pond. I constantly hear myself saying in Uzbek, “Can your repeat that?” “I’m sorry, I’m not understanding” and “I didn’t know that.”

Like people everywhere, often our weeks come with unexpected joys and challenges. I look back and see all the ways we were carried along, the people who gave us so much patience and grace, and I know each one is a gift. We are different people than when we arrived in Uzbekistan a year and a half ago, and we wouldn’t have it any other way.

Impacting Uzbekistanis and Many More - Brad’s Perspective

After one and a half years in Samarkand, I’ve been reflecting on the impact our presence has on others and on us. While Rachel’s description of daily life may give you some insight into how we have grown and changed, I’ll try to describe the things we’ve seen happening with other people.

Michael, an aerospace engineer and short-term REI visitor from the USA, teaches freshman engineering students about his engineering role at his companyOne of the great privileges afforded by our presence here is to facilitate and observe relationships that form between local people and short-term visitors from the U.S. My good friend Michael, an aerospace engineer, visited for a couple weeks in Fall 2025 to explore life in Samarkand and to share his professional experience with freshman engineering students at SIUT. Michael connected especially well with one student specifically, who even took him out to play tennis.

Another friend of ours, Amy (an acute care nurse practitioner), visited Samarkand as a part of a medical team exploring partnerships with local hospitals and medical universities. My father, who visited last summer, bonded with our first language helper. They discovered that they share similar values and still stay in touch with one another to this day. Cross-cultural and cross-national relationships have much potential to enrich everyone involved.

I also enjoy contributing specifically towards developing teaching skills and strategies at SIUT. I was able to significantly contribute towards recruiting and organizing speakers for a week-long faculty development workshop at SIUT in August 2025. I also recently led two short sessions related to active learning and assessment strategies for a mid-year teaching workshop for the School of Engineering faculty.

One staff member in particular seems especially eager to find ways to make engineering learning hands-on and practical. I’m hoping that this type of work – investing in the development of professors – can become an increasing focus of my work at the university. After all, developing people is REI’s goal: building people to build nations.

Lastly, investing in SIUT’s professors represents an impact on people not only from Uzbekistan, but also in professors from many other nations (Iran, Algeria, Indonesia, to name only a few). Our team does many things to try to build community among the university faculty, such as cookie decorating parties, movie nights, Thanksgiving dinners, and more.

Faculty from SIUT gather for a Thanksgiving celebration hosted by REI in November. The sticky notes on the wall represent things for which the faculty wrote they were thankful.

One Uzbekistani professor and his family (wife and two girls similar in age to our girls) have become good friends for us – we shared many meals together and have even gone horseback riding with them. Our conversations have grown more personal, reflecting a deepening, holistic relationship. We hope to continue making a positive impact on others’ lives even outside of university work.