Доoooбре Раaaaнук Amurrrrica!

I know... I know... it's been a while.

With moving, school, host familyish, and having little to no language ability, it's made finding internet a bit hard. But by this time tomorrow, I will have spent my first week in Kozelets!

Can I first say how awful / liberating it is to be disconnected to facebook and email for 5 days - literally 60 emails and a good 30 facebook notifications (granted there were a fair bit of pointless Cal Poly asking for stuff emails). So thanks friends and family for the love / tags I would have untagged 5 days ago if I could.

I guess I wasn't really completly disconnected - I did pick up a duel sim cell phone on Life:) My number is +38 063 656 7576. All incoming calls are free. So feel free to dial that number, as is, if you want to chat! 

Anyways, yes I am alive and indeed full of potatoes, borcht, and tea. Life in Kozelets for PST is going well. The town is pretty quaint and the cathedral looks awesome on a nice sunny day like today. I'm currently living with just my host mom Natasha. She has one son Shenya (age: 20) who goes to university about an hour away in Chernihiv who visits every weekend. My room is actually pretty big (I'm pretty sure it's Shenya's room) with lots of closet space, a desk, and a tv to watch Ukraine's Got Talent. Oh, and I do have hot water! I'm actually the 5th volunteer Natasha has had so she's kind of got this down to a science. She's awesome and helps me with language every night. We also go running at the sadium every evening. We have a dog Jake and a cat (which I can't remember her name). Both aren't allowed inside though. Natasha is very popular socialite of Kozelets haha - her 3 cell phones is always ringing.

Stray dogs here are everywhere! Picture squirrels, but substitude dogs - it's actually kind of sad, I want to own all of them.

My school scheduling is pretty flexible - I started at 9AM this week and it usually went to like 3PM. Classes are held at my LCF (language and culture facillitators) home and am greated every morning by their awesome puppy Rex (literally cutest dog ever - I will be posting pictures eventually)!  Aside from language, I'll also be working with a public school thoughout training. Thereofre, we just have to fit four hours of Ukrainian lessons at some point in the day. 

My cluster is pretty funny / hillarious - and I'm the only boy - so all of their host mothers want to marry me off... it can be a bit awkward.

Alright, I only have 4 more minutes left on this hour of internet so I better rap it up. Again, I'm alive and my belly is full (isn't that all that really matters?).

Also, spell check is in Ukrainian so... ha.

Cheers!

Pухомих!! (Moving)

добрий день (good day) friends! So the welcome retreat ends tomorrow meaning I'm moving to my new home for three months! The weekend consisted of a lot of sitting and listening to lectures - I met some pretty cool people for all over. 


The moment you've all been waiting for. I found out earlier today I'll be living in a town named Kozelets in the Chernihivs'ka Oblast. 

Of course I wiki'd it immediately. It seems pretty sweet including a soccer stadium, large churches, and apparently internet cafes. However I'm most excited / terrified to meet my host family. We had our first language class today which went rather smoothly - however the entent of my vocabulary is still that of a baby. I'm sure saying hello and thank you over and over will be rather "fun" for my family.


Stay tooned! 


на добраніч

2 Days of Travel

So it's currently 6:35AM here in Chernihiv, Ukraine. This is probably the best time to use the wifi here in the hotel because most are hopefully still sleeping (last night I'm sure the servers were overloaded with volunteers trying to access the internet that it made it basically impossible to keep a signal). It's currently 45F so my peacoat does wonders.

Anyways, so yesterday before we left for the airport in DC I felt obligated to at least go check out some of the monuments - seeing how I've never been there. Surprisingly, it was only around a buck to get down there by bus so I was stoked. Got to check out The White House (which was surprisingly a lot smaller then I was intending), Washington Monument, Linken Memorial, and just walked around the park. I was a bit jealous of all the joggers - I'd totally be down to run the 5 mile trek around all the monuments every morning.

The flight from DC to Frankfurt was long - even with trying will myself to sleep (which sadly only lasted a few hours). Most volunteers seemed to also be awake so there wasn't no lack of entertainment to be had. The inflight food and wine was actually pretty decent as well. I was forced to check my duffel carry-on (free of charge), meaning I literally had no extra clothes, no deodorant / toothbrush on hand throughout the flight which could have been a fun first challenge had it not all worked out. The hour layover in Frankfurt left me only enough time to purchase a pretzel and a beer - which I felt was appropriate to complete my cultural exploration of Germany.

my Ukrainian Visa - check out my name!

Frankfurt to Kyiv was a quick two hour flight. And was right when sleep deprivation kicked in - I napped for all but the take off, landing, and breakfast.  It was an interesting set of people on the plane; volunteers, a jewish group in all their get up, and some Ukrainians.

We were greeted with a fair crowd of Peace Corps staff once we arrived - all their flags and signs was comforting. I managed to find all my checked luggage! I was worried I'd be wearing my jeans and Cal Poly shirt for a good week while my bags were still in transit.

We hopped on a bus and drove a couple hours north to Chernihiv for our initial welome retreat. A shower and a tooth brushing was heavenly to say the least (I felt gross). I found out I'll be learning Ukrainian! While initially I though learning Russian would be cooler - I realized all the signs and transit information would be in Ukrainian meaning learning Ukrainian might be more practical. I still hope to pick up some Russian in my time here.

Our welcome dinner was pretty sweet - filled with awesome bread that tasted like angel food cake, beet salads, chicken legs, rice, chocolate, and of course tea and water.

my LCT / welcome bread passer outer

Cheers!