Some Updates From Past Blogposts

Since the March incident where I drank the sour milk in my tea, I have not had a cup of black tea with milk. For 5 months I have drunk only green tea with lemon, no milk or sugar.

Next week Lenara and I are heading to another training session. This time in the city of Komyanets-Podilisky which is a cool 18 hour train ride- each way, plus a 2 ½ hour bus after the train. We will be trained on how to give a seminar about AIDS/HIV prevention. I am sure the seminar will be fine, but that train ride is gonna suck.

Eleonora is scheduled for her first visit to Ukraine arriving October 8. We are both very excited and will spend 1 week in Razdolnoye and 1 week in Kiev and Chernigov (visiting my host family). We will also plan to meet up with Andreii and Olga, people I have mentioned in previous posts who live in Kiev.

I have run into the mayor a few times in the past month. He makes a point to say “hi” to me, has stopped photo ops in order to pull me into the photo with him and has given impromptu accolades about me to a room full of people that earned me a round of applause.

Except when I am out of town, I have been to the sauna every week since the first time. I have made friends with local businessmen there and they ask for me when I am not there and then ask me about my trip when I miss a week. I have been welcomed into their club and I am slowly becoming less self-conscious about the nakedness…that will still take a while though.

I am still friendly with the farmers at the bazaar and this weekend made my second trip to Kracnoperikopsk as their bazaar is bigger. I came home with lots of great things including capers and smoked salo (their version of bacon). Also I have made friends with a local shop owner who will special order anything for me and charge me his cost without markup. The only downside being that he has no way to know the price when I place the order. So when I asked him to get me a pound of Parmesan-Reggiano cheese, I didn’t realize it would run me US$23/lb., which, yeah is like 2 times my weekly allowance for food- all food. It is really tasty cheese though!

5 down and 22 months to go

I still have a PO box and would love to get mail from anyone. JIF peanut butter and old El Paso taco seasoning are a bonus, but just a postcard would go a long way to let me know you are here in spirit. A HUGE thank you to those who have already helped get my money’s worth out of the box rental.

Сим Моррелл                                  Sim Morrell

А/Я № 4                                            PO Box 4            

ОПС Раздольное                             OPS Razdol’noye

Раздольное Рай Центр                    Razdol’noye Rayon Center

А Р Крым, УКРАИНА                    A R Crimea, 96200

Индекс: 96200                                  UKRAINE

It would be best to print out this part and tape it directly to the envelope or package, that way both countries can read it.

I had hoped to be moving into my new apartment this week. Blogpost and photos to come, if it comes through…the landlord is a little skiddish about the rental and I wouldn’t be surprised if she bails at the last minute. We took another walkthrough today and the place is a mess in terms of grime. It doesn’t smell bad, but it just hasn’t been cleaned in a really long time. It was ironic that she kept giving me a cleaning schedule telling me what things needed to be cleaned every 10 days. A little bit of do as I say, not as I do, methinks. We’ll see if this comes through…fingers crossed.

Last week was the anniversary of Ukraine’s independence and for it every town had their own celebration. Ours was at the House of Culture and included a feats of strength demonstration as well as a competition of world strongman events including individual men tying on a harness and pulling a firetruck down the street. It was something to see alright, but when you’ve seen one human firetruck pull, you’ve seen them all. Congratulations, Ukraine on 20 great years…here is to many more.

Lenara has been an excellent counterpart. I have spoken with many volunteers who have issues with their counterparts and Lenara has spoken to several Ukrainians who don’t exactly love their volunteers for one reason or another. We agree we are a good match.

My host mom in Chernigov, Таня, signed up for Facebook just so she could keep in contact with me. She is waiting for El and I to visit in October. That will be nice. Then I can get a real assessment of whether my language has improved or not.

That’s about it for now.