A Tough End To A Great Week

A few times a year Peace Corps holds what are called “IST”’s [In Service Trainings] which are seminars and workshops designed to target a specific area that volunteers might find helpful at their sites. Then, you apply and if you are chosen to participate, you head to the conference. Lenara and I were told of the first IST at the swearing-in conference back in June and she expressed an interest in attending this one which was designed to address volunteerism among community members. You see, I have a bunch of ideas- most that I think are great and some that the community thinks are great. I can manage volunteers, but I am having an issue recruiting people to volunteer to work on my projects. This week’s conference was held in Kiev and there were 32 volunteers there- plus each of us were required to bring a partner, which was not necessarily our counterpart, but usually was. I have only made this trip 1½ times so far and already I HATE it. A 15 hour overnight train to Kiev and then a 13½ hour overnight return train (plus a 1 hour bus ride on each side of the trip to get to and from the train station). If you are wondering why the time is different, it has to do with train schedules and track usage, so there are certain parts of the ride where the train will just park on the track- sometimes in a station and sometimes not and just wait to get the all clear to press on. The ride to Kiev on Monday night wasn’t the worst. We were able to get coupe seats which is essentially a tiny room with two bottom bench/beds and two upper beds, a small fold up table and a lockable door to the unit. We rode with a young couple who spoke English and were nice enough. The trip was mostly uneventful.
We got to Kiev on Tuesday morning and were able to check into our room in the university dormitory immediately. We had no time for resting, so it was good that we both had a decent rest on the train. The conference started that afternoon and some sessions were for both volunteers and their partners and sometimes we were split into two groups instead of having the conference translated, they just held the English session for us and the Ukrainian session for our partners. At the end of day one we were tasked with getting together with partners to start planning our volunteer project. In an effort to get my park clean-up project to be affiliated with the library, we have decided to start an Ecology Club at the library and let clean-ups be part of the club. Over the course of Wednesday and Thursday we would have presentations by current volunteers on things like PDM (Project Design and Management), fundraising, and recruitment strategies for projects in our towns. Every day we would get more tasks to work on for our own project. On Friday morning we had to present all of our ideas to the group which was a) the completed plan for our own project and b) we walked away with 32 different ideas for potential projects to do in our towns.
Now, a couple of things. We have stayed at this university before for swearing-in and some people got sick on the food. On Tuesday I ate lunch there and was fine. For dinner, Lenara and I splurged and went out for Mexican food in Kiev. It was really not very good, sadly. I ate at the conference for Wednesday morning, opting for a slice of pizza for lunch. After lunch I start to feel a little odd in the stomach. Although, I (still) squarely place the suspicion on the sausages at breakfast. For dinner, Lenara and I go out for sushi. It was really excellent and the closest Ukrainian meal I have had to what I would get in America. As we walked home though, I was feeling really sick below my stomach- as in I doubt it was something I had just eaten, and more likely issues from the breakfast. I was so ill when I got back to my room, I did not go out to the bar with my friends. On Thursday I was feeling fine. I again ate in the university for breakfast and lunch and Lenara and I went for Indian food for dinner. Still fine. I figure everything has passed. Friday morning, still fine. Eat breakfast and lunch at the university- except this time the breakfast ham tastes really bad and there was some questionable food served at lunch. I feel OK, but wonder if I will have a relapse. After the conference wraps, we head to the train station to catch our 4:55pm train home.
Unfortunately, this is high vacation season for tourists to my part of Ukraine and trains are usually packed and seats together are hard to get sometimes. This time, instead of coupe, we wind up in platzcart which is the same 4 bed set up as coupe, except the beds are a bit shorter to allow for an extra set of beds perpendicular across the aisle-and there is no door. This time we wind up sitting with a group of friends who start out nice and reserved. Sadly, though, even though most people will tell you that vodka is this country's number one problem, they ALLOW beer to be consumed on the trains (and really everywhere and at any time). So everything is fine until about 9pm as our fellow travellers start the beers flowing. Not only them, but also the people both booths on either side of us. By 10:30 the voices are getting loud and the beer is still flowing and anytime we stop at a station people run out to buy more beer (although they do sell beer on the train). At one point Lenara stands up and announces to anyone within earshot that she needs to get to sleep as our stop is at 6:30am. Well, obviously to a bunch of drunks this warning was received about as well as you would expect. I may or may not have had to duck a thrown tomato or two and barely dodged the spit-take by our bunk mate as he laughed with beer in his mouth. Yeah, THIS was gonna be a fun night! As you can imagine, the drunks got drunker, Lenara got madder, and I start feeling that my stomach problems are beginning to resurface (no pun intended). I try to sleep, but between the noise (which I admit was pretty loud), the train car shaking violently enough during braking to wake you, and my stomach not sitting well, I get a grand total of 2 hours of rest. I was awakened at 2am to a shouting match in Russian. I find out later that Lenara has had it with the drinking and noise and called the conductor who now has to moderate between her and the drunks under the threat that Lenara will call the police (every train has a police officer on it) if he does not tell everyone to go to bed and quiet down. Now I am up, but Lenara can finally get some sleep and she is out like a light as the car finally settles down. All the while, my stomach is not getting any better and pains are moving. Checking my watch, I see that between rest of train ride, the bus ride, then the walk home I am looking at at least 6 hours until I can get home to use the bathroom. I hope by trying to sleep, things will settle down. They don’t. If you want to know just how uncomfortable I was…after all I have already explained…At about 4am, I actually woke Lenara up to ask if she had any toilet paper so that I could use the toilet on a train! Yeah, imagine taking an (at this point) 12 hour airplane ride and what THAT toilet must look like. Well, this was worse since at least the airplane toilet was relatively clean BEFORE the trip started. It was the kind of situation where the pain relief is so rewarding that at that moment you do not care what you are stepping in or what your pants are rubbing against. It was completely disgusting, but the alternative was too much to bear. I eventually made it home to my living arrangements that I had been spending all week bad-mouthing to my friends at IST, but which today looks and feels infinitely better than, well, at least one alternative.