Snowventure

Today marks the second time I’ve tried to go to New Hope Church and failed. Last Sunday I embarked on my journey with the very specific instructions “get on the marshrutka (bus) by your apartment and ride it until it goes down a hill and then up a hill and then walk for 15 minutes.” When these directions didn’t turn out quite right I ended up going to Vova’s church with him. Despite having to sit in the back with a translator at every service, I’ve really enjoyed all of the church events I’ve been to here. There's something unique about the Christian communities in Zap. The service at Vova’s church was particularly interesting because it was held in an old Soviet government building. When Ukraine was still part of the USSR it used to be a building where government officials would hold their meetings. They used to invite Christians there to speak in front of the group with the express purpose of ridiculing and belittling them. Since the fall of the USSR, the meeting rooms have been rented out. It seems like a matter of poetic justice that this is now home to one of the biggest Evangelical churches in Zaporozhye. All of the churches in Zap are held in rented spaces because of a law that Lenin instated against any religious buildings being built within city limits (that is, of course, with the exception of one Orthodox church currently being built-presumably as the result of a substantial bribe to the government to overlook the law). 

This week I got much better directions to New Hope but still ended up walking around in the fresh snow on un-shoveled sidewalks (plowing/shoveling/salting is really not a priority here—although store owners do occasionally throw some dirt down on top of the snow for traction). This escapade lasted a little over an hour. This was the first time I was able to really test my new snow boots and I must confess--the endorsement from the US Ski Team seems legitimate. I think next week I’ll stop trying to get directions on how to get there by myself and just attach myself to Steve & Jo. Overall it’s still been a great morning because my failure landed me in my favorite Coffee Life. I like this particular Coffee Life for three main reasons. 1) It has internet. 2) The soundtrack is all smooth jazz all the time, which reminds me of Derek West. 3) There’s a very nice girl here who speaks English. I’ve only been here while she was working one other time but as soon as I walked in today she recognized me and greeted me with "good morning" instead of "dobraye ootra". Perhaps that's merely a testament to how much I stick out, but it was a sweet gesture nonetheless.

Looks like snow all week. :)

Work with my internship has really picked up since my last post. I’ve been primarily working from my apartment, which is difficult given most of the work I need to do right now is internet based research. So my daily routine has included getting up, spending a couple hours reading through articles I downloaded the day before, then going to Fresh Zone to open a billion tabs in Mozilla and download whatever new articles I find so that I’ll have material to work from home the next day. When this routine gets lonely or boring or unproductive, I’ve been hopping on a bus into the city, getting off at a random stop and walking until I find a coffee shop to work from. I really love the way the public transportation works here. Zap is a little different from most cities because it isn't a grid or a cluster of development--it's just a line. There’s one main road, Lenin Street, and it runs for miles and for the most part anything of interest is on that same street. 

A government building on Lenin Street

On Wednesday I got to start meeting HOPE clients. There are two people who work in the client office (which is in the main part of the city, unlike the HOPE Ukraine administrative office, which is close to my apartment). There’s a loan officer named Ghena who spends most of his time in the field meeting clients at their businesses, and a secretary named Toma who runs the office and handles all of the payments and loan disbursements. With Katya (Max's daughter) translating for me, I interviewed 4 of the clients that came in for their monthly payments. I was surprised by how willing they were to talk to us.  Ghena and Toma had laughed and warned Katya and I that none of the people coming in that day might feel like talking to us. Luckily all four of them were feeling talkative enough to sit with us for a couple minutes.

It was really illuminating to meet with the clients. I spent a lot of my internship last summer feeling like I didn’t quite have a grasp on what HOPE is all about because I was learning everything secondhand in the not so exotic land of Lancaster, Pa. It’s one thing to read personal stories from clients in different countries, it’s another thing entirely to meet these people myself. I guess I'm a little bit of a doubting Thomas in that regard. I’ll be meeting new clients every week here and eventually, when the snow all melts and the roads are a little easier for travelers, I’ll be going with Ghena and Natasha to go see clients at their businesses.

On Thursday I met with Max in the admin office near my apartment and he offered the guest desk for me to work at if I so desired. I stayed there the rest of the day and worked beside Natasha. She speaks little English but she’s still so fun to work with. I expected the office to be cold—I’ve been told that some days it gets tolerably warm but most days it doesn't feel much different inside than it does outside. I wore the thickest sweater I had on top of several other layers but when I sat there shivering all day I still got told that I need to bring more layers. My hands were slightly purple and typing was a challenge, but I still got more done there in the office environment than I’d been getting done at home. Probably the worst part is that the sink water isn’t heated at all. Luckily they at least have an electric kettle. I can’t think of a time when I was more thankful for hot tea and I will admit that after a few hours I was desperate enough to hug the electric kettle for warmth--just a few moments.

The outside of the HOPE Ukraine admin office  

The outside of my apartment complex

On a closing note, I've never felt more American than I did watching President Obama's inauguration speech in the middle of a Ukrainian mall. 

38 Hours and 9 Time Zones Later

Now that I have internet, I can post what I wrote about my traveling experiences last week. 

Last Tuesday I started my journey to Zaporozhye. I got into the car with my family at 11AM. After going through customs at the Philly International Airport, I was on my own. I flew from Philly to New York, then to Moscow, then to Kiev. From Kiev I was picked up and taken to the train where I would try to sleep for the next 10 hours on my way to Zaporozhye. I got to the apartment I was staying in around 1:00 AM on Thursday (8 in the morning on Zap time), bringing my total travel hours to 38.

My parents watching as I go through security at PHL.

The trip was exceedingly long but there were very few complications. Except for a minor mishap with my suitcase lock there were no problems getting through customs at PHL and the security measures in Moscow and Kiev were nothing compared to the TSA.

The cultural shift began before I was even off US soil. Boarding the flight to Moscow it was very obvious that English was no longer the dominant language. Thank goodness those safety manuals have pictures--otherwise I'd never know how to transform my seat into a floatation device.

The flight itself was great. I finally got to watch at least the beginning of The Dark Knight Rises (I think it makes me a terrible person that it took me this long...especially since I didn't even finish it). I think my favorite part of the entire trip was coming down below the cloud level right before landing in Moscow and seeing snow covered trees and houses. Those of you who know I feel about snow will understand how beautiful that was to me.

View from the plane in Moscow

Surprisingly good plane food. Who serves fish in a confined space, though? Really?

As I started toward the next terminal for my flight to Ukraine, an elderly Ukrainian couple attached themselves to me. At first I didn't know what was going on--no matter how many times I pointed to myself and said "English...no Russian," the woman just kept rattling off to me in Russian. Finally one of the workers in the airport told me this couple was also going to Kiev and they wanted to follow me. I thought it was pretty obvious that I had no clue what was going on but they wouldn't take no for an answer, so we went through security together and started running to gate 48. The process was actually pretty straightforward and there were signs everywhere. At first they followed me confidently but when I stopped to read a sign halfway through they must have gotten nervous about placing their confidence in me because for the next 15 minutes they stopped every single person we passed to ask if we were going the right way. Luckily, I didn't lead them astray and the three of us got to the right gate with time to spare. 

I discreetly snapped a photo of my new friend.

As I stepped off of the plane in Kiev I received my first reprimand for not wearing a coat. It was extremely hot on the plane so the freezing breeze was a welcome change, but this idea made no sense to the flight attendant. As I boarded the shuttle in Kiev I was greeted by two Ukrainian men who had also ignored her stern advice about wearing a coat. One of them spoke English, which was a relief. After getting a good laugh about the overly nervous flight attendant he started asking all about whether this was my first time in Ukraine and where I was from and what I was doing here. He told me I came off more as a Canadian than an American (which I can only assume was a compliment). 

Upon entering the terminal, I parted with the friendly Ukrainian men to huddle around a table with the other foreigners who were eagerly filling out immigration cards. After a long wait I was accepted into the country (thank God). I claimed by baggage and was left standing in front of two corridors. One was marked “Red Route” and one “Green Route”--no explanation. I stood there for a while trying to figure out what the signs meant. It was clear that once I chose one I would not be able to come back into the terminal unless I went through customs, so this seemed important. Since I have no qualms about stopping random passersby to ask questions, I stopped an official looking man. He told me one was for people who had things to claim and the other was for everyone else. So finally I decided to take the Green Route.

At the other end of the Green Route I was greeted by Ira (HOPE's translator from the Kiev office) and the famous Vitalic (a lawyer/driver who works for HOPE--his name is almost certainly not spelled this way). They were standing there with a namecard waiting for me, just as every movie about airport meetings has led me to expect. They took me to the HOPE office in Kiev (HOPE Ukraine's headquarters) where I got to meet the country director, Andre. Tea was served immediately, of course. Andre treated me to a terribly exotic dinner of pizza from the local Italian restaurant (not quite what I was expecting) where he tried to tell me everything I'd need to know to get around in Ukraine. I asked Andre for the top ways I might accidentally offend people. He responded with these:

1) Refuse to drink with somebody. Andre says this will come across as extremely rude, but he gave me an easy out. Apparently it's perfectly polite to claim I have stomach ulcers and can't handle the alcohol.

2) Refuse to try food. "When Ukrainians find out you're American all they'll want to do is feed you."

After dinner Ira and Vitalic took me to the train station for my 10 hour ride to Zap. They were a little worried about me so they asked the conductor if they could help me get my stuff onto the train. They dropped me off in my room and Ira explained (in Russian) to the woman who was in my car that I was going to Zap and didn't speak Russian. She kindly showed me what I was supposed to do with everything in the tiny bunkbeds and made sure I was ready when we got to the city. The two Ukrainian men who were also staying in our room didn't really acknowledge me until the very end when they helped me carry my bags, which I was thankful for. After getting off the train I stood outside looking around for Max, my supervisor in Zap. It's a funny feeling trying to figure out which of the strangers on the platform might be the one who's there to collect you.

Max found me pretty quickly and took me straight to Galya's apartment. Galya runs a transition home for girls who have aged out of orphanages and she happened to have an extra bed for the week. I've been here at Galya's for a week now and will be moving into my own apartment in about an hour. She's been very sweet to me and we've had some funny moments since she doesn't speak any English and I don't speak any Russian. Google Translate has been our constant companion.

The stairway to Galya's apartment.

It's been a pretty eventful week and I'm still not quite settled in, but hopefully I'll be moved into my new apartment in just a few hours.

"I don't speak Russian"

After several days of traveling, I have arrived at my final destination! I spent most of yesterday just soaking in the jet lag, but I did manage to type up a blog post. Unfortunately that post is on my laptop which I haven't been able to charge, so this much shorter update will have to suffice.

Everything so far has been great. Max (my supervisor) picked me up from the Zaporozhye train station at 6:30 yesterday morning and dropped me off at his friend Galya's apartment. This is where I will be staying until I can get my own place. Galia was out most of the day yesterday so I was alone for the majority of the afternoon. At one point a Russian speaking man came to the door. I have no idea what he needed but he seemed to understand that I would be of no help to him when I just kept repeating "I don't speak Russian." Hopefully he will return and speak to Galya at some point... Communication was not much better when Galya got home as she also speaks no English. We tried talking for a while and eventually gave up and just laughed. She pulled out her laptop and we typed back and forth in google translator for a bit. Though we haven't had very in depth conversations, she has been very sweet to me, setting me up with a room, making me lunch, and offering me tea on several occasions. I am so happy to be in a tea loving country (Em, you would be so impressed with Galya's tea cabinet). Since then I have at least learned how to say "I don't speak Russian" in Russian. It ends up sounding something like "Ya ne gavaryu pa Rooski."

I am currently waiting for Max to pick me up and show me around the city and hopefully teach me a few more helpful Russian phrases.

I will post more when my computer is up and running! Thank you for your prayer over my travel (and those of you at FABIC, thanks for comforting my mother!)

-Steph

One Week to Departure

One and a half weeks ago I moved out of my apartment in Wayne and back home to my parents' house. Since then I've made a couple trips to Waynesboro, celebrated Christmas with the family, and gone to Alexandria to ring in the New Year with my good friends Dani and Alyssa. My parents,  grandparents, and sister have been faithfully helping to prepare me for my trip to Ukraine. There was a definite theme to my Christmas gifts this year (money belt, travel pillow, thick sweaters, etc.). I'm getting pretty excited at this point. I haven't been very apprehensive about the trip yet, but saying goodbye to two of my best friends today made it feel a little more real.

A Christmas tradition in the Walker house

Thanks, Mom & Dad

Dani and I in National Harbor on the first day of 2013

The next big task is deciding how many articles of clothing I can sacrifice to make space for more books...