Dear Friends and Family,
It has been over a month since my last post. Please forgive me for the delay in posting, but in all honesty, life was pretty calm and uneventful during our 3 weeks of Quarantine. Life has gone back to “normal” in that the quarantine has finally ended and the schools have once again continued classes. I was able to teach a new class today, the 6th graders, which was a very enjoyable lesson on “present continuous” and describing birthday parties and what one does at a birthday party. On Thursday, I am very excited for this, as one of the Peace Corps Technical trainers is coming to Boguslav to view us teach and I have a very exciting/interactive lesson planned for my 8th graders she will view me teach. I am hoping it goes well!
Since I last wrote to you all I have been able to travel to Kiev twice more as well as taken a trip to Kaharlik, the town where my good friend and Northwestern Alum, Meaghan Joyce lives. The trips to Kiev were both wonderful trips and very relaxing as life here in training is extremely chaotic and strenuous. The first trip to Kiev was a trip to see the Lavra Monastery. This Monastery began in the 1100s and houses the bodies of hundreds of years old mummified monks in caves located beneath the churches. It is a very interesting place to visit as anyone may enter the caves and see the glass coffins holding the decoratively dressed mummies. There is no electricity in the caves and so you must carry a small candle and all women must wear skirts so we had to rent wrap around skirts to be able to enter. The caves were incredible as some of the monks have their hands sticking out from the robes they are wearing and so you are able to see the state their decayed bodies are in. As pictures were not allowed inside, I do not have a picture myself but you can check online as it is really creapy to see!
Our second trip to Kiev was fun as we started the morning off at the Book Bazaar. Kiev has a huge book bazaar that requires its own Metro Stop. You may find anything relating to education at this bazaar from classroom materials, to computer programs, to DVDS and music etc. I bought picture flashcards to help me in my upcoming classes and the other 4 in my group bought books and some DVDs. After the bazaar we took a trip to a supermarket called Billa and bought the ever so craved but never found PEANUT BUTTER! I have successfully found it! I am actually eating an apple right now with the peanut butter as I type this post – it is delicious. The most exciting part of the day was when we stopped in at the Peace Corps Office in Kiev. The office has a volunteer lounge where volunteers come to use free internet, free printing, the book exchange wall and to converse with whomever is in the lounge at the time! We were able to meet people from Group 36 which are the Youth Development volunteers who arrived this last spring. They were planning a 1 week trip to Egypt together which is going to cost about 3000 GRN which is about $400 – round trip flight, hotel, guide and 2 meals a day – sign me up! Haha. I also picked up some new plant dress pants and a new pin strip black blazer from the free clothes pile left from past volunteers – it was quite a grab!
As for life in training, the best thing I can say is that it is coming to a close! We have 1.5 weeks left – on December 14th we will head to Kiev for the swearing in conference. That day we will find out our sites where we will be living for 2 years. I am extremely anxious to know where I will be! In these two weeks we have been scrambling to complete our Community Project – a collection of elementary and intermediate level English songs with accompanying lyrics and activities for the school we have been teaching at to be used in the classrooms as new material. We have also finished our Russian Language Project, which is a video on a day in the life of ourselves in Boguslav. I am especially proud of this project as I worked my I Movie skills and edited the entire film. Matt did the music composition and Whitney completed the title transition slides. All in all we were extremely proud of the film and Kelsey was able to get it onto You Tube – please feel free to check it out! Next week will be our Language Proficiency Test to see if we have accomplished the Intermediate level of Russian, the level required by the Peace Corps for swearing in. A lot is still needing to be accomplished but we are trucking along and I am confident the Boguslav Crew will survive!!
As a final word before I head out. I want to say that I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I was able to celebrate Thanksgiving a very American Traditional way here in Boguslav. The 5 of us along with the help of our language instructor, Yevginia, went to the bazaar Wednesday morning and bought a turkey, potatoes, vegetables and fresh pumpkin and rolls. On Thursday we baked the turkey with a fruit stuffing (they do not do bred crumb stuffing here). One side note on the turkey – unlike the nicely cleaned and bagged turkey you may buy at a Jewel, Rainbow, etc – here, turkeys purchased in the bazaar come with a neck, all the guts still intact and the feet in a baggie assuming you are going to eat them. It was quite funny to watch Whitney shriek and fly back as she opened the bag and saw the neck flapping on the turkey’s body! Aside from the turkey we also made mashed potatoes, boiled vegetables, Whitney made deviled eggs and Matt made sweet tea. Yevginia tried to make cranberry sauce but it did not thicken and so was a cranberry dressing. She also made pumpkin bread rather than pumpkin pie but we did not complain! As we dug in, we said what all we are thankful for this year – I am thankful for all the amazing opportunities I have had throughout my life and the wonderful people with whom I have been able to share these opportunities.
I want to wish you all a wonderful December – I will be sending you my next post from my site!! Please enjoy the pictures and the added links!
Best, Megan
Links to our You Tube Video (in 2 parts)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?
The pictures are from Kiev, the masks are during the quarantine scare our host families made us wear them, the Halloween Party at School, Kelsey and I made Chocolate Chip Cookies that Iryna and Max scarfed down!, our thanksgiving dinner with our turkey and me carving, and then 2 pictures from Kiev of our group in front of St. Sophia nad the 3 Minnesotans in front of St. Sophia.
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