PCV_Jenn's Xanga

Sunday, September 10, 2006

Sun, 10 Sep 2006 12:14:47 GMT

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"

Monday, July 31, 2006

Mon, 31 Jul 2006 16:42:54 GMT

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!

Thursday, July 06, 2006

Thu, 06 Jul 2006 19:27:32 GMT

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. =)

Sunday, June 11, 2006

Sun, 11 Jun 2006 06:14:02 GMT

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.

Thursday, May 25, 2006

Thu, 25 May 2006 07:10:46 GMT

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! =)

Saturday, May 06, 2006

Sat, 06 May 2006 17:54:59 GMT

sorry i've been MIA for a month. hehe...i dunno why. probably laziness. lenore reminded me that it's been awhile since i updated. =)

anyways....i just spent the past few hours finishing up a grant proposal. it's kinda late in the year...but it's okay. better late than never. my butt feels like it is permanently connected to this chair. it's not a good feeling, lemme tell ya that.

it's been pretty busy around here since i last wrote. lauren came to visit sheryl and i mid-april or so. we were happy to see her and show her around bar. started to watch season 3 of 24 (again). lauren had never watched an episode...after she left sheryl and i had to finish it because we're like that. so we did. just finished yesterday actually.

at the end of april, chad came over to visit and we were supposed to go to KP in a huge group. logistics got to be way too much and i got frustrated. wound up cancelling the trip, which turned out to be better for us in the end. instead of going to KP, sheryl and i invited all the PCVs in our oblast to come to bar for brunch. so they did! not everyone in the oblast came...but we cooked brunch for 9 people. it was a super tiring and busy day. chris, patrick, chad, and lauren wound up staying the night in bar. the next day we all went into vinny together and met up with sandy and eric again. jim went home the day before.

last weekend we planted potatoes in the village. it was work. not as much work as digging them out (which totally sucks!) but it's still a good day's work. it's spring time so we got new baby piglets. they are so cute! they won't be cute later, but they sure are cute now.

today is saturday but i had to teach because we get monday off. i don't quite understand the logic....but i've learned things in ukraine just aren't logical sometimes. =) after the 4th lesson they sent all the kids home. i dunno why we had to go to school in the first place.

tomorrow we're going into town to finish up some grant stuff. it'll be another long day. i should study my LSAT stuff, but i don't have the energy today. i pretty much wrote the equivalent of a 15 page paper today...and i'm pooped!

okay, picture time...

here is all of us (who didn't go to KP) at expresso cafe in vinny). we love that place because it doesn't feel like we are in ukraine. =) and yes, that is a hooka...the craze has just started recently in ukraine. from left to right: eric, chris, chad, me, patrick, sheryl, lauren (sandy is the photographer).

baby piggies...we have 4 total.

sheryl and i like to call this duck the ugliest duck in the world. found out later that he's a cross between a chicken and a duck. that's an explanation...but he's sadly still ugly.

this picture might come out sideways. oh wells. it's sheryl and i in the village. check out my super-cool fresno state t-shirt. =)

this is olechka in front of the village house. my host dad grew up in the house behind her.

sheryl's took a picture of the outdoor toliet...but it's on my external drive and i'm too lazy to plug it in, turn it on, and get the picture. maybe next time.

Wednesday, April 05, 2006

Wed, 05 Apr 2006 18:16:20 GMT

so it's been one of those weeks. every once and awhile i feel like it's really tough to be here away from home and the people i care about. thankfully it doesn't happen very often, but when it does...the days really start to drag on here. i haven't even had a full class load this week and i'm feelin' it big time. i'm glad that the school year is almost over. oaf...

i spent this past weekend in zhytomyr which is the hometown of my LCF, Ksenia. there are also quite a few volunteers who live there, including my friends kirsten and amy. this past weekend there was a truckload of volunteers there because it was national olympiads. sheryl and i bunked with kirsten, and amy spent both nights at kirsten's apartment as well. it was so much fun to have a group of girl friends around me. it's been awhile since i've hung out with only girls. there are usually always a couple of guys to break up the group. we read some american magazines and poked fun of celebrities (because it's fun to be catty sometimes).

kirsten likes to cook too....so we made this awesome chicken curry. it was yum yum YUM! hm...thinking about it makes me hungry. =) anyways - sheryl, kirsten, amy, and i had such a good time that we're going to meet up again later this month. one month they'll come to bar, and the next month we'll go see them.

chad is also coming to visit at the end of the month. he's going to give an AIDS talk at my school, since he's part of the HIV/AIDS working group. then a bunch of us from our oblast (plus chad, kirsten, and amy) are going to take a day trip to KP. it's going to be really fun! i can't wait. but i still have to get through the three plus weeks before the end of the month.

the power was going on and off today. it hasn't been fun. it went off right before the commercial break of "not born beautiful". olechka and i were yelling at the tv a bit. but then i came back on right before the program started again. can you believe that? talk about good timing. anyways...i bought a stash of candles and always keep matches in my room just in case the power goes off. it's not the first time this has happened.

okay...no pictures today. i don't feel like sifting through my picture folder and uploading stuff. i'll post a couple more next time i post.

Saturday, March 25, 2006

Sat, 25 Mar 2006 19:52:26 GMT

sandy and eric are publishing a cookbook in the states!! =) it's a florida cookbook (since they are from florida), but the recipes can easily be made anywhere. it's pre-order right now...but snap one up! should come out next month. they are going to be on a cook tour in florida next month. here's the link: Florida Bounty

went to vinny today to pick up dave at the train station. i am pooped! =) why is it that i'm always so tired after i have to walk all over town. i feel like an old lady here sometimes. but then i go back to america and i've got energy to burn. ukraine is stressful!

met sandy at expresso cafe for some (sorta) crepes and coffee. while we were there nick and fernando came in. they are here to "observe" elections tomorrow. nick is from england and fernando is from spain. anyways...we invited them to join us. they left before we did, and we sat around some more chatting and going over our new peace corps ukraine cookbook that sandy and eric revamped. when it was time to go, we went to the counter to pay our bill and the waitress told us that nick and fernando paid it for us!! they are so nice! they were already gone so we couldn't thank them (sandy wrote them an SMS). great guys. =)

after that sandy took up to the big vinny bazaar that is across from the medical school. i've been by there a few times but haven't had the chance to explore yet. it's awesome! sheryl and i are thinking about heading in once a month. they really have everything. i bought some cauliflower for my host mom (because she loves it and it's hard to find nice cauliflower in the winter) and a whole pineapple for olechka (pineapple is expensive here).

we picked up dave at the train station. i went to buy sheryl and my tickets to kiev this weekend and i got tongue tied at the ticket line. i just couldn't speak right. scrambled words were popping out of my mouth. by the end of the transaction both the lady behind the counter and i were chuckling because it took me five minutes to get out a 1 minute transaction. i'm glad (and lucky) that she was nice about it. some of the ladies who work at the train station are really mean!

then we went to the barski bus station to go home. the last bus leaves at 6:30pm. we were there are 5:55pm...there was only ONE space left on it. it was bizarre. saturday isn't usually a high traffic day. usually friday and sunday sees more traffic getting in and out of bar. anyways...the lady called in another bus for 7pm. we went grocery shopping for spare hour. poor dave was totally beat. it's like 10 hours on the train from donetsk to kiev and then another 4 from kiev to vinny.

so that was my day. was out for almost 10 hours today. i'm tired.

finally made it home with bags of crap. sheryl moved into her new place yesterday and she got lots of supplies today. btw, her new place is awesome. it's definitely big for one person...but it's cozy and comfy and i like it a lot. she's got living room, bedroom, storage room/dining room, kitchen, and of course bath and toilet. i'll take pictures after it's all put together, since i'll probably be spending a lot of time there.

okay time for some pictures....

these are from olechka's birthday this past december. they are her closest friends at school. they are also all my students at school. olechka is on top of the sofa. left to right sitting: vaselyna, sergei, sasha, and lena.

Friday, March 17, 2006

Fri, 17 Mar 2006 10:35:10 GMT

Group 27 Numbers: started in October 2004 with 109 people. Currently: 80 volunteers serving
Total PC Ukraine Volunteers: 283

so i guess i should write something, since it's been awhile.

things here are okay. we got snowed on again.....and today it's warmer outside so all of that lovely snow is now lovely mush. lovely.

reserved a plane ticket online. now i have to get one for my sister as well. waiting to know what day she should fly back.

COS conference will be august 26-30. it's so soon...and yet so far away. normally COS conference is in Crimea...lovely, warm, vacation-like Crimea. however, this year there are no venues in Crimea that can accommodate the peace corps at this early notice. we're the largest COS group that they have had so far. so peace corps has been looking at other venues that aren't in Crimea. i've been meaning to go to Crimea since i've been here, but i thought that COS was going to be there, so i've been holding off. no point in taking vacation days if we're going to be there for a week anyways. now COS isn't going to be in Crimea, so chances are i won't be going at all. it's a 20 hour train ride down there. i wish it was closer. but oh wells.

sheryl is going to come over for dinner. we're going to bake stuff. by stuff i mean some type of casserole and cookies.

showing movies all of next week. won't have class on monday or thursday. very nice! sheryl should be moving into her new apartment soon. yay! i'm excited! olechka is excited! and sheryl is WAY excited! hehe...

studying for LSATs resumes this weekend. i took a long break. should be more productive than the last time i was studying because i know what i need to work on.

last weekend i was in Vinny for Sandy's birthday. i love get-togethers at sandy and eric's place. =) here are a few pictures:::

from left to right: eric, chris, sandy, and jim (jim was a PCV in namibia before he came to ukraine). chris is the one who blurted out "i hate macs". poor fool. =) haha...jk.

from left to right: patrick, sheryl, and ME! =) patrick's russian is awesome. he wants to be a professor of slavic languages later on.

nemiroff pepper-vodka shots. the couple of the left are timber and vitaly (timber's ukrainian hubby). they are moving to america in june. vitaly can drink samagon out of a mason jar. it's a talent that many ukrainians possess (but, i do not). =)

Monday, February 27, 2006

Mon, 27 Feb 2006 18:52:16 GMT

patrick and stephanie might make me a ukrainian scavenger hunt! i think that would be fun! this started because they wanted me to find and take a photo of the russian desman (an animal that is endangered and not studied often). only i found out later that it's nocturnal, and aquatic, and only in the southwestern part of russia and east ukraine. oh wells. bring on the ukrainian scavenger hunt! (btw, when i told sheryl about the possible scavenger hunt, she said that i have fun friends. no surprise there! )

sheryl and i are going to do american music in our english club tomorrow...and we're going to teach the kids "this land is your land" (the peter, paul, and mary version, not the original woodie gutherie version). it made me think of "friends" when joey finds his hand twin..."this hand is your hand, this hand is my hand/oh wait that's your hand/oh wait it's my hand." haha...silly joey.

we got about 2-3 inches of snow yesterday...so a light dusting. it's nice outside - harna pohoda. =)

i lost my weekend because i took olechka to the oblast english olympiads. her grammar needs a lot of work, so i don't think that she will place in the first three; but i think that my 11th former, ira, has a really good chance. her speaking was really good. the judges made no corrections. but i knew that she would be stellar. she is the best student that i have at school. i give her high school level books to read here. she was late though on the second day and my coordinator was really annoyed. i think all will be forgiven tomorrow when the results are out.

there is such a huge gap between oblast and district olympiads. they should close the gap a little bit more. brian revamped the whole program before he left so it's tougher than it was before.

my host mom is making pizza now. i'm going to go help. bye.

--------------

11A chickies - working hard as always! i love them....

dima (also from 11A) who looks like he's working hard, but is actually just staring blindly at the book.