and a little child shall lead them

The Y's van isn't working again. Apparently, it broke down last Sunday just as they arrived back home from visiting another church in the oblast. (The Baptist churches in various towns and villages around here are taking turns visiting each other this summer...I wasn't able to go this time, as I was in Kharkiv with the other PCVs.)


Serojia Y's birthday was this week (he's five now). At our church here, when it's your birthday, you go up front, you pray, the pastor prays for you, and then everyone sings "Mwe Vam Bazhayem," which is a song where you wish someone happiness, peace, joy, and love in Christ. (We don't just sing it for birthdays...it happens whenever you want to congratulate someone for something.) Anyhow, Serojia's prayer was, "Dear God, thank you for Mama [Nadia] and church. Amen." I don't think I could have put it better myself.



Mom said that I should post about why I didn't have to teach the 11th formers on Friday, so I will. It is perhaps a sign of how much I've adjusted to living here that I didn't think about it as a blog topic until she suggested it. Anyhow, guys in Ukraine generally serve two years in the army after finishing school, as best I understand it. (I have yet to figure out how this connects with university, as they don't wait until the two years are over to finish...I should ask Sasha the next time I'm in Zgurivka.) So when I got to school on Friday, I saw most of the 11th form guys outside talking to the music teacher (the one male teacher on staff, who also teaches the older boys how to do military marches, in addition to teaching the younger kids how to sing)...and they were all in fatigues carrying guns. Apparently Friday was "Anton Get Your Gun" Day. As I entered the building and was walking down the hallway to the teachers' room, I saw Sasha, one of my 11A boys, in the hallway with his gun slung over his shoulder, talking to a teacher. After that, I didn't see the 11th formers (guys or girls) for the rest of the day. Still not quite sure about what happened. But apparently you don't get expelled here for having a gun on school property!



Nor is there apparently any disciplinary action when a 9th form boy tickles a teacher (me). This is a kid who I've been wanting to strangle the entire two weeks I subbed for his class. On Friday, they were taking a test, and Ihor was blatantly copying something out of his notebook. I requested that he give me the notebook, and he refused, putting it in his bag. Having had him for two weeks now, I knew that as soon as I looked away, he'd have it back out again, so I repeated my request. He handed me a different notebook. I took his schoolbag and started to remove the actual notebook in question. He started trying to play tug-of-war with me for it, and in order to make me let go, tickled me under my arm. This is NOT COOL. I was appalled. I never did get the notebook, but he didn't try and copy anything more out of it...instead, he took the notebook of the girl he was sitting with and started copying her work. After class, Ihor came up to me and tried to offer me free Avon samples (he sells Avon in his free time...don't ask) to get back in my good graces. Nope. Didn't happen. After school, I tried to explain what had happened to Nelya...i.e. that it is not okay for a student to tickle a teacher. It took a bit of explaining to make her understand what had happened, and her response was, "Don't worry about it. Ihor's rather strange."



Still...it seems strange and wrong that something that would get you suspended in the US has absolutely no repercussions here. And for the record, people who currently have tickle privileges (granted, some of them can't take advantage of them right now, as I'm here) are all Y kids from Valera on down (Liza and Valera know "tickle" in English, although it's strictly an outside-of-school thing), Jason, and any immediate family members who would want to tickle me. The list can expand if need be, but it's not going to include my older students!



FYI, my mint iced tea was very good. I made a liter jar full and drank it all in less than a day.



Yula and Serojia's wedding is June 24th. Tif, I said I'd help decorate for the reception on Saturday if they need help...you can either join me or sleep off jet lag, if you haven't by that point. And yes, I'll take the skirt. :)

It is now 15 times cheaper for me to call the US!

Please pray for the Y family...their van broke down this week, leaving them without transportation, which is a problem when you have 10 kids. I didn't quite get the details, but it isn't running at all right now, so they're going to have to try and get it fixed, I think. Nadia told me last week that they'd really like to sell this one and buy a new one, but I don't know how that works out financially.

Went to a concert at the Palace of Culture today, which was very nice. A lot of Ukrainian concerts feature flashing lights and large troops of scantily-clad children dancing to songs with random English lyrics, but this was a lot of love songs in Russian (and Italian!) with flowing piano accompaniment. And no flashing lights.

I am deeply impressed by the MSU Credit Union. I used my debit card tonight for the first time in close to a year to put some money on my Skype account. Apparently within an hour of doing this, someone from MSUFCU called my parents' house to confirm that I was, in fact, the person using the debit card. I'm amazed that a) they deal with this sort of issue this quickly and b) especially on a Sunday. As Mom said, they seem concerned about the security of my money.

Decided to clean out random things in my fridge tonight and ended up making a dip for crackers out of cream cheese, sour cream, imitation crab, green onion, and a little bit of Worcestershire sauce. When I told Grandma about this on the phone, she wanted to know if I was having company. Nope, but maybe the neighbor kids will help eat it. Tomorrow's cooking plans include pizza with chicken, onion, and mushrooms. Or maybe a couple stuffed mushrooms with a little bit of the cream cheese and crab that didn't go in the dip. I like cooking! (And I like reading recipe sites online now that I have Internet...but so many things call for ingredients like Mozerella cheese, which is only available at one store in Kharkiv and is rather expensive, comparatively speaking.)

As I mentioned, I put money on my Skype account, so now I can call US numbers (and maybe Germany also?) for about $0.02/minute, as opposed to the $0.30 I was paying before. Am trying to catch up on calling everyone...if you want to be considered part of everyone, let me know.