what the kids AREN'T giving me as a goodbye gift!

I'm home again from my travels, although it's starting to sink in that Balaklia's only going to be "home" for the next five and half weeks. So much to do before that point...

I had a nice visit with the Malkos, visiting with Mama Luda, wandering around Zgurivka by myself and my memories of two years ago, and watching Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix in Russian with Sasha, which was entertaining not just for the movie, but for Sasha asking me at several points to explain what was going on. Neither of us had seen the movie before, and it had been several years since I'd read the book, so I got a kick out of him asking me to explain a movie that we were watching in my third language.

My arrival home got off on the wrong foot (literally), as yesterday at 3:45 am at the train station, the combination of a heavy bag, poor lighting, uneven cement, and the urge to get to a taxi quickly (and therefore home) resulted in me falling, scraping a knee and twisting my ankle. So yesterday was spent resting at home.

Today, I taught my 7A form, and then had the rest of the day free to work on a booklet for our (yes, it appears to now be a plural possessive rather than just Nelya's) seminar, as out of the two of us, I'm much more computer literate. So instead of trying to drill English into kids' heads, I get to be home, keep off my foot, and listen to country music while typing. Today was just creating the bibliography for the debate I wrote before fall break (if I'd been thinking, I should have made a link folder of everything I referenced, but going back through my computer's history accomplished the same thing, even if it took longer), but I think tomorrow is going to be typing the introductory pages...in Ukrainian. But I have my little cheat sheet that tells me the key equivalents, so while it'll be tedious (I'm not nearly as speedy in Ukrainian), it'll be doable.

The kids at school have been collecting money to get me a going-away present which will be presented to me by the school parliament. It's supposed to be a big secret that I don't know about, but Nelya's been keeping me in the loop, mostly so she can get my feedback on what I'd like. We've decided on something of the handicrafts variety, and it looks like she's going to secretly give me the money this week so that when I go up to Kharkiv to have a goodbye party with all the oblast PCVs (Group 29 people are already starting to leave next week), I can go to the art market and buy something that I'd like. Then I'll bring it back to her, she'll give it to Natasha, the school president, and Natasha will present me with it on behalf of the school. I will be suitably surprised and pleased, and we will all be happy. Wow, Nelya and I are sneaky!

Plus, this means that I can choose something that will fit in my suitcase, which judging by the pile collecting in my room, is filling up quickly. I'm trying to limit the majority of my "stuff" to mementos, souvenirs, and gifts, but somehow that's a large pile in itself.

"What did the children suggest getting me?" I asked Nelya. We're agreed that some type of traditional arts/crafts would be the most appropriate, but I was curious what the kids had wanted to do.

Nelya rolled her eyes. "A large stuffed animal, like the teddy bear you use in class, only bigger," she said, gesturing with her hands to show a two-and-a-half-foot-high stuffed animal. (Family--remember Kate's Mr. Turkey? He could have a Ukrainian twin!) Picking out my own present sounds better all the time... :)

The English Olympiad is scheduled for Saturday, November 24. I don't have to miss church!

my writing style suffers when I'm sick...I apologize in advance

Ugh. I'm sick.

I'd had a sore throat/runny nose/lots of coughing the first week Tif was here, and while it got somewhat better last week, it never really went away. Add to that the 46 hours or so I spent on public transportation (electrichkas, passenger trains, buses) last week, and I have pretty much no immune system left. Today it all hit, with exhaustion, chills, over-heatedness, and a fever. I ran a few errands before it all struck, but when I came home, I went to bed and stayed there for about 4 hours. I want to get healthy enough that my first few days in Donetsk aren't spent in bed recovering, so today and tomorrow I guess I'm taking it a bit easier than I had originally planned.

I think my body's been trying to tell me to slow down for the last month or so, and I haven't really been listening. Oops.

Anyway, I loved L'viv. It was small enough that we could walk everywhere easily (although we did take the 50-kopek tram from the train station to the center once, which ended up giving us a nice little tour of the outskirts). The architecture was beautiful--it really hit me that when you build something, you have a choice. It can either be simply utilitarian, like much Soviet architecture (or large and grandiose), or it can be pretty. For example, a concrete balcony versus a wrought-iron one. I'll try and work on posting pictures if my Internet connection is happy with me in the next day or so.

I also liked staying at the hostel. First off, of course, there was a hot shower and a bathtub with even better water pressure than the shower. :) But really, one of the neatest parts of the experience was meeting people from all over who were also staying there. While we were there, there were people there from Great Britain, the US (other PCVs!), Finland, Switzerland, Spain, Canada, and Australia. Most of them knew little/no Ukrainian or Russian, so I helped some people out with understanding their train tickets. It was interesting to hear some of their stories--the guy from Switzerland, who was probably my age or a little younger, had spent the last six months in India and China, just backpacking around. He had then gone to Kazahkstan and flown to Ukraine (to avoid having to get a Russian visa), and was now going to travel around Eastern/Central Europe a bit, although he said he was a bit tired of travelling by now.

[Side note: Tif didn't end up shooting an AK-47 after all, as it was more expensive than she'd hoped for. You can all breath a sigh of relief/regret (take your pick) now.]

Tif and I also had a good day in Kyiv, although Andriivski Uziz, a street that usually is packed with souvenir stands and art booths, was pretty much deserted, and we couldn't figure out why. We met up with my friend Tanya and went out for milkshakes, which were very good. The only bad part of the day was that we had been planning to get a hotel room at the train station, but there weren't any available. The receptionist, who spoke English, wasn't very polite about it all. It was raining, and we didn't know where we'd end up. I was on the phone with Tanya, who was looking up Kyiv hotels online and sending me the info. Kyiv is notorious for being expensive, and we were trying to keep costs down, which added to the frustration. We ended up renting an apartment for a night (a common practice in Ukrainian cities, as apartments are generally nicer than most hotel rooms...PCVs often chip in together as a way to cut costs), which ended up costing us the same as if we'd stayed at the train station, plus the landlady was very friendly and impressed that as young American women, we could speak the language and were capable of taking care of ourselves in a strange country. :)

Friday morning, I said goodbye to Tif, who took the bus to the airport to begin her long journey home, and after lunch, I headed out to Zgurivka to see the Malkos. Sasha had left for L'viv the day before (trains passing in the night?), but I had a good visit with Mama Luda and Tato Kolya. Saturday, I took the train home from Kyiv, and I got back to Balaklia around 3:45 am Sunday morning. No, I didn't try and go to church later on...I was asleep!

The one thing I'm sorry that I didn't get to do on my vacation was go to "Festival of Hope", the Franklin Graham crusade in Kyiv last weekend. I wanted to, and I considered taking a later train Saturday night that went to Kharkiv and then taking the elektrichka home Sunday morning, but I decided that really, I was tired and needed to get home. Based on how lousy I feel today, that was a smart choice, but I still wish I could have gone.

This week has included being interviewed by a 14-year-old for the local newspaper, dealing with a burned-out lightbulb that appears to be corroded and impossible to remove from the light fixture, trying to get money off my US debit card, and hanging out with my neighbors last night. Today was mostly spent in bed. Hopefully I'll feel a bit better tomorrow and can get a few last-minute things done, and then tomorrow around midnight I get on a train to Donetsk for the English-language program down there.

I think I'm going back to bed now!

and we're off! (but we've always been a little off...)

Well, we packed our bags, took out the trash, washed the dishes, and we're off to L'viv tomorrow!

We've found what appears to be a really nice hostel to stay at, complete with satellite TV, a hot tub, free Internet, free laundry, and the chance to learn how to shoot an AK47 (Tif's hoping to, I'm not). We've joked that we just might stay at the hostel the two days we'll be in L'viv rather than go explore the city...but we're mostly kidding.

(There is a story told of a group of Ukraine PCVs who went on vacation to Germany and spent all their time at their hotel. When I first heard it, I was shocked, but I definitely understand now.)

However, the bad part of the trip is that I haven't been feeling very well the last few days...I seem to have picked up a possible head cold/sinus infection/whatever makes you have a sore throat and a runny nose. But I'm packing medicine and plan to rest on the 20 hour trip from Kharkiv to L'viv. Please keep us in your prayers.

~*~

For anyone who wants to write me while I'll be in Donetsk (hint, hint), here's my address. Letters generally take from 8 to 14 days to get here, and I'll be there from July 12-28, so plan accordingly.

Sally Behrenwald
Donetsk Christian University
Prospect Ilicha 106A
Donetsk, 83059
Ukraine

big update!

Yeah, I'm still alive. My apologies to all of my faithful readers who keep checking back and wondering why I haven't posted recently...it's a combination of general busyness, Tif's visit, and three days when the Internet didn't work. However, my Internet guy has put my connection on a different channel (I don't know exactly what this means in English, but it seems good) and now my connection is a lot faster...and I can upload photos! (See previous post.)

Let's see...going back about two weeks now, before Tif came. My friend Andrey's church did a series of evangelistic tent meetings for four nights in an area of town where a lot of my kids live. Each night, they would have a general meeting explaining the basics of Christianity with music and a sermon, which was then followed by a meeting that was more youth-oriented on topics like AIDS, alcoholism, and drugs. At least 25 of the kids from my school were there (we only have about 280!), whether sitting and listening or occasionally drifting over from the cafe/bar across the road. I don't believe that anyone got saved during the meetings, but hearing the Gospel is a rare occurence over here, and I simply pray that seeds were planted that will come to fruition later. I know that the mom of one of my seventh form boys really enjoyed the meetings and wants to start attending church regularly. I myself really felt convicted to pray for my kids...the barriers of language, culture, and my role as a PCV limit my ability to witness to them in words, but going to the meetings regularly and praying fervently for each child by name were things that I could do in spite of those barriers. It was a boost for my own faith.

Tif arrived last Friday, and we've had a grand time! She knows the language and the area, so a few days she was off visiting people she knew from before and finding souvenirs, but we've been together a lot, especially in the evenings...cooking, listening to the music she brought, and having random conversations on any and all topics. Oh, and finding out that the cafe on the corner has a lot of good food at cheap prices! I enjoy eating out once in a while, but I would feel odd doing it by myself here in town.

Sunday was Yula and Serhii's wedding...I had wanted to do a huge post about that event alone, but I think I'll just leave it with all the comments I wrote about the pictures in my last post. If you have questions, let me know.

Monday we bummed around town, took pictures by the statues of Lenin and Taras Shevchenko (Ukraine's greatest poet), and stopped by to visit Robert, the new PCV in my town. He works at a non-profit organization that helps invalids, large families, and families with invalid children. The organization had gotten a LARGE donation of used clothes from Canada, and the director had invited me over to look through and see if there was anything I would want. Most of it wasn't anything I would/could wear, but I ended up with two sweaters.

Last night was the school-leaving ceremony for the 11th form (US graduation). It involved lots of music and dance numbers, including small children dancing (very cute), a harem dance (weirdly fascinating and not what I would consider appropriate for the occasion...Tif caught some of it on video), and me singing "Fly Me to the Moon" in English. It was a very nice ceremony, and the kids were all dressed up--the boys in suits, the girls in prom-type dresses. After the ceremony, there was an all-night dance for the kids...last year I stayed, but we were planning to go to Kharkiv today and so we left after the ceremony.

Woke up this morning at 7 am to a severe thunderstorm and me having a sore throat and feeling exhausted, so we stayed home and are planning to go to Kharkiv tomorrow, as we thought it better that I rest today rather than keep pushing and get very sick when we go to L'viv next week. So I went back to bed and slept until after 11. Then we had pork stroganoff on toast for lunch (don't ask, we invented the combination earlier this week and it's really good), and Tif went off to go exchange money and look for Harry Potter books in Russian to complete her set, while I attempt to catch up on blogging.

Next Monday, we head for L'viv in western Ukraine, which is supposed to be a beautiful old city reminiscent of Prague or Krakow. It'll be about a 24 hour trip from Balaklia to L'viv, but we're up for the adventure. Then we get back to Kyiv on Thursday and Tif flies out on Friday morning. We're planning to go out to McDonald's that morning for her birthday, but we'll see how that goes. I think I'm going to visit the Malkos in Zgurivka next weekend, then come home for a few days, and then I'm off to Donetsk again.

Tif's back, so I'll close for now. :)

I am a goldfish.

While I've spent a great deal of time online this week, reading sites on all sorts of topics (mostly pointless), I don't seem to be blogging all that much more. Time to remedy this.

Tuesday night was my friend Natalia's birthday party. About a dozen of us were at a cafe near her house...a mix of her friends (mostly teachers) and former students. A lot of her former students spoke English a bit, and once they got over staring at me and being shy, we had a nice conversation. It was a fun party...good food, watching Natalia do an impression of a popular Ukrainian singer while dancing, and just a nice chance to be social.

However, around 9 pm, as the bar crowd was starting to collect in the front of the cafe, two of my 10th form girls came in. They were with older (ie mid-20s) guys and drinking beer. One of them, Maryna, is one of my wilder girls, so while I was disappointed to see her, I wasn't surprised. But the other girl, Natasha, is a "good girl"...does her homework, behaves, etc. She's the sort of pretty, romantic girl who wants a boyfriend and so is willing to settle for the first relationship she can, whether or not it's the right one. Sigh...

Four different students had seen me over the course of the evening, and so yesterday at school, kids kept asking me, "Miss Sally, were you at the cafe in Novoselivka (the neighborhood where Natalia lives) last night? Why? Did you like it? What did you drink?" I felt, as I often do, like a goldfish in a big tank. I have no private life, it seems.

Dealing with allergies and sinus headaches this week. Ugh.

I stopped at a shop on the way home today and found cinammon bread with raisins, which is very similar to a cinnamon roll, but the size and shape of a loaf of bread. Yummy. :)