Getting to the Starobilsk English Club

Everything I'm doing in Ukraine is a journey. Starting an English Club is no exception.

When I arrived in Starobilsk, on June 19, I knew not a soul, not a place, not a center, not a town. First I met Vera, the director of NGO Victoria, my first assignment, then Luba, whose house I'm staying at until an apartment becomes available. It was me and my nice little bedroom. A lot like Van Gogh's painting of his room. I was sick for the first few days, stomach flu and chills, so it was hard to accept the gracious offerings of fresh raspberries and sumptuous meals cooked on my behalf. Needless to say, my flu involved everyone in helping me, from Starobilsk to Kiev. It dampened enthusiasm I'm sure. I just needed to stay warm and sleep it off. No way to make a good first impression.

As soon as I felt better, I wanted to get the lay of the land. The Peace Corps calls it "community mapping," and that's what I did. Where was I? Luba and Vera obliged. They took turns walking me from Luba's house, past the bus station, the University and college, and various shops where I could buy necessities, into the center of town, where the city administration buildings and beautiful cultural center are, and finally into Lenin Park, where Victoria's office is. It was pretty much a straight shot from Panfelova, maybe a 25-minute or so walk. So I got to know my village. And to demonstrate my more energetic and curious self!

From there it was just a matter of branching out. I found the banks and ATMs, the public library, the post office, the computer store, school supply stores, food shops where I could buy water and cookies, fresh bread and cheese, a place to get online. And the bazaar. The bazaar is critical because that's where you can buy anything from food to clothes to toiletries and everything in between. I learned the hard way, as I learn most things, that it is only open from early morning to 13:00 (that's 1:00 pm here).

I began to meet and talk to people. Most knew right away that I was from America, and most were friendly and accomodating. I met volunteers associated with Victoria, terrific activists. I met teachers, doctors, taxi drivers, shopkeepers, store owners, computer experts, young students, college students, friends and neighbors of Luba's. I met those fantastic women who took me to Berdyansk. I met the directors of the Cultural Center, the Library, the Park. I met folk artists, musicians, and historians, and one anthropologist in Lugansk who spoke English. I met more faculty and students at Camp Sosnovy. I am still learning my town, but at least I know where I am and can walk and bike my way around the place. Most folks along my path know me as well, the Amerikanka on the red velociped, or walking with a dictionary in her hand.

In the process of getting to know the community I met people who were glad to meet an American. Several wanted to practice their English. I was more than happy to talk with them. I realized there was a need, and that I could begin a tried-and-true Peace Corps activity in my new town: an English club.

I talked to teachers and students and had several meetings with Iryna Andreevna, the director of the Biblioteca, a Rayon-wide (county-wide) library serving Starobilsk and about 10 nearby villages. I had the help of Anton, a poet and free spirit whose mother is a librarian, in talking with Iryna, who knows no English. I drafted a flyer in English; Iryna reviewed it; we made some changes, then she translated it into Russian. All this took time. She offered to pass the flyers out from the library, and I did the same with the schools, the university, shops, and anywhere else I happened to be. It was mostly word of mouth, and through the teachers of English at schools #1, 2, and 3. The English Club was on the way.

We had our first meeting on September 19, exactly 3 months after I got here. There were twenty-three people: 6 adults, 4 college students (of Natalia's and PCV Mike Young), and the rest were school students, mostly in the 11th form, equivalent to high school seniors in the US. Our youngest member is Vlad, 12 years old, who comes with his sister Yana. They are terrific. So are all the members. Several said they wanted to make English their profession. So smart, so good at a foreign language, and thinking ahead at such young ages! Meet Ukraine's future teachers, translators, business people, and civic leaders.

They came because they want to practice their English and meet other people who do too, and they want to learn about America. I didn't know what to expect but we had a great first meeting. We played games: Who are you? What do you see? (I made a poster with photos of the USA, Ukraine, the world, and others with some cultural significance), and What do you want to do? It was fun, with a high level of participation. That pleased me.

We decided to talk about holidays for our second meeting. I passed around a handout of American and Ukrainian holidays. We got to October 31, Halloween. Great sharing all around. If some of them fumbled or got embarrassed I reassured them that I wish I could speak Russian as well as they spoke English. Lots of clapping for encouragement!

Before ending, I introduced the theme of Autumn with four poems I had selected from around the world. One was by Robert Louis Stevenson (Scotland), another by Katherine Mansfield (New Zealand), and a third by Roselynn Curro (American), who wrote about going "tricks or treating" with her son, she dressed as a 1920s flapper and he a soldier. The fourth poem was a Haiko, a three-line poem by a 16th century Japanese poet, Matsuo Basho. We read it together because it is short.

Autumn moonlight--

a worm digs silently

into the chestnut.

We talked about how to write a Haiku poem. I suggested that we each write a Haiko and bring it to the next meeting. I'll write one too, I promised. We'll share and make a Fall Holiday Tree. Great excitement.

I didn't tell the club that poet Roselynn Curro is my mother, and that the young soldier she wrote about so lovingly was her son, my kid brother Loren, my children's uncle. That's for next time.

So this is how we got to an English Club from knowing nothing, with interesting stops along the way. Now we have to keep it going, with games, suspense and surprises, interesting topics and stories, some luck, and a little magic.

Sergei

Sergei Budonniy was born in Starobilsk, grew up here, went to school here. He lives right across the street from Luba, on Panfelova. He is my main computer man. He manages a popular electronics store that sells computers, cel phones, cameras, printers, and related accessories and office supplies.

I met Sergei when I went shopping for a new computer. My heavy 6-year-old laptop, which I had lugged from the States, was about to crash; the keyboard was really a mess after being repaired in Chernigov; and I needed something lightweight I could carry around with me.

Sergei is a wonderful young man with a quiet but competent business manner and great customer service (something a bit, ahem, rare here). He patiently helped me through the process of selecting an Acer notebook, and then managed to put in an English operating system, something the experts in Chernigov couldn't do.

Sergei also tried to speak English with me when he heard my abyssmal attempt at his beautiful language and realized I was from America. He was delighted actually, and so was I. Turns out he has a good friend from Starobilsk, Nina, who is living in Spokane, Washington, and that he learned English from Christian friends who wanted to help him. He sees this as a gift and remains grateful. He likes to practice every chance he gets, even from this technically challenged PCV.

Sergei was the person I went to when I wanted to have 300 Florida postcards copied to give to the kids at Camp Sosnovy. He not only got the job done, he donated some of the cost as well.

So whenever I need supplies or help with my computer, or any other technical stuff, I go to Sergei. He helps me with major problems like: “My tool bars disappeared and I can't find them."

Today I went in to have some poetry copied for my English Club. “How's business?” I asked him. He put his arms across his chest and said, “do you really want to know this?” Well sure. He said in Russian and part English that business is not good. “Doing business in my country is difficult,” he said, and more so since the bank credit meltdown.

To me it looks like Sergei is always busy and does a brisk business, but I have read and seen enough evidence that the global economic crisis has hit Ukraine especially hard. The need for more intelligent and inspired leadership is another theme.

I think back to the kids at Camp Sosnovy and marvel at talented young adults like Sergei, and I believe Ukraine will turn around. Whenever I express this belief, Ukrainians look at me like I'm from Mars. Well, I am from America. I know I am more optimistic than most Ukrainians, but sometimes an outsider sees things that insiders can't see. They are struggling so hard to make it.

I tell Sergei his business will pick up and he'll be a great businessman, a Ukrainian success story! He grins. “God willing,” he replies.

Natalia

She is a professor, a wife, and a mom of two college-aged boys, Artyem and Artur. She has a large home and a large garden, huge actually, and great responsibilities. The whole family works in the garden--planting, tending, harvesting. They are attuned to the seasons and the pace of agrarian life. She prepares, cooks and preserves what is harvested. She plays sports with her sons, hikes, bikes and swims with them. They have great extended family reunions. She is a wonderful cook and hostess. She is well-read, thoughtful, a critical thinker with a great sense of humor. She teaches English language and literature at the Starobilsk branch of the Shevchenko National University in Lugansk. She is Natalia, my Russian tutor and friend.

Her students, some of whom are in my English Club at the Biblioteca and some of whom work as counselors at Camp Sosnovy, sing her praises. They say she's changed their lives. She has encouraged them to dream, to achieve. Inspired them. She is their role model.

Now Natalia is concerned that many high school students in Lugansk Oblast in eastern Ukraine are not passing the National English Language test, a newly instituted exam that you must pass to go on to college. The students with the least resources, who cannot, for example, afford a tutor, are the most affected, and they are her main concern. She wants all students to have the same oppportunities to go to college and especially to continue English language studies. She ponders the diminishing number of potential English teachers and the consequences for the students and their communities. And she is going to do something about it. She is designing a special course to help students prepare for the test, and she is hoping a small grant to the Peace Corps will support this volunteer effort.

Natalia was born in Poltava, in central Ukraine. Her first language is Ukrainian. Ukrainian traditions and culture are ingrained in her soul. She's lived most of her adult life in eastern Ukraine, as has her husband. In this part of Ukraine, Russian is the language of most people. She is fluent in Russian. She studied English in Gorlivka, famous for its language institute and a highly regarded center for English language learning. She is fluent in English and loves the literature.

Her husband Vasyl, when he is not working in their home and garden, drives a taxi. He knows the town of Starobilsk and surrounding villages intimately, and can get to the unpaved roads of Karl Marx and Panfelova with ease. It's a comfort to me to know he's there. A dedicated family man, kind, funny, hard-working, with a strong sense of responsibility, he is passing these values on to his sons.

Natalia is striving to give her sons as many opportunities to explore the world as possible, to expand their horizons. They have both traveled and they have both spent time in America, at summer camps in Maine and Maryland, respectively. They are remarkable young men. Natalia wants them to question, to grow wiser. She wants them to dream and stretch to reach those dreams.

Now Natalia has decided she would like to go abroad. She would like to see America. It's her dream for herself. She hopes to teach and to learn. I hope her dream comes true. She will be a gift to any faculty in America, and to the students blessed to cross paths with her. I hope she can achieve for herself what she has worked so hard to give her children and her students. It's Natalia's time.

Seasons

Fall
Thoughts

To everything there is a season,
a time for every purpose under the sun.
a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
a time to kill and a time to heal,
a time to weep and a time to laugh,
a time to mourn and a time to dance...
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing,
a time to lose and a time to seek,
a time to rend and a time to sew,
a time to keep silent and a time to speak,
a time to love and a time to hate,
a time for war and a time for peace.
Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

There are seasons in our lives, as there are seasons in nature. That's why I love this psalm from Ecclesiastes. It moved The Byrds to write “Turn,Turn,Turn.” It has inspired Pete Seeger, Judy Collins, Peter, Paul and Mary, and many other artists. For those of us who are more spiritual than religious, it makes sense of good and evil, life and death, war and peace. It leavens harmony and discord. It unites eternal dualisms.

This is the time for me to be in Ukraine. I'm not sure why; it just is.

When I am missing my children and grandchildren and all those I love back in the States, which is often, I wonder about this time. I could be home in St. Petersburg, Florida, teaching, in my comfort zone. I could be having dinner with my friend Sandie, or listening to the wry and irreverent political analysis of Christopher. I could be going to meetings with Debi, Pat and Doris, going to a movie with Sue. I could be visiting my brother and sister, my niece and her family,and friends in Tallahassee, or going up North to visit cousins in New York, North Carolina and New England, or up to Toledo Ohio, to spend time with my daughters and grandkids, and great-grandson Philip.

But here I am, in a small village in far-eastern Ukraine, closer to Russia than to Europe, closer to strangers than family.

I am experiencing the autumn of Ukraine rather than the autumn of New England. I'm picking pumpkins in Natalia's garden (above), not buying them at Publix. I will see the first snowfall of winter in Starobilsk rather than in Toledo.

There is a time for every purpose under the sun. At this time in my life, as I approach a new decade, I am making new friends, learning new things, living in a foreign land. Summer has turned to Fall. The seasons are changing. I am changing with them. To everything there is a season.

Cultural Moments

What's wrong with

this picture?

When we were in training in Chernigov, in our Russian language classes with Lyrisa (the best teacher I ever had), we would stop to talk about misunderstandings that had taken place between one of us novices and our Ukrainian host families. "Cultural moments" we called them.

For example, one Peace Corps Trainee (PCT, not yet PCV), Mike, forgot to leave his shoes at the door when he came in one night. When his host mom didn't see his shoes in their proper place, she immediately called Peace Corps headquarters to report him missing. The police were summoned, the family was frantic, the PC folks in Kiev were on the phone. It was a huge crisis.

The funny thing is, the PCT was in his bed sleeping peacefully through all the commotion. When his host family finally found him, they woke him up to scold him for not taking off his shoes upon entering the apartment!

A total misunderstanding all the way around. But one thing's for sure: Mike remembered to take off his shoes after that. So did we all as this story spread through the PC grapevine. Mike was mad, but we thought it was hysterical!

Another PCT made the mistake of buying a bunch of flowers for her host mom. The mistake was that she had bought an even number of flowers, six rather than five. Before putting the flowers in a vase, her host mom took one out of the bunch and threw it in the trash! It is bad luck to get an even number of flowers.

It's also bad luck to shake hands or kiss across the threshold; to whistle inside the house; to turn your back on a friend. Nor is it a good idea to pick up kopeks (coins) from the street, unless you want to end up poor.

The superstitions and customs are hard enough, but the language barrier makes it worse. Misunderstandings are inevitable. Luba wants me to do something, and I don't understand. I've made the flower mistake. I've whistled in the house. I've forgotten to take off my shoes.

When Luba gets home from work, she wants to know if I have eaten, and if so what. It's her first question, after taking off her shoes. It's ok to yell a question across a threshold. She checks the food she left on the stove in the morning and notices it's pretty much all still there. So WHAT did I eat? It's been a rocky road, but I think we have this routine down pretty well now.

Luba can't help but mother me, although I am older than she is. It's her role. The head of the household tradition. She wants to be sure I look okay when I walk out the door. Several times she's made me stop to iron a skirt or a top! You do NOT go out the door with wrinkled clothes on, or dirty clothes. No way. It reflects badly on the head of the household.

Luba wants me to take off the lights when I'm not in my room, to hang wet towels on the clothesline outside not on the rack in the bathroom, to wash my socks out every night, to wipe water off of counters, to add a flower to the vase where I had two, to eat the potatoes and noodles, as well as the meat and vegetables!

I'm getting better, but most of the time I'm still not sure what Luba wants me to do, or not to do. If she thinks I don't understand, she says it louder, and slower. If I still don't get it, she shakes her head and says, rather forlornly, with a kind of quiet resignation, "Ne panimyu?" You don't understand. I nod, remember Mike's shoes, and just smile.

From Tea to Dinner

Olga, Natalie, Mike, and Luba adding to the table. So here's another photo of Luba.

I invited my fellow PCVs Mike Young, who teaches English at the local branch of Shevchenko University, and Natalie Schur, who teaches English at a secondary school in Antratsyt in the southeastern mining region of our oblast, over for tea to meet Luba and our friend Olga. As is the Ukrainian custom, Mike and Natalie brought a gift for Luba, a box of brandy-filled chocolates.

Mike's family is with the US diplomatic corps and foreign service, so they've lived all over the world, most recently in Taiwan. His parents are now at their home in the Washington, DC area awaiting another assignment. Mike is not sure where home is.

Natalie is from the Chicago area, and her mom keeps asking her when she'll be home. How about Christmas? Natalie says she hasn't made plans yet, in true Ukrainian fashion. When we were out for dinner last night, Natalie's mom called. During our visit at Luba's, Natalie's mom called. I know don't tell me, I joked. Your mom wants to know when you'll be home!

Mike and Natalie are recent college graduates, young and smart. They majored in Russian language and literature and are fluent in the language. They demur about this, but to me they are fluent. They've been here a year, and they are sensitive and wise about Ukrainian ways and traditions.

Luba and Olga were delighted to meet two young Americans who spoke Russian. They chatted away, and it was wonderful because Mike could translate for me. I learned for example that Luba's father had been in a Soviet concentration camp, something I had never grasped before. It's import touched me deeply.

I made the tea and offered cookies and a plate of fresh bread and cheese. Luba looked over the table and had other thoughts.

She went to the garden and picked bunches of green and purple grapes and ripe plums, washed them, put them in a pretty straw basket, and added to my meager, by her standards, offering! On top of that, she had spent all morning making stuffed peppers (she had picked and cleaned the peppers the night before) with fresh tomato sauce and, lo and behold, she brought these out as well.

Our tea became a dinner. Best stuffed peppers I ever had. Mike and Natalie feasted on a real home-cooked meal, thanks to Luba's true Ukrainian hospitality. Delicious and delightful!

From tea to dinner with love from Starobilsk.

9/9/09

I just have to record the date: 9/9/09. I won't get to write this date again.

I want to remember that I was in Starobilsk, Ukraine, working as a Peace Corps Volunteer on that special day. On 8/8/88 I was working with the DC humanities council in Washington. On 7/7/07 I was in St. Petersburg, Florida, retired, preparing for teaching a class at Eckerd College. Today it's 9/9/09.

I've read that these amazing conjunctions in numbers mean good things and bad things in different traditions, ancient and modern. Mathematicians and numerologists back to Pythagoras have a field day with them. I'll go with the positive - peace, compassion, good luck!

And good times. For that, above are some photos of a memorable bike ride to the Adgar River with friends Asya and Sasha. The light was brilliant, the farm land rich, the cows content, the sun danced on the river, and it sparkled, radiant. We biked along the river, then sat and reflected. It was a beautiful day for lots of reasons, among them that I was with friends, in Ukraine, and that my sister Andy came through her surgery with flying colors. Fall colors. Here's to the reds, yellows and oranges of Autumn, and to 9/9/9!