Sunglasses

Since arriving in Ukraine almost 9 months ago, one of my favorite activities to do is people watch.  No matter where you are, what time of day it is, or what the weather is, I usually have one fun experience people watching every day.

One thing that is different here in Ukraine is the fact that people don't wear sunglasses during the winter.  In fact, they stopped wearing sunglasses a couple months ago.  I, however, still wear mine.  Maybe just to stick out, maybe to people watch, maybe just because I like to watch people's reactions of seeing me in sunglasses.  Nonetheless, I enjoy wearing them on days where it's sunny and they are needed.  I wouldn't want extra wrinkles after all... :)

Today I wore my sunglasses while walking to the post office.  I noticed more people stare at my entire outfit today than I have in sometime.  For one thing, I wasn't wearing my giant winter jacket complete with fur trim.  Why is that?  Because it was FIFTY degrees here today.  Instead, I wore my North Face fleece (without fur) and got the oddest looks for it.  I also stuck out because I'm not going to wear 4" stilettos for my trek to the grocery store.  If I know I'm going to walk a lot, I wear my tennis shoes, which most females don't even own here.  Needless to say, I got some unbelievably long stares today...all of which I could secretly stare back at thanks to my sunglasses.

My sunglasses have also come in handy a few times on marshrutka rides.  I don't think I wrote about the time that I was sitting on a marshrutka, minding my own business, when a lady got on with a cowl neck jacket on.  What was nestled right under her chin in the cowl neck jacket?  A rat.  An honest to goodness, live, decently large rat.  I couldn't help but stare as she found her seat.  And just because I couldn't help myself, I stood up earlier than my stop so that I could turn around and look at her again and make sure that I wasn't seeing things.  It was real, I promise.

If only my sunglasses had a secret camera attached to them.  Oh, the things I could show y'all...

There is the more recent adventure that just happened last weekend.  I was on my marshrutka ride from Rivne to Kiev (a four hour ride) after our Thanksgiving day hoopla.   There was an older babushka on the ride too.  I drew a picture to help you visualize this experience...which is key to the story.

So, this is a marshrutka, typical for longer rides (as opposed to the ones I ride around town).  I am the "L," the babushka is the "B," and there is a sliding van door by the seat in front of me.  Also key for the story background.

We were probably 30 minutes outside of Kiev when I was awoken from my slumber (thanks to the sunglasses) by the babushka yelling and carrying on about something.  The driver (a younger guy...probably in his 30s) was yelling right back to her, completely unafraid of whatever she was saying.  She spoke Ukrainian so I didn't catch the whole conversation, but in my mind, it went something like this:

Baba: "It's really hot on here.  Open the windows."
Driver: "We're flying down the interstate.  I'm not opening the windows.  Take of your full-on winter parka and fur hat, and maybe you'll cool off."

I was still wearing my heavy down jacket and was quite comfortable.  Maybe the baba was sick.  Maybe she didn't want to take off her jacket.  All that I know is that I'm thanking my lucky stars I wasn't sitting in the seat in front of me. The baba was sweating profusely and kept dabbing her face with an incredibly old and gross looking rag.  Now would also probably be a good time to mention that this was a BIG baba.  She squashed the poor girl sitting next to her in the two-seater.  Again, thankful it wasn't me.

So, as we're flying down the interstate going at least 60 mph, she leans across the man sitting in front of me to OPEN THE VAN DOOR.  That's right.  It SLAMS open and the driver turns around to see what was going on.  He then proceeds to slam on the breaks so that the door will shut.  She starts yelling at him for shutting the door...and I'm sitting there wishing that I had another PCV with me just to witness this whole situation.  Don't worry, it gets better.

After the driver yells at her to sit down and gives her a good verbal lashing, we approach Kiev.  We start dropping people off at various stops along the way, and soon our once full marshrutka is half full. Or half empty?  :)  Anywho, the seat in front of me is now open, as well as the triple-seater in front of the baba.  She was too large to maneuver around to the row of three seats, so she chose the single seater in front of me.  It's high traffic time in Kiev as we're heading towards the bus station, when out of nowhere our driver has to slam on the breaks (a common occurrence here).  Apparently, the old baba was not ready for him to slam on the breaks, because she goes FLYING forward.  I'm not sure whether the aisle seat on the triple-seater is supposed to lift forward (for people to be able to pass by), or whether her brut force knocked the bolts loose, but regardless, the seat moved forward and the baba ended up in the floor.

The driver didn't know what was happening as the baba started screaming and cussing and crying for someone to help her up.  The two closest people to the baba were myself and the tiny girl who was her old seat mate.  Luckily, two men jumped up from the back of the marshrutka to help her into her seat.  This was by far one of the weirdest marshrutka experiences I've had in my time here, and I'm certain it's not going to be my last.  As soon as we parked at the bus station, I hightailed it out of there.

During my adventures today (all with sunglasses), I went to Kishenya, a GIANT supermarket I had yet to visit.  Holy.  Cow.  This is the motherload of all stores.  I think I spent an hour just walking around, then I decided to get a cart and start loading up.  I bought myself a little Christmas tree for 30 griev (less than $4)...and a shower curtain!  A hot pink, polka dot shower curtain.  I also bought some hangers which I can now use thanks to the fact that my landlady cleaned out a piece of furniture in the back room with hanging space.  They even have books in there, including the Harry Potter's in Russian.  I really want to buy them before I leave...it's one of my goals to read the first one sometime while I'm here (in Russian).

Tomorrow I've got English clubs back to back, but first my landlady will come to collect rent money in the morning.  I can't begin to express to you how excited I am to have some friends visit this weekend.  And the week after that, we get our new volunteers in K-grad.  And then it's Christmas.  And then it's my birthday.  And then it's New Years!

I've decided for every post I make in December, to do a random part of a movie or TV show clip that I enjoy and makes me laugh.  What shall be the first one I share with you...none other than one of my favorite movies of all time :)

 

Keep the change, ya filthy animal :)