Swearing-In: part 2

So we're actually going to flash back a little and explain the swearing-in retreat. On Monday, June 13, 2011, we left our training city of Oster and headed to Kiev for a 4 day retreat with all 103 other PCTs waiting to get sworn in. All of us in the Oster cluster had to get to the bus station with ALL of our luggage by 8:30 that sad Monday morning. I won't tell you how many bags I ended up having...partly because I can't remember, but partly because it's embarrassing :) My host mom was working so I said goodbye to her the night before, but my host dad and sister took me to the bus station :)

Andrei, Christy, and me!

The Oster bus station...this is where we met every time we left our lovely little training city to travel to Kozelets or Kiev or Chernigov.

Mark and his family

Jamie and his fam

Didn't catch a picture of Cassi and her family because they had a flat tire on the way to the bus station!

This is all of us and our families about to leave :( definitely a sad day. Can't wait to go back and visit!

After arriving in Kiev and getting settled into dorm rooms (I roomed with Hayley and completely forgot to take a single picture of our room), we had to meet in one of the conference rooms to find out where we would be living for the next two years. This was a moment that we had been waiting for FOREVER. Definitely before we came to Ukraine.

The concert hall where all of our meetings were held during the swearing-in retreat.

Jamie and Mark...and Jeff creeping in the background....anxiously awaiting the news!

The Kozelets gang...MK, Kymmy (Gibbler), Matt, Maria, and Anne

Jeff, Ed, and Tondraya

And then...they started doing the announcements. Ukraine is split up into 24 oblasts (think states) that are then divided into 10 regions. They announce your site placement by region, so at the beginning you really have no clue where you're going except to one of two or three oblasts that that region includes. This is what it looked like on the powerpoint slideshow:

Each region has a Regional Manager, a full-time PC employee. The RM is who I would contact with immediate questions about work, counterparts, travel, etc. My RM is named Tanya, as seen in the picture below. Each RM gets to announce the people going to that region and THEN the names are put up on the powerpoint...

Region 7 includes the Odessa and Kirovogradskaya oblasts, so upon immediate reaction I just knew I would be going to a room with all of the people listed on the slide. It was in those meeting rooms that we would find out about our actual sites and what organization we would be working with. After all 10 regions were announced and everybody was dismissed, we headed to our new conference rooms to meet with our regions. However, first, we had to stop at the country map posted outside of the large room...look at the next pic why!

It was complete and utter chaos. They definitely need a bigger map because all 103 people were trying to crowd around and see where we were going...

There's my name!

That was day 1 of the Swearing-In Retreat...get ready for day 2 and 3 and 4 soon!

P.S. It has STILL been raining on and off today in k-grad. I vacuumed my apartment, will mop later tonight, and have been watching Friends due to this weather. I've also been reading..but in the past week or so I think I've read 2 or 3 books. Guess I need to start keeping track of them!

P.P.S. I skyped for the first time since leaving in March! Got to skype with my parents for about an hour and a half yesterday...and maybe 20-30 minutes with my brother. Oh, the wonders of technology... :)

Swearing-In: part 1

Hello hello!

I've been absent from the blogging world for a bit and will probably continue to be for the next little while. Rest assured, I'll have lots of pics for you when I get back from my WEEK LONG CAMPING TRIP. Yes, that's right. I, Lydia Frost, will be living outside for a week. The ultimate hater of bugs and everything that goes with them. I leave on Friday and will get back on the following Thursday I think. This is where I'll be going, the южный буг River! BTW, that is pronounced yewni-buhg...just fyi :)

Anywho, this post is about the Swearing-In (not sure if that's supposed to be hyphenated?) Retreat. So, without further ado, here are a few sites that you can look at for some videos and pictures of the event!

This website has some great pictures captured...including one of me!

This website has almost the entire ceremony broken up into different videos. Not gonna lie...I didn't watch all of the videos, but that's mainly because I was there in person to watch them.

I am currently sitting in an internet cafe I found here in K-grad (Kirovograd, the city I live in). I almost feel like I could fit in with the other young people here, minus the fact that my adapter for my computer is giant and means that it is clearly visible that my computer is not Ukrainian. It rained ALL day yesterday here in K-grad. I woke up to it raining and it continued on for the whole day and is still raining again today (Monday). It makes me want to stay inside because I pretty much walk everywhere. However, Tuesday (tomorrow) is a holiday here in Ukraine (not sure what holiday...) but it means that I had today and tomorrow off. I needed to get out of my apartment, so this morning I ventured to the bazaar by my apartment and managed to check a few more things off of my list of things to purchase. Those items included a blanket (the wool blanket on my bed is incredibly itchy and too hot for right now), a full-size bath towel, and a trash can for my kitchen! Overall productive morning I would say :)

I'm going to try to Skype for the first time since leaving America! Maybe another post soon! Tootleloo!

Updated apartment pics :)

I wrote this post at home 2 nights ago with all intentions of pasting it into the blog format and hitting publish post...but that didn't work out yesterday! So, everything is written as if it were a few days ago...enjoy!

Well, I lied. I ended up staying up late last night when I finally got on a roll cleaning and putting away the last final things in my apartment…which means that you get more pictures of the way things will probably be for a little while! I am overall pretty pleased with how things have come together…considering that 1) I am in a foreign country where I cannot find things readily available (or just wouldn’t know where to purchase them to begin with!), 2) I am trying to stay on track with a small budget, and 3) the furniture I have is all I get…

So, without further ado, my {very first} apartment:

This is the view you see from the entry into the living room/my bedroom. My suitcases are underneath my bed, while most of my winter clothes are under the pull out drawer on the loveseat. (sidenote: I doused the couch in fabric refresher that I brought from home. VERY glad I brought a full size bottle with me).

Here is some more of the living room, actually standing in the doorway. The flowers I got from work on Friday which was my first real day at the job. My counterpart has pictures of me with the flowers looking nice and fresh…I’ll try to get them from her soon. It was all very sweet :)

A close-up of the corner which has 1) the blanket that came from inside my sheet duvet cover, 2) one of the two outlets in the room…the other outlet is by the cabinet with my clothes in it, 3) one of the two stools that I have no idea what to do with…the other stool is out in the entry way for me to sit on to put on my shoes, and 4) most importantly…an OU poster thanks to Mitchell’s accounting class project :)

Close-up of my shkaff (that is the Russian word for any piece of furniture that could hold items that is not a table). The bottom portion with drawers holds a random assortment of things that I might need at some point…extra toiletries, bug spray, air mattress, med kit, toilet paper, paper towels (which people do not use here…I was surprised I was able to find them to buy! I have used almost an entire roll just for cleaning…), etc. On the open bottom shelf is my stack of books/notebooks that were from PST (pre-service training). That’s a lot of reading material…

Different view of my bed and the loveseat. The entrance into the room is to the left in this picture. Amy, see if you can spot something that is an OLD, old (circa 2003) project you made me J it made the trip over here…and I’m quite glad it did. One of the first things I plan on having my parents send over is a pair of twin size t-shirt sheets. Bedding is very different here and I’ve had quite a time adjusting to it…which may seem pretty picky, but I would like to enjoy my bed for the next two years. (Sidenote: I'm about to be very whiny, so you can skip to the next paragraph if you don’t want to hear…). Ukraine does not have fitted sheets, at least that I can find. This means that every night, my bottom sheet comes untucked and I end up on the “mattress” that I would rather not know how many people have slept on. So, on top of the not-fitted bottom sheet, is a top sheet duvet cover for whatever blanket you happen to be using at the time. The top sheet in this set has a giant opening at the bottom for you to slide the blanket in…which means that the blanket also moves around throughout the night and becomes very whopper-jawed. My reasoning why Ukrainians do this is to allow you to wash your sheets every week but it also keeps the blankets from getting exposed to much dust or dirt. So, I really want some of my old dorm sheets that are bright Lydia colors and that will actually stay on the bed. The end :) moving on…

I love the little nook above my bed. Very handy to keep my phone (alarm clock), journal, Bible, and Kindle in. BTW, my Kindle has 3g here in Kirovograd…definitely faster than in Oster where I had EDGE. Oh, the wonders of technology…

An overview of the entryway into my room…Ukraine map, check. Calendars, check. Pictures, check!

This montage is immediately to your left when you walk into my room. I got the two blue stick on decals from Target right before I left…$8.00. They can come off and easily be reapplied wherever. If you click on this picture too and then click to enlarge it, you might be able to see the rocking wallpaper my apartment has in it. It’s GLITTERY. I kind of love it. The OU frame is actually magnetic but I taped it up to the wall for now because I don’t have anywhere to put a magnetic frame since my fridge is outside on the balcony…the frame also has an easel back so I may put it somewhere else. Other pictures printed include one of my favorite group pictures of our cluster…the day we bought our Ukrainian cell phones. And my Ukraine fam as well :) (sidenote: Tina, I need a copy of the picture of the 5 of us at the wedding. Please please!)

Moving on to the kitchen…This is the view that you see right now when you walk into the kitchen. I can’t figure out if I will actually eat in my kitchen or not. I loved eating breakfast at the kitchen table in Oster and watching my neighbor work out in the garden, but it doesn’t feel the same here. All that I would see out my window is people walking by…a little boring compared to Oster. We’ll see. It’s a trial run right now.

It’s like an unwritten rule that you have to have candy waiting for any guest that happens to come by your house. Luckily, my host family stocked me up right before I left. Thanks, Christy :)

My dish rack that I love so much! Those are all of the dishes I have, minus a metal pan.

Kitchen sink. Purchased the sponge holder at the super market. LOVE it. One thing my host mom taught me during my 3 month stay with them was to never be afraid to use enough dish soap…and to throw away the sponge. Also pictured is my lovely retainer case…forgot to take that out for the “staging” picture :)

Here is my electric tea kettle (borrowed from work until I buy my own) and the hot plate that I used for the first time today (tried to make kasha, epic fail). The “dragon” (aka, hot water heater) is mounted on the wall.

View from the corner of the kitchen (by the stove…that doesn’t work) looking into the hallway and into the living room. I purchased the hook that the towel is on for 10 grievnas, and the towel for 6 grievnas. Towels are relatively expensive here which kind of surprises me…most of the tea towels I saw were 35 grievnas (a little over $5). While that seems normal in America, I would expect them to be less expensive here like other things, so it was kind of jarring in my mind. I brought a microfiber bath towel that I am SUPER glad I packed because my first night here there was definitely no towel in the apartment at all. And, it dries super fast. Yesterday I purchased a stick-on-the-wall paper towel holder. It is now next to my towel hook.

So that is my apartment...hope you enjoyed the tour :) love love

Apartment pics!

This post will make many people happy...because it comes with apartment pictures! Hooray :)

Disclaimer: I took these pics the first night that I was in my apartment...after I'd been on a bus for 4+ hours...so my stuff was everywhere. I have since become more settled in and will hopefully post pictures of the rearranged and decorated apartment once I get everything in order (a couple of days!).

My front door...the darker door. This is on the inside of my apartment. A lot of Ukrainian apartments have two doors like this because the inner door isn't very secure, or in my case, doesn't even shut...The corridor is behind me in the picture above, the bathroom is to my left.

The entry way/corridor...the kitchen and living room/bedroom are to your right in this picture. On down the hallway is 2 bedrooms that are junk rooms...I don't pay to use these rooms, which is fine with me because I wouldn't know what to do with them anyway!

My bathroom! Which will hopefully have a washing machine in it (wishful thinking...). The landlady put the washing machine in one of the extra bedrooms that I don't pay for...not quite sure why. Still trying to get this worked out...

The first view of the kitchen

The other part of my kitchen! The oven and stove don't work, but it comes with a digital hot plate...I have since purchased my dish rack and a few other things for my kitchen :)

First view of the living room...this has now changed since I've rearranged furniture! The wood thing is a loveseat-esque piece of furniture with a drawer that pulls out underneath it. I put my winter clothes in it for now because it's not very easy to open...

The apartment has new windows and a new door to go out on the balcony. This will be VERY nice in the winter. Through that white door is my balcony, where I will probably hang clothes to dry. My refrigerator is also on the balcony...

The green thing is my bed, which is now where the loveseat was. They swapped places. The big furniture piece in the corner is my clothes storage space. I also have some hanging spots and shelves in the corridor where I can hang dresses and coats and store extra shoes.

And as a little teaser, here is a picture of my counterpart and I at the swearing-in ceremony!

Hopefully more posts soon! :)

Swearing In link...

Found this online from our swearing-in ceremony! Forgot to post it in the post before this, so be sure to read about my past few days in Kirovograd too. Enjoy!

http://usembassykyiv.wordpress.com/2011/06/16/beyond-certificates-and-statistics/

Who can spot me in the video? :) You definitely see me...clue: red dress.

Quick post while I'm online...

Greetings all! At work right now..so I may be whisked away to meet somebody else any minute, but I thought I would take this opportunity to tell you about my whirlwind of the last few days here in K-grad (Kirovograd's short name...). So, without further ado...

Friday, first real day in Kirovograd. After Olena picked me upat 10 am, we took a marshrutka to work...which would probably be a 15 minute walk otherwise. Not too shabby. I met SO many people on Friday I definitely didn't learn a single persons name. There are 100 people that work in the Oblast Center for Creative Youth...which I am still trying to figure out how to explain what the organization really does. More about that in another post. We ate lunch in the cafeteria that is in our building...I had a mini pizza, salad (cabbage, carrots, and oil...quite yummy), and a juice box for 8 grievnas...aka around $1.00 USD. After lunch, we had a meeting with people in Olena's department. 8 or 9 Ukrainians...speaking Russian...for an hour and a half. I could understand parts of the discussion, but as soon as more than one person started talking I completely lost track of what they were saying. With time, hopefully I'll be able to follow :) After the meeting, we headed downtown to the post office to mail some PC documents and open my PO Box. I will post the address tomorrow hopefully...which means I can start receiving letters and packages :) The PO Box cost 28 grievnas for 6 months...less than $5.00 USD. How much does a PO Box in the states cost? I've never had one...

Friday night was a fun night because I got to go have dinner with some fellow k-grad PCVs. PC has a program called Adopt-A-Cluster that during your 3 months of training, you are assigned a current PCV who usually comes to visit your cluster city. The Oster Adopt-A-Cluster person is Julia ...who happens to live in Rivne, Ukraine...about 30 minutes to an hour away from me by bus! She comes to k-grad quite often I think, so that was fun to learn that we would be so close together. Julia was in town on Friday, so I got to go to dinner with her and two of her friends, Ricky and Alex. Ricky and Alex (a young married couple!) live here in k-grad and are both teachers. We ate at one of the pizzerias downtown...quite scrumptious. The three of them walked me home (super nice because I live on the complete opposite side of town) and helped me rearrange a few furniture pieces in my apartment. HOORAY :)

Saturday was a day of cleaning and organizing. I had made a few trips to the big supermarkets around my house, but some things are cheaper if you get them at the bazaar. So, I headed to one of the k-grad bazaars...which was maybe 10 minutes away from my house (opposite the center of town). I had NO idea what to be expecting at this bazaar...it is at least 10 times the size of the Oster bazaar, if not more. I was specifically looking for a dish drying rack, a mop and bucket, a pillow, and some dish towels. I think that day I ended up finding the pillow, mop, and bucket. However, I got lost in the giant maze of tents and vendors...and literally wandered around having no clue which way was out for a good 30 minutes. It was neat just to look at all of the stuff for sale...my mom wants to know more about the bazaar, so I will do a post about it another day. Sorry mom :) At one point, I ended up in a giant building which had every kind of piece of meat a person could want for sale. Lydia was not exactly a happy camper...but I managed to hold my breath and get out of there quickly. For those of you who don't me very well...eating meat is not always easy for me to do...long story. But I had managed to avoid the meat houses here in Ukraine so far lol so...I guess it was just in due time I would wander into one eventually. I survived :)

I was invited out again on Saturday night by two more Kirovogradska oblast PCVs, but I was so tired that I decided to stay in for the night. I cleaned and got more stuff unpacked and organized.

Sunday, I went to the bazaar again to try to find my dish drying rack. I couldn't really clean my kitchen until I had something to let the dishes dry on. I finally found one I liked for 140 grievnas...which was pretty expensive, but I wanted one that I liked. They had plastic ones for sale that were around 80 grievnas...but I ended up getting a metal one that I love :) pictures later.

I was invited to my counterparts house to swim and have a cookout on Sunday as well...Olena told me what bus to take to her house, and I hoped and prayed that I got on the right one! Luckily I did...and she was waiting for me at the bus stop. It was a good 20 minutes marshrutka ride on a nice, stuffy bus. I bought some chocolate pechenas (cookies) to take to her house, which started melting on the way there. She also told me to bring over laundry to do...which was incredibly nice. Upon arriving at her house, we put my laundry in the washing machine, put on our swimsuits and swam while her husband cooked shaskleek (chicken schish kabobs) for us. It was lovely :) we ate an hour later and had kasha (a type of grain that I love...kind of like cous cous?), salad (cabbage, tomatoes, green onion, dill), grilled zuchini (with mayonaise and garlic on top), grilled chicken, and bread. It was delicious and much better than anything I could have cooked up. We put my laundry up on the line and got back in the pool then, only to have dessert...ice cream with fresh strawberry puree. She gave me a manicure later after we got out of the pool, and got to have fun translating between Russian and English. Olena wants to speak better English and I, of course, want to speak better Russian. So she asks me things in English and I answer in Russian. Pretty funny.

We talked about the two camps that I will be going to here in a few weeks. Get ready for a laugh...

The first camp that I am going to is called Ushnee byug. It's on a river...and I will be CAMPING for a week. Lydia...outside...for a week. Can't wait to write about stories from that. :) The other camp I will be going to is called Brigantina and is in western Kirovogradska oblast where another PCV is living. It's a 3 week camp that 20 kids from my work will be attending. Should be fun. I'm excited for both...even the camping one :) it's supposed to be beautiful...we'll see!

Guess I need to get back to work since I've written a novel here. Hopefully post again soon :) with pictures. Love love

first post from Kirovohrad!

Greetings friends and family!

I made it safely to my new city around 10:15 pm last night...yesterday was an INCREDIBLY long day...with lots of hurry up and waiting happening. But,the important things that could be noted are:

1) I am a PEACE CORPS VOLUNTEER. Officially :)
2) I have an apartment all to myself (for the first time ever...both to live in an apartment and to live really by myself).
3) All of my baggage is here, safe and sound
4) I have an amazing counterpart
5) My work seems amazing at first glance (currently on the computer there...)
6) I have running water and even better, HOT water at my apartment
7) I could keep numbering, but I think I'll go back to paragraph form now...


As I said, I am sitting on the computer in the library of the Oblast (think state) Center for Creative Youth. My counterpart, Olena, came to pick me up at my apartment this morning at 10 am. I met the director of the organization (which seems rather large...gonna have to figure out some stats some point soon) who is incredibly nice and handed me a GIANT flower arrangement. That should be interesting to carry home on a marshrutka ride...bouncing all over the road. But it was incredibly sweet and I can't wait to put them in a vase and make my apartment smell lovely.

It was dark last night when we got to my apartment, but I met my landlady and her husband. They showed me how to turn on the gas to make the water hot. My apartment is actually a 3 bedroom apartment, but I do not have access to 2 of the rooms which is completely fine because I don't know what I would do with that much space. I have a bathroom with a tub and a toilet...and the tub also has a moveable shower spiggot (sp?). In the kitchen is a table with 2 booth-style seats, a sink, a stove/oven that doesnt work, but that is used as a prep space. I have an electronic hot burner that they showed me how to use last night. My counterpart is getting me a chainick (tea kettle) of some kind from work. Awesome! Then, the living room/my bedroom. Quite a large room. Twin size (ish) bed, a schkaf (things to put clothes in...it's got shelves), a love seat (ish) couch, a coffee table with 2 small stools (we're going to have ask to get the dining room table from the extra room because I don't really have a workspace that I can sit at. There is also a kitchen chair in the living room. Off the living room is a balcony that has my refrigerator, and I assume that is where I will place my clothes to dry. I'll post pics as soon as I can.

It was definitely weird to go to bed last night. I took a shower/bath in my tub...after having unpacked a little. I really want to go buy some cleaning materials and shelf liner before I truly unpack, even though the landlady cleaned everything. That is just my OCDness taking over. I think it's also the fact that I can finally have a place to call my own and to do whatever I want with. I can't wait to rearrange the furniture in the living room. Hopefully tomorrow :)

Looks like Olena and I are going to eat now, so I will try to write more later whenever I get a chance :) love love!

the big news!!!

my new city for the next two years....drumroll please!

kirovohrad!!!!

wikipedia it. then come back and read the blog.

done with the wiki article?k...so heres what i know.

population...250,000

the number of current pcvs living there...7

my job...working at the oblast center for creative youth

my housing...an apartment

does my counterpart speak english...negative ghostrider

what my job description says...working with multiple people in the community. 50%of my time must be spent at the primary organization...then i get to distribute the rest of my time in between other partner organizations. m primary site work might include hosting clubs, facilitating interest group meetings, planning and co.organizingevents, ensurng outreach to other community stakeholdrs, and creating advocacy for the centers activities. i will aso work at summer camps and work with other ngos in the community.

i am so so so happy and excited for my placement. you could feel the excitement in the room before the sites were announced. it was ridiculous. in a good way. they divide ukraine by regions...which each region has a few oblasts in it. i am region 7 which includes the kirovohradska oblast in addition to the odessa oblast. my cluster was split as following..jamie is incredibly south in the odessa oblast...cassi is north of crimea...and mark is in the east in the donetska oblast. more about their stuff later when im not typing on my kindle.

i went into todays announcement thinking i would be placed in a small village teaching at a school. none of that is now true. so weird but so cool. feels wonderful to finally know where im going. love love

Less than 24 hours now!

In less than 24 hours, I will know where I'm living for the next two years! HOORAYYYY :) the time has almost come! Not every PC country (sidenote: I think there are around 70 countries with PCVs in it now around the world) does pre-service training the same way. It depends on the programs that are in that country, how intensive the language training needs to be, etc. That also means that there are different ways PC countries announce their site information. PC Ukraine has been around for almost 20 years and I feel like they have a lot of the kinks worked out of the system, although I'm sure there's always room for improvement. It was explained to us a few weeks ago why we don't find out where we are going to live for the next 2 years until right before the swearing-in ceremony. PC Ukraine used to inform trainees where they would be living in the middle of their pre-service training. However, what does everyone do when they find out something like that? You google it. Or wikipedia it. And the information isn't always correct, and it will either make you REALLY excited or REALLY bummed about where you'll be living for the next 2 years. So, on Monday when we find out where we're going for 2 years, we will be super excited. And on Tuesday, we will meet our counterpart who is actually FROM the city where we'll be living and can tell us all about it. It makes perfect sense in my opinion.

Yesterday was our farewall picnic with our host families. It turned out to be quite a nice day to do a little picnic-ing...not too hot. Although the bugs were out like crazy and my feet are still covered in mosquito bites from the other day.

My host sister, Christy, on the left with our teacher Zhenya on the right...starting the fire!

Our technical teacher Lyuda...getting rid of an envelope we saw for the past 3 months. It says "Tech. Training: feedback of yours is very welcome :) "

Some of the group...Lyuda (tech. teacher), another Lyuda (Jamie's host mom), Cassi, my host sister Christy, Lydia, Mark, and my host mom Gala.

Cassi and Lyuda

Mark, Zhenya, and Lyuda (Jamie's host mom)

Zhenya and Lyuda, who played the guitar for us!

The Oster River...if you look past the tree (click on the picture to make it bigger) you can see the beach area where kids always play...

My host mom getting the shashleek (shisch kabobs) situated on the fire.

She made great shashleek for us all!

Cassi's host mom (left) Natasha and Jamie's host mom (right) Lyuda

The spread! All of the plastic bags you see is how we buy things here...

Christy, Gala and I :)

Cassi and her host mom and sis (her sister, Zhenya, was in my 7th grade class at the gymnasia!)

Part of the group with the certificates that are given to the families from Peace Corps.
Lyuda (Jamie's mom, Jamie was sick...), Zhenya, Mark, Lydia, Christy (host sis), Gala (host mom), Cassi, Zhenya (Cassi's host sis), Natasha (Cassi's host mom)

The end! I am almost done packing...it's amazing how much stuff I have...but I need to go finish. I want to go walk around Oster one last time and take some pictures around here. The next time I post on here I will be letting you know WHERE I'LL BE LIVING FOR THE NEXT 2 YEARS! :) toodles