Good news! The store near my apartment has some Pepsi in stock! They had some last summer and then ran out, and I've had to hike three miles several times a week to a store that does carry it. But I went in yesterday and they have it!
Went climbing on the wall on Saturday and it proved to be too cold: managed only two routes before my fingers hurt too badly. Also got into a heated discussion (in Russian, which I was proud of) with the head of Polissya, the non-profit that built and is managing the wall.
Although a lot of people have used the wall in my absence, none were under 18. The head teaches at a university and he's been bringing a lot of his students. So our numbers are good, but not for what was (for me) the target group: kids who need an alternative to sitting in internet cafes or out in the street drinking.
Polissya promised $200 in advertising, of which they have done none and all their planned advertising is, once again, at the universities. They are also pushing to start charging from 18 and up (it is currently free for those under 21) in order to have funds to expand the wall and replace gear. This I'm fine with, as long as it stays free for those under 18.
But the problem is they now refuse to bring in under 18 year-olds on their own. They don't want to be responsible for them in case one gets hurt. I can bring all the students I want, he said, and they can keep using the wall when I'm not around, but Polissya wants to target university students, which defeats the reason the grant was given in the first place.
So we argued for about twenty minutes about this. The way things were going, when I leave in November, Polissya wouldn't be bringing any students in and would be charging the people they did, which made it nice for Polissya but killed the long-term purpose of the grant.
Finally, though, he agreed to advertise in schools, that we'd get forms so that parents could absolve Polissya of liability, and they'd split their efforts between students and university students.
In the short term this isn't horrible: with other volunteers I have the gears turning to have groups of about 20 students coming in on mini-field trips from their schools, with half being trained on the wall by volunteers and the other half listening to HIV/AIDS presentations by ACET, a Ukranian awareness organization, and then rotating. We need warmer weather for this so by late April through the summer we should have a large turnout on the wall by students, but I want it to keep going when I leave and that's threatened at the moment.
I understand Polissya has its own interests and originally wanted to build the wall for its own use, but when you accept $3,000 you accept the conditions, too. Things seem to be back on track now and hopefully everything will turn out for the best.
That's it for now. Did I mention the store near my apartment has Pepsi?
PEPSI!