I am sitting in Peace Corps office, just having got of a 7:15 AM arriving train from the Western part of Ukraine, where my entire group just had their Close of Service conference.
We were up in the Carpathian Mountains, which were beautiful, but we realized why you don't go to the mountains in August: it rained, hard, every day. We were inside mostly, realizing that getting out of Peace Corps may be harder than getting in, what with the insanely long checklist of paperwork, clearences and tasks that have to be done in order to go. We also did a lot of feedback sessions in order to improve the program in Ukraine and filmed a welcome message to the next group (who will arrive at the end of September).
But mostly we had fun: This was the first time our group had been together in a year and a half. We had a talent show during which Sean recited Pushkin from memory in yogic poses while I did an interpretive dance behind him. We had Ukrainian Disco night with everyone decked out in the extreme end of Ukr fashions (me in a billowy cossack-esque shirt, speedos, black socks and sneakers, which I've seen more than one Ukrainian in during the summer--well, they wear sandals, but I can't dance in sandals). We socialized. We drank. We realized we wouldn't see each other again for years, if ever (there were some that I hadn't seen since swearing-in, which meant we hadn't seen each other for years).
There were a couple of rain-soaked excursions: I bouldered in caves that once hid partisans. We rode a very-ghetto chair lift up a mountain in the pouring rain and then rode it right back down without geting off. I and three others made an attempt to climb the highest mountain in Ukraine and accidently climbed the wrong one (which will definitely be a future story on this blog).
I also had the best train rides out thus far in Ukraine. We practically took over whole wagons. I was feeling particularly social last night and jammed on guitar with a couple Ukrainians, spent hours talking with the eight Americans in our wagon, played with a seven year-old kid named Igor (whose mother half liked it/half didn't like that he was now bursting with energy when she wanted him to soon go to sleep), and met and got the digits of of a cutie named Lilia who goes to school in Kyiv.
It's been a good week.
I leave you with this:
I haven't seen television in eight months (watched some in America when I was there for New Years), but I happened to be at a friend's apartment a week ago and she happens to have a lot of money (both from a good job and her mom, who cleans houses in Italy, who sends money back) and has satellite television. It was on a music station and the Shakira "La Tortura" video came on. I'd heard the song before: it's a rage in the clubs here. But I hadn't realized the video was better than porn.
Due to said lack of television and internet bandwith problems I've never seen the video again, but while surfing here in the office I did find the code so all of you can watch it for me and send the resulting vibes my way. Shakira is the only woman I know who could have sex and draw a picture and have both come out perfectly. That is to say that her body moves completely independently of itself. Need to get back to the states and Latinas.
Que buena.