The defeat
often really comes after being chipped on for what feels like centuries and when it
happens you tumble into the mud trudging forwards at a negative pace. We have depthless bags of pieces of us we drag behind us which slows us down even more.
We cannot set ourselves free because that’s who we are - the chipped pieces of
experience and lessons from beyond what can really grasp or comprehend while it’s
happening. But even while the depths are heavy, there is comfort after the fact
that there is not yet resolution and that the longer we trudge on the closer we
come to our minds declaration. That pivotal point in which we have learned from the defeat is the point in which we can make the step towards advancing
again; acting instead of reacting and making a move to stay in it all. The experience
of feeling defeated is hard and painful, only that is to be expected, but it’s
not the end of it all.

Egypt! Its one of those places I’ve thought about only in dreams. Never did I think I would actually ever go there. When I was a little kid I was obsessed with hieroglyphs and Egyptian history. I loved movies like The Mummy, Indiana Jones, and Star Gate.  I always sought out those books about Egypt and would even wear one of those turban things around when I was little kid. (Ok that was a lie, but I thought it was funny and I actually bought one while in Egypt. The guy who sold it to me told me I looked like a terrorist, that’s not funny.)

Turns out, Egypt is one of those most popular vacation destinations for Ukrainians. Shelby found a really good deal through a Ukrainian tourist agency. Round trip tickets from Kyiv to Hurgada (the resort we stayed at), 5 days in Egypt, and 2 meals a day was only $350. We paid a little extra when we got there for excursions to Cairo and Luxor but it was worth the price. We had to wait until the last day to get the tickets to get the best possibly price which was kind of stressful and we actually had a back up plan to go to Hungary if it didn’t work out. It all worked out though thanks to Shelby. Seriously, how much does it cost to go to Egypt from the U.S.? Erica, Cody, (two other PCV’s) Shelby & I were on it.

I’ll start by saying that Luxor was much more enjoyable than Cairo. Don’t get me wrong, I loved Cairo, but its really a giant tourist trap that’s loud, expensive, and really dirty. There are guard and police every few hundred feet to ensure security and on the way to Cairo we went through a security check point about every hour. But in the midst of being overwhelmed I could really see why it’s on the 7 wonders of the world. You see pictures and hear of how big and impressive the Pyramids of Giza are, but I can’t begin to explain their size. And to think people built them by hand thousands of years ago is awesome. Lots of people say that the sphinx is a lot smaller than you think it would be but it still is an impressive thing to see. We also went to the Cairo Museum (which was also severely overcrowded) that houses some of the most impressive Egyptian artifacts including the mask and outer sarcophagi of King Tutankhamen. It was really cool for me because it was a continuation of seeing the Egyptian artifacts in the British Museum last Thanksgiving. Egypt is still trying to get back a lot of those misplaced artifacts back.

In Luxor we went to the Temple of Karnak which is impossible to describe. ‘It is about 1.5km x 800m and is big enough to fit 10 cathedrals in.’ (from Lonely Planet) It’s really massive enough to get lost in and if we would’ve had more time I would have enjoyed getting lost there. You can still see color on the hieroglyphs and see where different stories through out Egyptian history are chiseled into every square inch of every piece of stone. After that we went to the Valley of the Kings where the Egyptians moved the mummies of their kings after they started having major problems with tomb raiders. (Thanks Laura Croft!) Here King Tutankhamen is buried along with many other kings. We only were able to go into the tombs of Ramsees I & IX. King Tut was expensive and since we saw his findings in the Cairo Museum we simply took a picture of the entrance. The Valley itself was scorched and there was literally nothing there. However, Luxor was actually a very green place and driving into it was a cool contrast to the dessert and mountains.

We also went to a lot of other places in between lazing around Hurgada on the beach like a papyrus paper museum, stone crafting work shop, and places in between that were all just as impressive. I also ate Hardees and Pizza Hut twice because they don’t have those in Ukraine. Yes, I also tried Egyptian cuisine. My mouth loved it but it didn’t agree entirely with my stomach. (Well worth the price)  So, now were all back in Ukraine scheming for our next trip. Shelby is heading to Georgia in July and I am heading to Croatia sometime in the fall. First I have to get back to work and deal with the projects I neglected while I was gone. I love living abroad but it does come with its own set of head aches. Ill write more about that later.

Weekly I go to the 'Windows on America' club here in my city. (At least I go when I can, usually once a month or so.) This club is usually occupied by 4 or 5 regular people and then maybe a few more that aren't regular but like to come and just listen to us speak English. We talk about everything from politics to life in Ukraine, but always and most definitely the conversation ends on the topic of food, which is a common denominator to everyone everywhere. This week at the club we had a new guest who had just arrived back home in Ukraine from Detroit for the first time in 8 or 9 years. His name was 'Dre' as in the rapper, Dr.Dre. Dre is originally from Ukraine, Ivano Frankivsk, and while in Detroit his job was 'husteling cars', not people, not drugs, not the poker table...but cars. While Dre refused to speak English half the time, the other half of the time his perfect northern accent was dominated with words like 'straight up', 'bling', and 'keeping it real'. When the club was finishing, Dre gave me makeshift business cards with his name and number on it, including a message of love and peace for Ukraine. It looked like this;

Andre S.

364857

'Keeping it real for the brothers and sisters living in the world' 

This will be an interactive blog; Where is the biggest square in Europe? Where is the biggest Vladimyr Lenin statue in East Europe? What city takes 24 hours to get to by train from my city?

*hey. I forgot to mention that on Thanksgiving I took a trip into Europe. I went to Krakow, met up with my friend Brittany in London and then we went to Amsterdam. It was fun. After that I came back to Odessa to spend Thanksgiving weekend with other PCV's. It took 2 buses, an hour of hitch hiking, and 3 hours to get to Eileen's village. We killed a turkey, chopped wood for heat, and sang the Star Spangled Banner for our Ukrainian friends. I also drank a lot of home made wine with Emily's host mom, Ina. It was one of the most memorable moments in Peace Corps. :)If your reading this, send me an email and I will tell you more about the smugglers on the train coming back into Ukraine and how the UA boder guards almost didnt let into Poland.*

On television, what’s shown is only the exciting parts, the parts that make for a good story. Most of those ridiculous reality TV shows have cameras on their "characters" 24/7, but they only air the most interesting parts. We all know that its only 10% of a real person’s life and the other 90% is a drag. The last few months I've been posting stories that I thought were funny. (Jonathon's Real World) I've realized that they don't really give any insight to what my real life is like.  So, from now on I'll try and write more about everything in general. I’ve also had a comment that I should post more pictures, that is also doable and on the way as well as soon as I figure out how to do that.

Ukraine is finally back in full swing after the holidays. Everyone is back at work and even my schedule is filling up fast. I've picked up 2 classes a week, teaching at one of the universities. I just got back from language training in Rivne and a workgroup in Kyiv. And the best job related news is that I finally have a primary project. Over the next year or so I will be facilitating connections between my city, which is the Oblast Center (like a state capital) and 2 pilot regions near my city. I will create research teams to update the tourist information in these regions and then there will be conferences and training sessions for businesses in the tourism sector on how to use that information to their benefit on topics like marketing, business management, strategy, etc. That will start to take up a majority of my time. Finding a purpose while here in Ukraine has been half the battle to my Peace Corps service, now I feel like I have it and I'm excited to finally have some real work to do. Last year was all about just getting to Ukraine and surviving, now that I've done that it’s all about actually living here.

I got another package from home! This package was one of the best because my mom sent me a new pair of jeans and 2 new shirts. I'm not really a clothes person but Ukraine is abnormally harsh on clothes. A few months ago, during the raining season, (it literally rained for 2 months straight) I was walking home with a friend of mine. I walked up a sidewalk that was slightly tilted to avoid having to swim across a mud puddle. I slipped and fell into the puddle and accidentally ripped my jeans. Since then my friend has learned how to say "Jonathon fall down, ooops" and since this is the max of his English skills, he says this every time he sees me. So, now I can wear my new jeans and say "Jonathon have new jeans with out hole - hooray!” 

I also got a ton of new movies, magazines, and food from the US. I almost don't want to come home so I can keep getting boxes of stuff from home. It’s like having Christmas once a month. (Just kidding mom and dad)

In one of my last entries I wrote about my love for history and holidays, and sometimes the history of holidays. If holidays were a narcotic drug then I’ve been in a hypnotic condition for the past month. The western Christmas has come and gone and New Years 2008 has past, but that is only the tip of the ice berg of holidays for Ukrainians. They have all of our holidays and then celebrate Orthodox Christmas on January 7^th, and then they follow up modern New Years with Old New years a week after their Christmas. And I can’t forget about St. Nicholas day which involves a saint from Turkey who doubles up on Santa Clause’s duties, except he dresses like the pope and will leave you a stick if you’re bad. I was celebrating end of the year with some fellow co-workers and one of them turned to me and said with his thick Ukrainian accent “today is the first day of drinking, and then we drink until the end of January. So I will see you in February. Toast to a good year, knowing new people, family, friends, and seeing you in the New Year.” We, the Americans at the party, thought he was kidding and laughed. But actually we were the only ones laughing while everyone else was already pouring their next shot of vodka. In between the holidays there are “the days before” to get ready for the holiday, “the days after” to rest, and since consequently there are 4 holidays back to back in January,(due to an unexplainable “old calendar”) they literally will party until February. To say the least, the bond of holiday cheer is fantastic here just as it is in America. Especially amongst friends and family where you go gift shopping with the motto “it’s us against them”. (Them being everyone else in the store.) Here in Ukraine, people generally have that same motto except it’s applied mostly on the buses or trains. “Us” is normally just you and “them” is cab and bus drivers who seem hate life even more than normal and charge you double the fare to make sure you know their distaste for you using “their” bus/taxi. I’ve found the key to any solo adventure on a bus or train is to make friends with a babusya, or a grandmother/older women. After 45 minutes of speaking in Ukrainian, they will typically make two assumptions; regardless of age, you are a small child lost in a land where you don’t understand anything and that they need to protect you and your things with the fierceness of a polar bear. One thing to remember is to never underestimate a baba. They are as fierce with they’re machine gun like language as they are with their sack of potatoes, which can turn into a small battering ram with the correct aim and velocity. Once, in a bazaar with my Ukrainian host mother, a food booth caught my eye and I went over to investigate. Near by was a group of guys about my age, maybe a bit younger, and as I bought my food they over heard me and my horrible Ukrainian. They connected the two that I was a foreigner started to hassle me. Just as I was turning to walk away my host mother shot off a rapid succession of phrases that obviously said something along the line of “get lost or I’ll kick your…” Disarmed and ashamed they left me alone. At the time, I was a child in Ukraine, and from experience I know that in a normal scenario if my mother would have come to my rescue like that at that age I would be embarrassed. I would’ve retaliated as any angsty teenager would with “mooooom, that’s embarrassing. I can take care of myself” as she drags me off by the collar of my shirt. But in this situation I was very happy to have someone on my side in a country that I knew nothing about. In Ukraine, life is harsh and cruel with out someone to vouch for you in the “us versus them” world of surviving the cold and extensive holidays. It’s comforting to me to find this similar situation so far away from home and I’m very grateful to be a part of an “us” during this unusually long holiday season. Thanks to all of the people who hung out with me in the west over the past few weeks. It was awesome to have all of you.

When we are in elementary school, teachers
always make assorted punishments to teach us about consequences and rules. The
writing of math tables after school, writing sentences about "what i will not
do..." during recess, or standing in the corner during game time. During
my rebellious youth I broke the record for the amount of time i had to
"stand on the fence". For the typical student we got marks on the
board and for each mark next to our name we had to stand 5 minutes. My marks
meant entire recess periods. I'm not sure what it is about the magical power of
teachers at that age but they seemed to be a kind of sorcerer or part of harry
potters wizarding community. Each mark on the board increased the strength of
the magical bonds that tied you to the fence post and if you even attempted an
epic escape, fireballs and earthquakes would rain down upon you from the hands
of the teacher.

One gleeful day I actually did not have to stand on the fence and my friends
and I set out to conquer the playground. The only problem was that when we
arrived on the battlefield I really had to use the bathroom. Another magical
rule of the teacher was that once you stepped through the arcs of the
playground you could not leave. There was a powerful boundary set between these
wooden posts and I had already crossed passed it. I tried really hard to wait
but patience and pain were widdling me down. I was 8 years old at the time and
my sense of humility was limited to none, I didn't the rules of the world, only
the powers of the teacher and social status. I decided that a giant oak tree in
the back corner of the battlefield would cover me from the all seeing eyes of
the teachers. It was tall, thick, and ancient with powers far beyond that of
the teacher. So, I went and as I turned the corner to return to my conquest a
crowd of kids and teachers were waiting for me. Lets just say that I was really
embarrassed. Fireballs and earthquakes didn't reign down from the teachers that
day but from my parents and the principle. Marks were irrelevant as
representing entire recesses now, they now were the representation of entire
years of standing on the fence.

This is the story of an 8 year old during growing pains and massive amounts of
awkwardness. I think of this time a lot more now that I'm in Ukraine and I see
a lot of "public toilets" - walls, alleyways, phone booths, and other
places usually conveniently situated outside of a bar or a gambling palace
called "Royal" in Cyrillic, - or next to my business center. (instead
of the short cut behind the building we call it the **** cut - clever yea?)
Dont get me wrong, there ARE public toilets in Ukraine, most of them are
underground and are never cleaned or most of them cost a handful of change to
get into and are never cleaned. Once when I was out with a guy from my
Ukrainian family I had to go to the toilet and I asked him where the closest
one was. He laughed at me and said "this is Ukraine, toilets are
everywhere". I didn't really get it at the time but now I understand with
complete sincerity that he meant not "toilets are everywhere" but
that everywhere is a toilet. At first it was gross but I just kind of laugh at
it now and think "I guess this is what were trying to change", but
then again I'm not really sure.

It’s getting colder and the sun is
retreating more and more as the days pass. I'm guessing it’s going to be winter
soon. The only question is how cold it will be? Last year, I'm told that it was
a very warm winter but the winter before that was one of the worst winters Ukraine
has ever seen. Of course, for me its going to be harder than it should be
because I’m from the sunny south where it rarely gets cold enough for a thick
coat and gloves. Typically this time of year I’m still in shorts and sandals,
this year I'm in Ukraine wearing a sweater, wool socks, thick coat, scarf, gloves, and a toboggan
(beanie for you northerners). Ivano-Frankivs'k also is "the rainy
city" because it rains 2/3rds of the time. For the most part, I've gotten
a little bit more used to the depressing weather. Anytime the sun is out I run
outside and soak it up as much as possible but for the most part i just try and
eat bright colours of food and wear bright colours. (The baba's say that helps
lift your spirits...its hasn’t really helped but every little bit helps)

I just inherited a bunch of stuff from another volunteer who ET'ed last week
and went back home to Chicago. It’s a Peace Corps tradition that whenever another volunteer
leaves, that person passes on their stuff to other volunteers. So we end up
inheriting old clothes, books, kitchen utensils, and other things that have
probably been in PCV possession for several years. Ray (my site mate) and I hit
jack pot when Mike left for Chicago;

Stuff I inherited; 2 pairs of Adidas shoes, a pair of jeans, microwave, a
satchel, and a set of random books and magazines.

Ray's inheritance; Borat and The Departed and some other movies, a towel, some
magazines, wine glasses, a chai-nic (thing that heats up water electrically for
tea and coffee)

Then there is a whole floor filled with other stuff that hasn’t been sorted
through yet. We simply put it all in my spare room at my apartment until we
could get it all worked out.

I leave for Thanksgiving Vacation in 22 days...but not before I go to Kharkiv
this weekend for Halloween, Lviv for Warden training/Shelley's town, and Kyiv
for SPA committee, and Mom's Birthday. After November I'm not travelling for
awhile.

Its been a long time since I've written, Waging war on Ukraine is a very detailed process that requires copious amounts of commitment. I'll summarize events since my trip to Dniperpetrovs'k;

Weather here has started to get very cold. Its been a continuous plummet into the +3-+10 range. I've realized that I am not used to the cold. Being from the south makes the transition difficult. But I've held my own and armed myself with gloves, scarf, and multiple types of headgear.

I've officially been given a place with the Peace Corps Ukraine GAD Council and SPA committee. (GAD - Gender Awareness Development, SPA - a committee that reviews grant proposals to PCV's in Ukraine) This past weekend I had my first GAD meeting where we pretty much just elected new officers and created committees to run the different projects. Since I was at the guys camp this past summer, Camp TOBE, I am on that committee to facilitate it next year. Yet another post to help me advance the take over of Ukraine. Ahahahaha. Just kidding.

I also went to Lviv to go site seeing or scout out potential allies. Its a Beautiful city but I'm glad to be in my city. :) (Please see Facebook for pictures)

I've also booked my plane tickets to go on vacation to Krakow, London, Amsterdam, and Odessa for Thanksgiving! The great thing about being in West Ukraine is that it is really close to the European Union and traveling around inside the EU is dirt cheap. I only spent 300$ on my tickets. I leave on November 13th and return the front lines on the 25th.

Speaking of take-over, they finally had the Ukrainian Election. It has been building to a head ever since I’ve arrived in Ukraine. The competition between President Yuchenko/Temechenko and Yanakovich was settled with the latter lost to the Yuchenko-Temechenko coalition, but only by a slim percentage. The coolest thing about Ukraine is that its mostly the younger people who take part in the elections and its more than just speeches and voting (even though it’s the most important part), it can turn into a party. (Just like everything else in Ukraine) The night of the elections I was walking with my friend Sarah through the city center and they had blocked off the streets and had a techno party. There were hundreds of people dancing and partying in support of Nasha Ukraina (Yuchenko-Temechenko). It was wild but its good to feel like the young are deeply involved in the politics here as opposed to U.S. politics where it feels like politics is a game for the older members of society.

That’s about it. I’ll write an interesting story later. Ukraine always keeps me on my toes and things really have been busy around here.

Opening my eyes is like a warm bath. I slept so hard in what felt like the first time in years. South Carolina sun was glowing behind pulled shades and instinctively I slowly pulled my arm up and back simultaneously hooking the material. Light burned through the room and was the catalyst to nostalgic feelings. It was nice to be home.

It was 27 months, give or take, since the last time I had been home and the over night transcontinental plane from Kiev was just as tedious as I had remembered. I dragged my heavy legs off the bed which anchored the rest of my body into an upright position and also anchored all of my senses into “the on” position. Coffee, Dad’s French toast, and Mom cleaning were all in full effect beyond the closed door of my room. I couldn’t get my body to move as fast as my brain but I was instantaneously drug forward by my legs.

Zombying down the hall and into the living room I plopped down on the couch un-noticed because mom was vacuuming and dad was in his study, “the man retreat”, playing music. Festus the cat leapt onto my lap and mom cut off her instrument of dirt destruction.

“Good morning sweetheart, would you like me to get you some breakfast?”

“da that would be awesome”

“J, you’re not in the Ukraine anymore, you don’t have to say ‘da’.”

“Sorry, just habit.”J

She set the food down in front of my on the coffee table and dad came in and started walking with this floating effect towards the opposing couch. He was holding his giant cup of coffee in one hand and had his other up in the air balled up in a fist like he normally does when he’s challenging me to either Tekken or to play music.

“Yea yea yea, you don’t want none o’ this….mmmhm”

I laughed and dug into my food and coffee. CNN was muted on the TV in front of us and even though I paid it no attention, it had my full attention. American TV was something I hadn’t seen in over 2 years and its addictive pull was already sucking me in. I already knew I was going to spend at least 65% of the day in front of the TV absorbing useless information through image osmosis. I love being home. I had built up a callous inside to help ignore the fact that I hadn’t been home in 2 years. The callous was quickly being pulled away.

The rest of the morning I spent playing music and beating my dad in Tekken. He showed me some new songs he was writing for his 3^rd cd. We also talked about his work, mom’s work, and lots of other things that I can’t really remember. It felt like a dream and yet it was so real. Strange. It didn’t feel like I had been gone this long but in some ways it did. After that I walked out the back door, through the man retreat, and out into the back yard where mom was working in her gardens.

Her flowers had taken over everything. Roses, Azalea’s, blueberry bushes, something that sounded like a Ukrainian name, she spent almost an hour touring me around the yard showing me her art. The last thing she showed me was the vineyard. I had pictures of it 2 years earlier and it was exactly as I had left it. It was already starting to get small green buds and it stretched down a long line adjacent to work shop. She stopped to pick up a pine cone and I unconsciously kept walking, running my hands down the vine, brushing the leaves and buds, overloading the senses in my finger tips. I couldn’t wait to harvest them in the fall and make try to make wine as I had vowed to do, 2 summers before. I had made wine in Odessa with my friend Emily and her host family. So, now I had experience that I couldn’t wait to try out. I got really excited about being home and starting a new life. I loved Peace Corps and it was something that had changed me for the better. I missed my friends from there, but it was so nice to be home with all of these new opportunities.

Mom turned the corner of the workshop and yelled “J, go get ready and we’ll go get some lunch. How about that seafood place you like?”

“uhhhhh duh!”

I knew I was awake now because my legs broke into a sprint before I knew what I was doing. I got dressed and ran back out the door where mom and dad were already waiting in their black Toyota Corolla.

“Seriously, when are you going to get a new car?” I asked in synch with buckling my seat belt.

“you don’t talk about her that way….you wanna fight?” Dad challenged.

I just chuckled and we pulled out of our drive. I shuddered a little as Mom added Wal-Mart to the itinerary. I hate Wal-Mart, especially after shopping at bazaars and little shops for the past 2 years. But it was nice to have such a huge selection of food.

We walked and talked with our grocery cart, grabbing stuff we needed, and mom was asking me what I wanted for meals.

“Everything.”  Simple enough.

We pulled up to the chaotic but organized check out lines. (which I might add actually said ‘Check Out’ and not ‘Kaca’ like in Ukrainian stores. Ah, being able to easily read the signs was like a warm bath on my brain.) I was standing between them observing the patterns and colors of the people in front of us and had an idea.

“I was wondering if next week I could borrow the car to go up to Charlotte to visit Neil” I asked them both.

Mom just laughed and said “don’t tease your mother like that. Next week you’ll be back in Ukraine.”

“huh?” I was so confused. Things started to blur and I felt a little panic in the back of my head.

“yea, don’t you remember? Your flight leaves at 9am next Monday. OR were we wrong? We should check.” Dad perplexed.

“what….wait…” I started to back away and things started to get blurry as it was not like remembering but like someone simply putting the thought into my head. I had opted to go back to Ukraine for another year. The panic reached a head and I ripped the grocery cart away from the closest person. I hysterically started running down the aisles with my arms out sweeping everything and anything into the cart. Stuff I might need, stuff I know I didn’t need, or couldn’t pay for. I was mad. How could this be? Things didn’t make sense and it was like I was flying.

As I turned the next corner like a race car, something caught my foot and I went twisting to the ground with the cart and my loot spilling out onto the ground. It went blurry for a second and as I lurched up into an upright position, it was my bed trying to help me up, not the Wal-Mart associates.

I had fallen out of my bed in Ukraine during a lunatic dream. It was early and light was dimming in through my window as I painfully, yet humorously, crawled back into my bed. This is getting ridiculous, I thought and laughed at myself. Ukraine is making me crazy and if not crazy I'm going to be a complete weirdo by the time I really do get back home.  

"Mene treba kvitok oo Dniperpetrovsk, Bood-Lacka"
(Ukrainian for I need a ticket to Dniperpetrovsk, please) was what I started
this trip with on a cool rainy day in Ivano Frankivsk. My itinerary was
Ivano-Frankivsk to L'viv by bus, L'viv to Dniperpetrovsk by train,
Dniperpetrovsk to Comsolmovsk by bus and then back track all the way home. The
fun part about this adventure is that my train ticket to Dniperpetrovsk was the
only thing set in stone before I left. With a "Dolbre Den" to the bus
driver I climbed onto the bus to L'viv with the hope that my language wouldn't
let me down and to find some adventure.

The bus was only half full, meaning good news for me because normally the
marshutkas were over populated with people and their children, animals, food,
and bad smell. I'm not sure why this one wasn't but I decided to stretch out
and start reading my book. On the 3rd or 15th stop, in a town I think was
called Stree, I decided a toilet was necessary. As soon as the bus stopped I
leapt out of my seat and fought a woman and her small child to the front of the
bus where I asked the driver;

"I need the toilet, will you wait for me?" (Please don’t leave, you
have my stuff)

"da. da." (Just leave me alone you weird foreigner)

So I exited the bus and walked 10 feet to a store. No dice on the toilet but
there a great amount of food and with instinct purchased some cookies by
speaking and grunting in half Ukrainian half cave man. I proceeded to go back
to my bus but when I walked outside there were only 15 other buses that were
not mine.

No Bus. No Stuff. Momentary "Oh ****".

So I collected myself and decided that since my stuff was still on its way to
L'viv I should keep going to L'viv also. Fortunately I had taken my wallet,
passport, ipod, and phone with me off the bus. I got onto the closest bus going
to L'viv and unlike my first bus this one fit the description I gave of normal
transportation. I even had to haggle for a seat. (It was like that bus scene in
Forest Gump except a lot more violent and grumpier as old women used their
chickens and produce to dedicate themselves to 4 seats in a row on the bus)
Finally, I plopped down into a seat near the front and remembered that I still
had cookies from the store with out a toilet. Suddenly life was ok for a few
minutes.

I decided to call Megan to compose a Plan of Action (POA) and this is why Megan
rocks my world;

"take a breath it’ll be ok. Have you called your Regional Manager? no? Ok
ill call mine and figure out what to do. Call ya right back"

4.3 minutes

"ok. He told me to call security and I know you cant so I called for you.
Papa Sergie (our local "kickass" head of security) will call you in a
few minutes. Call me when you get your stuff."

5.6 minutes later I pick up to Papa Sergie who is cool, collected, and sounded
like he was contemplating in which way he was going to rock the **** out of
someone that day. (Papa Sergie is ex-UN military and Soviet military.) He only
says with a deep and thick Russian accent "Jonathon, how are you today? Fine,
I know about your problem. I think I can solve this problem from my end. Please
let me talk to the driver of your bus." It was an automatic thing for my
body to get up with out thought and go to the driver, even though my brain was
going "what? Why do you need to talk to the driver??" With my cave
man Ukrainian I proceeded to say random things to the bus driver that I knew didn’t
make any sense like "I need you speak on the phone...." "Safety
man...." "My bags...." and with out success I told Papa Sergie I
couldn’t get the driver on the phone and there was a moment of silence and the
cool moment of action came when his reply was simply "He does not want to
take the phone?? Make him take the phone. Say please."

"uhhhmmmok...."

Finally, the driver took the phone and his face slid from that "what the
hell are you talking about" look down to a "ohh....this guy is
serious" face. (

My best friends from training came to visit and go to camp with me! Our first reunion and adventure together since training was, for a lack of better words, interesting! You would think that being in 4 months would give us some sort of immunity to the “what the **** is happening” feeling we always have, but we haven’t and I don’t think we ever will. (However, I will say that if I didn’t hear Mika’s “Relax” at least 19 times a day this past week I would feel really incomplete. That is something I have gotten use to.)

Megan and Mike were the first to arrive by train at 4:30 in the morning. I was going to pull an all nighter and just sleep in the next day but I think in old age I’ve lost the ability to stay awake for too long because at midnight I was out cold. But, I woke up around 3:45 and began the hike to the train station. About half way to the station I took a wrong turn and ended up walk a circle around the middle of town, which is really fun when all of the disco techers are taking a 4 or 5 hour break from vodka and beer, that they would continue the next morning around 9am to or at work. They are inclusive to the zombie taxi drivers waiting for techers to stumble into the back of the cab. So I decided my daytime familiar city was not so familiar at 4am and I asked one of zombies in Ukrainian “how much to the train station?” He just kind of looked at me and shook his head. Little did I know that this would be the theme for transportation through out the next week. End of this story was that I made it and the train was late 15 or 45 minutes, not really sure because I was so tired from lack of sleep and walking around the city for an hour. We decided on a taxi over the walking adventure back home and made it home around 5am. Emily came on Sunday around 11am – piece of cake? Dah. It was really awesome to be with good friends again. Over the next few days we talked and caught up with each other. We even had some fun with the Ukrainian “kaca” (cashier) ladies.

            After Emily arrived we had planned on buying our tickets to Chernivtsi, where the camp was, before we even left the train station, but like good PCV’s we decided to wait until later, AKA – right before we left. (If you’ve ever been in Ukraine you should know that is the worst idea because everything take 5 million hours longer to do things that it should) So of course we went to the train station around 6 and there were no tickets. It was like Cherivtsi disappeared from the face of the planet because the kaca ladies didn’t even seem to know what we were talking about. Mike and I went back and forth to 3 different kaca windows to ask about tickets a few times. We even took turns asking the ladies and I guess they got fed up with us because at one point, before I even started to speak, the lady just looked at me with that “seriously?” look on her face and started shaking her head. I will say that over the period of an hour and a half we pieced together bits of information that revealed Chernivtsi had disappeared from Ukraine for the day, there might be a secret bus arriving a few hours from that point, and that the schedule for buses going to nearby towns is a mystery to all Ukrainians. We decided to surrender to circumstances and take the morning bus to Chernivtsi that leaves promptly at 6am. There are no Marshutkas at this time in the morning so refer to the second paragraph for details on the next morning because it was exactly the same thing except I had company.

            Chernivtsi is similar to other Ukrainian cities at 9am, about when we arrived - Beautiful buildings, somewhat sunny, and 2 guys drinking a liter of vodka at the bus station washed down with a pint of beer. (In my college days I would even consider this a little disturbing) We called Sarah, a friend volunteer who recruited us to help with the camp, and told her we were at the bus station across from a blue soccer stadium. I know you’re thinking, “a blue soccer stadium across from the bus station…that’s unique there could only be one of those.” But in reality there are two, on opposite sides of town from each other. I would tell you that it doesn’t make any sense what so ever, but we live in Ukraine, so it makes perfect sense. All ended up well and an hour later Sarah and her driver picked us up.

            The camp was about 45 minutes outside of Chernivtsi in a small village called nowhere, Ukraine. You’ll find a lot of places like this in Ukraine. (It’s usually where the buses and trains disappear for hours at a time, explaining why it takes 6 hours to get somewhere by bus/train when it should only take 2.) No cell phone service, mountains, 5000 kids, and lots of bugs. It was the perfect anecdote to the city and I’ll give credit to the fact that the power only went out once and the community showers had hot water and good pressure as long as no more than 2 people showered at a time. Our main responsibility was to just talk to the kids and help with lessons for a few days, at least until it was time to play soccer.

            There was a wide array of sports going on during the camp – basketball, volleyball, and of course there was a lot of soccer. (Of course the girls weren’t allowed to play with the guys and THAT was really annoying. To say the least because I know Megan and Emily were better 2/3rds of the guys out there playing soccer. But whatever) There was a big match between the campers and the counselors which involved referees, a sideline crowd, and the entire official ness of a professional match. Mike and I loved it…we felt like rock stars. It was anything but a professional match and was mostly just goofy because most of the game was just punting the ball back and forth from goal to goal. At “half time” Mike suggested that they actually pass the ball and the Ukrainians just kept saying that they didn’t think it was a good idea but couldn’t tell us why. But we finally convinced them and surprise, surprise – we actually started scoring goals. But, the game ended up in penalty kicks because it got too dark to see anything. The next day the counselors pulled mike and I out of English class for a “revenge match”. (I like how soccer supersedes English at English camp.) Of course we beat them again and they wanted a “revenge match” for the “revenge match”…we decided enough was enough and didn’t play. Other than that the rest of the camp was pretty much going for walks to the store to “read” (smoke) and get beers from the only magazine remotely close to the camp. We also went for hikes into the country side.

            Emily, Megan and I went for a great hike one day off the main road. We hiked through a bunch of fields, some trees, climbed over a log that crossed a water filled ditch, and ended up back on some dirt road. As soon as we turned onto this road this is the conversation that happened;

Emily – “hey look, bear tracks”

Megan – “hey look a bull”

Emily – “uh, lets walk the other way” (we turned and walked the other way)

Emily – don’t look at it….walk faster….

Megan – “its not tied down….oh crap theres another one….”

Me – “think we can hide in that field?”

Emily – “ oh crap its not tied down”

The good news is that not far behind there was a lady guiding the bulls. The bad news is that the lady was 1000 years old and the bulls weren’t tied to anything. I don’t think there have been a time in Ukraine yet where I haven’t felt like I was going to get run over by a Marshutka, car, guy on a bike, and now a pair of bulls. Life here is weird most of the time, but the important part is that we made it out alive further down the road to a really cool looking house that looked like a castle. I decided to try out my language skills and I asked an older guy about the house. He told us that it was being built by a lady who now lived in Italy. I also asked him if Dracula lived there, but he just kind of looked at me funny. We checked it out and then decided it was time for dinner because we smelled something really good even though it obviously wasn’t the camp food. (We contemplated asking the locals if they would take us in for dinner.)  We made it back then the next day we headed back to Chernivtsi and stayed there for the night. Trying to get back to Ivano Frankivsk was just as interesting as going to Chernivtsi. We had to trek to the other side of the city and look for a random marshutka heading on a whim that there might actually be one there....we lucked out and caught one leaving with in about 20 minutes. I don’t know what it is about this part of Ukraine but its like there are many parallel universes that swallow trains, buses, cars and people because its a ***** trying to get to and from Chernivtsi. What should only take 2 hours takes 4 and when there should be many buses going to the Oblast center...there’s only 1. I would say I don’t get it but its Ukraine. On the good side we made it back ok.

We spent the next few days hanging out and cooking really good meals together. E and M made French toast and I made hash browns. Mike made rice and eggs. Sarah made cereal.

It was hard to say goodbye over the weekend but its was really good to see everyone and get some good travel time in.

Traveling feels kind of like exercise...after a good travel I feel exhausted but good about myself because I was able to do something different and see a new place. Its even better when you get to do it with friends because they can relate to the experience...especially in Peace Corps Ukraine because you never know what’s going to happen. Then next adventure will be in central and eastern Ukraine. Were all going to meet up in Dniperpetrovsk and Comskamosk for Ukrainian Independence Day. My organization shuts down for vacation starting tomorrow through Sept. 1st. So I have time to kill.

"An interesting question came up during last night's CNN-YouTube Democratic presidential debate: Would candidates, if elected to the White House, be willing to forgo the president's annual salary of $400,000 in exchange for the federal minimum wage, which just went up to $5.85 an hour?

JOE RAEDLE/Getty Images News

Edwards? Sure. Hillary? Yep. Obama? No problem. Sen. Chris Dodd? No way.  

DODD: I have two young daughters who I'm trying to educate them. [Ed: On the basis of that sentence, you may not want to home school them.] I don’t think I could live on the minimum wage..."

So this past weekend I volunteered to be a camp counseler at the all guys "TOBE Camp" in Kololmiya, a town not far from my site. The GAD workshop hosted it and it was all about different subjects like leadership, gender equality, family roles, HIV/AIDS, and other things.
So on top learning 5 or 13 new cursewords in russian/ukrainian, I also had the awesome opportunity to teach the young minds of Ukrainians about important subjects. It was an amazing camp and most of the guys at the camp were really awesome with great potential to really help this country out.
We hiked to Mt.Hoverla, UA's highest mountain peak, and our driver was only speaking Russian to us all day. I was embarrassed because, yea, i dont know much russian and since this guy was speaking at mach 90 miles an hour, i had no idea what he was saying. So my friend Casey finally says to him in English, "dude seriously, we dont know what youre saying, speak Ukrainian."
The guy was just confused so we translated. One of the kids turned to us and said "seriously, were in Ukraine, this isn't Russia, we should all be speaking our native language."
I was floored, just the fact that a 14 year old kid was saying this truely put me back. I dont know many kids in the states that would make such a definate statement about being nationalists. Point being; the whole camp was like this. And even though we had a few kids that thought they were badasses, it was a good experience.

This weeks challenges - to find a bed and to survive on 5$.
Shasleevo!

When I decided to join Peace Corps I really had no expectations except that I wanted to do something different with my life because what I was doing wasn't what I wanted. In my head though, I was thinking "small village, no hot water, little electricity, reading lots of books, etc..." You know that’s the typical expectation when someone thinks of Peace Corps. Well I've been talking to some friends that are serving in small villages around Ukraine and it’s only more confirmation that what I am doing and what they are doing is completely different. And what I have definitely is not the normal Peace Corps Variant that people think of when they think Peace Corps. 

Don't get me wrong, where I am now definitely has its challenges but it’s just a different level of challenges. The needed level of flexibility and adaptation is the same, but as a former PCV from Ukraine said to me "it’s not like the physical challenges you face in Africa but its more of a personal and character challenge you face." It’s very true because trying to get close to a Ukrainian is like chipping away at a giant iceberg. Everyone here is very friendly and I like everyone I work with but it’s hard to crack the code on their personality. Sometimes I feel like I'm talking to people across a canyon because they are so distant. Its just Ukrainian nature I think. In Chernihiv was much worse - I suppose because they were so much closer to Belarusian and Russia. Everyone on the streets was wearing a frown. Even the little kids looked really disgruntled. We started playing a game to see who could get the kids to smile first. It was really interesting because we would walk by them and say "PRIVEET!" with a smile and they would just run away like we were crazy people.

I also feel really disconnected at work because I don’t know what I’m doing yet. People ask me what I'll be doing for the next two years and the only answer I can give them is that "ill be working with the dept. of economic development and tourism" A fellow site mate, Ray, keeps reminding me that it will take time and I just need to find my "niche". So until then I am just going to English clubs, trying to meet as many people as I can, and researching other volunteer’s projects. This next week I'm actually helping Mike Barnhill, another volunteer, with a "tour of Ivano Frankivsk" region. So I'll be hiking, rafting, rock climbing, and going on tours all week. It should be good for me to see since I'm working with an organization that works with tourism.

So like I said, things are much different here than they are in a village. I have regular access to internet, hot water, restaurants, pubs, lots of people but I don’t feel like I’ll find my "niche" as quickly as other people might. The expenses are much higher here so ill have to pay a lot more out of my stipend for living. Also, everyone here speaks some English and while it’s good because they can understand me, I can't understand them when they speak Ukrainian or Russian. I have to force myself to practice the language and really use it.

I would say a lot of the times I wish I was in a village just to get that experience. Here it’s easy to fall into a routine similar to the one I had back in the States - which completely defeats the purpose of us being here. I don’t want that routine and now that I’m living in a bigger city I really have to force myself not to get into it. If I were in a smaller village I wouldn’t have to work as hard at it - and that’s the challenge.

It would be AWESOME to hear from everyone back home or if you just want to send me things that would be great too. haha. cheers

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U.S. Peace Corps/Ukraine

PCV Jonathon Campbell