(written December 19th)

I had an amusing discussion with some of the NetCorps team about laundry, and Olivier suggested that I string up some rope in my room. That sounds like an idea! No snow-covered shorts for me! I was going to ask my host family tonight about what they had in mind in terms of hanging clothes indoors, but in light of what ( Read more... )

(Composed Tuesday, December 13, just after midnight)

Today (Monday, 12) was the day I decided to be better. That’s the funny thing about being sick and recovering; at some point you just have to decide that you’re better, and to Magadan with what slows you down. You could wait forever to be 100% again, so you just have to set out, head held high, ( Read more... )

(composed Saturday, December 10)One good thing about being home sick for a week is that you get a lot of time to think. Entire books could be written about what’s been going through my head; not that they’d be interesting unless you had all the relevant prior experience to go with them, in which case you’d be me and even then you wouldn’t have the ( Read more... )

(composed Saturday, December 10)I’ve always maintained that Ukrainians have a fairly broad notion as to what constitutes food, but today’s experience trumps this sentiment beyond further doubt. I say this with a sense of humour; few Ukrainians have dared try our outlandish (to them) “peanut butter,” and even fewer have enjoyed it. As crazy as they ( Read more... )

(written Wednesday, November 30th)Just to throw you off, here’s a bite-sized update ( Read more... )

(Composed Sunday, November 27)As things have happened, it may surprise you to know that I’m writing this new entry from my old host family’s computer. It also looks increasingly likely that they will turn out to be my only host family. Things are peaceful and uneventful once again. It’s hard for me to imagine that only sixty hours ago I was ( Read more... )

So I’m switching host families today ( Read more... )

There are a lot of things about Ukrainian architecture that utterly confound me. Mostly, it's doors. There's seemingly a whole subculture set up around doors that I'm only just beginning to understand.

Take my house. It has about the interior space of a trailer, just more square-like. Oh, and there are a lot of doors. Every concievable subdivision ( Read more... )

Keeping one’s sense of humour in Ukraine can be a test of will, especially after four months. (Wow, has it really been four months already? It seems like only fourteen.) Still, despite the cultural idiosyncrasies and other difficulties, I’m still finding the value of each new day. The cynic inside me says that I could be doing that on a beach in ( Read more... )

Composed Tuesday, October 25th, in the evening.Well, it all turns out that I needn't have worried and that I had no reason to be bitter. Isn't that always the case? As Calvin said, why does the Universe always give you the sign after you do it? In his case, it was hitting Susie with a water balloon, and then suffering the backlash. In my case, it's ( Read more... )