The opportunity was my neighbor, whose door is across the hall from me, through which I've heard the practicing of scales on an out of tune piano. Two days ago, I knocked on the door, the Russian prepared in my head. Most of it was lost in the realization that my neighbor was not some old woman, but a very cute girl of about twenty. Her name is Ina, and both her and her roommate are music majors at a local university.
Some confused Russian later, we had worked out that I was looking for piano lessons, and she agreed to teach me, starting today. The lesson went pretty well. I looked up the words for "scale" and "chord" ahead of time. I wondered how the notes were labeled, considering I was used to them having letters like A or B or whatever. It turns out they're on the "Do-rah-me" method, "Do" being a "C". After she found out I could read music (although not well, and I suck at sightreading), she busted out a song and we spent an hour working through it. Actually, I didn't do too poorly and I wish I had a piano so I could have kept practicing.
After the lesson, her and her roommate were naturally curious about why I was in Ukraine and we went through that series of questions that I've honed to a fine point after eight months of answering them: where are you from, what's it like there, why are you here, how long are you staying?
Neither of them speaks a lick of English, and this is good. In spending time with the Ukranians I do know, I never get to practice Ukranian or Russian because their English is always better than my pitiful attempts at their langauge. Ina actually wants to learn some English, so rather than pay her for the lessons as I had intended, I'm going to give her English lessons in exchange for piano lessons. The next mutual lesson is tomorrow night.
In other news, I'm going climbing tomorrow! People from the group with whom I'm doing the grant for the climbing wall with are climbing tomorrow and Carrie and I are going with them (Carrie's parents mailed her gear to my house in Florida, and I brought both her's and mine back with me). So that should be a lot of fun.
And in non-personal news, I encourage everyone to keep up with the events in Uzbekistan. Anti-government protests have resulted in violent crackdowns by police, with as many as 500 dead. I personally know a volunteer in Uzbekistan, and worry for her and for the Uzbek people.
This is the latest article on the situation:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/uzbekistan_town_dc
Revolutions in surrounding countries, including here in Ukraine, have made the Uzbek government scared, causing them to react violently to this possible one. Of course, there's been no outcry from the United States government, because Uzbekistan provides us with air bases for our efforts in Afghanistan.