10.01.07 First Impressions

So I spent Saturday night packing until 3:30am. We had to be downstairs at 8am with our luggage, and I didn't totally finish packing things up until 7:50am. Thankfully I made it down to the lobby in time. Thankfully also, one of my group members only had one check in baggage, so she let me "use" her and she offered to check in one of my bags. Thank you, Kelly!

Went out to breakfast with Emily, my roommate. Well, we searched. We did stop in at Walgreens to pick up some shoe insoles for me, since I apparently ate through my old ones. Got some snackies for the road as well.

On the way back to the hotel we passed a vendor. Score! I ordered a breakfast sandwich and a kielbasa. I didn't plan to eat them all, and in fact, gave half of my breakfast to another volunteer. The vendor's name was Muhammad. Very nice man and I think he probably undercharged us.

We got on the bus and headed for the airport--JFK in NYC. It was my first trip to NY and I got a bunch of pictures from the bus. My first time seeing the Statue of Liberty! MFI (my first impression) of the Statue of Liberty: It's VERY green! Also it must be really cool to be able to see that daily, the way in Seattle we see Mt. Rainier or the Space Needle daily. Something touristy for tourists, but an integral part of daily life for residents.

MFI of NY: The apartments are JUST like the Cosby show! Shoved up against one another, different colors, yards pressed up and gardens in the back. I think it would really create a cool sense of community. Also, I didn't realize people actually play handball! ha ha. I felt like I was watching a movie.

We got to the airport and it was a fiasco. We were split into groups of about six, complete with a group leader. My group got split up and Kelly and I were the last two to catch up. Got in the most massive line. Thankfully there was beautiful eye candy and German arm porn! This guy had the greatest arms and no sleeves. I had a little line crush going on!

At the front of the line the woman made me check in my carry on. GRRR!! $105 later and three trips back and forth and I finally have my boarding pass. Another line. Take off shoes, coats, belt, pull out laptop, oops, left a coke in there, drink it quickly, walk through metal detector, oops, left on my belt, finally success. Redress and repack and on my way.

Flying from New York to Frankfurt takes a long time. It takes several conversations, a book, naps, stretches, and even then you've still got a few hours left! My seat mate was Keith and we chatted about movies and tv shows and books. He is a big heavy metal fan and we had fun talking about everything. I was wearing long johns under my pants, and where I was sitting didn't get much air. I was so uncomfortable and sweating so much that I got up and changed out of them. I finally got a little sleep, but spent most of that time reading someone else's copy of Stardust.

Touchdown in Frankfurt! All the pilots threw down the football and did a dance. We got there late, but thankfully in plenty of time for the plane trip to Kyiv. MFI of Frankfurt: The men are delicious. I went to McDonalds in the airport (fast familiar food), and holy cow they have McRib! I got that, a coke, and a box of water. Seriously--a box of water. $9 and went back down and waited. We boarded and saw the most awesome posters.

The posters were four pictures, two repeated. There was a picture of Mars by a picture of the moon by the same picture of the moon by the same picture of Mars. The first said Madness, the second Romance, the third Romance, the fourth Madness. One had a woman's heel and a jalapeno with the captions: pain pleasure pleasure pain. Tattoos and henna: traditional trendy trendy traditional. They were amazing.

MFI of Ukraine: WOW! You could immediately tell the women residents by their SUPER pointy high heeled shoes. The woman who checked me in looked like a model--smoothed back hair with a rhinestone headband, glitter eyeshadow, mascara. Gorgeous.

The Ukrainian airport had a Heinekin machine instead of a Coke machine! Seriously! We got outside and it was SO HOT! We were greeted by Peace Corps people and they were so friendly and helped us out to our bus. We walked up these TALL stairs and onto a burning hot bus, which thankfully had curtains. I sat next to one of my favorite people: Anastacia. We were given instructions and walk around money and headed over to the compound for our training.

We were given a room with a roommate. My roomate is another teacher trainer. Very nice person and although we have little in common we're getting along really well. We had a Ukrainian greeting ceremony and dinner, a small orientation ceremony then went to bed.

MFI of our rooms: very practical. Small beds, very warm wool blankets, tiny bathroom. Everything in the bathroom is very tall. The toilet paper was unexpected--it is unbleached brown paper with no roll. It's just rolled up but no cardboard tube through it. The shower is very small and missing a small part of the door. I took a shower and it, apparently, takes a dexterity check of 12 to successfully take a shower. I think I rolled an 11.

Taking a shower in this building takes a few steps. Because the room is very small, you have to decide where to undress because there's not really enough room to do it in the bathroom. First step complete. Then the question is: where do you put the shampoo/soap. I ended up putting them on the sink ledge. Check. The third involves a combination of soaping up while balancing the hand held shower nozzle on the water control, then putting the soap down and grabbing the shower and turning it back on and rinsing off. I think half my water got on the floor and I completely blame my lack of dexterity.

Dinner consisted of a sort of chicken omelete--a thin piece of chicken cooked in an egg. It was very tasty. We also had cucumbers and tomatoes and a carrot/apple/strawberry juice.

I relaxed in the room and watched a few episodes of Weeds until I was falling asleep too much to follow the episode and I went to sleep.