Day 41 - Looking Up :)

Okay, so basically since I got here to Ukraine, there's been this sheet of snow or ice or slush or puddles or something on the ground that causes me to have to watch my feet everywhere I go. But these last few days have been amazing! The sidewalks are clear (or at least more clear) of snow and ice and all that stuff that's been keeping my eyes glued to that grey and white path right ahead of me. Walking around Kyiv, there is SO much that I've been missing on all my daily walks. There are so many old buildings, that look like they've stood through many tests of time (and probably have). But right next to those old tattered buildings, there are these very modern, very shiny buildings that also stand out to me. I wish I could have taken more pictures yesterday on my small exploration of Kyiv, but I felt odd taking pictures of every building and thing that I saw. Anyways, I'll have to post some of those pictures later. (Oh which reminds me, I found my camera!)

Also, about my expeditions. Sometimes I have some time to kill but I don't quite feel like going anywhere in particular. On those days, I'll take the Metro to a random stop, then try to find my way to another stop a ways away. It's fun piecing together parts of this city that way. Honestly, I don't know which direction I'm going usually, but I figure if I stay around the center of Kiev, I'm BOUND to run into another Metro at some point. When I really need to, I ask a random Babushka (old lady), "Izvinitye (Excuse me), Gdye Metro? (Where's the Metro?)"

Yesterday, this one lady totally made my day, she was SO happy. When I stopped her in her walk (to ask for directions), she was looking up at the buildings around her and just smiling.. SMILING :) People around here don't typically smile unless they're with their family or good friends. On the street, it's basically an anomaly to see anyone really smiling about seemingly nothing at all. But she was, and when I said, "Izvinite," to see if she would stop and help, she said, "Zdrasvite!" to me and kept walking. I think she thought I was just saying a happy greeting, but then she realized that I was needing help with something, and she stopped and turned back to me. I asked, "Gdye Metro? Do you know?" She preceded to explain to me with a ton of Russian words (some I even understood!) and hand gestures to explain to me where the metro was. She seemed to be conversing with me, asking me questions or something. I just told her, "Ya ni punimayu.. (I don't understand) ..Ya Americanka," and hoped that would suffice. After talking a while longer, she spoke in English, "You understand?". I said, "Toot-toot" (a little) then I ended the conversation with, "Spaciba, Paka!" Looking back, I probably should have said, "Do svidania" (A more formal goodbye), but I think she understood. Anyways, after talking to her, I just kept smiling. My whole day was definitely worth it for even that one moment conversing with the smiley babushka :)

Day 39 - Root-beer Floats!

Probably the least most Ukrainian treat you could ever have. But Root-beer floats are the BEST. We went to the Page's (a family from our ward) house last night. I think Brother Page works for the embassy, which makes sense because he gets all this stuff from them (Peanut butter, baking powder, and Root-beer!) and they're apartment is reeally nice. I felt like I could really be back home in America while I was there. Maybe it was the pictures up on the wall, how they were set up, or maybe the fact that everyone there spoke perfect English (American English), or maybe the fact that they had Mini-wheats and other tasty cereals lined up in their kitchen. I'm not sure, but anyways, it was fun to talk and laugh and have a bit of an out-of-Ukraine experience for a while there. I wish I could have taken some pictures while I was there, but I seem to have misplaced my camera somewhere. I'll have to go on a die-hard search today for it, and then I can finally post those tour-pictures and then update you with my own pictures on all that's going on here in Ukraine!

Day 38 - Temple Trip!

I stole this picture from yet another website,
 which actually has some cool info; here's the link!

Yesterday I had the opportunity to go to the Kyiv Temple. It was such an amazing experience! I get to see the temple every time I go to church on Sunday's but it was a whole different experience actually getting to go inside. We went with our ward, which consisted majorly of ILP's, so there were a LOT of us (I think 24 girls and 3 or 4 guys total). It was neat to see little bits and pieces of Ukraine scattered throughout the architecture and structure of the temple. But ultimately what I enjoyed the most was that overwhelming peace and quite that I could find there. It was great to have the time to meditate, and I definitely walked out of that temple being more at peace and in love with life than when I walked in :) I'm so glad I didn't pass up that opportunity! And afterwards, we all walked over to the church for some treats, and THEN we helped clean up the church (which didn't take long at all). After all that, most everyone left for home and whatnot, but I decided to stay back and go find a piano to play for a while. I realized I know so few real songs on the piano by heart, but it was nice to even just play the children's songs (I was in the primary room) or just chords and doodles on the piano. After that, I finally made my way home.  

Day 37 - Gargle and Spit :P

So last Wednesday, I started feeling kind of sickly. I've just been sniffly, sneezy and super drowsy (I'm thinking could just be allergies). But my host-mom has been worried about me like I'm on my death-bed or something. I came home, and she let me nap for a while, which was good for me because I was really tired then. Then when I woke up she gave me some lemon/ honey tea, which was amazing. But then  (after much confusion and trying to figure out what she was saying) she told me that I should gargle this mixture of salt, baking soda, some sort of orange liquid, and water. She filled an entire teacup full of the stuff, and I didn't really have any choice from there. I was so scared to swallow the stuff, it seemed (and tasted) like some sort of floor-cleaning liquid; I was pretty sure it would burn my insides. I took a bit of it, gargled it, and spit it out as soon as I could. She wanted me to take longer gargles, so I took more (so I could get rid of it faster) and gargled it longer. That stuff was SO disgusting, but I eventually finished it off. (Okay honestly, I'm sure the gargling is doing some good, but it really is awful.) Lena said something to the effect that ideally, I should schedule my time right now to sleeping, eating, resting, and ultimately not leaving the house until I'm well again. I've tried to respect that (I missed FHE last night for the first time), but I really don't want to miss out on things just because I'm a bit under-the-weather. It is kind of nice to have an excuse to take it slow, but I think I'm failing at taking it that today (so far, I've been home for just over an hour and in about an hour, I should be leaving for the Page's house for a game night.) Anyways, I hope I get over whatever this is soon; I don't want my host-mom to worry, I want to be more wide-awake-alert, and I am really not looking forward to gargling more of that stuff.

Day 35 - Ballet at the Kyiv Opera House

Picture taken from someone else's blog :)
Turns out they're actually couple
missionaries from Moscow!

My host-family's car is finally able to drive (it was completely covered in snow for the past few weeks), so I got a ride from them to this Opera House where I waited around for a few of the other ILPs (Cami, Kaitlyn, Madeline, and Maddy). As usual, there were a lot of complications for everyone in getting there (they weren't sure which metro stop to get off at, or weren't able to find the metro), but eventually we all made it there. We had gotten tickets for the Ballet of "Sleeping Beauty" last Saturday while we were on our Tour of Kyiv with Tania, our coordinator. The inside of this building is gorgeous; I felt like I was in a castle (or a real legitimate opera house:) ) with all the marble flooring and beautiful architecture. We were directed first down-stairs, where gave our coats to this lady who hung them up and gave us a tag to get them back later (that's how it goes in most any public building here - ballets, museums, operas, cinemas, etc). The Ballet was amazing too. We paid about 30 grivna (just over 3 dollars), but I would have paid upwards to 10 dollars for how amazing it was. The ballet-dancers were so talented, and the music was absolutely amazing. One negative though, we were on the very top balcony, and the seats there were not the most comfortable there. Other than that, I have no complaints, it was definitely worth my time and money :) When the "Sleeping Beauty" Ballet was over, we went back all the way down-stairs to get our coats. The lady was trying to explain something to us, but it was really hard to really understand her. Another lady who spoke some English translated for us. She explained that the coat lady was trying to tell us, which was that there was a'NOTHER performance in 15 minutes that we were supposed to go to. We were all so tired at that point though, and we felt like we had already gotten our days worth of adventures (with everyone else getting lost and such), so we asked to take our coats anyways so we could go. The coat-lady took our tags, and gave us our coats. We thanked her and the lady who had translated for us, then headed out.

Day 33 - Kinder Joy!

I can not believe I have lived my whole life without knowing about these! Today was one-of-the-kids-I-teach's birthday and he brought goody-bags for everyone; which we all got after classes were done. I opened up my little goody bag and there was some chocolate and a juice box and this little egg-looking thing called a "Kinder-Joy". The kids seemed to know just what to do with these toys, but it was all new to me, so I had them show me how to open the plastic egg in half and use the tiny plastic utensil to scoop out the chocolaty treat from one half of the egg. The other half had a "surprise" in it, which was this little toy that I got to assemble together (kind of like a McDonald's toy). Mine was a mini-version of that ant game where you have to get the ants to jump into the pants (I think it's called "Ants in Pants"). Anyways it basically made my entire day :)

Day 31 - Operrra!!

After a long day of touring around and figuring out post office stuff and walking around some more with Tania, I was finally able to go home and take a short break. It felt like just as I finally found some time to sit and relax, I was up and going again to get ready for the Operetta (An opera with talking in it too, like a musical). I was really nervous because I didn't have a phone in which I could call the other ILPs (I could only call Sasha or Julia from Lena's phone), and I didn't even know what time or where we were all meeting up around there. It wasn't too far from home though, so I walked there while constantly asking friendly looking pedestrians "Do you know where the Operetta is?" or "gdye Operetta?" A few didn't know, but the others all pointed me in the right direction, and I was reeally grateful for them. I made it there pretty early, but just waited around for a while until I heard some english-speaking a ways off. Just as I thought, it was the rest of my group :) ...more to come later.