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PCV_Jenn
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Name: Jennifer
Country: Ukraine
Interests: teaching english as a foreign language in Ukraine....meeting with PCVs from Ukraine 27!
Expertise: no expertise.. =( but i like getting letters, packages, and any type of mail (including emails)!! =)
Occupation: Education/training
Industry: Education/Research
Message: message meEmail: email me
Member Since:
9/3/2004
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| Picture before the First Annual "Ukrainian Guilty Pleasures" Dance. We all dressed up in Ukrainian clothing. Here are a few of us, all piled into Chad and my room. Can't see Alex because his head is being covered by Eric's beer bottle. It was super-fun!
and the immortal Jimmy Buffet....
"I took off for a weekend last month
Just to try and recall the whole year
All of the faces and all of the places
Wonderin' where they all disappeared
I didn't ponder the question too long
I was hungry and went out for a bite
Ran into a chum with a bottle of rum
And we wound up drinkin' all night
It's these changes in latitudes, changes in attitudes
Nothing remains quite the same
With all of our running and all of our cunning
If we couldn't laugh we would all go insane
Reading departure signs in some big airport
Reminds me of the places I've been
Visions of good times that brought so much pleasure
Makes me want to go back again
If it suddenly ended tomorrow
I could somehow adjust to the fall
Good times and riches and son of a bitches
I've seen more than I can recall
These changes in latitudes, changes in attitudes
Nothing remains quite the same
Through all of the islands and all of the highlands
If we couldn't laugh we would all go insane
I think about Paris when I'm high on red wine
I wish I could jump on a plane
So many nights I just dream of the ocean
God I wish I was sailin' again
Oh, yesterday's over my shoulder
So I can't look back for too long
There's just too much to see waiting in front of me
And I know that I just can't go wrong
With these changes in latitudes, changes in attitudes
Nothing remains quite the same
With all of my running and all of my cunning
If I couldn't laugh I just would go insane
If we couldn't laugh we just would go insane
If we weren't all crazy we would go insane" | | |
| pictures later this week. stephanie and i went to lviv. i love lviv! =) stephie didn't want to come back. haha...anyways...
cool people of the week:::
Megan - who is starting her Peace Corps training in the Caribbean this week. i am so excited for her!!
Chad - he took us all around Lviv and stayed with us all weekend, even though i know he's low on funding this month. he also took us to an real beach! it was relaxatin central!
Lynnette - she is donating a DVD player to my school! i was thinking about a $5 donation, but she's going to get the whole thing. how amazing is she?!
WongWong & PB - sent me a present in july! how cool are they! =)
Sandy & Eric - they want to throw me a birthday party. =) and they are going to cook mexican food! i love them.
Sheryl - cuz she's picking up the LSAT package
My Parents - cuz they sent me two packages with stuff that I really need.
My Sister - cuz...well...duh.
not cool people of the week:::
Olechka - because she ditched us the last two weeks to go to camp along the river, and she's ditching us again for the next two weeks to camp in the Mountains....jk....i still love her. =)
Marshrutka Driver from Vinny to Bar at 5:15PM - we got a flat (not REALLY his fault...but kinda)....and the bumpiest ride ever. it was like being on a rollercoaster.
Lufthansa Airlines (which isn't a person) - because it costs $150 for an extra piece of check-in luggage. holy-crapola that's a lot.
Lviv Taxi Driver - who tried to charge me 30 UAH from the Grand Hotel to the train station, AND drove around Lviv in small circles in order to charge us more. Does he think that we're dumb or something?! i argued with him and the fare went back to normal. what a vulture.
that's all. byeee! | | |
| hello...y'all (yes, i said "y'all") are probably wondering what the heck stephanie and i are doing in ukraine all this time....so i guess that means it's time for a photo update! =)
on our first weekend back we went on a little random picnic at a little random location. =) here are andrey and his cousin, Roman, playing with stephanie's softball mitt and ball. looks like windows xp without photoshop.
stephanie took a little walk on her own around the lake and this is the mess that came back. she was going to tell us a little funny fib about how her backside got so dirty, but in the end she told us the truth...which was that she decided to cut across a more narrow section of the "lake" and it was deeper than it looked. what a dork! =) if you think the pants look bad...you should have seen her shoes!!
group shot. stephanie is taking the picture. the guy next to olechka is our neighbor. he's an artist. he also helped us out this past weekend when my host family went to the village and we smelled gas in the house.
i think this picture is funny.
we went into vinny to celebrate peace corps 45th anniversary and met chris and chris there. went for coffee at the expresso club, and their expresso machine was broken. it was sad. =( right before we left i realized that we could have ordered a coffee press. doh!
andrey's graduation celebration extravaganza!! ::::
all of us lined up in front of andrey's school.
andrey and his friend, alina, accepting the bread (presented by my host dad and another mother representing all of the parents in the class). it's traditional to give bread at big events or big ceremonies in ukraine.
andrey and his buddies waiting for the graduation ceremony to start. no caps and gowns here. =) the boy with the light brown hair is sergey, andry's best friend. andrey asked him before graduation what color he was going to wear to the ceremony, and sergey said green. so andrey didn't get green and bought pink stuff instead. then on the day of graduation they were both wearing pink! haha....
this picture is included because i think that these are some of the most awesome costumes ever made! haha...the little pom-pom girls performed a dance.
olechka, stephie, and i stayed overnight at sandy and eric's place that night. the next day we went and grabbed cappucinos at expresso cafe...the machine was working. =)
afterwards we met my host parents - who had partied with andrey and his classmates (and their parents) all night at a restaurant in vinny. this is the medical school in vinnytsia which andrey will attend once he passes all of his exams to get in. it's the best medical school in ukraine. both my host parents went there...and olechka will also probably go there in the future.
here's andrey getting his paperwork in order to take his exams (results come out tomorrow!).
the same day we came back from vinnytsia, we attended the graduation at my school. here are some of my eleventh formers decked out in the formal glory for graduation. it's almost like going to prom!
after they all received their diplomas, all of the graduates put on a small concert. all the guys are together in the first picture and the girls are together in the second picture. there aren't a lot of graduates. less than we had at fairmont - but students can also finish school after the 9th grade here. so the system is a little different.
here's stephanie saying bye to you guys....
until the next update. hopefully it won't be a month from now. =) | | |
| grant approved!!
whoohoooo!! we are awesome! =)
home is great...but i have this itching feeling that i will be taking the LSATs again in the fall/winter. | | |
| so the grant is done. it's been a pretty busy 3 weeks.
we had victory day on may 9th. it was the first picnic of the year. sheryl and i didn't go to the big ceremony in town since we were working on our grant. but we went to bbq later with everyone else. it was a good day. i thought we were going to be rained out, but we were lucky and the rain drizzled and then passed us by.
sandy came over a couple of days ago randomly just to hangout. the three of us cooked dinner and had salad (real salad, not that mayo-crap salad). =) since sandy has told us that we can get lettuce at the bazaar in vinny, sheryl and i have been making pilgrimages there almost twice a month! haha....anyways we shared a bowl of salad, a huge pan of pasta, and 2 bottles of cabernet (although one of the bottles was not so great...hehe). having a girl's night is great! she went back to vinny the next day to go to work.
sheryl and i are pretty much done with our spa grant. i was so anti-grant writing when i first came here. i dunno why. it really has been one of the most fulfilling things that i have done here. i'm really glad that we wrote it, planned it out, etc. now we just have to submit and cross our fingers for approval. it was reviewed by two people and sandy is our coach. we haven't heard about any huge problems with it....so i hope that the committee will approve us. we'll know in a couple of weeks. =)
once it's approved it'll be a whole lotta work. the grant encompasses about 5 training sessions which will have to be repeated. in totally sheryl and i will probably run about 15-20 trainings. then there is the readying of the resource center space.
it's going to be a busy summer. implementing the grant, teaching summer camp, plus stephanie will be here!
okay...i'll be gone again for 3-4 weeks. i'll be at home...=) kinda weird to be going home. i can feel my peace corps service ending already and i still have 6 months.
truckload of pictures:::
here we are in the park in bar on may 9th (vicotry day). from L to R: vita, olechka, and my host dad. vita is one my kids at school. she's also olechka's best friend. that's champagne in my host dad's hand and vodka on the table. victory day reminds me of july 4th at home. the community really wakes up and comes together to celebrate. it's fun!
sheryl and i in the park.
host mom and host dad in the forest during on victory day picnic. i have no idea what my host dad is doing. =)
someone set up a swing set in the forest. so we took turns. here is my host mom, olechka, and andrei (who is trying to be a hooligan!). he really wants to push olechka high on the swing set to freak her out, and my host mom is trying to bat him away.
sheryl and i took an excursion into a neighboring village a couple of weeks ago with sandy, eric, chris, and patrick (the usual suspects). it was a green tourism excursion...so we paid for it. it was an interesting experience to say the least. the lady running it needs to learn A LOT before she can really branch out her company to include other foreigners. the jaunt into the village included watching a lady make bread, riding in a horse-drawn carriage (which was rather frightening. think less like jane austen and more like the ancient greeks!), a visit to some artist dude (where one of the locals pointed out in ukrainian that we weren't buying anything...these people got to figure out not to make snide comments when their guests can actually UNDERSTAND what they are saying!), a a huge dinner feast which in traditional ukrainian style lasted about 5 hours! anyways...it was an event that's for sure.
here's sandy and eric at the bread-making lady's place. she had a huge stone oven and literally made about 30 loaves of bread while we were there.
we were famished when we go to the lunch location (and totally parched as well). we sat down at the table before everyone else did...haha....but we only had something to drink, even though we really wanted to pick the food off of the plates! from L to R: patrick, sandy, chris, sheryl.
here is the right side of the table. the guy next to chris is a swiss guy who green tourism asked to come and consult them on how to better their business. he was really interesting and super smart. the guy learned how to speak russian when he was 59 years old.
here is the left side of the table. eric is next to sandy, and the lady next to eric is a secretary at the belgian embassy. she's on her second term and she's been living in kiev for the past 8 years! kiev is great, but i dunno if i could live in ukraine for that long!
sandy and i in a field of dandelion flowers. it was funny because after dinner and before the sweets came out they asked us to go and "look at the flowers". i was thinking, oh maybe there is a garden around the back of the house or something. but nope...they led us to this field of dandelions (which i might add that we had already walked through earlier). um...do the ukrainians know that these flowers aren't flowers...they are weeds! =)
there was an accordian player there. he is a music teacher in bar. he's quite talented, can pick up music by ear. patrick decided he wanted to try out his accordian. so the guy let him. i think the ukrainians really thought that patrick knew how to play the accordian. after they gave it to him and he sat down, it became apparent that he had never played the accordian before in his life. haha...
okay...for all you animal lovers....hehe....here is a picture of goat...who very badly needs to be milked. i dunno why they didn't milk the poor goat...but it looks sad.
bye! enjoy the start of summer! =)
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