Ukraine: Climbing Camp Fin

What an awesome week. I am completely exhausted and completely happy right now.

Attendence at the camp swung up to 15 and back down to 13 by the end of the week, but this turned out to be just the right amount of kids to have everyone climbing and belaying simultaneously.

The whole week was nothing but competitions and games and lectures and climbing and all the kids were loving it and begging to do it again next year. We played ultimate Frisbie, we built a web out of junk rope that the kids had to work as a team to get through, Jon and I strung up a rope across a 40 foot wide river and the kids had to clip in and pull themselves across hand over hand. In a flash of "why didn't I think of that sooner" insight I figured out how to make our four ropes into eight routes, each 25 feet high. We had a ton of stickers and on the last day we said that every route finished meant you got a sticker and these kids attacked the routes. One kid, Misha, finished five routes in 45 minutes! It was great. Got pretty good news coverage, too: one local television station and two newspapers sent reporters and cameras.

The package from Rock + Ice arrived and I decided it was time to take care of the troops, presenting my instructors with magazines, posters, patches and stickers in a small ceremony on Thursday (it kinda made sense since the magazines are in English). The tee-shirts arrived on the last day and the company that had made them had botched the order (the symbol on the front was smaller than ordered and the symbol on the back for the company sponsoring us was on its side; luckily its abstract and you'd have to know that), so I talked them into a 60% discount, which meant I saved some money because the original price had been misquoted and we didn't get enough from the sponsor. I decided to cover the difference ($23), but because of the discount actually gave money BACK to our sponsor. Also, the cost of printing the completion certificates was cheaper than expected, so we gave even more money back to our sponsor (the Center for Youth Initiatives, a Ukrainian NGO). Yesterday the kids got their tee-shirts and their certificates and I have a great photo of the whole group together wearing/holding them.

It was just a great time. The week as a whole was the most exersise I've had in a while. Possibly Tuesday-Wednesday was the best example: climbing during the day (someone has to lead up those eight routes), going to the club that night (yes, on a Tuesday) and dancing for three hours, climbing the next day, carrying a bed a mile from Steve's apartment to my apartment (the matress balanced on top of Mike's head and mine), and then going for a four mile jog that night. This was pretty normal. Jon and Sean, made a point of running every day. All of this was fueled by Sean's cooking, which was nothing but huge pots of spicy carbs and protein (nothing had a name; Sean's dream job, he told us repeatedly this week, would be to be the cook for an army living off the land, throwing together huge portions of spicy carbs and protien that have no names). It was good exercise, food and companionship.

Last night was the best of them. The entire staff went out to a club, along with a few more friends. Here were all my American guy friends and all my Ukrainian female friends all dancing together and having a great time and after I wore myself out on the floor I just sat (somewhat drunk) at our table on the second floor overlooking the throbbing mob and smiling contentedly.

I thought: "I did this. I put this together and now there's all these happy kids and happy friends and that's 'cause I followed through on this idea and didn't give up." It wasn't an ego thing, I just felt happily surprised that it all worked out and I found that I was really proud of myself.

Hopefully pics will be up tomorrow.

Ukraine: The Climbing Camp

Well, the camp has gotten off to a kick ass start. It was an experience before it even began, with four other American PCV climber guys crashing at my place: Sean, Jon, Mike and Mike. First, five guys in one apartment would be messy enough but my apartment had gone on the offensive against us, making it worse. There was no water for the first day, and not enough water pressure for hot water on the second and third, meaning no one was taking showers and the dishes were piling up. Also, the water shuts off at 11:00 PM every night anyway, meaning no toilet flushing. Add the hot weather and us sleeping two to the bed, two to the couch and one (this position is rotated) on the floor and all sweating like crazy and and all these smells combined into one huge funk.

On top of that we lost power for a while yesterday, two breakers blew again today and my laptop crashed (I'm taking it to someone who has recovery software in twenty minutes) so the first night's entertainment: watching DVDs, was out thereafter.

But it's still been a fantastic time. No one has noticed the problems and we all roll with them 'cause it's Ukraine and we're PCVs and generally someone always has it worse. Instead we've been whipping up big batches of pasta in the evening, eating communally out of the pot and going head to head in rotating chess matches that go extremely late, with the converstation richocheting from politics to sex to sports.

I have MISSED male companions. I never see Steve and Jon anymore, and while I have a number of female friends that I enjoy spending time with, it's almost impossible to hit the same level of comraderie, bare knuckle debate and, of course, raunchiness, with female friends. So I've really enjoyed the past few days.

Not to mention they've been spent climbing.

We had 18 kids show up on the first day of the camp, less than I wanted but more than I expected. I was shooting for 24 and thought they would come from the 50+ kids we'd had at the climbing wall who said they wanted to do the camp, but a lot couldn't participate because travel, studies, work (it's harvest season), etc. From that 50, we had 2. And the roster had been the last thing on my mind because I assumed it would be popular: of course, it might be, but no one knew about it. There was a blitz to get the word out, but by the time the articles hit newspapers and radios and everyone had called who they could call, we still had only 15 kids commited. So it was cool when 18 showed up.

Amongst the instructors the camp was a little shaky the first day because most Instructors were coming in last minute and we were short on prep. All the climbing time was spent on basic skills, too, and many didn't even get on a route because it took so long to teach them the knots and belaying (that was my fault; I've taught it a dozen times in Russian and can explain it pretty easily, but I left it in the hands of Mike, who has more experience teaching climbing than me, but not through a language barrier; I wasn't teaching climbing because I was floating among the three concurrent sessions and being gopher). And while the first day went okay, I felt the energy amongst the kids wasn't huge. They were participating, but they didn't seem really, really into it.

I wasn't surprised when only 12 showed up this morning, but those 12 had come to climb and have fun and today was a blast. They each finished two routes (and only one had climbed on real rock before), we played a ton of games, they listened to two healthy lifestyles lectures from ACET and we had a competition with posters from Black Diamond as prizes. The energy fed back and forth between the kids and the instructors and though we all dragged ourself to the camp in the morning by the afternoon we were all having a blast.

And it's only day 2.

So, there's some things I'd do differently if I did it again (but I'm a perfectionist) and I learned a lot from the whole process of planning and executing, but I can't say it's anything but successful so far and it looks to get better: a film crew from a local TV station is filming tomorrow, some of the cooler "ropes course" challenges will be done tomorrow and, hopefully, the tee-shirts will arrive. We ended up with so much swag that we abandoned the idea of a point system and the kids get swag for every milestone: New England Ropes posters when they could properly show how to belay, stickers for correctly tying knots, and tomorrow we'll do a healthy lifestyles quiz for them to earn their tee-shirts, and then they can wear their tee-shirts for the rest of camp.

Due to lower attendance and swag still coming (stuff from Mammut, Metolius and Rock and Ice are, theoretically, still in the mail), we'll have extra tee-shirts and stuff for next year when, hopefully the girls will do it again.

I'm pumped from today, so life is good.

Pictures up when I get some time!

Ukraine: PDO (Pics)

So this is a heck of a lot of pictures from the Pre Departure Orientation for the FLEX students going to study in America next year: four days of learning about the FLEX program, American Culture and pitfalls they might encounter.

I uploaded like a hundred pics from the PDO because a lot of my kids wanted them, and they can all be found here:

http://s34.photobucket.com/albums/d137/blogmaster99/PDO

But here's some highlights:


The kids learned all about the most important part of American culture: Ultimate Frisbee


Eating borsht for lunch


My kids working on a presentation


We had to go over a number of case studies of problems previous FLEX students had in America, so we did them as a talk show. Here, my teaching partner Tea is getting a reaction from the audience.


A perfect class: no, this isn't posed. These kids have their hands up at every question, so I asked one, whipped my camera out and took the photo.


Taking the test about everything they learned at the PDO. Yes, if they fail the test they don't get to go to America.


On the last evening there was a variety show from the students. Here is the audience.


No, I'm not sure why he's wearing a flag as a skirt.


After the variety show, the staff did "American Dream", a play we do every PDO poking fun at what FLEX students think they will find in America. During the "nightmare" part of the dream, I get to harrass the poor FlEX student on her flight to America.


And here I'm channeling my time in Oklahoma to be a hick


Giving each other autographs


The infamous Group 2, with their stalwart leader, me.

Ukraine: Khotin (pics)

Oy. Just got back from a great four days of teaching students who will be going to America in the fall. Even though I was fighting a throat infection all week (including loosing my voice on the third day of teaching and teaching anyway), the kids had so much positive energy that it was a fantastic experience. It was more like a summer camp with classes than a orientation. Hope to get up some photos and vids soon (including all the kids singing an acoustic version of Britany Spears' "Hit Me Baby One More Time". No, I'm not kidding.)

But here's more pics from last weekend that I'm only getting around to:


So this is the castle at Khotin. Khotin is a village on the bend of a river that was of strategic importance at one point, but now it's just a village on the bend of a river with a really big castle. It's about forty minutes from Kominets Podilsky, so we made a day trip there, explored a bit, lazed around at the river and then finally went back to Kominets to catch our overnight train back to Kyiv.

Although a lot bigger and a lot cooler on the outside, the castle wasn't nearly as much fun inside as the castle at Kominets Podilsky, mostly because a lot of the interior was inaccessible (and free climbing would have been too dangerous) or gutted. Still, we had just as much fun wandering around the area outside the castle, which was this sort of mythical land of wildflowers and 500 year-old walls and aqueducts.



Above and below are two more shots of the castle.




Some of the interior of the castle, shot through a window of the tiny church in the castle. Every room of every building inside the walls was completely bare, which was a little uninteresting, but it was still pretty cool.


Me jammed up in a window.



Above and below are from exploring the area around the castle.




A church in Khotin


A horse drawn carriage in Khotin

Awesome weekend all around!

Ukraine: Climbing Castles in Kominets Podilsky (Pics)

First: Amazing 1.5 hour meeting with the director of Peace Corps. She loves the Run Across Ukraine project and we're now working closely with the assistant director on bringing in the U.S. Embassy, and advertising company and some other major HIV/AIDS organizations.

Second: Just got back from an amazing weekend in the Western part of Ukraine, checking out a couple castles there but, most importantly, chilling out. Life, for a variety of reasons, hit a stress high point that ebbed away as the train left the station and I had nothing to do for two days but eat and explore. What follows today and in a blog tomorrow is an insane number of photos, and those were culled from the more than 200 I took:


Above and below are exterior shots of the fortress at Kominetz Podilsky. This area was battled over by the Poles, the Russians, the Cossacks and the Turks and this massive, five hundred year-old fortress helped secure the area.





Wooden church


Me and my Cossack brother


This wheel is used to draw up water, but now it lets me get in my hamster exercise.


What I love about Ukraine is that they let you climb on everything


Marina, whom I went with, is crazier than I am with free climbing. Since a lot of the wood had rotted away, we climbed up the inside of some turrets to get to higher floors.


Since this shot required climbing to get to, it's a view few have seen!


Marina being all cute and such. Since we're good friends and travel together, people assume we are together. The opposite was proven when we killed a bottle of vodka together Saturday night and slept in the same bed and nothing happened.


On the way into Kominets Podilsky itself. In this pic you can see a waterfall on the left and a climber on the right. I just found out they have bolted routes here, called up Jon and we'll probably come back in August, pitch a tent by that waterfall and climb all weekend.


Clash of cultures: It's a Catholic church that had an Islamic Minaret built onto it. After the Turks lost the city, a statue of Mary was placed on top.


A view


I love that the saint statues look like they are hitting on the Mary statue at a club


The city has a real "fallen from grace" feel to it. Many statues can be found in the surrounding parks, covered over in plants. Much of the town has a real wistful, romantic feel.


One last shot of the fortress

Ukraine: And a Coalition Forms

Remember three months ago when I said how important the parlimentary elections would be because it would determine the new government? Okay, you don't but I did and it took until NOW for the for a coalition to form to have a government.

After much squabbling that pushed the time limitations that nearly resulted in a new set of elections, a coalition formed around the three major parties that supported the Orange Revolution. Eventually they'll get around to voting for the Prime Minister, which due to her strong support during the elections, will probably go to Yulia Tymoshenko, which is a huge slap in the face to Victor Yuchenko because I'd say 80 percent of the fighting was about her NOT getting the position because Yuchenko, well, fired her from the very post she's probably about to get.

It's still only probably because she has to be nominated and they have to vote, but they haven't been able to do that because the Regions Party (the one headed by Yanokovich, the one who "won" the falsified election that sparked the Orange Revolution) surrounded the parlimentary podium and blocked access to it, so there was no nomination. It's politics as usual and in the meantime the government hasn't really done anything, including confirming Supreme Court justices (there aren't enough on the bench to rule on anything) who may or may not overturn the constitutional ammendments pushed through at the end of the Orange Revolution which, among other things, grant amnesty for all polititians.

I have a meeting with the director of Peace Corps Ukraine in a minute, to discuss the Across Ukraine Run. Three hours after that I'll be on a train to Kominetz Podilsky, a town that is actually a fortress. Should be cool.

Ukraine: The End of World Cup (Pic)

On Friday I watched Ukraine play in the quarterfinals for World Cup. The whole country was slightly manic, as this was the first time Ukraine had made it into the finals. I was asked fifteen times by fifteen different people where I’d be watching the game. I was also consoled by about another twenty on America not making it, them not realizing that neither I nor other Americans care. What I held back from saying was that if we did care, we’d win every year. I don’t tell anyone that because it would just reinforce the well-deserved stereotype of American arrogance, but it’s the truth: find a baseball or basketball team somewhere in the world that can beat one of ours. Go on. I’ll wait.

American arrogance at its finest.

Anyway, I ended up watching it at a friend’s apartment, one full of Ukrainians. I decided that it would be best to watch this game with some true fans instead of the Dutch guys, and true fans they were. Let’s just say I had a real life lesson in every Russian curse word ever invented.



You would have thought they’d play well: the Ukrainian coach had told his players that they could have sex with their wives and girlfriends if they made it to the semifinals. I hadn’t realized Ukraine had a “women-weaken-legs” no-sex policy, and to this day I still can’t comprehend why kicking a ball around on a field is better than having sex. I always assumed “love of the sport” really meant “as soon as I get famous, I’m getting some,” but apparently people willingly give up getting laid because of something once started when a kid on a dirt field was doing “look ma, no hands” and a game was born.

But even the promise of sex didn’t save the Ukrainians from getting stomped. It was a travesty, made all the more so by my new emotional investment in the sport. I really, really wanted Ukraine to win World Cup. Several times during the game I realized that I was standing and yelling because someone had gotten the ball within a few meters of the opposing goal, without any conscious input from my brain. It was beginning to dawn on me why people had been keeping me up till dawn with the partying in the streets that took place every time Ukraine had won a match.

Ukraine was scored on within the first few minutes, something I was told was okay. “It’s a Cossack thing. You have to loose at first to win,” I was told by the girl squeezed in beside me on the 50 year-old couch. But then another goal was scored. And then a third, this time off the foot of one of our own guys. Luckily it was the star player. I read that the same thing happened on the Columbian team one year, and the hapless mistake-maker was murdered upon returning to his country. See, that’s the kind of motivation you need: don’t offer them sex, offer not killing them.

Ukrainians are gracious losers, though. Every time the other team scored on us or one of our own kicks was blocked, they’d praise the kicker or the goalie. And they also had an elegantly simple post-game plan: if we win, we celebrate and get drunk. If we loose, we just get drunk. They broke out the vodka halfway through the second half, when it became apparent that Ukraine had no chance of winning. We lost, so we got drunk.

And for Ukraine and for me, that was the end of World Cup 2006.