There’s a reason Germans didn’t win on the Eastern front, and I’m in it. Two days ago, Ukrainians celebrated winter meeting spring (the holiday commemorating the actual arrival of spring will be celebrated with more parties on the last Sunday of this month; Ukrainians have a lot of holidays). The temperature rose to a couple degrees above freezing, and now the three-inch thick sheet of ice that covers the streets and sidewalks and the two-foot high piles of snow beside them are melting into slush. Except Ukraine doesn’t have, you know, gutters or anything, so it’s a bit like a mini-deluge. By the way, should you ever come to Ukraine at the beginning of spring, you should take note that because it’s mixed with dirt, water in a pothole six inches deep tends to be the exact color of the street. And should you be an American who’s not paying attention to where he’s walking...
Yeah. Up to mid-calf. In my slacks.
Yesterday, I was regaled with a story about three of my fellow Zhytomyr volunteers trying to leave my home the day before—the one that sits in the valley. The cab had come and off they went and I had closed the door behind them. Apparently while I was warm in bed, the cab was stuck in slush and mud. They got out; they pushed; it got stuck again. They got out; they pushed; it didn’t budge. Apparently, the cab driver was of the mind that high revs and throwing it in to gear was the way to get the taxi out. Smoke started pouring out from under the hood. They got out; they pushed; it got stuck again.
More revs, trying to get that cab with four people up an incline covered in mud and slush. More smoke from the hood, this time also pouring through the vents and into the car. The three Americans bailed out, thrust ten hrivna in the angry cab driver’s hand and walked up the hill, catching a cab up there.
The Germans, while attacking Russia, actually managed to make it through the Ukrainian winter (no one ever remembers that most of the “Russian Front” was actually in Ukraine) and then this is what they had to face. No wonder they lost.
As far as Lviv, the Olympiads are tomorrow and between that and a teacher being sick and me taking her classes, I haven’t had moment one to do any real writing.
Actually, most of my time has been spent babysitting a copy machine. We need 800 copies of these questions I’ve been writing for the competing students. Except the decent copier the institute owns was locked up and no one knew where the guy with the key was. So I was doing them on the small machine, which could only handle one copy at a time and jammed every fourth copy. Hands smeared in toner, several hours and 130 copies later, I called it a day.
Why was this not covered in grad school? I feel, when getting your Masters in Education, that Piaget’s theories of cognitive development and Maslow’s hierarchies of need probably could have been tossed out in favor of Office Equipment Repair 101. Seriously.
I really do want to get Lviv stuff up, because I have a lot of good pictures and a couple good anecdotes and even some video. The video is good stuff, because we went to a traditional Ukrainian party while in Lviv (it was supposed to be a candlelit dinner; instead it was a traditional Ukrainian party) and I have small videos of a folk band, folk dancing and even a Ukrainian stand up comedian. Plus, slang was the topic of last night’s English club and I do in fact have a video of two Ukrainian students doing a slang-heavy dialogue. Hearing a Ukrainian girl say “I am hooked up,” is about the funniest damn thing I can think of at the moment.
So, hopefully that will whet your appetite dear readers (all two of you). The problem at the moment is time, but I’m thinking Monday or Tuesday I should have some time to baby sit an upload.