Stardate: Nov 2, 2007

Written: Thursday, October 11, 2007
Tidbits

• Door bells don’t go “ding-dong” they go “tweet-tweet”, or “eeeeek.”
• They do not wash their eggs prior to selling them. So, yes, they have poop on them. I know some people who would be absolutely disgusted by this, including Pat and I. We still buy eggs, but don’t eat as many was we used to. They inhabit the inside of the refrig door, and more than once we’ve uttered under our breath, “Yuck…Poopie eggs!”
• The subway here is called the métro and it smells just like the “T” in Boston. Dirty diesel fuel, fumes, dust, and oil smell…aaah! “Subway” on the other hand is the phrase that they use in Russian to indicate “to go”. I wonder what they will call the Subway chain if they come here?
• We’re getting internet cable at home soon. I’m so excited. The installation guy is here as I am typing. He will install the cable itself. Then, we must call the company to schedule a technician to come out and hook it up to the computer. It looks like it will be some more time before we are up and running, but this is a giant leap from where we were before.
• Patrick is teaching his first, solo EFL class tonight. He finally has his own class after weeks of observing other teachers at the International House (language school). It’s a business English class at a computer programming company who does lots of work in Austria. The topics for his lesson tonight are right up his historical alley-the wives of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I. He will also teach about uses of “must, might and can’t” as well as how to write a short biography. I’m excited for him! He really needs this for his self-esteem. He gets really worked up before classes and also obsesses on minute preparations; This approach will serve him well in his teaching, because he will always appear capable and organized. He will also be a good teacher because his personality allows for flexibility and a certain degree of casualness and approachability. His boss, Viktor, likes him and his teaching style and skills so well that he has given him 2 classes instead of just one. This is really good for Pat’s teaching skills, which will increase from the practice, but it’s also good for the extra cash.
• Maddy is growing up super fast. She is getting really funny, too. Some of the things she’s been saying are, “I’m gonna tickle you in your poop-pooh, butt guts” (an adaptation of one of Pat’s more vulgar lines), or “I a super hero!” (thanks to the Backyardians). She just cracks us up. At school, she says, she “plays Russian” when learning the language. She also wants to be helpful and tries to sweep the floor and vacuum with us. She just tried to help the cable installation guys by vacuuming near their drill site (as I did upon their instruction when they were drilling the exterior wall). She is currently eating Cheerios (no milk) with a fork. She’s developing a lot of new dance moves. She just started carrying around her pillies saying, “I got my purse.” She calls farts, burps. When she “burps,” she says, “Excuse meat.”
• Upon Pat’s return from work tonight, our building security guard was fast asleep on the job. This building goes through security guards like vodka through a Russian.
• There are lots of stray dogs and cats. It breaks my heart. A feeds them regularly and I try to whenever I remember. They are mainly really sweet and scared of people; they haven’t had the best lives. Apparently, when people here cannot afford to keep them, they just turn them out. Random people do feed them, too. Thankfully! Anyway, it makes me really sad. Where is Bob Barker when you need him?
  

• We may have found a sitter for Maddy. She will babysit on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Friday nights for about 18-20 hours per week. The cost will be H10.00 per hour or $2.00 per hour the going rate for sitting here. That’s what I used to charge for babysitting in the early 80’s!
• Aside from hauling large quantities of water purchased at the grocery at exorbitant prices, we can only purchase drinking water from the water truck that visits our building on Saturday afternoons between 4-4:30pm. It’s great that the water comes to us, but the timing sucks. It ties us to the apartment on Saturday afternoons. If we miss a week, we essentially dehydrate.
• You really use a lot of bottled drinking water, too. We use it for drinking, brushing teeth, cleaning fruit and veggies, as well as boiling pasta, etc. You just can’t trust the tap water at all. Not even a drop! Maddy and I still have Montezuma’s revenge. No matter what we tell her, she always opens her mouth during baths. I suspect we may have the Revenge for the remainder of the time here.

Deep into our 2^nd month here, Pat and I are really feeling like we live here. We know our way around, and where to find the things we like (the good cinnamon bread, chocolate croissants, spinnochi pizza, Puccini pasta, Camembert cheese, fresh fruit and veggies, Georgian wine, and Зiбэrta beer). Pat has a joint to hang out at with buddies who work there. We have preferences for which computer to ask for at the computer lab (I like #14 the best). People know us-the lady at the bread store is always very nice and tries to be especially kind and helpful to me. The security guards go out of their way to be kind to Maddy and to chat with us. The large round, black-haired babushka at Maddy’s school always pats a place on the bench to welcome me and make a place for me to sit with the moms. We know to bring TP with us everywhere and to carry fruit for Maddy to eat. We remember to bring our own bags to the grocery store. We have grocery store preferences (I like Kapabah (Caravan) better than Billa). We can read most store signs. And we order items by the gram now as opposed to a couple, some, or lbs. With A’s help, we’ve solved some problems, like the faulty phone, the hot water, getting back from the grocery store with tons of bags, where to find baby wipes, and….well, we haven’t solved all the problems. I guess we’ve learned to live with them; I did some laundry by hand last Saturday. I was just sick to death of the dirty clothes.

We’ve been picking up on small cultural patterns and suggestions and adjusting. For example….

• People take off their shoes when they enter your flat (even the repairmen). So, when Maddy goes to preschool, everyone changes their kid’s shoes to house shoes in the alcove prior to entering the classroom.
• Women wear more makeup, so I’m back to putting on the full façade each morning.
• Instead of saying hello to people every time you see them, sometimes, you just nod.
• Men always shake hands with each other the first time they see each other for the day. Even young boys do this.
• Instead of “Oops” or “Woe”, I’ve been saying, “Oompah.”
• I’ve also been ending sentences with the word, “yes?”
• Pat has been replacing the word “that” with “this.” For example, “This is a good thing.” This pattern is a typical Russian adaptation in English. Pat finds this remarkable that he’s modifying his native language use to accommodate the pattern here, and he’s cringing over his own language use.

Understanding the Competing Factions

Last Saturday evening while leaving the pool, A, V and I stumbled across a candlelight vigil for the Ukrainian National Army that stood up against the Red Army and the Germans during WWII. It was a beautiful and provocative gathering with singing and talks given by various men and some priests. This is one of those situations in which I wish I could understand more in Russian. A told me that they were condemning the actions of the Red Army, of course. They didn’t seem hostile though, they seemed resolved and sad. I think many other countries would still be angry.

I’m starting to get pissed about the Ukrainian/Russian divide. To expound, I have to take Russian, because this is Eastern Ukraine and most people here speak Russian and there are no Ukrainian classes. But if I say thank you to someone in Kyiv, I gat chided for not using Ukrainian. On the internet, after posting a folk singer on the net with a ? following Ukrainian folk music, some jerk had to tell me it was Russian. Do I really care? Not right now. This duality and conflict are becoming annoying. I mean, why does everyone have to be put in the middle all the time? This is Ukraine, a separate sovereign country. Russia just needs to get over it and move on. The entire country is like a huge freakin’ slacker or something. Recently in the news, Putin said something to the effect of Russia is nothing without Ukraine. Well, if that is the case, that’s a sorry state of affairs in Russia.

And besides, I don’t want to be put in the middle of this cultural argument. There’s no solving it. What do I have to do with it anyway? I figure if you tried DNA testing (like they did with the Roms or Jefferson’s progeny) to determine if there is any separate Ukrainian strands, you’d find that they are all so intermingled here it is impossible to distinguish folks between Poles, Russians, Tartars, Ukrainians, Scandies, Turks, etc. Basically, who ever lives here, lives here. If they don’t like Ukraine as a separate country, there’s always immigration back to good old Russia. ;-)

Sorry for the frustration, but I don’t like always being put in the middle of this impossible situation. You can’t even open you mouth sometimes without making a political statement here.

Besides, my heart lies with the oppressed here; those who were dominated by the Poles, Russians, Germans (WWII), and who have the first time in their entire history to be free to choose their own destiny.