Not the best tip ever...

A couple weeks ago when I was walking to the bus stop from Steve and Jo's house I saw this guy playing the sax-and he was great. The sidewalk in front of our beloved McDonald's is a popular place for street musicians, apparently. Aside from this Ukrainian Sax Man's smooth tone, I managed to catch another feature of Ukrainian life in this video. If you pay attention to the left corner, you'll notice that the nice young man who goes up to throw a tip in the open sax case also accidentally spills beer all over it. The lesson here: drinking in public = no problem in Ukraine. Today I even saw a father help his young son stick a straw in his juicebox before cracking open his beer. It was (almost) precious.

 

 

С Днем Рождения, otherwise known as "Happy Birthday"

 Over a month ago I turned 23.

I suppose now is as good a time as any to finally tell you about it. 

I didn’t have very high expectations for my birthday away from home—except I knew for sure that I was going to be loading up on Ukrainian chocolate no matter what happened, so it was bound to be at least alright. At home I always have my Dad’s salsa chili to look forward to on my birthday since of course the birthday girl gets to choose her favorite dinner and his chili is unparalleled. At Eastern the Hub never disappointed (for those of you who don’t know, the best friendship between me and Miss Dani Bailey is extreme enough to warrant its own name: the Hub). But here in Ukraine? Surrounded by Russian speaking strangers?

While I didn’t get the world’s best chili, I did manage to be completely blown away by the hospitality of people who had only known me for 2 or 3 weeks. On the morning of my birthday I had the opportunity to go into a smaller town with the Tomorrow Clubs to get a little taste of what TC is all about. The TC leaders, Lena, Oleg, and Ghena, were putting on a puppet theater show for the elementary aged children at the school. To my surprise, the show turned out to be the Christmas story. That’s right folks, Ukrainian Christmas was still going strong on the first of February. The puppet show was fantastic and the kids were having trouble staying seated because they were so excited. Lena and the others would pause the show every once in a while to ask the kids some trivia about the story they were watching and give out some prizes. At the end she called me up to the front and said I needed to help with some snowball related skit. I knew something was up because as it turns out, children are not so good with secrets. I heard Lena say “ne pah ne ma yu” which I know very well (for obvious reasons) means “can’t understand you.” Shortly afterwards small children started giving me sly little glances and smiles. Long story short Lena dumped a box of fake snowballs on me and then 100 Ukrainian children sang happy birthday to me in English AND Russian. They even gave me a gift. 

Oleg (as Shrek) and Ghena sing with the kids

One of the kids inspecting his prize

Shrek (Oleg) and Ghena dance with the children

Not to be outdone, Steve and Jo invited me over for a birthday dinner. Upon my request, we feasted on Jo’s delicious burritos. I just can’t get enough of Jo’s cooking—luckily I end up over there for dinner on a weekly basis. Then the real festivities started when we went to Cosmic Bowling with Bailey (who is part of the Peace Corps) and his girlfriend, Malina. Actually, Cosmic Bowling was the second bowling alley we visited. There were bouncers at the first one and they wouldn't let us in without paying for admission to the adjacent night club. Maybe someday when we've got our clubbing dresses, stilettos, and fur coats we can try that one again, but for my birthday we decided to stick with the tamer option. I don't understand why I love bowling so much as I'm consistently terrible and have shown no signs of improvement, but I had a really great time.

This beautiful piece of work was in the lobby

As if being serenaded by a tiny, adorable choir and bowling my heart out wasn’t enough, Natasha and the women at the HOPE Ukraine office also remembered my birthday. When I got to work on Monday Natasha presented me with my very own office mug. In a freezing cold office where the tea is as important as the internet for productivity, this is no small gesture. I have been happily sipping hot tea from it since. 

To wrap up my birthday weekend I had some delightful Skype calls.

First I got to talk to Alyssa for a long time. She Skyped me from my least favorite study room: the one with the death painting. We had a delightful time chatting and she even pulled the dreadful piece of artwork off the wall in my honor (don't worry, it was promptly replaced). Later our little library group (minus one Benevolent Ben) was reunited when we were joined by Steph Shogren.

Alyssa defacing library property as a gesture of true friendship

Then I got to Skype with my wonderful parents, who also sent me a birthday card all the way in Ukraine. :) I also received cards from my Grandma in British Columbia and the one and only Kayla Zirbel! Mail is always exciting - but even moreso when you're miles and miles from home.

To conclude a fantastic birthday weekend, I watched a movie with my best friend...also over Skype. Dani and I see no reason to stop hanging out just because we're separated by a vast expanse of water. I stayed up until 5AM Ukraine time watching Pitch Perfect and talking to Dani. Totally worth it.

She really knows how to throw a party over the internet

I'll be posting again soon with a little more info about what I've been working on with HOPE and some pictures of my time in Kiev! Until then, I'd appreciate prayer for my Russian studies! My first real lesson is tomorrow (finally) and I'm pretty excited about it.