Updated post--October 24th

Hello—

What I previously posted is more or less a summary of the last few weeks. Now this is updated for today, the 24^th of October.

I have never been so happy to use the internet. Seriously, I had an actual dream a couple nights ago about using wireless internet. How pathetic is that? It’s kind of nice being disconnected from the world and not be completely dependent on technology. But I gotta say, I am loving me some internet right now.

Life in Ukraine is great/stressful/fun/crazy… every emotion and feeling. I have been here for pretty much a month. This has been a good week. I co-taught a lesson in the local school to 7^th graders, and it was great. While the topic was hard for us to teach (Present Perfect Tense) it was still fun and definitely made me feel more confident about teaching here. But I have only taught two lessons so far in my school. After school vacation, which is next week, I will begin teaching 2-3 lessons a week, and will stop co-teaching. Everytime we teach, we are observed by the actual Ukrainian English teacher for that class, our fellow volunteers in our town, and our Peace Corps technical trainer, so after every class we teach we debrief and get suggestions and comments from everyone. It is incredibly helpful.

At our school there is a woman who is in charge of extracurricular activities and other things, and she has asked us to assist in an event they are having on December 1^st for World AIDS days. We will do a presentation for about 80 high school students at the school about HIV/AIDS information, safe sex practices, testing and information about HIV/AIDS in Ukraine. I think it is going to be a really important event and I am glad that the school asked us to help out. Ukraine has named HIV/AIDS as an epidemic, with the infection rate as high as some African nations. I only wish we could present this to the entire high school population at our school, and not just a portion of them. So if anyone has any useful info/resources about HIV/AIDS, email them to me!

Over the weekend, I made Vareniki with my host mom and her sister. Vareniki are basically dumplings filled with nearly anything, and it is a Ukrainian tradition. We filled half of them with mashed potatoes and the other half with a cabbage/carrot/onion mixture. It was delicious and really fun to make. I am glad that my host mom lets me help with the cooking, because I love to cook and I am enjoying learning how to make some new things, especially Ukrainian specialties! I am also really happy she likes vegetables and she seriously makes the most amazing salads. Actually, both of my moms (American mom and Ukrainian mom) are fabulous cooks. J

Last night my host mother’s granddaughter spent the night. She is 7 (same age as Rafael!) and we had so much fun. She is a total goofball, just like me, so we spent the whole evening laughing, doing origami and watching the Ukrainian dance show which everyone in this country seems to be totally obsessed with (and now I am too!) I have already found a couple of shows that I like to watch with my host mom-mostly Ukrainian soap operas. Amazing. The dancing show is good. Plus I enjoy watching American shows and movies dubbed over. The other night me, my host brother and host mother watched some terrible Tom Cruise movie I had never seen dubbed over in Russian it was great. Also House is on all the time, and that’s also a good one to watch dubbed over.

I am looking forward to going to Kyiv (hopefully next week). I don’t know what we will do when we get there, but I have heard it is a beautiful and fascinating city, and I can’t wait.

Last week for one of our cross-cultural sessions, we received a really interesting history lesson about Ukraine. One of the things I had heard prior to my arrival here, and that I experience here every day, is that nothing is wasted (mostly in regards to food). I had heard that bread is sacred and is never thrown away. This is something that I think is really great about this culture, and something Americans could learn from. We are all so wasteful in the states, including myself. Between wasting perfectly good food, to wasting electricity, to water... the list goes on. Here, nothing is wasted or taken for granted. Showers or bathes are quick and not usually taken for enjoyment, just to quickly get clean and get out. People are so efficient about only turning on lights if it is necessary, and turning it off as soon as you leave the room. Same with food, nothing is wasted. If we--for instance--eat fish, my host mom puts out all of the bones and leftover little bits of fish that were not eaten for stray cats to come and eat. And yes, bread is sacred. Even if bread goes moldy, it is saved. I am not sure what it will be used for, but my host mom has a bag of bits of old, stale and some moldy bread. I am sure it will be used for something. So the reason that this is so ingrained in the culture is mainly because in the early 30s, Stalin took every last bit of grain from peasants, leaving them with little to no food for themselves. Even during a year where there was a terrible drought, he stripped the peasants of all of their food, leaving much of Ukraine suffering from terrible famine. People and families starved to death, and if they attempted to leave for Russia, guards were there waiting and would kill them. It was really terrible. And to ensure that the world did not hear about this famine, he shipped the grain that he stole from Ukrainians to other countries, to give the impression that everything in Ukraine was fine. While there has been tragedy in parts of Ukrainian history, there has also been a lot of triumphs and amazing events that have taken place. I learned some other really interesting things about Ukraine last weekend and I am looking forward to reading and hearing more about this country.

There is still much more to say, but for now, that will have to be all. Thanks for reading!!!

Much love,

Rose

PS Sorry this is so long. I am just not sure the next time I will have internet!

Ukraine: The last 3 weeks!

I will try to sum up three weeks in just a few paragraphs….

My town, where I have my three months of training has a population of 8000. Yes, 8000. It’s so tiny! I had no idea it was that small. The town also has a 13-person police department, 2 schools (grades 1-12) and also 4 colleges, which draw about 2000 commuting students everyday. The deputy mayor said that the town is very safe and “there are no gangsters”, so that’s good! Also that most places are safe, and that if college students hit on us in the center of town, just “use our humor to tell them politely that we are not interested.” I don’t think “using humor” is the easiest thing to do when there is a severe language barrier, but if this happens, I will try!

Right behind my house is a nice little forest and one of the colleges is located there (I saw a whole bunch of students out having a dance party of some sort and Akon was blasting from a stereo.) There are a number of statues and monuments in the forest there that we walked to. A large statue of a man named Shevchenko who was a famous Ukrainian writer. There is a big statue of Lenin and also a WWII monument. My town is really great and has some beautiful areas. There are two rivers running through it—one of which eventually leads down to the Black Sea. It even has a beautiful sandy beach, but it is too cold already to swim.

The food here is great—my host mother is a fantastic cook. And let me just say what they serve in the states and call “borscht” is not borscht. Borscht is not beet red liquid with sour cream on top. Real borscht is flavorful and delicious. She makes AMAZING borscht. I don’t even know what is in it—beets (but not many), carrots, chicken, beans, potatoes, more veggies. So delicious. Also she has the best garden ever—we eat insanely good tomato salad every night with the best tomatoes I have ever had. I also hope parsley is good for you since we eat the parsley from her garden by the handful every night.

Even though my Russian is very very minimal and her English is nonexistent, we are still communicating and we already have established some jokes, and I also have jokes with her sister, who lives across the street. I am looking forward to when I can have meaningful conversations in Russian, and not just be able to say “I like tomato”, “I like borscht”, “I like baseball.” I mean seriously I sound like the character in Anchorman who says “I love lamp”, “I love carpet”. Okay I can say more then those things, but I am just looking forward to the day that I can really keep up with my host family, and also so I can understand what they are saying about me, since I know they talk about me all the time!! J

In general, from what I had heard about the Ukrainian style of dress has pretty much been true. Many short skirts, high heels, lots of make up, etc. Women wear heels through the rain and mud and they never seem to get dirty, yet the second I step outside, even if the sun is shining, I somehow manage to get my shoes covered in dirt. At our school, even the students dress way stylish. I mean 5^th graders wearing crazy amazing boots, skirts, heels, funky jackets, shiny tote bags. Amazing.

Here is a summary of what learning Russian is like: Our language teacher explains a grammar rule and shows a chart, like for instance, a chart on how to make nouns singular and plural. Seems simple enough, right? NO. First make sure you can figure out if the word is female, masculine or neutral, then decide in which way you will be using the verb that goes along with the noun, and figure out if that verb will be used in the nomitive, genetive, dative or accusitive case, only then can you make the noun plural or singular. And now, ignore that ENTIRE chart you just read, because there are a million exceptions to the rules and very few words will actually follow a consistent rule. This is the point that we all crash and burn and say who invented this crazy language!?!?! Then we complain and smash our heads on the table and beg our teacher for a break because we cannot handle the insane grammar rules of this language. Then he says no, and we endure 3 more hours of inconsistent, confusing, crazy grammar and vocabulary words that we cannot pronounce correctly with an alphabet that we are still trying to figure out. Today we had a Russian test. I think we all bombed it. Oh Russian—you are such a mystery to me.

So I don’t know how this happened, but I didn’t bring ANY hot sauce with me to Ukraine. Seriously, I don’t know how this happened. Although I guess that makes sense since I finished packing at 1AM the day I left for Philadelphia. My procrastination in packing might also explain why I brought like 20 pairs of tights and only 2 skirts. Oh well. One of my fellow volunteers brought a bottle of Siracha and when we have our lunch breaks during Russian, we slather that on everything we eat. We have finished half the bottle after only 3 weeks. Yikes! If you want to be my most favorite person ever, send me a bottle of Tapatio or Siracha once I have a permanent address. I will be forever grateful.

I have a cell phone! WOOHOO. I finally feel like a real person. I was getting tired of seeing 7 year olds walking through town showing off their cell phones. It’s very exciting. We all got Bluetooth phones to try to get Internet on our computers. Not sure if it will work. We shall see! My host mom was so happy that I have finally been able to have contact with people back home. Every day she had been asking if I talked to my mama and everyday I said no, I haven’t. And now that I have (and with other people!) she is happy, and so am I! If you want my cell number, let me know!

While training is stressful, I am having a great time.

I miss you all very much and wish you were all here with me!

HELLO EVERYONE!*

9/30/2009

*written by Rose; typed into the blog by Cara

Today was my first full day in my town, which meant that we had our first language lesson and we walked through the center of town for the first time. Let me tell you -- Russian is hard to learn and understand! BUT after only 2 lessons, I already have down most of the Cyrillic alphabet and have almost completely learned the numbers 1-100, as well as some introductory conversations. My language lessons are taught in the home of my language teacher, who is living here temporarily -- his home is somewhere else.

I am sure there are much smaller towns in Ukraine, but my town definitely qualifies as "small." I am not sure yet, but I just asked my host brother if there is internet in town, and he said no. I've heard that it is sometimes possible to get internet with a bluetooth phone, but that may only work in larger cities or towns.

There are dogs EVERYWHERE. Most are on the small side -- some are behind fences but many are just loose. Today my host brother walked me to my language class, and we walked past a dead dog on the sidewalk. It wasn't roadkill on the road -- it was just there on the sidewalk, its eyes wide open, with flies all around. I'm sorry to conjure up this kind of an image but it was a very startling thing for me to see, it was so sad and disturbing.

Right now, however, me and my host brother are watching TV. At the moment, we are watching Ukranian news but we were watching American MTV and Russian MTV a minute ago. It was so weird/comforting when he first turned on American MTV and a Lada GaGa video was on. It was like I forgot that American music and culture even existed.

Last night, my first night here, I gave my family some American souvenirs. I gave my host mother some nice lotion and a Boston shot glass. I also gave her sister lotion and a Harvard shot glass. I gave my host brother a Red Sox hat and his cousin a baseball that had the Red Sox logo on it.

Tonight at dinner, my host mother served the leftovers from yesterday's dinner. she also laid out some sprigs of parsley! I don't usually eat parsley by itself but it was very good. Then she took a clove of garlic from the fridge and held it up for me to see. I tried -- successfully I think -- to explain that I like garlic, so she handed me one half. Next, she instructed me to put salt on my half. We each did that, then she took a bit of the raw garlic, ate a sprig of parsley and then a bit of bread. I was thinking, she is awesome! People never eat raw garlic! So I did what she did and? Delicious.

Okay, so you now, we are now watching HOUSE on TV (dubbed in Russian, of course). Yay, Dr. House.

Apparently there are two Australians and a Canadian living in my town who are teaching English. We have yet to meet them, but I would like to.

I am surprised how much I am able to communicate with my host fmaily, even though we speak different languages. I guess I undertsimated how useful and easy it can be just using gestures, signs, pointing, expressions, etc. Even though for the most part, we have no idea what the other is saying, we still manage to communicate -- I can't communicate exactly what I need to say, but I can still find a way to get the point across.

One I am able to fully master the alphabet, that will be great. In the meanwhile, I feel like a little kid again -- walking around and not understanding any signs in town or being able to read anything, or being able to sound out words but not knowing what the vocabulary means. That will change ... hopefully ...

Until next time!

Love,

Rose