9/9

Wow so it's been months since I've written anything. I'm a terrible blogger and I'm not even going to try and catch up with everything right now, but I will quickly enlighten you with my amazing summer:

One week after I moved to Kherson I took two buses to the Peace Corps summer camp Big Bang in Gaivoron and taught mutliculture awarness classes three times a day for a little over two weeks to some very amazing Ukrainian students. Here I got the opportunity to meet and work with other volunteers, which was very exciting since I had just sworn-in as a volunteer. Side story:During my stay at camp Big Bang, I went to get an xray at a local hospital in Gaivoron because I had this giant bone like thing sticking out of my foot. It's on the inside of my left foot (opposite foot of the planters afasciitis (spelling?) so now both feet hate me) and is not breaking the skin, but it definitely shouldn't be there for more than three weeks. At that point it didn't so much hurt any more, but it was just freaking me out. So after all the volunteers encouraged me to call a PCMO (Peace Corps Medical Officer) we set up something up with the local hospital. The camp nurse, an English speaking Ukrainian camp counselor, myself, and a camper all piled into a taxi and headed for the hospital. I walked inside and immediately I was taken to the back room to the “chief of medicine” who is 900 years old, has on glasses thicker than Pride & Prejudice, and is wearing a chef's hat. I take of my shoes a prop both my nasty camp feet onto a chair next to him as instructed. I tell him that it only hurts when I walk a lot and it doesn't hurt ever day. He starts pressing down around my foot and asking if it hurts. I tell him 'no' and then he presses as hard as he can right on top of the bone (or whatever it is) and of course I almost scream because that definitely hurts. Finally, I get to the technicians room where I'd officially stepped back into the 1940s technology world, hopped up on the table, and got my xrays. I called my PCMO who talks with my chef, I mean “chief of medicine,” and my PCMO then tells me that I have small fracture, but it's not a bad one and everything will be ok. I find this interesting considered this literally appeared out of nowhere after walking around one day and I didn't fall or do any sort of intense or damaging physical activity to make this happen. Anyway, my PCMO tells me to take it easy and we hung up. That night the Ukrainian camp director comes up to me and tells me she has a funny story. Apparently, one of the nurses from the hospital came to the camp and told her the following: Before I came to the hospital all of the nurses and staff were telling the “chief of medicine” to study and review all of the foot anatomy and diseases because an American girl was coming in for an xray. They were worried because he's so old. To top it off, after I left the hospital, the chef, I mean chief, wrote down that I had a fracture in my right shoulder. Umm... ha-ha-ha. Needless to say, I left for Kiev three days later. My PCMO looked at the xray and assured me that it's not a tumor or bone or fracture, but it's soft muscle tissue hardened and will go away after rest, stretches, and ice. I told him about the old doctor in Gaivoron and what he wrote down in my chart. He just laughed and said, “Welcome to third world country medical services.”After Big Bang, Jenny (clustermate and also went to Big Bang) and I went to Kherson for two days and then went to volunteer at the Ukrainian summer camp Pribrezhniy in Lazorne for three weeks. It's an hour and half south of Kherson and is on the Black Sea. My Ukrainian friend, Alina (who was the Ukrainian that came to get me at my swearing-in ceremony, who was supposed to be my counterpart, and who helps me with everything), knows many people that work there and made the phone calls for this to happen for us. She is THE BEST! Basically, we were sent on vacation. We taught English Clubs for an hour twice a day and then helped Yulia, one of the camp leaders, with the 30 Russian kids we were bunking with. However, a week and half later our Russian kids left because we had come in the middle of their stay at camp and they moved us to a private room. There were other groups there, but we weren't assigned to any of them. Jenny and I worked two hours a day and then spent the rest of our time on the beach. Besides the food poisoning I had for a day, it was the most fun I've had in Ukraine thus far. We swam with jelly fish and hundreds of their babies, we saw wild dolphins over a beer at sunset, we had a Russian couple proudly buy us our first hotdog in Ukraine, we danced at Club Orange one night until 5am, I played poker for the first time with the other Ukrainian camp leaders, I met an interesting gay Russian racist (long story-ask if you want to know), we had sunset walks on the beach almost every night and then fell asleep early to an American movie and a Twix bar and then slept through breakfast, and last but not least: I woke up one night to Jenny speaking Russian in her sleep. She was saying, “Listen, it's a new game,” but in Russian. Which is what we said 100x a day for our English Club kids. It was hilarious.One week after returning to Kherson, I went to Crimea for vacation with Alina and her girlfriends. Arriving in Evpatoria at 4am the first day we wasted no time going to the beach. One difference between American girls and Ukrainian girls: they want to get their time worth. Every single night we went to the clubs until sun rise, sleep for two hours, and then go to the beach before 10am. Every day I heard the same thing, “We'll sleep on the beach.” However, we would, of course, go to the hottest beach club where music played so loud you couldn't even think. After a couple of days I got used to never sleeping though. We went on roller coaster rides, fancy restaurants, had champagne bought for us, went to the historical old town, walked through shops, the wax museum, and the piers. All of the girls spoke English very well, but mostly they would speak Russian. It was very hard for me to understand because most of it was slang, but after a couple of days, the mix between my “whatever” attitude and getting used to all their voices, I could understand some of it and what I didn't understand didn't bother me. However, after a few drinks at night time, they would be more relaxed and speak more English. : )Most importantly, this summer, after spending four weeks at the Black Sea, I got THE BEST TAN I'VE EVER HAD IN MY LIFE and that was without burning or peeling (thanks to the two Peace Corps provided bottles of sunscreen I used).

So now...It's September and I've finished my first week of school, but only observing. All the schools in Ukraine begin on September 1st. This year it was on a Thursday and the celebration was really nice at our school. All of the parents and students come to school to give flowers to the teachers and listen to motivational speeches from the school administration while handing out special awards to students. Right before it began, I was asked to introduce myself to everyone after the administration spoke. Luckily, my school director, Natalia, said I could say it in English (not that there was any other option). Peace Corps helps us practice introduction speeches like this one before training is over, but I think the information they help us with is stupid. I would to say something along the lines of, “Hi my name is Beth Henderson and I'm very excited to be teaching your students this year.. blah blah blah ...thank you for this opportunity.” Instead they teach us, “Hi my name is Beth, I have a bachelors degree in _____, the classes I've taught during training in Ukraine are ______, and I helped put together a summer camp about _____.” No one cares about that stuff. Once you've said you're from America, they've pretty much stopped listening and start nodding their heads thinking, “That's why her clothes are baggy and she doesn't have on high heels.” Anyway, First Bell was really fun and I enjoyed seeing all of my future students. I'll be teaching at Kherson School #2 for 160 students. My school is the size of a village school and considered extremely small for a city of 330,000 people. Yes, people, I live in a huge city. At first, I was pretty disappointed and couldn't figure out why I was in such a big city, but now that I've spent a week at my school I get it. Furthermore, I live in teach in the center of the city which I absolutely love. The city is split up into four parts: the center and the three outer suburbs. I live in the outskirts of the center, but it's still the center. To get to school, I walk 20 minutes down the boulevard of fancy shops and restaurants where jazz music is played through the loud speakers all day. My school is actually located on this fancy touristy boulevard so there are no cars driving through which is very nice. However, my school is not so fancy and because it's in the dead center of town there is no grass for kids to play, but only the broken asphalt yard in the back. Luckily, there is the big Lenin Park across the street that's quite beautiful. So far, I love my house, my school, and my city.

For the first two weeks of school I will only be observing. I'm so thankful that I get to do this because now I know when the bell rings on which days (it's rung by hand so sometimes it's a few minutes off which is confusing as well), what students are actually doing when someone is teaching and which students are a problem, which students need help, when the students are more active, etc. Honestly, I'm bored out of mind and scared to death. My counterpart, Kate, is 23 and just graduated so she has no teaching experience. I have more teaching experience in Ukraine than she does so this should be interesting. Unfortunately, she never has a lesson plan, walks into the room, tells the kids to open up their books to page whatever, and starts teaching from there. The thing is, only two students are paying attention so she only teaches to those two students for the entire 45 minute class. I'm completely serious. All of the other children are hitting each other, cursing, running around, throwing paper, talking on their cell phones, or carving their names into the desks. My week has been filled with f*** bombs/phrases to my face and spitballs in my hair. With that said, I can't help but think that if they had something to do they wouldn't act so poorly. Considering my counterpart only teaches to two students with no lesson plan... what else are they supposed to do? They're just kids. During my observations, I sit in the back of room and never say I word... until yesterday. Finally I had to intervene and confiscated matches and a box cutter. I sat watching one of my 7th formers (graders) light matches and throw them out the window onto children playing in the court yard. I got his attention and told him to stop, but he continued to do it. I moved my stuff to the desk directly behind him and he eventually stopped, but I took everything after class. I told my counterpart about it, but she just laughed. So I'm still sort of confused about the policy on students bringing matches and box cutters to class. I don't know, but if you ask me it sounds dangerous to let them do that. Thing is... no one is asking me.

Today is Friday and I'm feeling very T.G.I.F. Plus this morning it was raining and all I wanted to do was sit inside and read a good book. You know that feeling, right? But instead I walked to school in the rain and got my feet soaked in puddle. I was SO close to school and almost made it the whole way without stepping knee deep into water. Maybe next time. Anyway, so my 1st period was the 5th form which is Kate's, my counterpart's, classmaster class. There is a classmaster that is assigned to each form (grade) and Kate is assigned to the 5th form. A classmaster is like a homeroom class. A classmaster is in charge of these students for the entire year. They dole out the discipline and deal with the parents. So naturally I spend the most time with this class because this is the first place I go in the mornings, for lunch, in between classes, and I teach them 4 times a week which is more than any other form. Thank goodness for me because they are precious angels and I love them already. So I take my seat in the back of the room and continue reading my second class management book as well as take notes on the English class. Then my next class rolls around and it's my 7th form again. Today was a great day for the 7th form and they were so well behaved! My little troublemaker in the back brought a huge multi-tool Swiss army knife thing to class and kept pulling out all the saws and blades. However, he wasn't thrusting it towards anyone and he only sawed into the desk a little. Then he got his lighter out, but never lit a thing. Phew. After 2nd period, Kate tells me she's sick and wants to go home. If she goes home, I go home because she is the only English teacher at my school, and there is no point in me sitting in substituted classes all day. So I was home before 11am today. Yay for me! Now I can curl up to that book like I wanted. Somehow I ended up falling asleep to the first season of 30 Rock and woke up at 3pm. Oops.

5/25

Ok since I've missed writing in a month, I'll try to catch you up on what's going.

TRAINING IS ALMOST OVER! Trust me... most of the stuff you don't want to hear. Training hasn't exactly been the greatest experience I've ever had. However, there have been some of the best moments in my life so it has balanced out. Good comes with the bad. So I'll tell you some funny/interesting stories you've missed out on.

Teaching is absolutely amazing and I'm so glad that's what I'll be doing for the next two years. My first few lessons were on Environmental Protection. Awesome! One of the activities included asking students what they use for water for on a daily basis. As they would give examples, we would write them on the board and later they were given three pieces of paper to vote on which were more important. So one of the students raises his hand and says, “To wash my brother.” All of us just died laughing! Rebecca, whom I was co-teaching with at the time, just looks up at me, laughs, and writes “brother wash” on the board. It was hi-larious. “Brother wash” actually got a few votes too.I just want to clarify that Inessa's boyfriend (they're back together now) is not psycho, but actually very very sweet. Blowing up someone's phone is normalno (English phonetic translation of the Russian word 'fine') around here. He is very shy and does everything for her. It's adorable. *6/8 Update: they're broken up and he actually might be a tad crazy*Rebecca and I also taught a class on the book Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein since we were still on the topic Environmental Protection. We talked about all the things that trees could give to us and what we could give them to help them grow. At then end, we split up the poem in 5 sections and had each pair illustrate their section and present their drawing to the class with explanation. It was beautiful. I teared up in the back of the classroom because it really hit me why I was here.I got planters afasciitis (spelling?) during training and was pretty much crippled through a third of it which really sucks when you have to walk every where. By the time I was able to see a doctor it had already gone away.Here in Ukraine they burn their trash. Yeah it's awful, but that's just the way it is. Anyway, Rebecca and I were taking the trash out one day at the house where we go to learn Russian everyday. The land lady has a big barrel in the back where she burns all the trash. However, you have to walk through all the gates that fence in geese and chickens to get there. Rebecca had the trash and I had the giant pot of borsch that had gone bad to take out to the barrel. Some how we let some of the chickens get out. So he we are running around trying to get the chickens back in the fence with trash and borsch in our hands! Finally we started laughing so hard we almost peed our pants right there. We literally had to go inside, use the bathroom, and then try to round up the chickens. So we get back out there and Rebecca suggest locking the other chickens inside this smaller cage sort of thing so we don't let any more out while trying to scare the loose ones back inside. So I scooted a few in there, but then they started jumping out through this tiny hole we didn't see before and it sort of looked like they were hitting their heads on the way down. All the sudden Rebecca screams, “Let them out! I don't want them to rip!” I lost it! Tears were rolling down my eyes and I was in the 'I'm about to pee myself' position even though I had just gone. After we got ourselves together we were able to scare the loose ones back in the cage. Note that we're in black dress pants and nice shoes running around scaring chickens all the while geese are getting pretty close to biting us. Definitely one of my favorite moments in training.The Peace Corps Medical Officers (a.k.a. doctors) came on two separate occasions to give us these day long seminars to our link about medical issues and what not. The first “Personal Health Day,” which we sadly figured out was not an off day for us, we had the pleasure of placing condoms on a dildo individually in front of everyone. It was hilarious! At first it was embarrassing, but by the 3rd person we were trying to race to lighten the mood a bit. Bravo Peace Corps! All your trainees know how to apply condoms in front of strangers. A few weeks later we had our second “Personal Health Day” and this was the best advice that he could give us: “Don't get hit, don't get bit, don't do it, and don't get lit.” Umm... ok.One day we were leaving the school we teach at to go to our Russian language lessons. As we turned onto the our street Rebecca sees a man lying on the grass, points to him and says, “Is that guy dead?” They boys were a little ways in front of us so we screamed for them to come back. This guys was tangled up in his bike with his head on a rock. We just looked around in panic and didn't know what to do. This was a while back the little Russian we knew was probably going to be useless in a community that speaks Ukrainian. This street is a busy street by the way, and an old lady sees everyone freaking out and surrounding this man. She comes to the group and ask if we're from America. Then she flips her hand and tells us in Russian that he's fine. Rebecca nudged the guy and he started grunting. The lady said he was drunk and it was fine. It was 1pm.So the metro station, or public transportation in general, is what I like to describe as “Ten pounds of shit in a 5 pound bag.” It's an extremely tight fit on both the metro and buses. If there is a bus with 25 seats, that means that 30 people can stand in the aisle. Seriously. Also, Ukrainians think drafts will kill you so don't even think about opening the windows. Can't wait until July. Our first trip to Kyiv with our LCF she takes us on the metro and is supposed to show us how to use it. Of course she doesn't and what she does say she waits until it's so loud we can't hear anything. So when the doors to the metro open people rush off, and then everyone rushes on and squishes as many people as possible. And by possible, I mean everyone who wants to get on and makes it before the door shuts. I think my feet weren't even touching the ground at one point. So after our day in Kyiv we have to get back on the metro to get back to our bus. Our LCF starts running for the door without checking to see if everyone was behind her and three of us get left. So now we're standing there without a clue what stop to get off at. Luckily Rebecca and Jenny were spread out on the platform, and Geoff was popping his head out at every stop to try and see them. We have to catch a bus to Meronivka every other Saturday to meet with our link for cross-cultural sessions. On the way back to Boguslav, Jenny, Rebecca, and I tried to catch the small bus. Unfortunately I could only fit my foot on there by the time we got to the door. Jenny and Rebecca made it on, but they hand to stand the entire time squished up against everyone else. In fact, later on they told me that every time the bus stopped a bunch of the passengers would have to jump off to let other people off at their stop. There was a few other buses that left later that day so no worries. Plus the boys hadn't left yet so I went to the cafe with them to grab a beer. We catch the next bus about an hour later. We're about a quarter of the way into the route and the bus breaks down. Awesome. Since we were closer to Meronivka, we decided it would be cheaper to catch a taxi back to Meronivka and then get on the next bus. I called Andrew from our link who lives in Meronivka and he got a taxi number from his family. Ok that's good. So now all we need is the address. No one knows the street name! Are you kidding me? Geoff asked this guy who clearly lived in the house he was sitting in front of and he told him didn't know. Now it's starting to rain, but we found a street sign and zoomed in with my camera to get a good look at it. By that time, another taxi pulled up to pick up a different family and he offered to call his friend to come get us. Sweet! However, less than five minutes later another bus headed to Boguslav pulls up and is able to fit everyone on that bus. We didn't have to pay again either. Good stuff.

Sorry about not keeping up with my blog! Training has been too busy to have extra time for the blog. However, we're starting to slow down a bit so I hope to write more often. Here is what I had written already from a month ago so I'll go ahead and post it. The month of May will just have to be skipped over. Oops.

Saturday 4/2

We have to visit each clustermates' host family for integration/training purposes. So today we went to Rebecca's house to meet her family. She lives with just a host mom who is a university teacher. She lives in a big beautiful home in old town and has the best landscaping of anyone I've seen so far (which is all of three houses). We went inside where she had borsch and hot tea waiting for us which was no shocker because Rebecca says she's always trying to feed her. She's glad her host mom teaches at night so she can fix her own dinners. However, there was an incident where she woke Rebecca up at 1am (she teaches night classes until 12am) with a steaming plate of food and telling her to eat. If you want to live in a place where it's impossible to starve, move to Ukraine. I feel like I eat 5+ times a day. My family always makes me eat when I get home, but then an hour later Inessa will say, “Come to eat.” I get so confused. What is this meal called that's in between lunch and dinner and why am I the only one eating it? Then there's tea and cookies/bread after dinner has settled. For the most part, I can get out of the late night tea and cookies because I go to bed before everyone else. Here let me break it all down for your: there's hot breakfast that also includes what ever was left over from dinner, some sort of coffee/tea break at language training that includes food, lunch, then there's the 'I must feed you as soon as you walk in the door' meal that's an hour before dinner, dinner, and late night chai and chocolate. I thought I might tone up a bit on this trip, but I don't think that is going to happen. The Peace Corps statistics say that in Ukraine men volunteers lose weight and women volunteers gain weight... go figure.

After Rebecca's host family visit, we had to book it over the Geoff's house. Rebecca and Geoff live the furtherst apart than anyone else in the cluster. So here we all are speed walking across the village with fresh borsch just flopping around in our stomachs. We finally make it and now we get to eat again with Geoff's host mom who is also a university teacher. She and Rebecca's host mom are bff and talk every single day. You can definitely tell that she's a teacher because she was drilling Geoff the entire time on his Russian. She walked over to the liquor cabinet and thankfully she pulled out a liqueur. We had a few rounds and it tasted sort of like Bailey's, but had an orange citrus after taste. It's not something I would be able to drink a lot of, but it did taste better than that homemade БAБУШKA (grandmother) vodka. During these host family visit we're supposed to be asking the family questions in Russian and speaking as much Russian as possible. On the wall I spotted this incredible cat calendar that pictured this orange tabby with his tongue sticking out. I thought it was hilarious and wanted to tell her I like it so I pointed to it and said, “I делат that cat calendar.” Immediately, everyone started laughing. Instead of telling her I liked it, I said, 'I do that cat calendar.' Earlier this week I waved to my neighbor on the way to class and said 'good day' in Russian, but then I realized I had said 'good bye.' This community probably thinks I'm a moron.

Sunday 4/3

We went to visit Jenny's family in the afternoon. She's the 5th Peace Corps volunteer they've hosted so they know the ropes. They have the sweetest and cutest son who was helping set the table. He didn't pick his head up the entire time. After pigging out on espresso and chocolate (which we bought for Jenny's host family, but ended up eating ever piece because Ukrainian chocolate is amazing), we headed to the internet cafe to fill out some emergency form for Peace Corps. Of course, the internet didn't work, but one person did manage to get the form downloaded so we copied it to our flash drives and were able to fill it out... kind of. We had about 3 of the 12 names, phone numbers, and addresses they ask for (hospital, police, ambulance, etc.). Not only that, all the names and addresses we had were in Ukrainian so we were mixing Russian and English phonetics together on the computer to spell it all out. Needless to say, we got an email back the next day asking us to correct everything. They wanted the name for “leader of the militia” (like chief of police) and we put something like Nachoblahblah Militsee because that's what our LCF (language and cross-cultural facilitator) gave us. We all thought it was weird that the head militia guy's last name was pronounced militsee because that how you say police in Russian. Of course that was wrong, and our LCF had given us the actual “leader of the militia” position written in Russian instead of the name.

4/3-4/8

Training was brutal as usual. However, I'm quickly forming this, “I'm doing the best I can so whatever,” sort of attitude. This has been the only time in my life where I literally have to take it one day at a time. If I can just get through each day without being suffocated by everything that's being thrown at me, then it's a successful day. I can not think about the future at this point. There are so many projects that have to be complete with barely any resources and so much language that has to be learned in such a short amount of time. I know it's possible and that's all that matters.

There was this sort of insane moment with our LCF this week. We got to an activity that connected with some phrases we did they day before. However, not everyone had them written down because we're never told which ones to write down and because there's not enough time to write everything down (I actually take pictures now). So she called on one of my clustermates to present first in the activity and he/she was trying to explain that they would prefer someone else to start off the activity so he/she could observe and have a refresher of all the phrases. Somehow this got construed into our LCF thinking that my clustermate didn't think this was an important lesson to learn. It was so confusing. Neither of them understood what the other was saying. The rest of us knew exactly what our clustermate was talking about and tried to explain, but it just wasn't being understood. After a few minutes of the back and forth confusion, someone who had written down all the phrases just started the activity to keep the ball rolling. Then someone conjugated one of the nouns wrong and she ran out of the room! All of our mouths dropped and we just stared at each other for a minute. We told ourselves that someone must have been knocking at the door, but finally realized that she totally just had a meltdown. She walked back up to our room less than three minutes later and we continued our lesson. We were in complete shock. This is not the first time she's worked with Peace Corps as a language facilitator. We're only her second group, but we hoped there was something else going on and we're not the worst cluster in the entire world. This is all difficult and overwhelming for everyone, but if anybody is having a meltdown I think trainees should get first dibs.

Thursday 4/7The first day I arrived to XXXXXXXX, Inessa told me about how her birthday was coming up on April 8th, her friend Tori's birthday is on the 7th, and how much fun we were going to have. Tori's parents are great friends with my parents, and Inessa's godmother is Tori's mother. So Thursday rolls around and my host family calls for a taxi to take us since it's too far to walk in the dark (which is good because the potholes and rocks eat me alive in the daytime). The hand me flowers and a birthday card to give to Tori... awkward. So now I'm sitting in the taxi with this bouquet of flowers that have pink glitter sprinkled on top of them that I'm about to give to a 16 year old girl I've never met. So we get to the house and I'm just standing there at the door holding the flowers and the card while no one else has gifts. They open the door, I tell Tori happy birthday (luckily I had seen pictures before), and hand them over. Apparently, she speaks a little English, but she was extremely shy so she didn't say anything. I thought there were going to be a bunch of tweens there, but it was all adults except Margarita, Inessa, and Tori. Adults are in the kitchen and I'm whisked away by the teenagers to Tori's room. There I just sat in complete awkward silence while everyone caught up with each other in Russian/Ukrainian. I just love hanging out with teenagers and I just love hanging out with ones who speak some English, but choose to speak something else... awkward. Tori handed me some pictures to look at while I was sitting there in silence. Wow! Never in my life have I seen such short dresses on such young girls. These 15 year olds were wearing dresses made for 20+ and even I wouldn't be caught dead in them. They were the dresses that were tight on the bottom around the thighs and butt and the loose on the top. It was for a school dance! It's definitely the culture hear to wear short dresses, but I'm shocked that it starts at such a young age.

We finally get to the dinner table that's set for 20 people! In the states, you might be able to fit ten people at this table comfortably so you can only imagine how close we were to each other. On one side they had a futon pulled up to because they didn't have enough chairs. Guess who had the honors of sitting on the futon? Nothing like crawling on top of chairs to get to your place setting at the futon and you can't forget the added bonus of your legs going numb because your knees are higher than your waist... awkward. Anyway, there was TONS of food. I actually counted the plates and there were 38! Can you imagine?! It was an insane amount of food. While people were eating, new fresh food plates just kept coming out of the kitchen. I have no idea how they do this (then again they have no problem leaving for out on the table for days and then eating it so maybe that helped).

The first few minutes of dinner and it's going all right. The food is amazing and no one is talking to me, but that's no big surprise because they don't speak English. However with 20+ people sitting at one table and there's some random foreigner there that no one has met before and everyone is completely pretending that I'm not there... akward. Anyway, Tori's dad gets up and starts pulling out the vodka. Here we go. Ok so I already assumed there would be alcohol so I decided to take at least take one to be polite. He fills everyone's shot glass (not the teenagers though—that had a small glass of sparking grape juice). I tell him 'choot choot' (English pronunciation) while he pours my shot which means 'little', but somehow my glass is still more than half full. On birthdays, it's a tradition for friends and family to make a toast to the birthday girl/boy. It's not in any specific order or time and it's not required. You just sort of get everyone's attention and then start talking. It's very casual. The first toast ended and everyone cheered their glasses. First, let me explain how Ukrainians take shots. They don't flip it up fast like they do in the states, but they sip it in the beginning and slowly drink it down. That is absolutely miserable for me. I hate vodka and all I want to do is just sling it down my throat as fast as I can so I can taste as less as possible, but I can't do that. Do you want to know the result of me drinking shots like a Ukrainian? I completely choke out and start coughing uncontrollably. Some of the vodka has gone down the wrong way (probably from the squirming and gagging in my mouth) and now I can't breathe. Luckily, it wasn't a bad coughing fit and nothing fell out of my mouth, but still... what a terrible first impression for twenty people. I looked at Inessa and told her that Ukrainian vodka is much stronger than American vodka in hopes that she would translate for me so I would have an excuse for looking like a complete idiot. Tori's dad stands up immediately to refresh everyone's drinks. At this point, I'm thinking I need to redeem myself so they don't think I'm some stupid American. Again, I tell Tori's dad 'choot choot,' and again it doesn't work. The second shot went down fine and hopefully I was able to gain a little respect back. When he came back around for a third time I told him 'no' because I had school tomorrow. He kept saying, “What is today? What is tomorrow? What is today? What is tomorrow?” Inessa flipped my glass over for me and with much difficulty he moved on to someone else.

Earlier during the party, Inessa told me she was going to go home with me when I left to do my homework. When Ukrainians get together for parties they don't return home until 12 or 1 in the morning, and I told them I definitely couldn't stay out that late. Apparently, Inessa and Tori's friendship isn't the same it used to be and she wanted to leave early. Dinner started to slow down and Inessa whispered in my ear, “In one minute, ask me if you can leave to go do your homework.” No problem. Not that the party wasn't fun or anything, but it's extremely intimidating to be sitting with 20 Ukrainians at a very private celebration and not speak Russian/Ukrainian. Everyone starts to get up from the table and help bring all forty something plates off the table, and then I ask Inessa if it was all right that head home in a few minutes so I can get some work done. She says something to her mom and then says, “Go tell Tori's parents you have to leave early because you need to do your homework.” What?!?!?! Dude... I just got thrown under the bus! I looked at Inessa in shock and said, “Are you serious?” Apparently, she was and now Inessa and Natasha (host mom) are just staring at me waiting for me to tell them which should be interesting since I don't speak their language. So during the hustle and bustle of 20+ people bringing 40+ plates to the kitchen, I pulled Tori's mom to the side and said “спасибо за всё (thank you for everything), but I have to get home to finish my homework.” She just stared at me kind of smiling and then looked to Inessa who explained.

We get out of the taxi at home and I start on my homework. About 20 minutes later, guess who shows up? Inessa's “ex-boyfriend,” who is a complete psycho because he call's her on everyone's phone (including mine) 24/7, and his friend. So basically this 16 year old threw me under the bus so she could be cool and smoke a cigarette with her friends. I was watching outside the window though and say them freak out when they saw a car pull up the street. They thought it was her parents and everyone started freaking out, putting their cigarettes out, and running around looking for a way out. Unfortunately, there's a huge fence surrounding the property with only one entrance that's right where the street is located. It turned out to be a neighbor and everyone calmed down. I definitely got a good laugh out of the whole thing. It reminded me that I was 16 once and so I decided to let the whole 'throwing me under the bus' thing slide.

Friday 4/8Today is Inessa's 17th birthday! Tonight there will be a party at our house to celebrate. Since I've only been to one birthday party at this point, I'm assuming it will be similar to the one I attended last night. However, our house is not even close to the size of the one we were at last night. Our table fits four people (which is probably 19 in Ukrainian terms) comfortably so I'm looking forward to seeing how this works out. Today is also 'cooking day' at school so I was personally looking forward to learning how to cook borsch. The cooking portion of the day was to begin at 1:30pm after our language lessons and I was to be home for Inessa's birthday before 5 so I could help set up. Inessa invited Rebecca and Jenny to come so I was ecstatic about spending some non-school related time with them and so they could finally meet my awesome family.

So 1:00 rolls around, and then 2:00, and then 2:30 is when language lessons finally ended. So now I could get home at 5pm when everyone else is supposed to be there at the very latest. I'm already a little ticked off that we ran way over today. I wanted to get home as soon as possible to help my family with cooking, cleaning, etc. I feel like I never get to spend time with them because I'm always at school or working on projects. Now we have to walk to the bazaar to get the ingredients. The bazaar is a 30 minute walk and it's raining. So now I'm really ticked off. Not only am I not going to help my family with anything before the party, but now I'm going to look like a wet dog when I get there. I tell Victoria about Inessa's birthday and that I was concerned about time. She responded, “When we were going over the schedule, why didn't you say anything?” Huh? Do I need tell you all my weekend plans? I said, “Well, lessons were supposed to end at one today, and I really didn't think it was going to take 4 hours to cook borsch.” She didn't say anything so I just walked away. Well what do you know... the bazaar closed early because it's freezing and raining outside! I almost let Victoria have it right then and there. She's always reminding us about the importance of time management and preparation, and here we are standing in the rain in an empty bazaar. I'll spare you the rest of the details, but we finally made it back, made borsch, and then I rudely excused myself, Jenny, and Rebecca at 6:30! My family had already called my phone a few times wondering where we were. I was so upset and mad about the entire situation. I would have loved to have had a great cooking night with my LCF, but that night was not the night. Luckily, everything gets fun from here.

Even walking in almost two hours late, in our work clothes, and looking like rags, we were welcomed with open arms and shots of БAБУШKA vodka. Inessa greets us outside and I handed her flowers and chocolate (I was guessing that was appropriate since that's apparently what I got Tori the night before). Everyone had already started eating so that made me feel a little less bad that they didn't wait on us. Our kitchen table fits about four people so I was wondering if they were going to keep it low key. They've managed to drag the the kitchen table in to the living room along with some other table. Then there was a bench on one side for seating and the other side was pulled up to the sofa. There sat 10 people. The house was packed with people, the table was full of food, and our glasses were topped with vodka.

I didn't wake up until 11am on Sunday morning and would have slept until 4pm if someone didn't wake me up. Inessa told me the night before that they normally sleep in on Sundays and that she'll get me up when they start getting ready to visit their grandmother. Grandmother is БAБУШKA is Russian and is pronounced babooshka. Yes, like the scarf, but the 'ba' is held out longer to differentiate. Babushka is a made up American word for scarf and is frowned upon if you call someone's grandmother a scarf. Margarita, Inessa, and I start walking to grandmother's house around 12:30 because we're supposed to be there at one. Inessa explains she has to visit her tutor to go over some of her lessons and she'll meet up with us later. So now it's just Margarita and me. We both kind of giggle when Inessa walks off in hopes that the absence of a translator will be just as funny as it was yesterday. Ok so I was told that grandma lives in “old town” and I sort of new where that was from our walk yesterday, but I didn't know it was going to take an HOUR to walk there. I was freezing! Inessa told me it was warm outside so I didn't wear my arctic jacket, which I hadn't even unpacked yet.

When we finally got to БAБУШKA (babooshka) my nose was runny and my face was about to turn into ice. She gave me a hug and kissed me on the cheek. In broken Russian, I told her hello and my name. She immediately got the nose spray out because she heard me sniffle, but somehow Margarita intervened before it got to me. Thanks goodness because I don't know how I feel about sharing nose spray. We watch Ukrainian television with their seven year old cousin Otione while grandmother continues cooking in the kitchen. Inessa shows up about 15 minutes later and asks how everything is going and then tells me that her grandmother wants to drink vodka with me. Oh lord, this is the moment I was dreading. I can't take straight shots of anything in America without the thought of possibly throwing it up immediately, much less very strong homemade Ukrainian vodka. Inessa tells grandmother that I said 'no thank you.' Unfortunately, that was not going to fly. Inessa translates her grandmother and says, “Any guest in my house will drink vodka.” I almost threw up a little bit in my mouth right then and there. I knew it wasn't going to be just one shot. Drinking vodka in Ukraine is a celebration and is considered polite and traditional so there was no getting out of this. Lunch was served with just the five of us: Margarita, Inessa, Otione (who only knew one English phrase, “Sit down please,” and repeated it all day long), grandmother, and myself. We drank sooshka (don't know Russian spelling) which is an amazing fruit tea and ate crepes, potatoes, rice, pickles, chicken, sausage, vegetables with some sort of vinegar and spice, and then more crepes and tea. I finished most of my plate before grandmother sat down, as did most of the others. However, she walks right over to my side of the table takes the serving plate of chicken and potatoes and dumps the entire thing on my plate! Seriously? There's no way I can stuff more food down there. Then she stands up to grab the vodka. I immediately start to sweat and I'm pretty sure Inessa can tell. I told her before that I didn't want to drink and that I didn't like vodka so she knows this is going to be rough. Grandmother pours me a shot and Inessa makes me a glass of water to chase it down. Grandmother makes a toast that translates into, “To you learning Russian and marrying a Ukrainian!” I take the shot, drink the water, and eat another pickle. You must eat while you drink in Ukraine; otherwise, you're considered an alcoholic. She starts to open the vodka bottle back up, Inessa grabs my shot glass and starts yelling at her in Russian. Literally, five minutes went by and then grandmother finally put the vodka away. Phew! I know they warned us about this and how to handle the situation, but I'm extremely thankful Margarita and Inessa already knew that I didn't want to drink a lot of vodka. In the end, I was able to be polite without getting sick or drunk.

There's also a concern about the town finding out about your drinking. Peace Corps tells you not to go to bars because people only go to bars to get wasted, everyone will know, and that your reputation will be ruined in five minutes. One of the Ukrainian staff members even said, “You will be offered vodka at work during parties and celebrations, but don't drink much. Ukrainians drink more than you and they drink stronger alcohol so don't try to keep up. One day your collegues will offer you lots of shots during a celebration and drink with you, but the next day they'll think, she drinks too much. So there's definitely a fine line between untrustworthy alcoholic and polite. I don't have a problem saying 'no' after one celebration shot/drink. I'd rather keep my reputation than have an entire village not support or respect me. This has actually happened to Peace Corps volunteers in Ukraine. Staff members told us about a story where the locals thought a Peace Corps drank too much at a work party, even though they were the ones that kept offering her the alcohol. From then on, no one in the community would assist her in any projects. In fact, she was able to get all the resources for a computer lab for her students, but when she left the computer lab shut down. It may seem like a ridiculous thing to do to someone, but I'm not here to argue about cultural differences. I'm here to be productive so I'll have to play their game and that's something I'm struggling with already.

“They will hear you sneeze on the other side of the village.” -Peace Corps Training Director

For years I've had this “I don't really care what people think about me” attitude (don't worry mom--of course, work doesn't count). I was comfortable walking down the street saying and doing whatever I wanted. Not that I'm some extreme person that screams blasphemous monologues in church parking lots or anything, but I'm comfortable in my own skin, being myself and opinionated without worrying about judgments from people who have nothing better to do with their lives. With that said, somehow I must undo this way of life I've been living for so many years and it's not going to be easy to let go of these ideologies that define who I am. There is NOTHING that I do in this town that everyone doesn't know about. In fact, Inessa got a phone call about one of my clustermates buying toilet paper at a market. What the heck is that all about? We need toilet paper too, ya know. My cluster has named this gabfest the Boguslav Telegraph. When we unknowingly do something culturally insensitive we assume it'll be top news through the telegraph before you can say “borsch.” I can't talk loud walking down the street with my clustermates, I can't laugh with my clustermates in public, I must have the Ukrainian “brick face” on at all times and never smile, I need to buy a new bag because no adults wear backpacks, I have to sit at 30+ minute breakfasts with my host family even though I'm running 15 minutes late because there's no concept of late in this culture, I must dress nice (as in black pants) every single time I leave the house, I have to be wearing a jacket when I'm outside even when the sun is out in the afternoons and my walk is 30 minutes away, I can't sit on the ground inside/outside, I can't wipe my bare hand on the table to scoop crumbs into my other hand, I can't show the bottom of my shoes to anyone (which is harder than you think when you take off your boots every time you step inside anyone's home), I can't set my purse or book bag on anything but the floor, and the list goes on. I did diversity trainings and cross-cultural audits as a major in college so yeah I get it, but trying to remember all the things I can/can't do when I've been living freely for so long is extremely difficult. What I wear, where I go, and how I sit is nobody's business. Unfortunately, Ukrainians make it their business, and because they have such a tight circle of trust my success as a Peace Corps volunteer depends solely on my integration into the community.

“Today is a big day in your life. You are not sitting in your chair, but you're standing on the line with your previous life behind you.” -Douglas Teschner, Peace Corps Country Director for Ukraine, during our Group 41 introduction to the arrival retreat

Time to let go of my previous life.

Training is going all right for now, but it's only been the first week which has felt like an eternity. My head is about to explode from information and scheduling uncertainties (Peace Corps rule #1 - be flexible). Everyday is filled with 4 hours of Russian language and then 4 hours of active cross-cultural training/safety training/technical training. Of course, the language training is very difficult and I feel like an idiot half the day. There are Russian letters that are identical to English letters, and my brain refuses to let me pronounce them in Russian phonetics. Nonetheless, I was able to read Russian by the time I finished the first day of training so something has got to be sticking. Not every sound is perfect and I'm still not a very quick reader, but I can spit it out if you can just give me a minute. I heard the above quote during our arrival retreat from a current Peace Corps volunteer in Ukraine when he was speaking about PST (pre-service training). He hit the nail on the head because that's exactly how I feel every single day. I can't stay out past daylight, I can't purchase anything without help, I had to be told how to use the toilet and how much toilet paper to use (still a little confused about toilet paper allotment and flushing procedures). I get into language training and sound like a 1st grader trying to read the word “mushroom.”

mmmmm.... moo moo moo.. no no wait.. muh muh.. mus.. mus hu mus hu.. mus ha rome mus ha room? No? Ok hold on.. Ohh.. mush right? Mushroom!

Except for when I finally get the word out, I have no idea what it means or I put the stress in the wrong place and now it's a completely different word. Most of the time our teacher speaks only Russian which I find extremely irritating. We'll be doing some sort of activity and I'm just repeating/reading something because I know what the words “repeat” and “read” are in Russian and not because I know what's going on. I understand total immersion, but if you don't explain something to me than how the heck am I supposed to remember when to use it again?! Everyone in my group requested not to be in total immersion on our language questionnaire so I can't even imagine total immersion pre-service training. I probably would've walked home crying every single day. There's been a few moments where I completely shut down and refuse to speak until I get a better explanation even if that means it has to be in English. I feel like a complete ass, but I'm not going to pretend I understand something when I have no idea what's going on. I absolutely adore my teacher and realize that she's not even close to being fluent in English and sometimes doesn't even know enough to explain; nevertheless, if one of my clustermates knows what's going on (someone normally does—there's only 5 of us) then they should be able to take 45 seconds to explain it to me instead of talking in circles of broken Russian for 10 minutes and getting extremely flustered. This is nothing against her, but it's just my style of learning. I need example, pronunciation, EXPLANATION, more examples, rules of exception, and then lots of repetition, which I can do on my own later. Anyway, that's just my rant about training and I'm sure it's only going to get worse so I better just go ahead and hush up about it.

On a more positive note, my cluster is absolutely amazing and extremely supportive. There are three girls and two guys. We're all in our 20s except one of the guys—he's around 40 I believe (you definitely wouldn't know it by talking to him though because he's got such a young spirit). The girls finally got some alone time yesterday after class. Since it was such a beautiful day yesterday we decided to hang outside before heading back home. We sat in the city square where it's very busy since we thought it'd be safe with all the people around. However, we forgot we stood out so terribly with our book bags, giant jugs of water we just bought, and smiles on our faces. So when we sat down people started talking to us as they walked past. We decided to move a little further out of the open and down to the river so we wouldn't be seen by so many people. There we sat on the ground (oops!) and chatted it up for a while. We immediately noticed a dead dog about 25 yards away from us. This was the first one I've seen, but my clustermates have seen a few. There are a lot of wild dogs here and they're are extremely scary in the morning. I guess they're just extra hungry and ferocious that time of the day. Unfortunately, that's when I walk to school so during my 30 minute trek I'm trying to dodge wild barking dogs all over the place. Most of them are scrawny and could easily be kicked away (hopefully) if attacked. With that said, a huge german shepherd that came up to my waist crossed my path the other morning and stopped right in front of me. I almost wet myself right there standing on the sidewalk holding my 1990s J.Lo lunchbox.

Saturday morning I had to meet with Victoria, my Peace Corps language teacher, and the rest of my cluster at the house where Victoria is living during training. This house will be our school (ШKOЛA) for the next three months. After breakfast, which was the same delicious spread as dinner, Inessa and Margarita walked me around Boghuslav to show me the town. It was cold, gray, and windy. This new life will certainly be different from the one I've been living, but who's to say it won't be a happier one. Most of the housing is small apartments or one level 1-2 bedroom houses. There are a few main roads in Boghuslav that are made with asphalt. The remaining streets are dirt, some gravel, and pot holes which makes it very hard for me to walk without difficulty. I'll get used to it I'm sure. However, Inessa wears five inch stiletto shoes with spike studs on them. They are very cute and fashionable, but I think my ankle would break off within the first three steps. She managed the uneven streets and mud very well. I was extremely impressed. Margarita doesn't like heels and unlike her sister, she's less of a fashionista. They showed me Victoria's house, a shoe store, a small store with food & tea, and the Love Bridge. We went back to the house for tea and then did the 30 minute trek back to Victoria's where Victoria went over the house rules (where to take your shoes off, where to put your coat, what towel and dishes we're allowed to use, etc.), go over our 3 month training schedule/goals, and to give us 30 lbs of language training books. Luckily, we only have to bring 1-2 to school with us everyday. Inessa was waiting for me downstairs when we were finished and back to the house we walked. Lunch was tea, cheese, sausage, rice, chicken, vegetable salad, dumplings, borsch, and anything else you could find in the house. Apparently, we are not supposed to be drinking the tap water which is extremely annoying and inconvenient. So we must boil the water any time we want a drink; however, sipping hot green tea is definitely not a bad alternative.

I spent the rest of the day unpacking and chatting with Inessa and Margarita. Inessa's English is so helpful (she knows Ukrainian, Russian, Dutch and English)! She's not fluent so there are very many moments where we're both flipping through our dictionaries to find words, but she knows the important stuff. In fact, I don't think Victoria knows much more than she does and Victoria's the one teaching us Russian. Anyway, Inessa had English lessons at 7pm so this would be the first time I would be alone without anyone to help translate. Natasha works in Kyiv three days a week and won't be back until Tuesday so now it's just me, Margarita, and Andriy. I thought I might be able to get on their internet (YES! THEY HAVE INTERNET!) since I hadn't had the chance. Instead, Margarita and I tried to have a conversation through google translation. Have you ever tried to have a conversation through the google translator? I don't recommend it! Nothing ever translated correctly and we were back to the dictionaries. At one point, we both started laughing hysterically because neither of us could figure out what the other was trying to say. So let me start from the beginning..

Margarita and I had dinner while Inessa was at her English lesson. By the way, I've come to notice that we, Inessa, Margarita, and I, always eat separately from their parents. That's fine by me because Inessa is a picky eater and doesn't taste everything that's served to us on the table (they set everything on the table and then we put on our plate what we want). While Margarita and I washed our dishes, Andriy walks in and starts gesturing to eat more. I touched my stomach and shook my head no while telling him I was full. Then he started pointing to these giant jars on the kitchen counter, but I had know idea what he was saying. Earlier that day Inessa let me taste the tea that was inside the jars and it was some sort of homemade mushroom tea she said, but I couldn't figure out why Andriy was pointing to it now. He eventually gave me the “will tell you when Inessa gets home look” and Margarita and I went back to the dictionaries. Then I started to realized that Andriy thinks I'm sick because I keep giving him these weird faces and rubbing my stomach. So I googled the mushroom tea and showed Margarita. She agreed that the picture I showed her on the internet was the same thing sitting on their counter. Then I looked up the word sick and told her, “HET,” which means no (pronounced nee-et). I was hoping that she would understand that I wasn't sick and would tell this to her father. She looked confused so I pointed to the word “medicine” on the mushroom tea wiki page and in my dictionary to connect the two. Margarita's Russian is not very good. So translating English to Russian to Ukrainian was not working out. She flipped through her dictionary and then showed me the word “funeral.” Ahhhhahahahaha! I've never laughed so hard in my life. I was so confused and I had know idea why she showed me that. So I looked up “funeral” in my dictionary to show her what she just told me. She starts laughing and then gets my attention to show me a new word that might help the situation. What ever word she showed me translated into “fortune teller.” That was it! Tears just started rolling down my face from the laughter! Both of us just sat there for about 10 minutes with uncontrollable laughter. This was the best moment I've had with one of my host family members so far. Translation timeline: not sick—mushroom tea—medicine—funeral—fortune teller. Brilliant.

Family – Ukraine Style (Friday, March 25th)

The phrase “Peace Corps Dream” doesn't even come close to describing my Ukrainian host family. They are more than I could have asked for or ever imagined. There is the mother, Natasha, and the two daughters, Inessa (16-17 on April 8) and Margarita (15) are all the epitome of beautiful Europeans. The father, Andriy, is very nice and seems quiet; however, he acts just like an American father would when they live in a house full of women.

Two links (4 clusters) from the Kyivskaya Oblast took a bus from the retreat in Chernihiv to our host families today. We left at 1:45 this afternoon and didn't arrive to Boguslav until after nine, dropping the other clusters off along the way. Needless to say, my cluster is the furthest from Kyiv, but I like to think this will give us a more genuine experience. We'll train with our cluster and we'll live in the same community during these 3 months. A link is made up of two clusters that will join in activities together during training.

I wasn't really nervous about meeting my host family until we dropped our first cluster off 3 hours away from the retreat. The feeling passed quickly until it was only my cluster left on the bus. Suddenly I realized I only knew three words of Russian: yes, no, and thank you. I tried to study in the dim light, but there was not 2 seconds on the trip where the paper wasn't shaking from the infamous Ukrainian roads. I put the 12 phrase “Survival Russian” study sheet away hoping I could trick myself into thinking that I was nauseas because I was trying to read on the bus, and that it would go away once I just closed my eyes. I was extremely nervous.

We reached Boguslav and every group of people we saw standing on the sidewalk we screamed, “There they are!” We drove right past them. Then we'd see more people standing and say, “Oh look it's them,” only to drive past that group as well. Finally we pulled up to a parking lot in town where lots of cars and people were waiting. Here we go. It took a minute to get everyone introduced and unload our luggage out of the bus. Just as our Ukrainian Peace Corps staff told us, they insisted on carrying the heavy bags to the car. In fact, during one of the cluster drops offs, we saw the PCV and the Ukrainian mother fighting over a piece of luggage! One trying to be more polite than the other. The entire bus died laughing! The Ukrainian mother insisted and then made the PCV get into the car so the family could finish loading the remaining bags. It was just as we imagined. I'm not going to lie, I was sick and tired of trying to haul my luggage all over Ukraine, and I didn't much argue when they started to take my big bag. “CΠACИƃA,” I said.

Their home was just a few short blocks from the drop off location and the Kuznetsovas began to unload the bags while Inessa showed me to the door. She speaks a little English which was amazing to have for this first night! This was the first time they've ever hosted a volunteer and this was the first time I'd every lived with a family where verbal communication was nonexistent. We were all nervous.

Before I continue, I want to tell you a little about how Peace Corps described the meeting of the host family. First and foremost, you ALWAYS take your shoes off before walking into the house. To be quite honest, after using one of the squat toilets on one of the stops during the bus ride, I don't blame them. I wouldn't want shoes that had been anywhere near that thing in my house. Furthermore, they were going to feed us so much food that it would make us sick to our stomach. Because famine is so prevalent in their history, that's how Ukrainians show that they care. They feed you. They feed you a lot. So when my family prepared my plate of food I would somehow need to show them that I can't eat that much. If you don't set your food boundaries the first few days, they will make you that much food everyday and expect you to eat all of it every time. Ukrainians DO NOT waste food ever! They especially don't waste bread because it's considered sacred. This means that whatever ever is on your plate, you WILL EAT. Unless of course, you're going to projectile vomit on the kitchen table. So to avoid discourtesy they suggested asking for a new plate and placing only a small portion of the food from the original plate onto your new plate or you could push the food you wouldn't be able to eat to one side of your plate before you started so you wouldn't contaminate it, in case someone else wanted to eat it later. Not only were we going to throw up from food overdose, but we were also going to start taking shots of vodka immediately. They drink. They drink a lot. Saying “no” to alcohol is very difficult in Ukraine because they keep asking and asking and asking and asking. We were told to “say no, do not smile, and use nonverbal gestures.” Another thing to remember was that you might not have electricity or at least not all the time, you might not have a bathroom, and you might not have running water. “Bucket bath is different. You will like. It's stress reliever.” Last but not least, toilet paper is a concern. Once they stuff you full of food, you must not use a lot of toilet paper or they will have to plunge it out of the toilet and that would be embarrassing. Not only that, there was a period in Ukrainian history were toilet paper was in a shortage and you had to wait hours in line to purchase it at expensive prices. So toilet paper is quite the luxury. Personal space is also a huge difference between Americans and Ukrainians. Ukrainians sit close together, stand close together, talk close together, and are literally on top of each other all the time. This is normal and we needed to get used to the fact that the “only personal space you have is your toothbrush.” We'll have our own room, but the family members will come in when ever they want because there's not that sense of individual space in a house. It's everyone space and doors are rarely closed. There were even current volunteers there to share their own stories about this situation specifically. One said that her host mom came into her room to tell her that, “If you get blue mulberry on your skin, you can take the white mulberry and make it go away,” at eight in the morning. “They think if you're in your room alone with the door shut you're suffering and they just want to come inside to make sure you're not sick or crying.” Another volunteer said his host mother would talk through the door to his room instead of barging inside which he thought was even more strange. Peace Corps actually tells the host family that our temporary rooms are “the territory of the United States” in hopes this would help them understand how serious personal space is to Americans.

So back to the story...

I walk into the house and it's beautiful! It's not huge nor small, but it's very modern. They show me to my room which looks to be Inessa's room before I came along because there are pictures of her all over and drawings all over the wall (eg: “Love and Pease” and “Re$pEcT”). As expected they say, “Eat?” I was so afraid I was going to leave the table drunk and 10lbs heavier, but I was absolutely starving. So now I'm preparing for the entire family to sit on top of me at the dinner table while I just sat there without knowing a word of what they were speaking. This would have been fine because it's what I was expecting, plus I was ready to start integrating into the family. To my surprise, it was just Margarita, Inessa, and myself at the table for dinner. Inessa fixed me hot tea by shoving both open boxes under my nose so I could smell out the one I wanted. All three of us sat and ate while Natasha came in and out to have Inessa translate questions to me. I ate borsch, an amazing traditional Ukrainian soup, some sort of lettuce, chicken and whipped cream salad, and of course bread. Inessa fixed my plate and it was perfect portion. There was also a plate of these large orange dumplings and ham on the table, but she said I didn't have to eat either of them if I was full. Is this real?! No vodka or food boundary issues?! PHEW!

We went back to my room where Inessa told me she and Margarita would help me unpack my stuff into the empty cabinets and armoire. I ended up having to do this myself since my packing had no rhyme or reason, and I wanted to know where everything was placed. Along the way I showed them the pictures I brought of my family, house, car, and Cartersville. Inessa translated for everyone. Afterwards, they helped me take all my items to the bathroom and then taught me how to turn the water heater on for a hot shower. Yes, I said hot shower. My first time trying to light the heater I completely freaked out. I couldn't remember if Inessa threw the entire match in there or just popped it in and then back out to light the gas. My hand just sat two inches away from the opening for a few seconds until she started pushing my wrist to get the flame inside. I panicked and blew it out. All three of them laughed hysterically. Inessa showed me one more time and then I nailed it the second go around. You don't throw the entire match in, by the way. No, it's not very hard, but I didn't want to burn down the house on the first night. My plan was to time how long their showers were and then make sure I never showered longer than them. However, I was unable to do that so I took the quickest shower I could and hopped out. Not only did they have hot water, but they had a washing machine, a toilet, and toilet paper! I could definitely get used to this. I walked passed the entire family in front of the TV in the living room and headed back to my room. Andriy had been sitting at the TV the whole time. Like I said before, he reminded me of every American dad with the “stay out of the girls' business” attitude and unfortunately for him it was a house full of them. As I walked into my room, my host mom peeked inside and said, “Good night,” and then shut the door.

Not only have they blown my expectations out of the water, but they don't have pets either which was a major concern for me. Like in the states, it's very popular to have animals and difficult to find host families without them. I'll be able to breathe and I'll have hot showers.

Can you say Peace Corps miracle?

**I don't know why the background is a different color. The cities were blacked out so I changed the color and now it looks all weird.**

Sleep has never felt so good! Waking up fully rested and realizing I've made it to Ukraine with all my luggage has been the best feeling so far on this trip. Breakfast was served at 8 with two eggs, granola with warm milk, yogurt, cheese, ham, and bread. Bread is served at every meal and I need to stop eating eat it now. If anyone knows me, I'm a salty carb person and not a big sweet eater. Historically, bread and salt are very important to Ukrainian culture. So much so, that instead of calling our galaxy The Milky Way they call it The Salt Way.

Along with photo sessions and lots of paper pushing, today's itinerary had two classes that were an hour and half: TEFL Project/PST Overview/Policies & Procedures/Dealing with the Media and Intro to Language. I'll be learning RUSSIAN! I didn't have a preference on whether I learned Russian or Ukrainian, but I must say I'm pretty happy about the decision. Either way we don't get a choice so I'm glad I didn't get my hopes up on Ukrainian. Both languages are very similar and most of the country speaks a mixture of the two. There's a specific name for this mixture, but I can't remember so let me get back to you on that one. Douglas Teschner, our Country Director (CD), also spoke to us for a bit. He was very heartfelt and genuine during his speech. He quoted a Ukrainian native that spoke about the Peace Corps volunteer that worked in his village: “I told him that I would be his eyes and ears. At the end of his service, he told me that I was also his heart and soul.” Mr. Teschner began to cry during this quote and I couldn't help the tears forming in my own eyes.

Tonight's seminar “Ukraine's Past and Present: Intro to Ukrainian Mentality” was incredibly helpful on understanding the brains of the natives. Ukraine isn't a developing country, but a transitional country instead. Some citizens would choose to go back to Soviet times if they had they choice because they consider it to be more stable, while others would choose to change some things around so the country can continue to progress. All of this was explained starting from 1861 and I had no idea the extent of destruction Ukraine endured in the past. They're a strong country and built to survive. In fact their the beginning of their anthem translates into, “Has not died yet...”

I also found out I'll be living in Bohuslav with my host family! Our bus leaves tomorrow and my cluster is the last to be dropped off since it's the furthest away in our oblast (it's the Ukraine version of a county). Can't imagine meeting a family I'll be living with for three months after a 7 hour bus ride and not no a single word of their language.

These last couple of days have been a complete whirl wind and I don't even know where to begin. Maybe I should just start with Atlanta so here we go...

Sunday night I slept a good 45 minutes before I woke up at 3:30am to get the car packed for the airport. My flight from ATL to DC was horrific and didn't leave at the 7:30am scheduled time. Nothing like adding more stress to the most stressful situation. We were late boarding, they forced me to check in one of my carry-ons right at the gate because they ran out of room in the passenger area on the plane, DC wanted us to delay take off another half hour because they were too busy, then the pilot decided the engine was making funny sounds and sent us to get onto another plane. As we were boarding the next plane the flight attendant told us there was no room and all remaining carry-ons would have to be checked. Didn't we just go through this? How did the same amount of people, with the same amount of bags, that are boarding in the exact same order, fill up every compartment? Luckily, the flight attendants did a little handy work and organized the bags so the remaining passengers could get there personal items on the flight. We finally took off a little after nine.

I arrived to Washington, grabbed my bags (pack, rolling duffel, bookbag, small rolling carry-on), checked in with Super Shuttle, and I was off to Holiday Day Inn Georgetown. If you've never been to D.C., which I hadn't, you'll notice how clean the place is right off the bat. I've never seen multiple bridges without at least some sort of street art painted on the inside, grass without litter, and perfectly landscaped medians.

Staging started at noon and I arrived to the hotel around 11:30am so I had to rush to iron and change clothes. We registered, introduced ourselves, met our staging officers, and then had seven long hours of ice breaker/cross cultural/role play activities. Needless to say, I found myself unable to hide the misery on my face when Lenny Bankester, our staging director, began to speak at the end. I've never felt so rude before in my life, but having only three hours of sleep in the last three days started to take its toll. However, staging definitely made me more excited about Peace Corps and I didn't think that was possible. Group 41 is made up of 106 people and that is the largest group any country has ever taken at one time. Which makes sense because Ukraine is the largest Peace Corps post. After staging, I walked with a few fellow Trainees (yes, it's official-we're not Invitees any longer!) to the Whole Foods for dinner and literally passed out around 8:45 that night.

Tuesday we loaded up our bags around 2pm on the bus, flew out of D.C. at 6:50pm, arrived in Germany around... I don't know because my freaking watch broke! Eventually, I woke up on a bus in Ukraine headed towards our retreat site. The retreat staff is made up of 76 Ukrainians and they all speak English! Some of us are staying at the retreat site which is a dormitory and some are staying in a hotel. However, the dormitory is set up exactly like a hotel.

The retreat staff welcomed us in their native dress and offered a festive bread. Unfortunately, I missed the welcome part because I ran upstairs to grab my camera. Dinner was delicious and was made up of beet salad, chicken, rice, bread, Ukrainian chocolate bar with a gooey inside, tea, juice, and bottled water. Apparently, you can't drink the tap water here, but I'm not sure if it's that way for all of Ukraine. I met with the medical team after dinner around 10:45 to get shots (typhoid, meningitis, and Hep A) and to express any concerns I might have while serving. None of us had slept during the two day travel, minus a nap here or there on the uncomfortable plane rides or the bumpy bus trip, so my roommates and I cut the lights out as soon as our medical interviews were over.

*Please excuse grammatical errors in the above post. Didn't have time to read over.*

December 2006 - Peace Corps thought bubble formedNovember 2009 - started application January 29, 2010 - submitted application with all referrals and transcriptsFebruary 18, 2010 - received rejection email from PC recruitment coordinator stating, "We are interested in your application; however, there are currently no available programs that fit the skills you bring to Peace Corps."--- started sending emails, making phone calls to PC and ESL volunteer organizations about making my application more competitive ---February 23, 2010 - received an email from recruitment coordinator stating that he would take another look at my applicationMarch 3, 2010 - sent an email to recruitment coordinator asking if he was able to review my application againMarch 4, 2010 - received an email from recruitment coordinator stating, "Peace Corps Recruitment will now allow qualified candidates to be recommended for service as English Teachers contingent upon them gaining at least 3 months or 30 hours of relevant teaching/tutoring experience before their invitations to service. This allows applicants to move forward in the process while gaining qualifying volunteer experience. Of course, if that additional experience is not gained, applicants would not qualify and would be withdrawn." I replied confirming that I was interested in moving forward with the application process under these conditions.March 6, 2010 - application has been reactivatedMarch 8, 2010 - received a phone call from my recruiter, Mike Robie, about an email he sent me regarding the next step-- security clearance.March 11, 2010 - received a large envelope from Peace Corps containing fingerprint charts, FBI background check, and skills addenda for my requiured ESL teachingMarch 17, 2010 - interviewed with Mike at the Atlanta headquarters. I think it went pretty well, but I did have thoughts of inadequacy when I left. Hopefully, I'm the only one that had them.March 22, 2010 - Mike called about my conditional nomination to Eastern Europe in September 2010 for ESL!!! Have to sign off on a document he sent me to confirm that I will be gaining the qualifying volunteer experience as an ESL tutorMarch 26, 2010 - faxed in documentMarch 30, 2010 - received nomination information packet in the mailApril 5, 2010 - received medical/dental packet in mailJuly 2, 2020 - received an email about completing an alcohol/drug questionnaire and writing a personal statement about my alcohol related incidentsJuly 8, 2010 - completed 30 education volunteer hours. I did my ESL teaching at the International Rescue Committee of Atlanta.July 14, 2010 - mailed in medical/dental evaluationJuly 20, 2010 - sent in my personal statement regarding my alcohol related incidentsJuly 21, 2010 - application status update: PC has received my medical packetJuly 22, 2010 - dentally cleared with "complete"July 24, 2010 - legally cleared, but the "complete" is not next to the check markJuly 30, 2010 - application status update: (1) Medical - "Hold. All nominees have a medical hold while they are under review. No further action from you is required, unless the Office of Medical Services contacts you to request additional information." *note: I have not yet turned in my eyeglasses prescription form so this comes to no surprise* (2) Placement - "Your OMS/Placement review was completed on July 29, 2010" (I have no idea what that means)July 31, 2010 - sent an email out to my medical assistant asking what else I need to do to insure my medical clearance besides the prescription eyeglass formAugust 2, 2010 - received an email listing all of the 4 items that need to be completed or redone. I forgot to (1) sign a form, need the (2) eyeglass form filled out, need to (3) redo a test and (4) get varicella titer even though having the chicken pox is listed on my GRITS immunization form. Not too bad though. Got a letter in the mail stating the same thing.August 14, 2010 - faxed in the above required forms and emailed pre-service unit office of medical services stating that they should be receiving my remaining forms shortly August 16, 2010 - called Marta, pre-service assistant, to make sure the fax was received. She said they received everything and sent an email to confirm. So now I wait for medical clearance. I've obviously blown my September departure date, but I'm hoping they will still review my medical information as soon as possible. Peace Corps reviews those who are scheduled to leave in the next 4 months first and then moves on to the next set of files. Seeing that my 6 week deadline has past for September and I'm currently not nominated for another program so I am concerned about how long it will take for them to review my file.August 17, 2010 - application status update: Peace Corps is currently reviewing your medical documentation. The hold has been removed from medical and my file is currently under consideration. All I do now wait for their decision.August 18, 2010 - application status update: Medical - "Complete. A decision has been reached regarding your medical review. Please look for a letter in the mail". Placement - "In order to coordinate your invitation with your medical accommodation requirements, the Office of Medical Services and the Office of Placement began an OMS/Placement review on August 17, 2010." The result of my medical evaluation will be sent to me in the mail!! From the sound of my Placement section, it looks like I'm medically cleared, but I can only go to certain areas that can accommodate my asthma/animal allergies. I hope there's still countries available with ESL positions and that can accommodate my medical needs within the next 6 months. I would hate to leave next year and have all of my medical information expire and start it over again. I'm not going to worry about that because I'm too EXCITED!!!!!!!!!!! ****JUST RECEIVED AN EMAIL STATING THAT I AM MEDICALLY CLEARED*****

Greetings from the Assessment & Placement Office at Peace Corps Headquarters in Washington, DC!

The Office of Medical Services has informed us that you have received your medical clearance. Over the next few weeks, your file will be reviewed by the Assessment & Placement Staff for further evaluation. This includes evaluation of technical skills, suitability and legal information. Upon completion of the assessment, you may be considered for an invitation. Please keep in mind that an invitation is never guaranteed and applicants should make no plans to go overseas unless an invitation has been issued and you have spoken to headquarters staff to accept your invitation.

The email also asks to send an updated resume including work and volunteer experience. I'll be sending it in asap today!August 19, 2010 - received an email from Morgan at the Education Placement Desk stating that she would add the information to my file and will be in touch if they need any additional information. I replied to the email with a few questions about a new program since I've blown my 6 week deadline for a September invitation.August 20, 2010 - I hadn't heard anything back so I called the Education Placement Office and left a message. I was beginning to become extremely antsy. August 23, 2010 - Morgan, my Placement Officer, called AND emailed me back answering all of my questions. I'm so thankful that she's extremely nice because I've heard stories from other PC applicants about their difficulty communicating with their Placement Officer.

Thank you for your email. As you noted, you did not medically qualify in time to be eligible for the program you were nominated to. We will be reviewing your file in the coming weeks, and will assess your eligibility for another teaching program. We will be in touch sometime by early September to let you know the potential placement options we are looking at for you.

September 3, 2010 - received two emails from two separate people in the Placement Office requesting my final transcripts. They already have an unofficial copy, but it doesn't have the institution on it anywhere. When I print them off, everything except the Valdosta State University logo prints with it... of course. So now I'm waiting for VSU to mail me an official copy that I can fax to the office.September 15, 2010 - faxed in my transcripts September 29, 2010 - application status update: Place - has the check mark next to it now. Maybe that's from faxing in my transcripts. I never got an email back confirming that they've been received, but hopefully that's what that means. Now everything has a check mark next to it (Medical/Dental Forms, Physical Exam, Dental, Legal, Medical, Place) besides Placement, which of course is the last item on the list.September 27, 2010 - continuing to volunteer at the IRC in DecaturSeptember 29, 2010 - application status update: placement has a check next to it and information will be sent to me in the mailOctober 8, 2010 - received invitation packed in the mail for TEFL UKRAINE MARCH 2011!! The packet includes: visa applications, passport applications, insurance information, press information, handbooks for volunteer and family... lots to do!October 10, 2010 - I have to get an I&D surgery on my neck for an infection. I will have to send this information in to PC for medical review. Unfortunately, I'm medically deferred until everything is cleared again. **Update** I spoke with Nancy from PC medical services about the I&D surgery and she said it shouldn't be a problem and to the send information to her. A few days later, I had to call her back and inform her of a second surgery to remove a branchial cleft cyst that had been causing the infection in my neck. Now I have to wait until after the second surgery and after all follow ups are complete to mail in medical information. She didn't say much about the second surgery except that she'll just have to review the information. Bummer. I would hate to come this far and not be cleared again.January 29, 2010 - second surgeryJanuary 7, 2011 - overnighted all ENT doctor information and surgical information to PCJanuary 12, 2011 - I called PC to see if they received my medical package. Georgann called me back stating that they have not received the information, but I can email in PDF form all of the information. As I sat down and started to scan all 50 pages of my medical papers, she called back and said they have it in their office. She said that it was placed on Nancy's desk and she'll review it as soon as possible. She also said that I'm pushing my 6 week deadline and if not cleared this week that I might not be able to leave in March. **Update** Nancy from PC Medical Services called at 6:30pm to confirm that I'm medically cleared to leave! I just need one more appointment with my ENT at the 6 week mark as a formality. I've got about 2 months to start getting everything together!March 21, 2011 - flying to Washington for staging