Many people (including myself) envision Peace Corps volunteers saving the world one village at a time, with their summer camps, community projects, youth projects, various seminars on how to do this or that or how to improve one such thing, writing grants to build this or install that. All in all, the life of a Peace Corps volunteer equals out to be busy all the time. So what am I up to at present?
Nothing. Not unless you count all those episodes of classic Doctor Who, Boardwalk Empire, and the Walking Dead I've finished watching. By those standards I've been up to a lot.
Now now, it's not because I'm slacking or my community isn't interested in doing anything. No, it's because I've arrived at my site at the end of the semester, kids are going home, teachers are scrambling to get their grades in the register, people are shopping for the holidays and frankly, there just isn't any time to even consider a project at the current. Everyday I am told to come to my college for one thing or another that doesn't usually take more than an hour and then my counter point gives me this look that's a cross between concerned mother and a person who is showing pity towards a child who has no toys to play with and says "go have a rest now". So I go back to my comfortable (and extremely awesome and practically better than any apartment I've have in the US) and watch my TV shows, do my Insanity work out (that shit is INTENSE) and patiently plot my schemes for after the holidays end.
Seriously though, my apartment has more room than I know that to do with (as well as more beds than I know what to do with--you read that right. I have about 5 beds in my apartment and I only have theories as to why. So far though, I have only slept in one). The first night I was here, unpacking all my stuff, I got a little overwhelmed. There were so many cupboards and closets and places to put all the things and I just don't have enough things to put in them! I got it sorted out though, no worries ;)
Not that I have been completely slacking. No, no. My counterpart (the teacher who is my official contact person for everything I need and who I will be working with the most) is a real "get goer", much like myself and we have sat down and gone over project ideas that i'm interested in and we discussed what she's interested in, which turns out that she wants me to jump right on HIV/AIDS projects with her students ASAP after the holidays (time to start studying and applying for shit) and tomorrow we are going to the vice director to show her the list that I so dutifully wrote out with notes and action plans on all the projects that I am interested in doing. So I have been doing stuff, and it's rather exciting stuff to. I do love planning.
Oh, right, a little bit about my site! Well, I live in a town named Bohuslav that is home to about 16,000 people. I live right on campus in an apartment building that houses mostly teachers from the college but also some other working people and police officers. I live about a 10 minute walk from the center of town where they have just lighted up a giant New Years tree (they celebrate Orthodox Christmas here on January 7th, which puts News Years first, hence the "New Years" tree instead of a "Christmas" tree). There is an actual grocery store about a 15 minute walk away, but also a lot of little grocers around. My favorite is a little shop named "Mango" that sells fresh fruits and vegetables at prices comparable to the bazaar. I have also made friends with a shop owner across the street from my apartment and she finds it particularly amusing to listen to me stumble over Ukrainian as I try to buy chocolate from her. She totally thinks that I only eat chocolate, I'm sure of it. I only buy it because I've been invited over to people's houses and you can't go empty handed! Really, I'm not eating it all while watching Doctor Who in the dark alone. Really.
There is a river that splits the city (I forget what it's called but it's the same river that splits Kyiv so I should really know what it's called). Speaking of Kyiv, I am a 2 hour Marshrutka (bus--but not really. It's really just a van that someone put bus like seats into) ride away from the capitol which is radical dude. The bazaar is on the other side of the river and is a lot more crowded then what I am used to from being in sleepy little Kozelets. I had a thought to try and make friendly with some stall owners (because that's what's recommended so that people don't rip off the American with the "foreigner tax"), buuuuuut I don't see that happening because everyone was so busy running around everywhere that they just got frustrated at me when I tried to make idle conversation as they were getting my order. Oh well, maybe I'll have better luck next time.
Bohuslav has a lot of little cafes, and shops and a church that I haven't visited yet and is just really cute. I like it.
My college houses about 1,100 students. It is a Pedagogical College for the Humanities and has departments for music, physical education, economics, teaching English as a foreign language, art, primary school and pre-school education, social work, and I'm sure I'm missing some others but pretty much all these students are learning how to either teach their respected disciplines or work in them (such as the social work department). My teaching schedule has me working with the pre-school and primary school teachers, as well as the social workers and economists.
There are 6 English teachers and I've had the pleasure of meeting them all. One of them will be leaving for Italy at the beginning of February to live with her husband (who's Italian) so I will miss her. She invited me over to her apartment and we chatted over delicious Ukrainian food and coffee and I met her mother who is a doctor and can speak a bit of English so our conversation was a mixture of Ukrainilish but it was nice.
My counterpart has also had me over to her house for Ukrainian food (I finally had Vereneky--a sort of dumpling!). She has a daughter who is currently working as an intern at a hospital in Kyiv. She graduated from med school to be a doctor which is pretty cool because she's the same age as me. From what I have gathered of the education system here, students are able to either stick with a general education and graduate from a secondary school, or they can split off and go to a "college" or specialized school to start learning/training in a profession of their choosing at the age of 15, which puts them graduating medical school at 23 instead of 30 like some people in the States. I think I like the system here a little better.
Pictures!
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| My Town |
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| WWII monument in a park that's right outside my college |
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| Student's dorm ( I don't know why the snow is colored) |
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| Entrance to my college |
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| "Bohuslav college for the Humanities" |
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| Student's New Years tree |
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| They decorated the school! |
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| And the windows! |
The English department:
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| My desk! I have a desk! |
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| The lady in the gray shirt and dark short hair to the left of the picture is my counterpart Ludmyla. |
The sports students had a little festival last week that they invited me to! They gave out certificates to those students that did exceptionally well. Between every certificate presentation they had a performance by each of the sports clubs as well as some singers which I'm not sure has anything to do with sports but one of them sang the crap out of a Beyonce song. I'm beginning to think that all Ukrainians can sing because this isn't the first time that I've been to something official and there was seemingly random singing going on that was more than spectacular, if not out of place.
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| Sports celebration |
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| The director of the college |
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| soccer club |
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| dance team (and I WILL find out where the Victoria's secret is...I will) |
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| Cheer leaders |
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| Wrestling |
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| singer |
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| the group |
My apartment:
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| my xmas tree <3 td=""> |
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| my living room/workout room |
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| couch that pulls out into a bed (bed number one that can sleep two) |
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| my bedroom (the big bed is actually two single beds pushed together. The fourth bed is pushed up against the window) |
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| my adorable tub! |
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| my toilet closet |
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| kitchen looking out to my enclosed balcony where I hang my clothes to dry |
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| Kudos to anyone who can guess what I was watching :) |
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| my entryway |
I heart my apartment!
Swearing in ceremony! That was exciting. We left Kozelets early in the morning and arrived in Kyiv around 10am. We had two days of PEPFAR (HIV/AIDS awareness) training as well as presentations from working partners with the Peace Corps. We were scheduled to go to the embassy on the last day to do the actual swearing in but due to the protests happening (and still happening) our country director decided to swear us in right then and there in the hotel. Surprise! He decided to do this in case we weren't able to make it to the embassy the next day but we were able to make it so we swore in twice. I was horribly disappointed that the embassy didn't have a Starbucks in it. I think all embassy workers would agree that Starbucks should be a must in all US embassies around the world.
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| Training director, Irena Krupska |
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| Jake, busting out the Ukrainian national anthem like a badass |
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| Singing/playing the American National Anthem |
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| Out patient and god sent LCF's who we wouldn't have made it through training without |
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| Natasha! |
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| Second swearing in |
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| Ludmyla and I |
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| Surprise swearing in |
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| Ludmyla, Doug (country director), me |
Well, tonight I am going to a concert that one of the students is playing in. Tomorrow is Monday and thus will begin another week of trying to find stuff to keep me busy! ;)
If any of you want my mailing address, just FB message me and I'll send it to you :)
Oh, and it was mine and Mike's 6th month anniversary yesterday! Here's to surviving the rest of my service and a wonderful life together. Love you!
-Jamie
