It’s been a while since I felt as out of sorts as I do here – guess there’s more egotistical American in me than I care to admit! I fully expected to have no language problems, it’s Europe! Of course they all speak English. Rude awakening, my dear! The hotel restaurant staff understand English about as well as I understand Spanish. Found that out when my “vegetarian” lunch included chicken ceasar salad. Gotta refresh my memory about some key words!

The little piece of Madrid I’ve seen near the hotel is nice. I went for a walk after lunch, but almost all the shops were close 2-5 pm. How quaint! After the lunch ordeal, I wasn’t much up to dealing with shopkeepers. As I passed a shoe store I overheard a young woman say “pyat”. Just figured there was a Spanish word that sounded like the Russian word for “five”. Nope! Those three lovely ladies were russkis all the way, and they were just dumbfounded that shops would close in the afternoon. I have to admit, I was kind of surprised too, but like any good devushka, they figured it was just meant for everybody else and proceeded to ring the door bell, expecting someone to come open the store for them. It was kinda cute, atually, in a weird sort of way. Put me right at ease with my new surroundings.

US: ice and its easy availability (hotel ice machines rock, bags of ice you can buy in grocery stores are bee’s knees).

Ukraine: the free luggage carts at Boryspil airport; the way drivers thank each other on the road by flashing their hazards a couple of times (like if you move over towards the berm to let someone pass you on a narrow road) – one of the only polite things drivers do on the roads here.

What are your favorite things?

It’s been a long day. It’s almost 1am local time, just an hour difference from Kyiv but I seem to have a new wind and can’t sleep. Things that I remembered today that I meant to write about earlier:

- Need to add “ice and easy access to getting it” to the list of things I love about the US, like ice machines in hotels and bags of ice at grocery stores. We spent days making ice for our margarita party this past weekend, which we used up in just a few short hours. Argh!

- Numerous crazy stories from Georgia. Such as…

I was all freaked out by the guy across the aisle from me on the Kyiv-Tbilisi flight, whose cell phone kept beeping throughout the flight. “Is your phone on?” I asked. “No, it’s off,” he said. “Strange, electronic devices rarely makes sounds when they are turned off.” He just stared at me.

As soon as the wheels of the plane touched the ground, two-thirds of the passengers jumped out of their seats and started getting their stuff from the overhead bins. The flight attendants asked a couple of times for them to sit down until the plane had stopped, but then they seemed to accept their defeat and just kept to themselves. I always wonder, where do those people think they will rush off to? The plane is sealed up tight, we’re still taxiing to the gate, yet it’s somehow crucially important that they get their stuff out and be ready to sprint out of the plane?

We hired a car and driver one day to take us to some cool historical sites just outside of Tbilisi. The driver stopped at a gas station on the way. There was a man sitting, maximum, six feet from the pump, smoking a cigarette. The driver got out, left the car running, and filled the tank. Igor and I looked at each. “I love you,” we said to each other, thinking these could very well be our last seconds on earth. We didn’t explode, thankfully, and Igor commented that he understands now that cell phones in airplanes is really nothing to these people.

When I departed from Batumi a week later, a woman got on the plane at the last moment and flopped down into the first available seat, which happened to be across from me. She buckled in as we pulled away from the gate. She starting searching through her purse, clearing becoming increasingly agitated. As we taxied to the runway, she unbuckled, stood up and took her luggage out of the overhead bin. She searched it as we pulled onto the runway, put it back, sat down again and searched her purse again. As the wheels lifted from the ground, she pulled out her cell phone, turned it on and dialed a number. I nearly had a heart attack.

“I can’t believe you are doing that”, I said to her. “I understand you’ve lost something, but it’s a question of safety.”
“Oh, calm down girl. I’ll just be quick.”
“And we’ll all die quickly.” (My imagination runs wild in a situation like this – all those unexplained plane crashes, were they because everyone on a plane turned on their phones?)
“I forgot my mobile phone in the airport,” she said, as if that justified everything.
“Your phone is more important than the lives of the people on this plane?”
Clearly she thought so.

As we ascended over the Black Sea, she called someone to tell them she’d forgotten her phone. I was contemplating calling my husband to tell him I love him.

People in this part of the world have a strange relationship to rules. I guess they would say the same about Americans, that we take them much too seriously. But I’m American and yes, dammit, I take my rules seriously, especially the ones that I understand to be about my safety and the safety of those around me. Do I think it’s absurd that in most of the US it is OK to operate a multi-ton motor vehicle after a couple of beers but it is not OK to walk in a park with an open alcholic beverage in your hand? Yeah, I do (how much damage can you do walking, for Pete’s sake?). Do I think there is logic to traffic rules? Hell yeah. I guess I understand somewhat risking your own life, and I recognize that some people (many?) don’t care about the lives of strangers around them. But driving like a maniac with your kids in the car, or standing up in a taxiing airplace with your baby in your arms, that I will just never understand. Even if you care for no other life around, how can you not care for the life of your child?

I’ve philosophized over this question with many an ex-pat. I do believe the insane rush to get your carry-on out and be first ready to exit the plane comes from the the mentality towards lines here, which is one of the biggest legacies of the Soviet Union (close but still not equal to the insane need to have any and all documents stamped; I swear one of these days I’m buying a unicorn stamp for all official business!).

I’ve concluded that if they don’t die from it the first time, they decide it’s OK to do all the time. There are many flaws to this theory, but it’s the only way I can rationalize the behavior.

I always answer the Ukrainian question by saying “Some things are better in Ukraine, some are better in the US”, which opens the door for me to comment on a few of the areas where the average Ukrainian could contribute to improving society: litter, reckless and dangerous driving, smoking, etc. Being in the US for a month recently, I was asked several times about what I like better about life in Ukraine, and I talked about the delicious, truly organic food, the safety, the freedom. While it wouldn’t hurt to have a few more regulations in some areas (consumer protection, for example), I don’t get a 12-inch long receipt from a Ukrainian store with extensive warnings that are common sense and detailed outlines of how they are NOT liable for anything at all. I think we’ve gone off the deep end in the US trying to shirk all responsibility for anything and everything. Don’t get me wrong, Ukrainians don’t like to take responsibility either, that seems to be human nature. But at least they haven’t codified it in the law and the lawyers haven’t created a whole industry of trying to make someone else pay for the fact I spilled my hot coffee or I don’t know how to properly use a toothbrush.

Anyway, before I digress any further, I thought I’d share the non-comprehensive lists of things Igor and I love in both countries. We’ll keep adding to it as things come to my mind, and please feel free to leave comments about what you love too! (And if anyone knows how to insert a table or columns in a WordPress post so these can be side-by-side lists, please email me.)

United States

Ukraine

We’ll be in Korosten for the weekend, celebrating Friday night with friends, Saturday with family. Sunday Igor is taking Michael to the forest for mushroom hunting. I, happily, can finally be excused from this activity. I just don’t get any thrill out of it, but Igor, his parents, and millions of Ukrainians anxiously await mushroom season and gleefully spend hours skulking through the forests in search of mushrooms. Me? I think it’s hot, uncomfortable, boring, and an endless battle against mosquitoes. Of course I’m more than happy to help with the eating of the delicious mushrooms! That’s more my kind of sport.

I didn’t manage to get his birthday present here in time to give him today (a digital camera ordered from the US), so today he got a new camera bag with a lovely picture of his soon-to-be camera. When I left for work this morning, he was already scouring websites to learn all about his new toy. It should be here in a couple of weeks, when a friend comes back to Kyiv. Nothing like a bit of anticipation!

So, my darling – З днем народження!

Igor went to Korosten yesterday, and I’ll join him today. The car is in the shop because the motor burned out, leaving us without windshield wipers. It came as no surprise that they couldn’t find a new or used motor for our 1984 BMW, so they’re trying to repair our motor. Hopefully it won’t cost an arm and a leg, since the car itself is barely worth an arm, or a leg for that matter.

So I’ll be taking the bus to Korosten, something I haven’t done in quite a while. And for once I’m not too upset about that, maybe even a little bit glad ’cause it means I can work on my embroidery while someone else does the driving! I’m about half way done with my first cross-stitch. It’s got quite a few mistakes in it, but I’m plugging along. One important thing I learned is to not try to do it at 1:00 in the morning when I’m exhausted but can’t sleep – I ended up redoing the same little area about 5 times before I finally got it right. I couldn’t resist buying my next pattern yesterday. It’s got six colors (up from three with my first pattern), and involves two types of stitches, so it will be a challenge for me. But it’s relatively small, so I think it won’t be overwhelming. I looked again at the traditional Ukrainian patterns, for the ceremonial towels and shirts and things, but they are still way too intimidating. It’s fun to have something to work towards, though.

Speaking of goals – I went to Buffalo Expatriate’s farewell get-together last night (she’s moving back to the States). She’s been working with the International Organization for Migration, and doing research on trafficking and related issues. There was such an awesome, interesting diverse group of people at the bar. We went around the table introducing ourselves, with most people saying the usual “My name is…, I work/study at…”. One young Nigerian man introduced himself and said “I am going to the be president of Nigeria some day.” Talk about having goals!

But back to this weekend. Igor’s godson turned one this past week, and today is his birthday party. What do you wear to a first birthday party? I don’t think that this will be like an American baby’s birthday party, with lots of other kids crawling around and parents swapping parenting stories. I suspect this will be like most other Ukrainian celebrations – adult family and friends squeezed around a table overflowing with food, which will keep coming until long after you can’t eat another bite, and plenty of drinking and toasting. This would be the down-side of not having the car this weekend, as it’s always a great excuse for me to pass on the vodka shots when I’m “behind the wheel”. Maybe I’ll use the “I’m taking some medicine right now” excuse; that one usually works pretty well, too.

I guess it’s time to get myself together and head out to the bus station. Can’t wait to get to work on my cross-stitch!

I was sporting the absolutely beautiful bracelet that Igor gave me – citrons and blue topaz, to go with the presents of the last 2 birthdays, a blue topaz necklace and blue topaz earrings. The set is complete! Dad bought me the cell phone I’ve been coveting for ages. My colleague Anna gave me a really cool cookbook, with Ukrainian recipes in both Russian and English, and the most beautiful, appetizing photos!

I told Igor I didn’t want to do anything fancy this year, no evening out, nobody over, just me and my guys at home. The sweeties that they are, Igor and Dad had a cake with candles waiting for me when I got home and they sang “Happy Birthday.” Igor cooked a fabulous meal (as always). I had requested zucchini pancakes (like potato pancakes, only made with the zucchini). Being the creative overachiever that he is, he made up an entirely new recipe and combined all kinds of vegetables for the pancakes – beets, carrots, zucchini, etc. They were both pretty and delicious!

After dinner, Igor did the most beautiful thing. He told Dad that in the Far East they have a tradition that a husband who is happy with his wife gives gold to his father-in-law. Igor said “I am very happy with Ann, and I want to thank you.” He gave Dad a gold ring, which fit perfectly on Dad’s little finger. Dad got a bit misty-eyed, and finally said “I don’t know what to say.”

I can hardly believe sometimes that this amazing and wonderful man is my husband, that I get to live with him the rest of my life. What pure joy!

Most of the short-term observers arrived very early Saturday morning – airspace is less expensive in the middle of the night, so many flights arrive and depart in the capital Tbilisi at hours that I would prefer to think don’t exist. We landed about 4:00 am. After passport control, customs, collecting luggage, checking in with OSCE and finding the right chartered bus for my hotel, it was nearly 7 when I finally collapsed in bed. I slept a few hours, just enough to get me through the only full free day of the week.

My roommate in the hotel was an adorable young woman from Slovenia, Patricija. She and two of her colleagues from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Monika and Marko) made up the entire Slovenian delegation to the mission. They were all some of the nicest people I’ve met in a long time, and I happily spent much of my free time with them during the week. Patricija is a tiny thing, energetic and peppy – kind of like a perky toy poodle. I enjoyed her enthusiasm and optimisitic attitude as much as anything else in Georgia!

But Georgia itself was also really great. Everyone talks about the hospitality and friendliness of Georgians, and I certainly encountered nothing to challenge that legend. I had heard that not many people speak Russian anymore, so I’d been nervous I wouldn’t be able to communicate much with folks. It’s true not so many young people speak Russian these days, but pretty much everyone over 30 I encountered spoke Russian. Their accents were another story though! I took a short guided tour of one ancient church, conducted in Russian, and frankly couldn’t understand 90% of what the guide said. But she was a nice lady!

Saturday the Slovenians kindly adopted me into their group and we all agreed that the first place to visit was the ancient city of Mtskheta, the capital of the Georgian kingdom from the 3rd century BCE to the 5th century CE. We were so anxious to get on the road and do some sightseeing that we hailed the first taxi we saw, made him an offer for a half day of driving, and hopped in. Only after we settled in for the drive outside of Tbilisi did we start to take notice of what exactly we’d gotten in to. Monika was reading her guidebook and asked me to explain one phrase to her – it read something like this: “There are many private taxis, they are safe. But beware of beat-up cars.” I simply looked around and indicated the car we were in to explain the “beat-up” phrase. A couple times during the day, the driver couldn’t get the car started up and we had to push the car while he tried to pop the clutch to get it going. It became quite a joke for us, which of course was much funnier after we were safely back in Tbilisi, having cut short our plans for touring the nearby countryside after just two sites rather than risk getting stranded somewhere.

But those two sites were some of the most famous one near Tbilisi – the ancient capital with its beautiful Svetitskhoveli Cathedral, dating from the 11 century, and the nearby Jvari monastery, dating from the 6th century. Perched on a hilltop, Jvari offers a breathtaking view of Mtskheta and the surrounding hills and valleys. Just gorgeous.

Saturday evening we investigated the famous sulphur baths in Old Town Tbilisi. We visited three or four of them to compare and get the full scoop, planning to come back later in the week. Patricija and I went to one Tuesday night for a truly fantastic experience. The natural spring pours forth water at 50 degrees Celsius (122F), and in the small pools where you soak it is about 42-43C (107-109F). The tiled room is steamy, and the water feels absolutely great. We opted for the massage, which isn’t so much a muscle massage as it is a good thorough scrub down with a special woven hand mitt. You lay on a marble table, and the massuese rubs off so much dead skin you think you’re going to be just bare bones – but it feels great! My skin was soooo soft and smooth afterwards. We soaked, steamed, got rubbed down, soaked again – all in all, we spent an hour there and it was far from enough. We would have happily stayed several more hours.

Sunday the four of us decided to head out early to visit the town of Gori, about 80 km (50 miles) from Tbilisi. Why would we go to this sleepy town of under 47,000 people? It’s the birthplace of world-famous dictator Josef Stalin, and they’ve got a museum to him there. Too bizarre to pass up.

There’s not much I can add to Carpetblogger’s amusing post about the place. The museum is Soviet-style humonstrous, with cavernous halls. Among the many things I couldn’t quite get about the place was what the hell is actually in that huge building? The exhibitions we saw could not have accounted for even half of the space that had to be in there, judging from the outside. Did we miss the good stuff? And by that I mean did we miss the stuff that actually mentioned something about the fact that the subject of the museum was responsible for the death of millions of his citizens? I’m not asking for an analysis, even less a critique of him or his life. But I think what was most offensive about the place was the complete and total absence of any mention whatsoever that he might have done something a little bit bad in his life. I suppose I have to acknowledge that at least they didn’t say he was a good guy either. It was a rather mundane museum – facts, figures, photos, newspaper clippings, office furniture, family photos. You could almost forget the guy was a monster. The closest the guide came to mentioning anything approaching critical, and I’m sure it was more on account of a poor English translation someone gave her of the official tour, was when she pointed to a photo of Stalin casting a ballot and she said “And this is the first democractic election when Stalin elected himself.” I wanted to ask if they counted any of the other ballots cast in that election, or if it the one was enough to call it. I’d like to think it wasn’t just a poor translation but rather someone’s subtle way to sneak something more than the mundane facts into the tour.

I did learn a thing or two – Stalin was married twice and had a son. His second wife is actually still alive and lives in the US. They have a photo of his grandchildren visiting the museum.

They have Stalin’s personal railway car next to the museum, which is the length of two normal railway cars. It was relatively modest inside. The guide said Stalin didn’t like to fly and prefered to travel by rail as much as possible.

They also have the two-room house were Stalin was born and lived the first four years of his life. It looks to have been separated from whatever other construction it used to be part of, and the two rooms stand awkwardly in front of the musuem, under a stone and glass canopy. Stalin and his parents lived in just one of the rooms, which they rented from the people who lived in the other one. It was really small; hard to imagine a family living only in that tiny space.

In the end, I wondered if there might be something to the museum’s non-analytical take on Stalin’s life and reign. After all, everybody else only talks about the crappy stuff he did – but who knew he had a son and that his grandkids are still alive and kickin? I asked our driver what Georgians thought about Stalin. He said there are definitely people who hate him, mostly those who were repressed (go figure!). On the other hand, many Georgians see him as the great leader who defeated facsism and united a huge percentage of the world, and those Georgians are proud that Stalin was Georgian. Our driver also stated proudly that Stalin always made his first toast to Georgia – “He never forgot his motherland,” he said. I wonder if he remembered the ones he shipped off to Siberia?

And toasting in Georgia is a topic worthy of an entire blog post in and of itself, but that will have to wait for another day. It’s late, I’m tired, and the Georgian stomach bug that kindly accompanied me home hasn’t quite gotten the hint yet that it’s time to get packing. More later.

We took our time heading up there on Saturday, spending the beautiful morning with a new colleague, her husband and their 1.5 year old daughter. They’ve been in Kyiv about 3 weeks, and are still trying to get oriented and settled in. We took them to the farmer’s market and the supermarket, and generally enjoyed getting to know them better. Their daughter is just as cute as can be, and they are a very nice couple- she’s just a year younger than me, and we seem to have a lot in common. I’m looking forward to spending more time with both her and her parents.

We took a roundabout way to Korosten, driving first to Ivankiv for a quick visit with my friend Valentina, whom I was supposed to visit last weekend, when car trouble nixed those plans. Valentina is an amazing artist, poet, and lover of traditional Ukrainian arts and crafts. Her real speciality is “floristica”, making beautiful pictures from dried flowers and leaves. She spends tens, sometimes, hundreds of hours on a creation – each unique, each very delicately and purposefully designed and created. The colors, the designs, the types of flowers and leaves, even the arrangment of the scene – it all is created in a specific way for good fung shui. Sometimes they are so detailed and so intricately crafted that it’s only when you look at a picture up superclose do you realize it’s not a painting but instead made from hundreds of tiny petals. They are really breathtaking. I am the proud owner of 3 of her works of art, my favorite of which is called “Sea Fantasy”, with two beautiful blue goldfish with billowing tails, swimming with a school of tiny fish in a coral reef. Just breathtaking.

I have about ten of Valentina’s pictures that I am trying to help her sell – she’s an extremely talented artist, but not so hot at business. She ends up giving away a lot of her pictures because she’s just so sweet and she loves to give people presents. But with two sons in university, she really needs the money. I’ve sold two of her pictures so far, and I figured her earnings would be especially useful now with Easter and the upcoming May holidays. I was also excited to finally see for myself her flower garden I’ve heard so much about. Did I mention that she grows all the flowers and dries them herself? Her house and yard were even more fantastic than I had imagined. She gave us a tour of her house, which really is more like a greenhouse at a botanical garden. Dozens of different kinds of plants in every room, each with a special trait and purpose. Every room also had stacks of books with bits of newspaper sticking out from between the pages – her drying method. She opened one book and casually flipped through probably twenty pages, each with one or two delicate petals carefully arranged and pressed. I can’t even imagine how many thousands – maybe millions? – of petals and leaves she has pressed and drying in her house! It was really amazing. It’s still too early for much to be blooming in her garden, a few tulips were up, but she pointed to different spots and described what would be coming up. I can’t wait to see that garden again in June or July! Selling Valentina’s pictures not only makes me happy that I can help her with some much needed (and well-earned) income, but I also look forward to seeing her and her garden when I deliver her money. After the short visit with Valentina, we enjoyed the drive through the countryside. It was a beautiful day, warm and sunny, and it was fun to drive with the sunroof open.

We arrived in Korosten in early evening, had a light meal, and then headed to the family banya. Igor’s father built a parnaya banya (steam bath) years ago, but it hadn’t been in working order for a couple of years so I never could try it before. I’ve heard many a banya story, and was always quite curious about them, but have never had the opportunity to try a real Russian banya before. I was also especially curious about the infamous tradition of beating yourself with birch branches. I just couldn’t even imagine what it was like. Igor loves saunas and banyas, with an insane passion even. I don’t enjoy the dry heat of a sauna so much, but I occassionally go to a sauna with him mostly because I enjoy being with Igor and I like seeing the pleasure that he gets from a good long bake. He was excited to introduce me to his beloved banya, and in retrospect admitted that he got kind of carried away and should have introduced me more slowly to the experience. It wasn’t traumatic, it was just surprising and temporarily unpleasant.

The banya house has a two rooms, plus a small corridor lined with windows. The first small room has hooks for hanging up your clothes, a couple stools, and the small metal door of the wood-burning stove. The next room has a shower head hanging from the ceiling and a bath, and the door to their small banya, which is kind of like a closet. It is long enough for two people to lay end to end, and just slightly wider than a person. A small metal door at one end opens to a small wood-burning fireplace, from which a long, wide metal tube extends the length of the banya and which is lined along its sides with fist-sized stones. You open the wooden door and step up high to get onto the a long wooden shelf which is fixed right above the metal tube. I crawled up and in, not really crazy about the smallness of the space. The wooden shelf on which you sit was really hot and I found it very uncomfortable to sit on. Igor gave me a two-by-four board to slip under my bum, but that didn’t help with my legs and other parts touching the shelf. I was trying to handle it gracefully, he had such a huge grin on his face and was so happy to be sharing his beloved banya with me!

He told me to stretch out my legs, and then he started gently whacking them with a fistful of long birch branches covered with leaves, called a venik. The leaves had been soaking in water, and the aroma was really pleasant. But the whacking was a bit weird, I have to say. It’s like an exfoliant, scraping away the layers of dead skin cells as well as dirt and grim. After a short venik session, Igor filled a dipper with water and splashed the stones lining the metal tube. Steam billowed up and it was HOT. I couldn’t get out of their fast enough. That was the part that later Igor admitted he should have warned me about. The steam lasts just 15-20 seconds and then dissipates, but it was so intense it freaked me out. There was no way he was getting me back in that thing, so we took one of the requisite breaks. We sat in the first room with the stools and drank a glass of beer.

After we’d cooled off a bit, Igor was ready to go in again, but I still wasn’t feeling good about it. He explained the whole ritual (it really is a ritualistic process in the banya), how it works, what to expect, etc. You steam, beat yourself with the venik, cool off under the cold shower, sit in the resting room and drink and snack, and start the cycle over again. It can go on for several hours, until “you’re done”. How do you know you’re done? Your skin is good and red, and turns white when you touch it. There’s no set time for everyone, each person is different.

Igor steamed a few more times, and I threw the water on the rocks for him. He closed the door tight and I could hear him whacking away with the venik. Eventually he got me to go in again, but we agreed no more steaming rocks for me. He gave my back a good workover with the venik. I finished up and went back to the house while he stayed another ten minutes or so. “How was it”, his mom asked me. “Interesting.” When Igor came back in the house, I started to say the traditional post-shower phrase “s lyokim parom”. Anya taught me that phrase when I first moved to Tvarditsa. I remembering asking what it meant and she said she didn’t really know, it was just what you said to some after they took a shower or bath. Kind of like a “hope you had a good bath”. Literally it means “with light steam” but expressed in the Russian way of congratulating someone on the occassion of an event – as in “I congratulate you with your birthday” or “I congratulate you with your light steam”. Sounds strange, I know, and I could never understand the phrase – that is until I said it to Igor after his good steam! Nothing like a little cultural context to put some meaning into a language.

Sunday was Easter, which meant the end of the Great Fast (Veliki Post’), or 40 days when strict observers do not eat meat or dairy products. Igor’s father keeps post’ strictly (it is also observed during advent before Christmas), and usually Igor observes it just the last week before Easter. This year he decided to observe it for about a month. I don’t know who was more anxious for it to end- me or him. I swear, all the man could talk about the last week was meat. I think he was even dreaming about meat. Since I’m a vegetarian, he didn’t find much sympathy from me in his suffering, but I sure was suffering from his endless talk about every possible variety of meat.

Ivan went to church in the middle of the night (2 or 3 am?) for the Easter mass, loaded up like everyone else with his basket of food to be blessed by the priest. The rest of us got up around 6:30 to have the first big feast of the day. We start with the hard-boiled eggs dyed red (boiled with onion skins to make the special deep red color). Each person holds one egg in his or her fist, and then you tap one end of your egg onto the end of your neighbor’s egg, to see which egg cracks. Then you flip them and do the other ends. It’s fun to see who has the strongest egg, who’s egg can crack the most other eggs. Then you peel and eat. Then you dive into the overflowing table. There were a couple veg dishes added to the usual meat-laden menu for me, and I was quite content. Of course Nina fussed and worried that I didn’t have “anything” to eat, which was quite far from the truth. I did just fine, and I was happy to not over-indulge as often happens at these celebrations.

We sat around eating and drinking and talking for a couple of hours, then everyone retired back to their beds to sleep off the hard work of the morning. Around noon, Igor and I went with his father to the cemetery to make the traditional offering at the graves of departed relatives. Then we went to their village house to check on and feed the animals. Ivan bought a sheep last winter, which gave birth to a lamb the day before our wedding in December. He’s growing up fast, and both Igor and his father were speculating when he’ll be ready for shashliki (i.e., barbeque). It was a beautiful day, and Igor and I strolled around the field while he dad tended to the sheep and rabbits, enjoying the fresh air and quiet village sounds.

Back home, after another resting period, we headed next door to Oksana’s house for Denis’ birthday celebration. Turning 16 is an important event – you get your own passport, which is akin to becoming a legal adult in many ways. You are no longer just a note in your parents’ passports. Denis is a typical moody teenager, and the celebration was obviously more fun for his parents and grandparents, but he suffered through for a respectable amount of time and then was released to go hang out with his friends. We continued the party without him.

After a couple hours Igor and I were both ready to get as far away from food as possible. We decided to go for a walk in the beautiful park in the center of town. It was a sunny, warm day and it seemed like most of Korosten had the same idea as us. I still sometimes find myself scandalized to see people drinking alcohol openly the street, especially bottles of vodka at 8 in the morning (open containers are legal in Ukraine). Every once in a while though, I get a kind of guilty pleasure out of walking through the park with a beer. This was one of those days when I wanted to indulge, so Igor bought me a bottle and I sipped at it as we strolled.

The evening was quiet at home, everyone was satiated and relaxed. Monday we lounged in bed late reading our books. We started back to Kyiv around 1, driving through a light drizzle most of the way. I had a workout scheduled at 6 with Elena, and boy was it a tough one. I’m glad I planned it that way, though – it kept me motivated throughout Monday to take it easy with the food!

All in all, a very nice weekend. And Nina sent us home with enough leftovers for an army!