How I Spent My Quarantine

Hi all,

Days are slippery things, and these past few weeks have been no exception...here are some highlights from the past few weeks:

Ternopil Retreat
I took a personal day the first Friday of the month and pilgrimaged to see Darla in Ternopil. We didn't have school, due to being in quarantine - which would then get extended another week! I arrived just after midnight, and managed to get a taxi with ease - I turned down the ones that approached me, in favor of calling my own for a cheaper price. He dropped me at the wrong door, and once I realized I'd have to walk farther I waited for him to leave so I could do so without looking like an idiot - but he diligently waited for me to go in, driving up to the right door in the process, which led to some confusion for the waiting Darla.

We stayed up a few hours chatting and finally went to bed around 2am. We were up the next morning to go to her school. It was atypically quiet - and the kids who typically were found in corridors were no where to be seen. So Darla and I holed up in her office to discuss things, including the training we have tentatively planned for March. We eventually managed to find some kids between classes, as we clustered around the animal petting station. I would not trade my life for the poor hamster - the only pet small enough to be routinely pulled out and carried off.

After school, we traipsed into a big, beautiful grocery shop. It had brown sugar! And balsamic vinegar! And Parmesan cheese!! No coconut milk, but everything else was found. We'd decided to cook Indian food, and to invite two other volunteers who were around to come to dinner. When we got back - later than anticipated - the first thing to make was the chocolate cake for dessert. Darla's oven is a bit homicidal - the door will flop open with no warning...and has even punctured her foot. This happened about 10 times in the course of the evening. No toes were harmed.

The cake came out lovely, the chicken korma nicely, Darla's spicy curry went over very well, the rice was excellent, and lentil dahl was tasty and the chocolate cake got rave reviews. And there was a wine, so there certainly weren't any complaints!

The next day Darla took me, as a rite of passage, to her favorite local second hand. I did not leave empty-handed! Next we forayed into town for lunch, and I had an amazing chicken dish...reasonably priced as well! We took ourselves home and had a lovely girls evening. We noshed on a variety of cheeses and fruits with bread and wine, discussed traveling in Ireland, life, and finished the evening with a showing of P.S. I Love You. To my credit, I barely bawled.

Darla!

This tasted as amazing as it looked.

Dinner!

Sunday morning was a leisurely affair, and I was on my 10:30 train in no time. I had a 4 hour layover in Lviv, so I got to hop into center for lunch and a good wander. The train ticket lady was pretty adamant about wanting to sell me student tickets though. I had lunch at my favorite Uzbek restaurant, got to see the Chinese New Years celebration (happy belated year of the Monkey, all) and was back in my town just before 9pm.

On my way home, I walked my normal route, which involves no back streets. It wasn't very late, so there were lots of people out. On a stretch along the main road, between my usual small grocery shop and my turnoff to my apt building, I found myself walking through a ring of young men. I had one of my earphones on for a podcast, but felt myself tensing up as I approached the group, surrounding the sidewalk. I strode through with ease and without ill-effect, and it was only once I got home that I made the final connection.

As I'd walked through, one or two of the boys made a certain hand gesture (smacking a cupped fist into an open hand) that is meaningless in America. It's loosely translated into "I'm going to fuck her/you" and at least one poor volunteer has indeed gotten swung at for accidentally making this gesture in mixed company. So essentially, I'd been sexually harassed.

When I shared the experience with Lila, she said "Well, they probably did not mess with you because you looked so high." When slightly pressed, she elaborated that I always look high...which then led to me having to explain why you really can't use "high" and "tall" interchangeably. She found this hilarious.

Judge and Jury
So my planned participation in the English Teacher of the Year event as a jury member was postponed two weeks due to the schools in Uzghorod shutting down for the quarantine there. So it was postponed until the 10/11th. Unfortunately, the other volunteer had a vacation planned for Paris during that time, so I'd be the lone American. Her counterpart puts me on quite the pedestal, so this can be awkward at times as she announces to women 20-30 years my senior with years of teaching experience that my opinion should count for the most as a Native English Speaker. Yet we all survived.

Deciding on Criteria.

The first day started off with a ceremony of great pomp with local singers - who were phenomenal and looked amazing in regional traditional dress. There were four competitions this year: English, Math, History and "Defense of the Motherland". I have no idea what that means, but the men were all of a military background and the one with the most medals ended up winning. Outside of the Defense group, only one of the other 15 teachers at the competition was a man - a history teacher. Having never had a woman Math teacher, it was kind of a funny moment for me.

After the ceremony, where teachers drew lots for lessons/forms/topics for their teaching demo the next day, we went back to a classroom.The first task for the 5 participants was an essay. They had 45 minutes - the same as students in the English Olympiad. Several of the teachers struggled with the timing of writing their final drafts, and the results were a little disappointing because of this. While I and the head of the jury read and marked the essays, the teachers were trooped off to the computer lab to work on a "research project". They had half an hour (!) to put together a presentation on learning styles. This amounted to some slap-dash work, and I was impressed with what they still managed with such short time. The last task was supposed to be a 30 minute teaching "master lesson" on a topic. However, it was decided (apparently at that moment?!) that they'd only have 10 minutes.

Write! And we'll...stare awkwardly at you...

So, they all frantically tried to cut down their presentations and it was...well, not ideal.

We went straight to the dorm after the presentations and I made a rather unfortunate discovery - while I had definitely grabbed the tank top for my dress that I was afraid of forgetting - I had completely forgotten to grab the dress itself!

With the other volunteer gone, I was a bit dismayed over this development. However, I remembered the other volunteer that recently arrived to Uzghorod (having met her once for lunch) and called to explain my predicament. Thankfully, she found this hilarious and quickly promised to grab some items and meet me in the center. Incredibly grateful, I staggered out into the blustering, pouring evening, and wandered my way into town. Minutes later, bag in hand, she arrived like a guardian angel. This is the power of my organization. Because when I later told Will about the story, his first question wasn't "Why would she do that for someone she just met" but was "Are you the same size?" - volunteers just have that something that makes you know that you can just as easily reach out to give help as to ask for it.

So I didn't go semi-naked the next day, for which everyone was undoubtedly grateful.

The main event the next day was watching all the real demo lessons. It was easy to place 3rd-5th but it was more of a challenge deciding between 1st and 2nd. In the end, I believe we all made the right choice for selecting the teacher to represent the region at the national level.

The awards ceremony took several hours, but had lots of amazing dancing and singing. Afterward, we all got tea and coffee and said our goodbyes. I met up with Lila and we headed home.
It was a long process, but I am glad I had the opportunity to see it through.

English Teachers with roses, Teacher on Left got first place.

Anyhow, I think this has gotten QUITE long enough. More next time,

Hope all is well,

Steph

We Missed the Sausage Fest

Hi all,

So by Saturday, I'm pretty sure that Will was going stir-crazy from the quarantine and being cooped up. So we decided to go to nearby Berehovo (about half-way for all of us) to go to a local meat festival. However, upon arrival and after hearing that PETA was protesting in int Kyiv we changed our minds. I changed their minds back once I mentioned that we could say: Did you ever think you end up at a sausage fest in Ukraine? Alas, the buses we departing back too soon for comfort, so it remains a lost opportunity...

However. Will did manage to drag Hugo and I to the local museum (the other volunteers couldn't make it due to disinterest or fear of plague), which turned out to be surprisingly entertaining. We managed to stumble in just after a city tour group - which apparently is a thing there? - came in, so we got to jump in on the tour. Of course it was in Ukrainian dialect, so I mostly zoned out to look at the art in the first room we came to:

No idea of what's going on here. But, fun!

Just under the painting you can glimpse the main exhibit of the museum - a long hallway with hundreds of photographs and sketches and collections of local coins. With about 1000 years of history (changing hands 5 times ranging from Ottoman Empire to finally Ukraine), there were plenty of pictures and the whole museum was dual Hungarian/Ukrainian. There were many significant pictures (including pictures of soldiers during war and societal events), but this was my favorite...

If there aren't horses...
(You can't take me anywhere, I guess...)

In addition, there were three side rooms with minerals from the area, archaeological finds, and other more recent historical artifacts. And in the office, they also had an interesting sideline:

Naughty ones not pictured!

 There's a local glass blower who makes beautiful decanters/ decorative elements that are then filled with local wines. They also had a rather risque section with more of an...anatomical flair.

After the museum we took a picture with Petofi - a famous Hungarian poet who I feel must have actually been a really tiny man - as all statues to him I've seen have him roughly the same size.

We wandered around the city looking for a place to lunch. We were approached several times by Roma children asking for money. They generally tag along for about 20 feet, telling you how they want to eat. Giving money seems to only encourage the behavior, but it's always a somewhat wrenching experience. I know there are organizations, and the kids should be in school, but it's hard to turn down the kids. It was less hard to turn down the second horde. We passed a mother with four children, who she literally sicced on us. They grabbed my purse, and then were hanging on to my arm. Two went after Hugo, and he literally had to extract his pinkies from them. It was rather extreme, and a very uncomfortable situation. I know there are quite a few organizations aimed at helping the Roma, and I felt bad that the kids were sent to beg by their mother, but it was very invasive. Not sure the best way to deal with it, honestly.

Anyhow, yesterday Lila had a blended church choir concert, which was really nice to go to. Very sociable, and the singing was lovely.

And, today I went to Uzhgorod - finally getting to meet the new volunteer there, who's lovely - and as we walked from the bus we discovered that large shop (called Ukraine, unfortunately), was in the midst being a roaring inferno.

Not pictured is the swarm of gawkers. The police station seemed content to contain it and then let it burn. The whole city was wrapped in a cloud of smoke it seemed.

Anyhow, on that warm note, I'm going to conclude this post.

Hope all is well,

Steph

P.S. Lila told me this joke (after asking me what the name for a chicken's man is...)

Why did the rooster close his eyes when he crowed?

To prove that he knew the words by heart!

Confinement

Hi all,

So, it's been an eventful past week or so. Last weekend (Thursday night, technically), I hopped a train to Kyiv to go to a committee meeting on Friday. I was in a third class berth, and was happy that it was all women. Third class is similar to second, except that they don't have full compartments - there's rooms of four bunks (stacked two by two), with an opening to the corridor, which has two stacked bunks across from it. So there's a lot of humanity going on, especially when you're right next to the bathroom.

Some of the humanity involved a rather belligerent man who kept shouting Glory to Ukraine (which necessitates the response: Glory to the Heroes!) and insisting that everyone only speak Ukrainian. This was treated good-naturedly for a while, but soon wore down the people around him. One charming young woman apparently decided to try debating with him. There was much side-eyeing happening between myself and the women in my little semi-compartment. Eventually he did pass out, which made for a more pleasant environment.

Despite it being broiling, I managed to pass out for a few hours, but was happy to pull into Kyiv around 7:30am - in plenty of time for the 10am meeting. Kyiv had snow! Like, inches of it. Their best management techniques apparently involve salting and, somewhat bewildering, putting up plastic hazard tape (at neck-level) across portions of particularly dangerous stretches of sidewalk. So you got to have the added danger of clotheslining yourself as you tried to focus on not slipping. Fortunately, the organizational HQ is quite close to the train station.

I waltzed in to discover three other early/late arrivals - some of the closer volunteers had arrived the night before. It was fun to catch up before getting ready for the meeting. The meeting itself went on for less time than expected, as it was mainly organizational. I'm officially the "head" of the committee - appointed by the organization - but it's a great group and I think it just means I'm the official deadline and materials round-up coordinator. Fine by me!

It was also productive in the fact that I got to meet with the doctors, get my flu shot and then meet with my regional manager and the safety and security officer in charge. He made me name his (second) fish. My regional manager is very hands-off but supportive - I know that he'll go to bat for me and there's a good relationship of trust. It's also not very hard, because I don't see the point in not being completely transparent in my plans - there's nothing to hide. I think if he was constantly checking in with me, I'd be more tempted to tell him less details so he wouldn't be tempted to micro-manage. Anyhow, it's nice to have a style that I find easy to work with. Plus he's pretty cool - knows the good places to go for nightlife or to buy a tent...

So you know it's clean...clearly we got the ritzy room somehow!

A little sexist.

After dropping stuff at the hotel, a group of us ventured off in search of a restaurant. I thought that we were going to this burger place that came strongly recommended, but it turns out I missed a twist in the decision making tree. Which was perfectly fine, but got a bit confusing at one point. I didn't have to lead the expedition though, so I was perfectly fine with where we ended up - a restaurant with 50% all the menu items...slightly strange, but we made it work and had some pretty decent beer.

I don't drink alone at site - actually I barely drink at all because Lila is Baptist and she's who I hang out the most with. And it's not really within the culture to go out alone as a woman. Sometimes groups of women do go out, but it seems that it's only for special occasions, and probably still not to a bar. So it was really nice to get a few beers with people who were drinking responsibly and fun to talk to. It was nice to meet some of the new volunteers and hang out socially as well.

That's right, hot chocolate WITH mini-marshmallows

Saturday I made plans to meet a previous volunteer who is now working in Kyiv. She was actually going to the National art museum with one of the staff from my organization, whose husband is a painter. So we ended up getting a curated tour, which was pretty awesome. I'd covered the museum briefly with the 11th form for their "Art" section, and so I recognized a few of the works. My favorite painter was Abram Manievich , who I just discovered eventually came to live in the US. There was also a self-portrait by Taras Shevshenko, the national poet/painter forced into servitude and soldiery. The volunteer's roommate (who is half Ukrainian, half American and recently returned to work as well) came along, and was a lot of fun to hang out with. Afterward, we three went to find lunch and then to meet up with the dwindled group of volunteers who didn't leave until the evening.

Before I left, I met with my secretary/student friend from work, who was in Kyiv for courses. It took a while, but we ended up finding a place to get coffee. I also took a creeper picture of a guy who embodies the Kyiv-vibe - shaved head with long topknot bun, rocking a sweater...

Also: note the manspreading

The trip back was pretty uneventful. Tired of the eventual awkwardness of my trainmates discovering my lack of communication was due to foreignness, I out-ed myself immediately, figuring that I'd be comfortably ignored. Nope, instead one declared that they'd just speak slowly, and I ended up in an hours-long conversation. I definitely lost the thread at times, but it was still a lovely exchange. I was in second class, which was more spacious, quiet and less heated. Unfortunately, I found myself starting to come down with a sore throat...and with a tree abandoned on my doorstep. (No Idea)

Second surprise: the glowing eyes was a cat.

I arrived back Sunday morning, and wasn't feeling so hot. I stayed home from school Monday - trying all day to reach the medical office. I finally had to call the after-hours line. Between my low fever, sore throat, sinus pain and fatigue, they ordered me to start taking antibiotics (thoughtfully given in advance) and forbade me to return to school for three days. Wednesday night, I was informed that our school was closed under "quarantine" for the next week and a half, so apparently I'm in good company.

Yesterday I left the house for the first time, and managed to get all my house cleaning done! Plus in all my down time I managed to create some materials and get some grad school writing done.

Anyhow, going to utilize the rest of the week for more prep and materials creation...

Hope all is well,

Steph

Cat in the (floating bowler) hat

Day Two of Captivity...

Hi all,

Totally joking.

The first few days of the semester have actually been pretty good. I mean, I know my classes and we're starting new topics and I feel my creativity is up to snuff. I also didn't forget as many names as I feared...just, maybe, 10 or so?

I have still been fighting some anxiety, although I hear this is not uncommon among other volunteers. But when I have to talk myself into going back to sleep when my body thinks we should get up an hour earlier than needed, it certainly is annoying.

On a more positive note - today I realized I hit my 6 month mark of being in country.

So that's pretty cool. I thought about what I've accomplished, and felt no panic at only having half my time left. I know that this semester will be even more full, and I'm working on breaking it down into manageable chunks. I'm in them midst of planning on being a part of at least 4 trainings, helping to implement an international creative writing initiative, look into getting some free books, and of course grad school and committee work. Plus, hanging out with my Ukrainian friends.

And breathing. Because breathing is good.

Other random things: The free app of the week is Lifeline - and it's basically choose-your-own-adventure on steroids. It works offline, and I just spent a harrowing past 3 days wondering if Cadet Taylor was going to make it off the moon he was stranded on in a freak space accident. If you die, apparently you get to rewind to any one of your past choices. I managed to make it out, but it got...oddly intense? And pretty freaky. Anyhow, I recommend it.

I recently researched water towers - why do we have them and are they obsolete. Short answer: gravity and no! Keeping up with high-volume times, being able to supply during power black-outs, and handy navigation devices for small plane pilots flying over many small towns. Thrilling stuff.

Also, today's younger club theme was "Things that Fly" (that well of creativity...sometimes it's a bit...leaky). It actually went really well and culminated in a paper airplane competition.We obviously had a blast. I'd looked up a pattern for airplanes, but they all decided to just go for it and did their own designs:

Best of all, no one lost an eye!

My older club was a bit of a bust - only one student made it. So after asking what he did on break (read comics on his phone), I then learned an awful lot about Lanterns. As in the Green, Red, Black etc. variety. So that was interesting. And then he worked on trying to make me a better "Durok" (Idiot) card player. To practice, I made him name all the cards and suites. 

Anyhow, full day tomorrow - shopping, planning, and HOPEFULLY starting on my third paper...

Hope all is well,

Steph

PS - bonus picture! Just got this today from the baby baptism party I was invited to by my friend (although the baby was in none of the pictures, because: sleeping infant).

Lila, happy couple, school friend and me

Back to School

Hi all,

I have to say that I always hated the beginnings of semesters (or quarters, going back to high school). I'm not overly fond of change: I enjoyed knowing my schedules, the expectation of the teachers and classes I was in and the routine that I built up. Becoming a teacher hasn't changed that much - except that my class schedule is at least the same. Added fun for this semester is completing my grad school work, serving on several committees and continuing to do several trainings a month (I assume).

This has made me a bit reluctant to jump back into school. Although, honestly, I have no idea what I'd do with myself if they extended break. It's just...change!

I've made a valiant attempt to prepare myself - mostly by keeping an irregular schedule and doing things in no way productive to the upcoming events. Play hard, work hard, right? Yesterday was the last day of freedom, and so I enjoyed it.

We were hoping to do a volunteer meet-up at the local red wine festival - which indeed was happening all week, but at the park instead of town center. However, we also got a surprise snowfall, blanketing the town in 2-3 inches of slushy snow. The two volunteers in the town nearest to me (excluding Hugo), decided to not come over fears of slipping. Hugo decided to come on Sunday - until he read up on the program of events and discovered the fire performers were going to have a show in the evening.

Not My Cat
I made plans to go in a bit earlier with my counterpart Lila and another teacher, and so was leaving my apartment at 2:30pm. I stepped out into the hallway to discover a man knocking on the door across the hall from mine. He perked up a bit at seeing me, and rapidly launched Ukrainian (?possibly Russia? it was rapid). I asked him to repeat, and still understood nothing. So I gave my "I don't speak good Ukrainian because I'm American" speech, and he graciously replied in very good English that he was wondering if anyone on my floor had an orange cat.

I didn't know the answer to this, other than the obvious fact that I  don't have a cat. He followed me down the steps explaining that the cat (spotted easily on the next floor) was camping outside his door, and running in at every occasion.The cat was about three quarters grown, clearly well-cared for and quite friendly - running up to say hello. The cat then followed us down to the next floor, crouching in front of the door under the man's apartment. He knocked, but there was no answer.

As I turned to go out the door, I decided to take a photo of the handsome fellow, and caught the apartment door opening as I did.

Not their cat.

However, when I returned 4 hours later, the cat was not in evidence - I'm hoping he finally found the right door!

Fire Show
So, going to a wine festival with Baptists is a pretty anti-climatic affair. It wasn't until after 5 minutes that I was informed that they were now planning on going to the center. So I trooped along after them, shadowing their random errands until Hugo arrived. It was just below freezing, and the slushy sidewalks had turned my toes a bit frosty.

We went to the festival, wandered the craft booths (not quite as good as the honey festival's, surprisingly) and got some hot spiced wine. We then decided to grab a bite to eat, and got shuffled down into a communal table. We were seated across from a friendly couple who were from Chernihiv - a place where we'd gone for training seminars.

They were in the area to enjoy the thermal springs, and were wrapping up their visit to the south. They soon insisted on sharing some of their wine with us, and we stumbled our way through conversation. The husband was a geology teacher (or geography...?) so Hugo the archaeologist was well suited to talk shop. Unfortunately, the fire show started while we were chatting, so we all ended up getting up fairly quickly to go watch. It was an interesting contrast to my life in Germany - there the language barrier wasn't even as strong, yet it was very hard to find people willing to engage with you. Here, countless times I have encountered the opposite. Despite so little common language, the attempt is usually made and carried out with enthusiasm, laughter, and (to be honest) alcohol.

The fire show itself was much shorter than the last for the city name day, but was still quite a sight.
Anyhow, off to enjoy my last evening of relative freedom until June! (/July, when camp ends...)

Hope all is well,

Steph

January Sojourn

Hi all,

School begins on Monday again, so I figured I'd better pop this post out soon. It turned out to be quite long...feel free to skim...a link for pictures is below.
My holidays were quite lovely, my Counterpart, Lila came over and Hugo came into town to eat Christmas pizza on the 25th. We had a lovely evening together.

I spent a low-key time in Ternopil for New Years, and enjoyed many simple pleasures - including some actual snow!

After Ternopil, I was in Lviv for a few days - unfortunately it was bitterly cold and everyone who met up ended up with a terrible cold. However, it was full of hours of happy companionship, delicious food, and being terribly spoiled by Darla's (an amazing volunteer who lives in Ternopil and is pretty much who I want to emulate whenever I grow up) husband, who also brought me my favorite rum from the US. It was good people, good conversation and good times.

Highlights were the vegan restaurant (so much hipster), games at the apt we stayed at, and an amazing eggs benedict breakfast at Veronica.

After a few false starts and confusion, I got myself a cab and was on the way to Lviv airport. This felt a little peculiar, as the last time I'd been there it was for evacuation. I had a slight moment of unease as I passed through passport control. I needed to show my national registration, and it was only after the agent whipped the booklet open that I realized I'd stashed my emergency cash inside! Luckily, it looked like the least intentional bribe ever, so she just rolled her eyes and shoved the money back at me. My flight was at 2:30am, and instead of other volunteers I found myself surrounded by many Turkish nationals. I don't remember even taking off.

Culture shock can be a fickle thing. So can a bit of sleep-deprived exhaustion. Suffice it to say, it as literally a rude awakening to disembark in Istanbul to an outdoor area, and endure a quick hike to the shuttle bus. The rain was unpleasant but it really the several inches of snow (or feet, in the dumping areas) that took me most aback. Then, as I searched for my transfer counter, I was informed that they were enjoying their 4:30am breakfast. Eventually, all three of them ambled up.

After I made it into the terminal proper, Starbucks and Victoria's Secret (relax, just the perfume line - don't get too crazy), helped to increase my imbalance. Not that I went to either of them, but still. I did find a quiet boarding area with a stretch of free seats, curled up and passed out for a few hours. I enjoyed eating some borek and made it to my flight with no problems. I really lucked out on my flights and was in exit rows both times - the second flight I had no seat in front of me.

This turned out to be fortuitous, as I believe I spiked a moderately high fever during this time, and pretty much just floated in and out of a feverish slumber. I also had a bit of a cough, and this caused my neighbor to regard me with utter disinterest, so I was happily left alone. By the time we landed, I seemed to be through the worst of it. I was happy to discover the airport wi-fi (Istanbul was sadly lacking in this department!), which helped to pass the hour long visa control wait. The agent was a bit thrown to discover I was not going back to America at the end of the trip, but as my cleats were not in evidence this time, it wasn't really remarked upon.

The important thing about going on vacation is to stop thinking in term of the Ukrainian hryvnia and my moderate stipend, and make the switch to vacation and my US account I used to fund my trip. For example, a bus ride costs 4 UAH (approximate 16 cents), and the train shuttle to Amsterdam from the airport cost almost 6 euros (about 180 UAH...more than what I spend in a month for transportation in my city). A train to Kyiv (15 hours) costs less than that! So clearly, a thought process that must not be followed!

Here is a link to my photo album that you can access by clicking: CLICK ME!

Amsterdam
In Amsterdam I was serendipitous enough to have excellent taste in finding a snack before heading out on a short jaunt to my hostel. I bought "stroopwaffeln", delicious, large, round, crispy waffers filled with a sweet filling - usually caramel, but in this case honey with citrus spice. And thus a love story was born. Apparently you can purchase some types state-side, and I heartily recommend them!

Anyhow, it started a theme of tasty food experiences on my travels. While waiting for Bean (from the community days!), I drowsed on the chair in our hostel room - waiting for the bedding to be changed. This finally happened as we headed out for dinner, but I'd perked up quite a bit from travels. After a flurry of greetings and quick catch ups of her traveling (she'd been in Italy, Sweden and England previous to our meeting up), we were just going to lock up our stuff for dinner when the other 6 members of our hostel room filed in. 4 were currently living in Germany: 1 from Dubai (plus his brother who was visiting from Dubai, 2 from Armenia and 1 I missed, and finally a Canadian from Syria. I believe these gentlemen enjoyed Amsterdam to the fullest, but were very polite - offering M&Ms, coming in quietly later, and none of them even snored! Demonstrating the best part of the hostel experience.

Anyhow, back to food. We wandered the drizzly streets and ended up at a quiet sushi restaurant. The food was good, but greatly overshadowed by the conversation. It'd been a bit over a year since we'd last seen eachother, and our online contact is sporadic. We chatted about our ideas for the trip an found ourselves to be on the same page - lots of wandering, low expectations, and keeping it low stress. A perfect traveling companion! We finished the evening with some tasty gelato, and a long ramble through the red light district. Not terribly scandalous, and indeed difficult to distinguish from other areas at times.

Efteling, Tilburg & Cologne
The next morning we were up at a reasonable hour, ate the free hostel breakfast and were off to the trainstation for our 9:30 train. After a quick ride and a bus ride (complete with mind-blowing Wi-fi and seats for everyone!), we found ourselves at the gate of Efteling - a smallish amusement park with a fairy-tale theme.

While ideal for taking children under the age of 12 to, it was naturally up both of our alleys. Much of my formative reading years was spend immersed in fairy tales, and so it really was quite enchanting. Though clearly not up to today's modern technological standards, it was more than made up for by the relatively small crowds. We went on 4 roller coaster rides in 20 minutes. One about mining and ghosts, a "dueling dragons" (two side-by side rollercoasters on separate tracks that race...we lost both times...) an intriguing "bobsledding" coaster, where you spent part of the time off tracks in a luge, and one based on Rocs with some funky laser effects.

We also discovered a fresh stroopwaffeln stall, and enjoyed them immensely  - they were full of caramelly-goodness and almost as big as my face! The part was personable, as there were all unique booths - not the repetition of the same knicknacks or snacks every 20 feet, and the regions all distinct in their flavor.

We saw a hall of dioramas, with a complete miniature country side sharing a hall with a gorgeous carousel. Here and there, rides for younger children with automatons were also present. Maintenance crews were busily keeping everything pristine, and Bean's winged knitted cap drew great interest and approval where ever we went - the carousel worker even carried it off to show his co-workers at one point.

After hours of walking around, we decided to take a peek into the fairy-tale statue/automaton garden, just to glance around. This resulted in being lost for a good half an hour, attempting to stumble back to the exit. (Because we'd eschewed taking a map or downloading the park app in a fit of adventurous spirit.) We found a creepy talking tree, and enjoyed seeing the different stories.

We finally exited the park, hopping a bus to our transit town of Tilburg. We had an hour to find food, but after being denied access to a cafe (apparently it was that kind of grass cafe, and we had to be nationals to enter), we ended up at a pub that cooked our delicious dinner so slowly that we were forced to abandon it to make our train. Prompting a slightly snide comment from the slightly strange barman, so we had to promise it wouldn't happen the next time....

We made our train to Cologne, arriving in the evening and trekking to our hostel with no problem. We took a night stroll, unaware of the drama that had unfolded several days before. The streets were quiet, with no roving bands of harassing men in evidence. We turned in at a reasonable hour, as we were taking an 8ish train to Stuttgart the next day.

Stuttgart
We arrived to our Stuttgart hostel with ease, after some initial local transportation confusion while buying tickets. There, we met Sara and her partner Andy already waiting for us. After we checked in, we set off to explore Stuttgart.

I hadn't seen Sara since I left Regensburg about 8 years ago -making me the age she was when we first met. She had returned to Regensburg and lived there for 4 years, and then made the move to Stuttgart where she'd been living for the past four. Luckily, it was a holiday, so she had the day off to meet us. However, this meant that many things in the city were closed. They brought us to one of their favorite restaurants that served local Schwaebisch food, and the meal went by quickly.

We'd made no concrete plans, and they were lovely enough to just fold us into a plan to spend the day together. Due to our lack of interest in cars, we opted out of going to the Porshe museum. The Rittersport chocolate factory and museum was of intense interest, but the transportation would have made it time consuming. So we ended up going back to Andy's apartment.

We had a lovely afternoon: they had a huge stash of holiday chocolate - so there was an impromptu chocolate sampling of over 10 chocolates, I learned the game Carcassonne (German, despite the French name) and we played two variants. It was similar to Settlers of Catan, and was great fun. We also discovered our shared love of Doctor Who, and so geeked out a bit over that. We ordered in dinner from a Doener place around the corner, and had dinner while watching Doctor Who.

It was a lovely day of catching up, renewing a friendship, and sharing memories. I believe Bean enjoyed herself as well, and as we were both suffering from colds, it was a relaxing way to spend a recuperative day.

We returned to our hostel to find it taken over by the belongings of our third roommate. We called it an early night, and were up early for the next day's adventure!

Dachau/Munich & Regensburg
In stark contrast to the theme park, Dachau was much more forbidding the gray light of day. I've lost track of the times I've been to Dachau - although I believe it's around 4. It would be a stretch to call it something I enjoyed. It's more of a pilgrimage, and a pledge that I won't forget. I spent longer this time in the museum than ever before. Dachau was one of the earliest camps, meant for "political" prisoners initially. The PR surrounding the camp was astounding. However, as the war went on, the quality of life plummeted into being a complete nightmare. Dachau became the dumping ground of those not fit to be sent out to the surrounding "work" (Read: death) camps that it served as a hub for. And swelled to an enormous number of prisoners by war's end.

Stories of resistance still somehow managed to happen - in one instance, a group of women (a rarity, as it contained only men for the majority of the existence of the camp) who worked in a camera factory, came to their breaking point over salt. Starvation was not a new phenomenon late in the war. Resources were limited, and at one point the salt supply ran out - the sole seasoning of what cannot even properly be called "soup", the basis of their diet. This was the last straw, and the women went on strike - knowing full well the possible implications of this action. This spark of humanity resonated strongly with me. In a strike of luck, the ringleaders, condemned to death,were somehow never executed.

Yet many were not so lucky. Walking the grounds with their few barracks and memorials is an incredibly grounding experience. The Jewish memorial is especially powerful, and contains an atmosphere of palpable sadness. In the back wall, a carmelite convent is in operation - started by a priest who survived internment. An echo of the faith that was somehow kept by Christians, Jews and others that somehow survived.

Munich was rainy and served as a stopping point for dinner on our way to Regensburg. I sent a brief text to my friend Uli, and was relieved to see him at the platform.

Regensburg
So awesome it gets its own second heading.

Regensburg felt like coming home. As Uli showed us the way to his apartment (spiffily located near center), it was awesome to realize how much of the city I recognized. Uli took us out to his favorite pub as soon as we'd dropped our things, and it was pretty awesome. It'd been opened in the past few years, and was new to me. It had awesome beverages including an amazingly strongly spiced wine, mead, and of course German beers. It also had Pflammkuchen - basically a very thin crust pizza covered in taste combinations that made my inner foodie very satisfied. After 5 minutes with Uli, I turned to Bean and said: "Don't I know the best people?", and she had to agree. (After all, she is one of them...)

We had a fantastic time (though I discovered the solidity of the wooden tables in a painful manner, thus resulting in a beautiful, free bruise souvenir), and had a good night's sleep.

The next morning, Uli had to go teach 5 classes, so we enjoyed sleeping in. I then gave Bean a brief tour of the city  - as it is rather small. Unfortunately, the bridge is under construction, but I think I got the mythology of the deal with the devil down. We ended up at this little gourmet foodie cafe with delicious panninis - after we made the mistake of doing gift shopping for German chocolate and other goodies.

We met up with Uli around 12:30, and decided to accompany him to Nuremberg. Poor man needs to transfer for his final stint of student teaching and must relocate for the next 5 months. The Christmas markets were still in evidence in Nuremberg (as well they should be, as they lay claim to the largest Christmas market in Europe/the world (?)), and we parted ways to go trek up to the castle. That accomplished, we meandered around until we met up with Uli again. His apartment hunt had been successful, and we ended up in a cafe. After the train back to Regensburg, we hit up a favorite pizza place - still going strong. We then did a little bar-hopping, savoring some wonderful German brew.

All good things must come to an end, and we soon found ourselves packed up for our early morning departure to our next step, and last day traveling together.

Prague
Bean and I had both been to Prague before. I have to say it's nicer in the spring, but the snow was a nice touch. Figuring out the metro took a minute, and involved an interesting experience. Directly ahead of us on our way down to the platform was a young woman (early 20s?) with lilac hair, being pestered by her boyfriend. With a slight edge of exasperation, she informed him that no, she did not have any cigarettes. She batted at him ineffectively as he took glee in pestering her by touching her face a lot.

However, it was soon evident that he was NOT her boyfriend. He took off after another woman. Now, I have no idea what he said to her, but I'm pretty sure he came to regret it. This woman LIT into him. For the next three minutes, she railed non-stop at him - and it was pretty easy to interpret that she was giving this creep that what-for. I really had to stop myself from applauding - this lady was NOT going to put up with his shit.

The actual trip into the city was uneventful. We ate at a cafe, meandered through town to take in the astronomical clock tower and enjoyed many groups of talented street musicians. (Oddly popular were jazz and American folk traditional songs.) We went over the bridge, and then up to the castle. Bean's train was quite a bit earlier than mine, so we called it a day. I spent the next 5 hours in a cafe, and then outside it in the train station. It was nice to have Wi-fi, but the plug ins were all shut off, which was annoying. My midnight train to Slovakia (trying making that into a song) finally arrived, and I managed to nap intermittently for the next 5 hours.

Bratislava and Kosice
Bratislava was a bit of a let down - although my tiredness clearly played into it, and the bleak weather as well. Arriving at the train station at 6am meant spending the next hour and a half or so waiting at the station for the sun to rise and things to open - as it was also Sunday. Unfortunately, the train station was not very comfortable - as it is a mecca for un-housed and many inebriated men. A slight altercation between a few men cemented my idea to change my travel plans - as I was not sure I didn't want to spend the evening hours waiting for another midnight train.

So I went out and explored the town for a few hours (including another castle, of course), but it was mostly quiet and closed down for Sunday. I'm sure it's much prettier in spring. It was interesting that Slovakia is on the euro, although prices are much different than in Germany or the Netherlands. It seems like a hard way to use the currency.

Anyhow, I took a noon train across the country to Kosice - the sun was out and I enjoyed a first class compartment to myself. I arrived shortly after dark and made the trek to my hostel in the middle of nowhere. I had a room to myself by chance, and called it a night early on. The next morning I explored the old city, including a beautiful church. (The castle is quite a trek out of town, and I simply didn't have it in me at that point to make the trip.) I also discovered a lovely chocolate cafe, and managed to get a beautiful fruit-covered waffle.

After several hours, I made it onto my bus back to Mukachevo. It was a bit strange, as it was a fancy coach bus (complete, again, with Wi-fi), and we made great time across the border - without stopping to pick up random people. I was very happy to arrive back home safely, and have spent the past few days recovering and doing a mountain of laundry.

This concludes my epic tale...

Hope all is well,

Steph

Did You Ever Think?

Hi all,

Merry Almost Christmas.

Will has a saying (that he loves to whip out at random times, like in the midst of a 50km hike), of "Did you ever think that you'd be doing X in Ukraine?"

And honestly, Hugo and I usually just have to laugh and answer no.

Being a volunteer is filled with moments that when I stop to think about them, quietly blow my mind. Part of it is just attitude - in my life in America, I had moments as well, of course. It's a great tool for mindfulness however, especially as I have now hit my 5 month mark in country, and things are feeling pretty settled.

I have a weekly routine: classes, meeting to lesson plan with teachers, Ukrainian tutoring, cooking, maybe doing a training, cleaning my apartment, working on  grad school papers, and communicating with friends and family both in Ukraine and abroad. The little victories seem to be less important to share, and this demotivates my blogging. But here are some moments:

In my 5th form class I planned an activity around food: students would work in groups of 4-5, each group got about 15 or so food cards, and were told that they were opening a shop. They needed to organize their items by food group, and write out a price list. Then we would cover the concept and design of a balanced meal using food groups. They would write their own menu and then write an ingredients list. Finally, they would see what things they needed from their shop, and visit the other groups to see what else they could buy. In the end, they had to announce the total price of their meal, and any items they couldn't find. It was an in-depth activity, and took two class periods.

However, a moment before the class started, I realized that the order was wrong. That students would (most likely) try to make a menu centered around their own shop offerings. So I turned to my co-teacher and said "I'm going to change this, ok?". She said sure, and I changed the order - having them start with the menu/balanced meal, and then going to the shop formation. And although there was the normal amount of confusion at times, it went really well.

It was a moment of personal triumph on two levels: I was able to trouble-shoot a potential problem before it happened, and my co-teacher had complete faith in my ability and judgement to make a last minute change. So that was really awesome.

I also found myself sitting in as part of a jury for the English teacher of the year (which happens every 4 years??), and it was an interesting process. There was a new format of having the teachers submit materials, rather than come in person for the first stage. Participants needed to submit documentation (15 points), a video component/presentation (20 points), and have prepared a blog (65 points).

First of all, the weighting perplexed all the judges. One exclaimed that what we would see was not the best English teacher,  but the best tech teacher helping to create the blog. The criteria for judging that weighty category seemed vague - comments, visits...but very little about the actual content. Every single teacher who submitted the blog link had created it solely for the competition. We had no rubric for judging them, and it soon became apparent. Luckily, we were all pretty united on the top 3 choices and little discussion produced numbers 4 and 5.

I will return in a month for two days of judging the next and final phases - a test portion, a presentation, and a teaching demonstration in a random classroom. I'm hoping that this levels the playing field.

Funny that the first time I'm on a jury is under these circumstances.

Life Updates
So, here's a list of things that I don't have time to expand on...

1. I got a sitemate - he is a community development volunteer and he arrived yesterday. We connected by phone briefly, and he only seemed semi-shell-shocked.

2. I was selected to be on the National Olympiad Committee with 9 other volunteers - so my spring break will be helping to judge that, and in a few weeks we have our first meeting to create materials for the competition

3. I was also honored by being named chair of the Olympiad Committee.

4. I've hung out with the "orienteering group" a few more times and also have been invited on Saturday to go to one of my students' house to celebrate with her family.

5. I submitted my final draft of my second short grad paper, leaving me with 1 more plus the thesis.

6. I am cleared for my whirlwind tour through The Netherlands, Germany, Czech Republic and Slovakia in a few weeks, and looking forward to it immensely.

7. My kids at club created Christmas decorations for me, and we had fun making cookies and other decorations at club.

Anyhow, clearly I'm glossing over a few things that happened in the last 2 months or so, but here's a start to the catching up.

Hope all is well, and happy holidays!

Steph

A New Level of Exhaustion: Achieved!

Hello all,

I just posted a beautiful post about my weekend.

And then the fucking computer ate it.

Things Cute Children Say

Hello all,

So I'm still tinkering with my blog look (my mother has complained about the previous pattern, which I thought was adorably Ukrainian, but is apparently hard on the aged eyes : p), but I've put in a temporary generic design.

Anyhow, today's theme is all about the cute children in my life.

First: my relationship with my secondary counterpart's 2 year old daughter is pretty cute. She exclaims "Stepha!" every time she sees me, and hurls herself into my arms. I dutifully repeat her slightly-butchered diminutive name and swing her up for enthusiastic greeting.

The other day, after I returned from Will's village for a training (which I have mixed feelings on - it got cut short and the parts I'd spent hours preparing didn't get used, which made me feel inadequate), I met up with my counterpart, my secondary counterpart and her three children, and a friend who is a secretary/librarian at my school.

We had tea and cake, and spoke a mixture of Ukrainian and English. I got to re-tell (in Ukrainian, it didn't go well) how Hugo almost missed the bus to Will's village Wednesday evening, dashing in the door with literally seconds to spare. We were short a chair, so I served as the 2 year old's.

I walked with my counterpart and the friend to her bus stop, and as we waited my counterpart received a phone call. She laughed and shared the following story, about the car ride home my secondary counterpart had with her children and husband.

2 year old: (suddenly): "Daddy, you love Stepha?"
Father: (caught off guard): "Oh, um, no..."
2 year old: "Mama, you love Stepha?"
Mother: "Yes, I love Stepha"
2 year old: " *sister* , you love Stepha?"
Sister: "Yes, I love Stepha"
2 year old: "*brother*, you love Stepha?"
Brother: "Yes, I love Stepha"
2 year old: "...Daddy, why don't you love Stepha?!"

Ukrainian, of course, has different verbs for different kinds of love, and I got the impression that her question blurred which kind she was asking, so of course her father felt a little awkward answering. I love that she interrogated her entire family over their devotion to me!

However, even this outpouring of love pales in cuteness levels of comparison when looking at last Friday's exchange I had with one of my second form pupils - we'll call her Dasha.

I was walking to the front desk with my co-teacher of the day to return a key. As I went, I passed through a little mob of the 2nd form class that I teach on Mondays with my counterpart. One little girl, shaking with excitement, bounced up to me:

Dasha: HELLO!

Me: Hello! How - are - you?

Dasha: *scrunching up face in adorable concentration* 'I...am...Dasha!'

(with great triumph)

Me: Yes, you are Dasha...And - HOW - are - you?

Dasha: *looking slightly panicked*

Me: I am -great-...are you -great-?

Dasha: *quivering with understanding* 'Great! I am great!'

Me: Great!

Dasha beamed with pride and rushed over to some friends.

I turned and continued on to the classroom - about 15 feet from the group. It wasn't until I turned around to shut the door behind me that I realized I'd been followed - lined up like ducklings, the 2nd form class had decided that I was apparently going to be their teacher. I gently shooed them away, and my co-teacher told them they had to wait for the other teacher to collect them.

It was adorable.

Anyhow, I'll probably post about my recent trip to Lviv and how I've kept busy over fall break this week. But not tonight!

Hope all is well,

Steph

Time Slips By - One Training at a Time

Hi all,

It was a full week again.

Monday I was only at half my lessons, as Hugo and I conducted a short two-hour teacher training in a local village. His counterpart was tasked with arranging them once a month for the next three months in different villages and I'd been invited along for the ride.

Now, this meant that on Sunday we were still finalizing touches. The glamorous life of trainers. It's an interesting trade-off, doing co-facilitator. It feels very natural with Hugo, since we started in training two years ago, and so there's a very good sense of each others strengths, mode of operation and cues of requiring a helping hand. This helps to mitigate the worry that the other person won't or can't back you up if you get stuck, and the consolation that you'll go down together if it somehow crashes and burns.

And it didn't crash or burn. It was interesting, because we basically had modified a presentation that I had thrown together for a previous training, and then added a "demo class" to demonstrate the communicative approach. Hugo ended up getting stuck at the same place I had - which is mainly demonstrating the four parts of the communicative approach. Normally, I'd be a bit leery of jumping in on someone, but I felt comfortable slipping in some examples and things continued smoothly.

Our demo lesson was on the theme of Halloween. It went fairly well, but we both agreed afterward that it needed some more updating. So, as we'll be doing this "same" training twice more, we have more opportunities to sort it out. We needed to get the teachers more comfortable with speaking, and get them up and moving a bit more.

Next time, next time.

We also got asked to come in about a month to Uzhgorod to present to another group of teachers. Plus, Will is having a training this Thursday that we're doing part of the communicative approach in and part basic lesson teaching - reading/listening/speaking. We're doing half hour session rotations, so I'll have 30 minutes to hone my skills on teaching reading. I have a ppt and a lesson plan from my organization, that I'll have to cut down. So that'll be my Wednesday.

Anyhow, busy week ahead - lesson planning as usual, special Halloween-themed club fun for Tuesday (as next week is fall break), my first tutoring lesson in Ukrainian on Wednesday in the morning, seminar prep in the afternoon, traveling in the evening. Training on Thursday, and then teaching as usual Friday.

Hope all is well,

Steph

My Address

Hello all,

I got this figured out a while ago, but haven't posted. Apparently the post office will deliver most anything to my door - letters for sure, and a package depending on the carrier (Meest is the best). However, it's pretty cost prohibitive. Should anyone feel like dropping me a postcard or letter, I'd love to get some mail!

Стеф Мунсон

Вул. Данила Галицького 57, Кв. 19

М. Мукачеве, Мукачівcький район

Закарпатська Обл.

89600

Україна

Steph Munson

57 Danyla Halytskoho St., Apt. 19

Mukachevo, Mukachevo Region

Zakarpats'ka Oblast

Ukraine

89600

It's probably best to simply cut and paste both addresses onto the mail for the highest probability of successful delivery. And remember - dictionaries and antiquities are prohibited.

Hope all is well,

Steph

The Good, The Bad and the Funny

Hi all,

So it's been a rather hectic past two weeks!

The other day I completed my test questions for the Reading portion of the Olympiad - a national competition that is held in Ukraine each year for most academic subjects, including English. So that's about 20 hours of my life gone, but hopefully for an educational cause!

Friday was "Teacher's Day" in Ukraine. This means we once again had a school gathering outside (which was downright chilly - a complete 50 degrees cooler than the first day of school) where the 11th form put on a presentation. There was singing, dancing, skits, jokes and thank yous said. Then, the 11th and 10th forms went around to the classrooms to teach, instead of the teachers. At least, that's what should have happened, but, you know, organization.

So for most of the classes we had a few of the 10/11th formers come in and "teach". They mostly had the kids play charades in English. But, it didn't require me to do any lesson prep, so that was a win. I felt a little left out at first in the festivities, as all the teachers were showered with chocolates and flowers. There's this weird vibe I get about being stuck somewhere in ambiguity as to my official space in the school. I get called a teacher, but I get left out of a lot of loops. (More on that soon...) However, I did have some children come up to me eventually,   I left after my lessons and went home to change with my counterpart. We ended up riding with my back-up counterpart to a local teacher's house. The other teachers had just arrived in a bus, and we all gathered in a covered picnic area (very cool), and ate lots of delicious food while making lots of toasts. Needless to say, I understood very little...but it was a nice atmosphere. A lot of kids were there, and so it was fun to match the child to the teacher.

I also had an awful club last week. I had two boys play scuffling, although I told them to stop, they apparently picked it back up the moment my back was turned helping another student. One kid landed a punch square on the other's mouth. For several panic-stricken moments, it was relayed to me that the kid had lost a tooth. With tears streaming down his face and his refusal to let me see, the matter was only more complicated by the fact that I couldn't get in touch with my teacher counterpart.

Fortunately, it was soon clarified that he had NOT lost a tooth - just was bleeding from where he had lost a tooth recently (and by bleeding, I mean a drop or two). But he was in tears, upset and went home. The second boy stood in stony silence, a look of mild panic and full-on apprehension in his guarded, solemn expression. I dutifully lectured everyone about not fighting in my broken Ukrainian/English. Afterward, I checked in with him, telling him that I knew it was a an accident - only for him to deny it! (Meaning that they both were messing around, not that he meant to actually hurt the other kid.)

So, that was a pretty terrible way to have a club. The matter got worse on Wednesday - although I wasn't at school and no one bothered to call me.

I found out on Thursday that they were going to require another English teacher to come to my club to supervise. This is ridiculous, as none of them are free - they're all tutoring. And, I'm guaranteeing this is an isolated event. If the kids can't handle it, they either can't come or I'll simply cancel the club. Having some Ukrainian English teacher flipping out over the fact that kids are being loud playing games is certainly not going to foster a positive environment.

Apparently both sets of parents came to the school the next morning to complain about the fight, and there was even a bit of a screaming match. (I feel so terrible for that homeroom teacher and still need to give her a massive apology for getting sucked in.) Also, apparently the story was mis-reported, so there were claims of being kicked in the mouth. Luckily, the vice principal's daughter was in the vicinity and quickly clarified that this was NOT true. God forbid they have someone call me.

Anyhow, it was just an overwhelmingly negative and unfortunate experience with some very real repercussions.

Thankfully, when I had club today, no one bothered to actually follow up to make sure it was supervised. My counterpart stopped by, but didn't want to come in to disrupt, when she could hear through the door that no chaos was happening.

Finally, some funny.

So, first there's this: it's from outside an English primary school in Uzhgorod. The volunteer there was doing a teacher's talk last Wednesday, and I tagged along to observe. It was a little stilted, the teachers were surprisingly uncommunicative.
However, as we exited the building, I chuckled as I saw this "planter" - I'm pretty sure it would have saved some trees from my father's mowing - an unfortunate fate that no less than 20 saplings brought home from "Plant a Tree Day"  from various years ins school suffered...

(Sometimes they even paint the tires to make them reach another level of special-ness.)

Another funny thing is that I was giving a vocab mini-lesson (using words they supposedly learned last week to put into sentences) and I was having them translate as they went. (Not that I'm ever sure they're correct, but I count on my co-teacher to be listening). One kid kind of lost it at one point, and my co-teacher wouldn't explain except to mumble that she'd explain later.

The list included: an event, a member, to be keen on something, to practice, to join in, etc.

I discovered later that "a member" has exactly the secondary meaning that it has in English, and apparently that electronic dictionary has it as the primary definition.

Finally, can we just all have a laugh at the absurdity (once more) of the English language?
We worked with sentences today:
You're not mad, are you?
You're mad, aren't you?
She isn't here, is she?
They weren't traveling, were they?

etct.

Then we have: I'm your best friend, aren't I?

WTF English. No wonder people came up with "ain't", rather than use aren't (for you) or amn't I?

But really.
Ugh.

Hope all is well,

Steph

The Human Experience

Hi all,

So today I had a really upsetting and rather frightening experience. I held it together until I made it home, but when I called Hugo to express my anger over the situation and my fear of mishandling it, I found myself dissolving into adrenaline-fueled tears.

First and foremost, I have to say that my response the situation was not ideal, mature, or a good reflection of what my program is trying to promote.

Then again, I really never expected to be almost ran over on the street out of malice.

To back up.

I was almost home, walking after a full day of six lessons and my first club organizational meeting. I like to walk with my headphones in, listening to a podcast to pass the time and learn something new. I was about 2 minutes from my front door. I live in a cluster of apartments that are arranged in groups of 3 or four. They've been (slowly) working on resurfacing the roads and sidewalks around the whole area. Usually I walk on the road, but there was a horse parked with a cart in the middle, and the road is rather rough-going in a pair of flats. There's a whole little system of walkways that run around the buildings, so I walked parallel to the sidewalk on one, and went to cross the 15 feet of road (more like a driveway leading into a parking area to get to the continuing path).

Out of my peripheral vision, I see that a white van is approaching the corner when I'm about 4 feet onto the road. I picked up my pace, but between the road and it's current speed I should've been able to clear the whole road about 1.5 times safely. After I'd taken 4-5 steps and was about 3 feet from the curb, it struck me that the van was now going WAY faster. The road was uneven, but free of any major potholes. It's wide enough for two cars to pass comfortably.

I barely had time to register that the van was really coming up (but was within 2 feet of the curb on the opposite side of the road that it should be driving) when I looked back and saw it swerve TOWARDS me. I literally jumped the last few feet, and had it miss me by inches. There was NOTHING, absolutely NOTHING wrong with the right side of the road and it was immediately apparent that the asshole had purposefully just made a swipe at me.

I'm fairly confident that he wasn't really trying to risk damaging his car by actually hitting me, but I'm fairly convinced that had I frozen in fear, he really might have.

What kind of person does shit like that?

As my adrenaline fear-fueled rage hit, I made a gesture that would not make my organization proud.
I don't think I've ever used it in real anger in the US even.

The car came to a stop about 30 feet away, and the window came down, with a man whipping his head out. I suddenly realized that I perhaps should not risk pissing off a stranger who has already shown a capacity for malicious maneuvers, who might also have a whole van full of like-minded buddies. At this point, I'd really only held up my hand for 2 seconds, and so I quickly continued my walk, hoping he wouldn't turn the van around to follow me - and already cringing about the potential tongue-lashing this could earn me from the Safety and Security manager.

So yeah. That's something I've been processing the last few hours, and I drew a pretty unlikely parallel from a story from a few days ago that I'd also like to share. Because crap like this can really stir up some feelings of doubt and anger about your environment.


Anyhow, I'd like to talk about my 'friend'.

Last Saturday, I went to hang out with my newly-returned-from-America counterpart. I went next-door to her building and we walked into the center. We met up with her sister, and all went for a quick bite. As we started to walk along, at some point I melted over a ridiculously cute puppy. I joked that maybe I could get one, and how would they feel about a nicely-trained one year old dog when I left, and we compared the merits of dogs vs. boyfriends in a light-hearted manner.

Now, my counterpart doesn't like dogs, especially ones that bark, they make her nervous. So it seemed to be a bad turn of fate, when we were startled by a lot of intense barking, and a yellow blur flying at an oncoming man. The businessman swung his suitcase at the dog - a smallish yellow mutt that may have had some golden retriever blood in it, as evinced by some pretty serious matting in its long hair on its legs.

We eyed the dog warily, but expected it to continue on.

But it didn't.

For the next fifteen minutes, it paced behind us, weaving from side to side and barking ferociously at any man that got too close. My counterpart was pretty nervous, but after a few minutes it became apparent that we were being dogged. (haha.)

We even stopped at two shops at the bazaar, and our new friend would patiently wait outside in an inconspicuous spot. Here's a picture from where he curled up:

My counterpart's sister joked that my wish had come true - although this certainly wasn't a puppy, and one look at the mats convinced me that this dog would probably not put up with domestication gently. The dog continued to follow us for the next ten minutes - despite encountering another territorial stray dog who he apparently convinced that he was just passing through.

The dog next singled out an old man. He was possibly un-housed, but certainly did not look like he probably had much more than his pension to keep him going. The dog came barking up to him, and I held my breath - ready to see the old man take a swing at, shout at, or find a rock to throw at the dog.

None of these things happened.

The old man came to a stop, despite the dog pressing closer with its snarling and barking. He reached out a hand, slowly, gently...

And the dog walked up to him cautiously...and let him scratch behind his ears.

The man may have said something softly, but all I know for sure is that he stood there for several long seconds, quietly communing with the dog.

We walked past them, and I thought that we might have lost our tail.

He came running up a few minutes later, and my counterpart's sister made us pass through a building in order to ditch him.

It's probably for the best, as there are often loud screaming, playing children outside our apartments and that's probably not ideal for a rather high-strung dog.

But what a moment.

For every asshole who gets their kicks with reckless, senseless behavior, it's a good reminder to see that the opposite also exists. Someone possessing a strong sense of empathy for a scraggly, confrontational dog who was only looking for a kind hand.

And of course this is a fact all over the world - that people can be simply and quietly marvelous. That sometimes the unexpected behavior can give you a moment of appreciation for kindness.

So yeah, I almost got ran over today. But I'm going to keep my faith in humanity, thank you very much.

Hope all is well,

Steph