Going Clubbing, Some Thanks, and a Bітаю!

At the beginning of the year, I told myself that English Club, this year, was going to happen. Not only was it going to happen, it was going to be on a regular basis, and I was going to be intentional about it. And, as it turns out, English Club has become something I enjoy and look forward to! It's a relaxed and safe environment for students. The numbers vary depending on other activities that week, amount of homework, and of course, the memory of over-stimulated middle-schoolers.  

Some of the more 'successful' EC lessons have revolved around holidays, (see the Halloween post a few days weeks ago) but we're having a blast whatever the topic, whenever the season.

I haven't been very good about bringing my camera, but my iPhone catches a few moments! Take a look at what we've been up to!  

Magazine Poetry!

Creating, Writing, Speaking, Learning!

Team Activities!

Singing Songs!

Crosswords...always a favorite!

Decorating our 'Thankful Turkeys'!

I want to end this post with gratitude and thanks for the many, many blessing in my life. I am so fortunate to be where I am and couldn't be more appreciative to the people that have helped me along the way. I have the most amazing family in the world, supporting my crazy adventures and overwhelming me with love and encouragement. My friends, at home, in Ukraine, and all around the world inspire me with their talents and gifts, and shape me to be a better person...and haven't forgotten about me! This experience in Ukraine couldn't happen without all of you, so I humbly say thanks. As a wise woman once said, "It takes a village". You all are my village.

Other things I'm thankful at this moment in my life:

• My health and the health of those I care about so much;
• The last of this seasons apples and the peanut butter that accompanies them oh so well;
• Great Internet! (I have wifi now. Let's Skype! Seriously.);
• My electric kettle. (How do you people live without one!?);
• The love that is shown to me in Kolky every day;
• Celebrating election victories (and not having to watch election ads);
• Ukrainian friends that are going to keep me sane without my soon-to-be departed PCV gang;
• High-5's from my kiddos;
• fresh milk. 

aaaaand one last thing. 

Two great friends of mine from Cal Lu got engaged this weekend! A HUGE ВІТАЮ (Congratulations) to my friends Danny and Blythe! They are two of my favorite globally minded, do-gooders that are literally changing the world with each adventure they take on. I'm so excited for this next one of theirs! 

My CLU Family!
(Danny and Blythe are on the right!)

"Home and Family"

A few weeks back, a reporter friend of mine, who had written a story on me a while back, asked me for 5-8 family recipes for a magazine his newspaper publishes. "Home and Family" published 3 of the 'dessert' recipes the other day! I haven't found a hard copy yet, but I found the article online! 

The photo, I'll admit, is quite misleading because I certainly did not make that cake - but rather was gifted it from my school and Tanya, our head cook on my 24th Birthday in March.

I've translated the short text below, and then it's followed by Bread Pudding, Banana Bread, and Apple Crumble recipes shared from me and my family! Смачного! 

Taste Banana Bread from Colorado

"A Volunteer from Colorado, Benjamin Hogue, has been living in Kolky for two years. During this time, the American has not only loved Ukrainian food, but also learned to cook. (Side note: I didn't learn in Kolky, but rather the necessity has been heightened and enthusiasm honed.) And besides borsch and varenyky, 'the guy' enjoys food which he loved at home. Ben has shared with 'Domovychk' recipes, that his family makes overseas."

This article has been shared with permission from the author, and my friend, Андрій Соколовський (Andriy Sokolovsky) 

Finishing October Right!

As stated in my previous post, some exciting events are happening in my neck of the woods. My Lyceum held our Olympiad last week and we had quite the turnout. I'm pretty sure that everybody was excited about the English test and not just wanting to miss some lessons. Results are finalized and this was to help us determine who should go on to the next round in the region (county). If they place, they go to the Oblast Level (State) and then possibly to the Country Level!

The start of the Olympiad - Quite the crowded room!

The 7th From starting their Listening Task

Volodimyr Mykolyovitch proctoring 'Listening Comprehension'

Working diligently!

Ira, Dima, and Roma at the head of the room

Also, I spent a weekend with Ukrainian friends in L'viv. Most of them were locals, and showed me a side I'd never seen before! One of them being atop the Administrative Tower in the center of the city! 

One of the last beautiful days of Fall!

Looking at the Greek Catholic Church and a bit of the city center!

"High Castle"
Many, many stairs will get you to the top - just ask my Mom and Dad!

High Castle with the city in the foreground

One of my favorite cities in the world

 Then, we went to the Lviv Museum of Folk Architecture and Rural Life, or rather "Shevchenko Grove". It's an open air museum with 100+ different structures, buildings, houses, monuments, etc. There was even a Cossack Wedding while we were there, so we watched a little of the procession!

The Bride and Groom

Of of the Wedding Party/Cossack Ensemble

One of the Churches

This isn't an exactly hidden treasure in L'viv, but it was the first time I'd been there and cannot wait to go back. I feel like we only saw a fraction of the territory -- much to be explored! 

And then it was time to celebrate Halloween. Well, there was no carving of pumpkins, but there was a lot of candy, 90 minutes worth of games/Halloween entrainment, plenty of costumes, 2 pre-carved pumpkins, 40+ children and one English Club facilitator...me.

I was slow with the photos, because frankly I had my hands a little full. Costumes included a ghost, lots of witches/vampires/princesses, a couple of cats, a real PCV (me in a traditional Cameroonian outfit), some movie stars, etc. Activities included: Halloween Vocabulary Concentration, Mummy Wrapping with TP, Put the Stem on the Pumpkin, a presentation about Halloween in America, watching a short clip about 'How to Carve a Pumpkin' and of course, a Costume Fashion Show.

"Put the Stem on the Pumpkin"!

Mummy Wrap!

More mummifying!

What's left over of our Vocabulary Concentration Game and our 'stemmed' pumpkin!

I'm leaving for Moldova tomorrow, so I'm spending a few days in Kyiv exploring while on Fall Break. Hopefully the VISA reapplication process goes smoothly and I'll be back with some fun stories and photos from Moldova...and I guess a VISA. It started snowing off and on here in Ukraine on Saturday. That's nothing compared to Sandy -- praying for the best for everybody in the East!

Happy Halloween to everybody! Eat some Candy Corn for me please! (Photos of the Candy Corn brownies I made coming soon...)

Dodging the rain/sleet/snow in Kyiv with some Windmills and Pysankys!

Slava!

The Reign has Ended!

I'm recently back in Kolky from an awesome weekend in Kyiv where I had a Volunteer Advisory Council meeting on Friday. It was a productive meeting, and my last as President of the VAC (one year term limit) but during my extended time here in Ukraine I'll still be representing the other PCV's that have chosen to extend. I'm excited for the little bit of extra free time that goes with giving the position away and still excited that I'll be serving on VAC. In other "Extending News", I'm going to Moldova to get re-register my Visa. That will be at the end October, so I'll blog about that next month!

While I have internet momentarily, I'll upload some photos from the past month or so.

They include: The 2nd Annual Potato Harvest! Of course these photos were taken about a month or so ago when I could get away with wearing t-shirt and shorts at 4 in the afternoon. The sun is setting a lot earlier these days, but as of yesterday, I have heat in my apartment, so life is good!

Doing what we do best!

Carrying the buckets into the shed

About twice of what we had last year!

What's a potato harvest without celebrating afterwards?

Not very often do you get to eat sunflower seeds right from the flower itself!

Teachers Day - I was given an award by my regional Administration for "Commitment to Excellence in the Classroom, Promoting Modern Methods of Teaching, and Leading Workshops and Seminars for Teachers of the Oblast". Other teachers were awarded for various accolades and accomplishments!

The teachers  and Administrators from Kolky Lyceum who went to the Regional Award Ceremony/Concert

Some of my "loot" after a fantastic and eventful teachers day celebrationUnfortunately this doesn't include the cake my class gave me!

"How sweet it is to be loved by you!"Thanks again for the LOVE via my care package :)

Kolky's Bus Station got a paint job!
(I wonder how "Slovyanka" feels next door?!")

Plans for the future include Kolky Lyceum's English Olympiad on Thursday and Monday's English Club celebration of "Halloween". I'm going attempt to supervise 10-13 year old's carving pumpkins for the first time. Wish.me.luck. 

COSing

Or in Peace Corps lingo, Continuation of Service-ing.

Last Wednesday began Peace Corps Ukraine Group 40's (that's my group) Continuation of Service Conference! For 3 days we talked about how to wrap-up our service over the next few months (some Group 40ers are leaving as early as November - some leaving as late as January 2014!) You may be asking yourself, why Continuation? Well, all of our services just don't stop or close in Ukraine...we continue them back to the States, sharing what we learned here in Ukraine and bringing it with us in everything we do in the future. This conference was a great way to share those ideas, and give us the start to some sort of closure here in Ukraine.

For me, the COS Conference was quite surreal. Our Group hasn't been together since we Swore-In in December of 2010. We've lost a few along the way, but 80 of us still managed to make it the whole 27 months here in Ukraine.

Peace Corps Ukraine Group 40!
The Biggest Group PC has ever seen...we're still 80 Volunteers STRONG!

Also, I'm not leaving just quite yet, so the whole "How to Readjust" and "Life after PC" topics were distant for me. I was getting ideas for new projects and networking with Volunteers to see what I could do in the next 9 months. A lot of people were really ready to leave...but not me, not just quite yet.

Me and Rocky - The Gr. 40 Volunteer Advisory Council Reps...
apparently peering into our distant and uncertain future

 

My Training Cluster and Link!
All 10 of us have made it the 27 months in Ukraine :)

You might remember us - Ben, Asia, Laura, and Evan
Kivshovata Training Cluster
September-December 2010 :)

After the conference, I made my way down to Odessa with four of my closest friends in Ukraine! We had an extra long weekend down by the sea. The city was beautiful in all it's Soviet glory and the weather was perfect for a little time on the beach.

Val, Evan, Laurent, Ben and Grace on some famous stairs in Odessa

In front of the Potemkin Stairs!!!

Let's go back right now!!!

Odessa!

Now, finishing school tomorrow with...TEACHER'S DAY! Yes, this Friday, the 11th Formers will be taking over the school and letting us teachers have a relaxing day at school celebrating us! A Teacher's Day 2012 Blog - equipped with photos and stories coming soon, along with a photo of an award that I won today in Regional Center!

Peace.

Over the past week, I've been slipping a little something extra into each one of my classes -- that little something being - peace. 

Today, September 21, is the the United Nation's International Day of Peace. I just happen to work for an organization that promotes peace, am from a country in the UN, and living in a country that is also a member. With each of my forms, we talked about what exactly "peace" means to them. Of course, some discussions were more in depth because my 11th Formers, highly conversational in their English, are able to more eloquently express their ideas than say, my 5th Forms. 

My younger classes, using simple sentences and fun cutout shapes, expressed how we can be peaceful or how we can "Be the change" as Gandhi puts it. (Yes, I had them read and translate Gandhi!) Their ideas were fantastic, and although it's quite the abstract idea, they did really well with it. Some of their ideas included, but are certainly not limited to: "Solving problems more creatively", "Making my parents lunch", "Respecting my classmates", and "Giving hugs and smiling"

How can you "Be the Change"?

My older forms were assigned to translate some small texts about famous peaceful leaders in history. Some more recent, such as Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese politician who led the pro-democracy movement and recently won a seat in Parliament in Burma's first free elections. Some were quite famous, like Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Princess Diana, Gandhi, and Nelson Mandela. Others, they had never heard of, like "El General" the 22-year old Tunisian rapper whose song "Rais Lebled" ("President of the Republic) became the anthem for the Arab Spring, calling for the corruption to end. Or The Corinthians Football Club, a Brazilian team who started managing their team as a democracy, a small but public protest against the military dictatorship of the 1980's.  

Also, they found peace quotes and lyrics and brought them to school with translations. My favorite was: "Peace increases as we make higher choices from our heart's intuitive guidance. The peace we create within ourselves, creates the emergence of peace outside ourselves." ~Doc Childr

This all accumulated into Friday's big reveal of our Peace Board in the main corridor of our school. It was a bit too rainy for our planned street art, putting the UN Peace Day logo and song lyrics on the sidewalk outside in chalk. Next year, I hope -- or for another holiday.

Happy International Day of Peace! 

Peace Day really hit home for me when I attended my first funeral while being here in Ukraine. Yesterday morning, I got the unfortunate news that the mother of one of my dearest friends and colleagues had passed away. I knew Oksana Pavlina well, as we shared many bowls of borsch together, and she'd tell me stories about the great famine and raising daughters in the USSR. She'd always laugh when I tried to convince her that it was actually me that had made the banana bread she was eating, and Anastasia Serhivna would laugh at the two of us and our funny misunderstandings because of the language barrier, pouring me a little more congnac and telling her Mom it was in fact I who made the bread. My visits at Anastasia's house won't be the same, but the laughter and memories will be remembered and cherished.

So, on this drizzly evening in Kolky, I wish peace be with you all. In a world with uprisings and gaffes, I pray that tonight, my dear friend Oksana Pavlina -- and all of us -- can rest in peace.