two ankles in two weeks

So it seems that the way I go through culture shock is by physical abuse. This last weekend, I got the chance to go home with Svitlana to her family's cottage - around 15 minutes outside of Ostroh. Every month the Ukrainians, and their counterparts, get the chance to go home for the weekend. No folks, this won't be something that happens in Canada - it is a special aspect of the Ukrainian phase. The trip was full of highlights: a long adventure in the ponderosa pine forest outlining the cottage, time with a large, fun, and very hospitable family, a Ukrainian sauna, tasting and elaborate meals from the 'garden', playing with Svitlana's little 4 1/2 year old nephew. And one lowlight - I managed to sprain my ankle, jumping out of a tree. Why I jumped - I don't really even know. I think i just wanted to do something a little bit risky - my version of culture shock. But now I have another sprain that's bruising like crazy on my other ankle. Hopefully it'll be gone soon because I hate limping!

I'm going to make the rest of this note short because my fellow Canadian, Becca, and I are freezing it outside the post office as Ostroh embarks on a late fall. We are rocking out to Michael Franti, but freezing.

Today we had our first CAD ( community activity day ) - a discussion day for the Ukrainians at Ostroh Academy. They seemed to really enjoy it and many of them commented in their feedback sheets that they thought it was awesome and well planned out - we planned it by the skin of our teeth! So it made us feel confident in our skills.

Ostroh has been as beautiful as always. I found another bike to work on at Svitlana's cottage - a Raleigh Tarantula ( a lot like my scrambler ). I was going to ride it back to Ostroh before I sprainged my ankle. There's a little seat on the top tube for Nazar (svitlana's nephew) and it has an old seta - made in Canada too!

Everyone is at the pizzaria right now watching the soccer game - Becca and I are going to stop in soon. I'm making her wait until I finish this letter.

Love everyone lots and looking forward to a Jenn skype date either today or tomorrow..?

love,

ellen

An easy work day

Working in the town council has turned out to be pretty simple. After returning, we were given a duotang of information and asked to make a brochure on recycling for their town - they told us to read the duotang and come back on monday! When do we need to complete the brochure by - oh, just as fast as you can. Now, I don't know if they realise we could make a brochure in a few hours of hard work, but this sure seems pretty simple so far. Most of our peers work were similar in difficulty - cleaning parks, writing a number on a pottery bowl broken into a thousand peices, drawing. We heard a couple times in the past little while that Ukrainians are used to the concept of volunteers, so I guess they will test us 'on easy' until they see that volunteers work!

We have been making use of our free time. On Tuesday, I went with 3 Canadians on an adventure into the country side. What gorgeous landscape and people with the endless rolling hills. I'm still not sure how to place the landscape - it's like nothing I can remeber ever seeing before. More like a combination of many places. After treking for about 5 km, we found ourselves standing in an open caked dirt land plot, long and skinny, with a panoramic view of village, farmland, old USSR buildings, a lake, a nuclear power plant, and another town in the distance. With the setting, the sun, the people, and the mood, it felt like we were perched in one of those magical places, while a helicopter with an imax film maker circled around us. Wow!

On the way back, we ate apples and detoured around, following windy dirt roads, until we hit fmailiar ground. The rest of our night was spent at the pizzaria as we attempted to order food - without a ukrainian at our side. On a large meal, we each spent oer $2. Then I went running and 8 minute abing at the stadium under the stars.

Sometimes living here feels like a dream.

"Hi!"..."who areyou?"..."your volunteers!"..."our what?What are you going to do?"

So that's how our first day at town council has gone. It's now 10:50 am and I'm sitting in the internet cafe, about to return to council. Inna and I don't really know what to expect.

Here's the story:

After dressing in fancy pants and a new shirt I went to put on the only black pair of heels I own, and was surprised to feel and squishy feeling on my toes. I looked inside, and it was full of soap. I realised this must of been a place I hadn't noticed was subject to the multiple soap explosionsin my backpack during travel ( you would think after the first time, I would have thrown it out...but who expects those things to happen twice! )

Frantically, I worked to clean it out. still, after a walk down to meet my work partner, Inna, I had one foot heel and one foot carwash! That was interesting experience one.

The second, I couldn't understand as Inna and who I expected to be our supervisor rattled on in Ukrainian while I smiled. I could tell by Inna's face that something was off, and when she eventually translated for me, I discovered that this women had no clue who we were. She was asking Inna what we were going to do as volunteers, and after a while, told usto come back in an hour. Now it's almost time to return.

It's a beautiful day out and I kind of hope we do get sent home so I can put on my runners and explore the country side.

What a comical morning. But I guess you could call this a typical first day-something always goes wrong. Murphy's law.

love,
ellen

somethings weird with the milk

so I'm feeling really lazy, except full of energy and distracted. It's midnight in Ostroh, and I've spent the last hour getting distracted from writing in here.

Before I share some information of the fascinating stories of the last couple of days, I think I'll check-in:
- I think I'm really starting to miss people from home. Not all the time, but just when I'm buy myself or at my host families house, without any canadians around. Usually it doesn't last long because then I get absorbed back into the amazing people and place around me, but it's something I'm constantly analyzing - am I homesick or just normal. I also am crazy a bike ride or a swim - both are currently unreachable. I am really considering buying a bike for my stay here because they are only around $60!

Since I last wrote many things have happened, and it's been too busy to write - here's the interesting points:
Thursday - Went and visit Svitlana's sister's house, where her grandma, sister, bother-in-law, and nephew live. They have this beautfiul house on a patch of land surrounded by working gardens, meaning they basically grow all of their own vegetables and fruits there. Here grandma is awesome - I wish I had gotten a picture of her! She's so kind and full of complementary words, but in ukrainian because she doesn't speak english. I just smile ande laugh lots and say 'do-bry' lots which means 'good'. In fact, every word I knew how to speak in ukrainian I basically used with her, like counting to 10, and she couldn't believe, guaranteeing I could speak fluent ukrainian in three months...we'll see! Svitlana's nephew is so cute - about five and very very shy. He loves watermelon too, so we have something in common, but he's pretty scared of me because I speak a different language - sometimes he cries and runs away, but hopefully we'll become buds soon! Her sister has done the program before and we talked until late.

Friday - we went underground.... there is literally a crazy ancient tunnel network under the church at the ostroh academy that's two levels deep. A historian took us on a small tour of it, but supposively it goes up to 3 levels deep under the town. Orignally the one under the academy was a cemetery and they still keep some very small coffins with bones down there - I felt like I was in a video game. We also went on a scavenger hunt around the town, followed by the tedious yet important discussions about policies and our program. At the end of the day, we learned and decided on our work placements. What I'm doing probably won't surprise you - working at the town council on their solid waste city project. To tell the truth I'm really not that excited for it - probably because it doesn't appear new and exciting to me at first....I swear politics just follow me! What I really wanted to do was volunteer in this forest park and do research on different trees, and feed animals, and explore the country side, but it didn't work in my favour. I'm sure there will be lots to learn from this experience in town council and I'll probably be pretty stoked on the whole thing by Monday!

Saturday - more work in the morning. After Svitlana and I bought a watermelon in the market. I did the Hunter trick of knocking on the melons, and I thought that the ukrainian watermelon lady would think that I was crazy - apparently i was wrong, and this totally normal here! I still am a gawking mess in the markets and stores because everything is just so different and intriguing. The stores are filled with so much chocolate, bread, produce, and cheese and sausage, and alcohol, but very little milk or nuts. Everything is super cheap too. I bought quite a few groceries for svitlana and I today and it was around $7! svitlana and I basically lazed around in the afternoon and then went to the stadium in the afternoon.

The stadium and the lunet have become our groups main hang-out spots over the week. Our group's really active, and the stadium in basically an outdoor gym with an odd turf track, chin up bars, basketball court, and lots of room to do abs. I ran with John, the canadian, under a sea of stars - super beautiful, and something i could literally do every night. The lunet is like a convient store with an outdoor patio where lots of young people go to hang out in the afternoons.

Mom, here's the description of food: LOTS OF IT! breakfasts are weird - you are often served toast with meet, mustard, and cheese. On the first morning I was here, Svitlana's mom, Svitlana, made pancakes with apple slices inside them - they are probably one of the top ten things I've had while being here. lunch is usually some sort of borche ( there's hundreds of kinds), and bread or other random things. Sandwichs are also common. Dinner - a fresh vegetable salad with very little leafy greens ( more mexican ), some minced meat, bread, soup, buckwheat or rice, some other type of vegetable. leftovers are common and fresh food is the norm. A lot of chocolate, sweats, and fizzy drinks are consumed as well.

Despit all the food, ukrainians and usually very fit. Most don't drive, and many are out and about - active - throughout the day. The stadium is a popular hang-out for students at the Academy. But I have noticed that it's common for people past 30 to be a little larger. I think living in a university town has skewed this impression a bit, but all seem pretty fit and healthy to me.

Most Ukrainians are fairly good looking too, and they all dress up for shool at the academy. Extravagant outfits to the point of being tacky. luckily everyone knows of the "canadians' since CWY participants have been coming to this area for 13 years. So it's perfectly alright for us to stnad out as not dressed up. Overall, you get many smiles from individuals who hear you ramble on in english and many people swarm to meet you - some particpants descirbed feeling like movie stars. It's interesting to observed!

Well that's the update, from the now tired writer. Hope all is well with whoever is reading this, and want to let you know that I would love to hear from you this weekend!
love,
ellen

fell in a hole, got lost with a watermelon and sprained my ankle...a great day!

Man I am enjoying this place.  Today we had a day off.  My counterpart, Svitlana, had to take a 5 hour train into Kiev ( 300-400 km away - it took us 9 hours by bus!), so I spent the day with others from the program.

it was time to explore the area! Becca, Katr, and I went in search of a bank, and once we had money, becca and I basically wanted to stop at every ukrainian shop and just stare.  Everything is different: brands, clothes, drinks, social norms, the layout of the city.  And watermelons are 50 cents! Exploring, we ventured to areas that Katr hadn't even seen and ended up getting lost, with a watermelon in tow. We did find our way back and found the others for a basketball game.  I hadn't played in so long and I'd forgotten how fun it can be! No one knew how to play except me, but that didn't matter and we just all played hard - I managed to sprain my ankle, but after watching Mr.T elevate many ankles, I think I've treated it well. Went back 'home' and had a shower and some dinner.  Later tonight, a bunch of us are meeting up to hang out and watch a soccer game! Can't wait to see them all again.  We are all really forming a strong comunity and once again, the joy of working  and living with others is giving me so much drive.  Many thinkgs about this experience here so far remind me of Naramata.

For all of those interested in calling me, here’s my host family's number:

0 ( or 00…check with operator ) – 38 (country number) – 03654 (area number) – 23896 ( house number)

For a cheap rate, I would suggest buying a phone card online at the ‘phone card website’, making sure that it will call to Ostroh Ukraine.

The time change in Ostroh is 10 hours ahead, which means don’t call past 12:00 pm! Haha…or before midnight!
Remember father…you won’t just be waking up me, you’ll be waking up their whole family!
 
As for skype….it may be a little random when I’m available. It’ll usually be between 7:00 am and 12:00 pm. There’s an internet café that’s pretty close which I can use.


Now for the whole story....there's a moaut around the Ostroh Academy track.  We were there last night. It was pitch black and I was going to someones house from there.  I literally dissappeared in this giant hole with my friend Becca falling in right behind me.  The ukrainians and everyone else found it hallarious, and I couldn't stop laughing myself~!
Love you lots and look forward to talking soon!

Ellen

first time washing clothes by hand = pink shirts

Hello Ukraine!

I'm on my third day in this beautiful country.  We left from Toronto on Friday afternoon and arrived after midnight on Sunday.  We were greeted by tradionally dressed young Ukrainians, eager and excited to grab our suitcases and move us through a an evening full of events. I wish I could show you this first encounter throughmy eyes.....  I was sleeping on our 'seventies band tour bus ( which is the Ostroh Acedemy bus )'  and woke up just before we arrived at our training location.  I remeber looking outside the buses window to a sea full of stars inthe pitch black while 20 new friends slept around me on the bus. We were in the middle of nowhere - aka, rural Ukraine. The bus turned onto an old cobble/brick road, slowing from it's already 'turtle speed' to a stop in front of old rickety giant gates that we iluminated by our buses headlights.  There were 20 soon to be friends, standing in front of this old church camp and home for the next 3 day orientation.

The Ukrainians brought us to a court yard entrance, dressed in tradional white blouses for girls and white with red ribbon shirts for boys. We each formed these awkardly situated lines in front of them.  This girl with bright blonde hair held this giant loaf of gread, which I thought was angel food cake at first.  All of the others around her said some nice greeting words to us, followed with the passing of this welcoming 'wedding bread' to share and a bag of goodies for each of us. Wow!

Of course, us Canadians, having prepared a sentence in Ukrainian and gathered a couple gifts tried to give a decent response to this decidant introduction!

All of them had waited until we arrived to eat dinner - we'd eaten less than two hours ago!  But politely, we sat down to a second feast.... this is the first thing I noticed about Ukrainians - they make huge, homemade, beautiful, and tasty meals, and they eat a lot!  At each meal I've had, we've had at least half the food  left over.  It's a little overwhelming, but you are definitely eating very good quality food.  They really spend time on preparing meals.  I feel like they havn't become part of the craze of proccessed foods; therefore they aren't changing to the 'One Hundred Mile' diet. It's already the norm! But really, I can't eat that much all the time!

Then we stayed up until 1:30 am, having a big girl chat in the Ukrainian girls room. That was only 3:30 pm Victoria time, but by that point my internal clock was so mixed up!  I literally crashed that night, and getting up at 8:00 am during the camp was horrible!

We did lots of 'Naramata style' training activities, and had check-ins!  I learned a ton, and a couple Ukraine phrases too!

Ukrainians are extremely polite and hospitable.  They really work to include you and make you feel comfortable.  Allof our group speaks pretty fluent English, which surprised me.  We talked about some pretty deep topics, and the conversations with everyone made me so excited for the adventures to come!

But this first training was more than meeting people, for me it was meeting the environment.  It's absolutely gorgeous.  The climate is pretty similar to Victoria, and our camp's village was very rural, with no cement roads ( all cobble or dirt or grass ), it made a cool , quiet and comfortable environment.  Each house is very small, with a giant garden - most Ukrainians grow all their own fruites and vegetables, and raise livestock.  Their were lots of cats and dogs in the 'village', which is read a road with some houses and one store. There's no way I can follow the travel clinics advice by avoiding animals!

Yesterday, host families and counterparts were chosen ( the person you will live with on both pahses of the program ). I'm with Svitlana, who is AWESOME!  Her parents are both teachers.  Her Dad 'masters' a grade 10 class at the Ostroh high school and her Mom is the dean of english at the Ostroh Acedemy.  Her Mom has supervised the CWY/Ostroh Acedemy before and I think they will all be great resources for this experience and an awesome host family!

Well, Svitlana and I are heading over to another friends house from her families apartment to hang-out.  I love you all at home.  My phone number will probably come tomorrow!

Now, for a short explanation of the title of this.  When I first arrived, I was super nervous and felt pretty awkard.  They've basically given me their living room as my room, and I didn't know how to react to a new family and how to intrude on their family.  After unpacking my stuff - I really didn't bring anything - I wasn't really sure what to do.  I needed to wash clothes, but I didn't know how they did it.  I asked Svitlana and she got my started, washing them by hand in their bath.  I had these giant striped colour woolies from Han and Meg and I needed to wash them.  Well, I thought I washed them before, but it turns out I didn't because it turned their tub purple.  I felt horrible and didn't really no the proccesss. they helped me through the proccesss and it's alright now!  
They really are an awesome host family and I loved getting to know them better over dinner.

Got to go now
love,
ellen

The Journey

Today we finished our orientation. Tomorrow we begin our journey to Ukraine. We'll head to the airport at 2 pm for our 6 pm flight to Frankfurt. From Frankfurt we fly to Kiev, Ukraine. Then from the airport, we take an extremely slow bus to Ostroh, going around 300km, which takes around 7 hours!. I think our journey will take around 24 hours.

So good-bye, CANADA!

day one of orientation

Hello!

I have finally arrived in Toronto for my orientation, and after a day of intensive community building and culture exploration, I am eagerly awaiting the many days, weeks, and months to come.

A look into the life:

icebergs:

-think of a person as an iceberg. The top is their actions - what we can see as observers into their lives. The middle represents their thoughts - social norms, and the bottom stands for their feelings - where their values lie.

situation:

- after an 'experience' you and a peer react to a situation differently - the tip of the iceberg is different.

- normally, I would assume that since their action is different than my their thoughts and feelings may be different as well.

-however, their action is what I would place with very different t and f.

- think of it different. Think that they could have the same thoughts and feelings but different actions, due to culture.

ie.

(true experience of the leader)

- canadians on a CWY exchange in Uruguay bring snacks randomly to events and meeting during training in Uruguay. They individually eat their snack. Culturally for them this is totally acceptable.

- for Uruguayans, this is very rude. All food opened is always shared equally with all others in it's presence.

- This action is associated with totally different things in Canada and Uruguay due to culture.

We went over six areas where these norms very across the world. This was an example of the linear scale of collectivism and individualism.

I'm in Toronto until Friday. We fly from Toronto to Frankfurt, then Frankfurt to Kiev, Ukraine. After our flights, we hop on a bus to Ostrosh, which supposively takes 7 hours to go between 300 and 400 km! As long as our flight! It should be quite the experience.

Ukrainians are already beginning to interest me so much....soon I'll be living with them!