Lots of Change

It’s been three weeks since I returned to Ukraine, and A LOT has happened. A LOT. I am just starting to feel like my feet are solidly underneath me after everything. When I got off the plane here, I had no idea where I would be going. Well, first stop Peace Corps office, but other than that a lot was still up in the air. I walked in the office and for all intents and purposes there was not one person there who knew what to do with me. My Regional Manager was out of the office and I’m not sure that he was appraised that I would be returning to Ukraine, and the Medical Office knowing that I was deemed healthy had figuratively washed their hands of me. I literally walked up and down there stairs between two offices at least ten times in a little over an hour to figure out where I would be going next.

The program people wanted me to go back to my old site, since my new site hadn’t found me an apartment yet. My RM told me I was never going back to my old site and I didn’t really want to go back there. Unfortunately, decisions had to be made on the spot and I was kind of homeless in Ukraine. I wanted to go to hang at Conor’s site for a couple of days until the dust settled, but administratively that didn’t make sense to the people in the office. Many panicked phone calls were made to my RM, my new site, my old site, etc. I was literally a few steps away from the ticket window at the train station and my RM called and told me to wait a few minutes and that he would call me back with a plan.

The short back story being that all of my stuff minus my valuables that I took with me to DC were still in my old apt. in Balakleya. After almost a year, I have accumulated a lot of stuff in addition to what I had already. Plus the PC gives us a space heater, a fire extinguisher, and about 30 lbs. of written materials during training. When all is said and done, I had the equivalent of 4 large suitcases, 3 smaller bags, and a backpack (filled with my laptop, my new Netbook that I picked up in the states since my laptop might not make it much longer, Kindle, camera, and all the wires that go along with that). Plus a gigantic backpack of food that I entrusted to Kim with the assumption that I might not make it back to Ukraine and I wanted my closest friends to reap the benefits of my cache of American foodstuffs – peanut butter, hot sauces, mac & cheese, and Nature Valley granola bars. (That bag is still with Kim, figuring out how to get it back is still in process. I miss my hot sauce!).

My RM called me back and told me to buy a ticket to my old site for the next day. If I was there and if my new site was able to find me housing he would come with the Peace Corps car and move me to my new site. If not, I was on my own. Well, I took a chance that my new site would be able to find me housing ASAP and went back to my old site. Unfortunately, finding an apartment in 24 hours is a huge feat and it didn’t happen, so my RM called me back and told me I was on my own for the move. Well shit. How does one girl move 4 large suitcases, 3 smaller bags, and a backpack down 3 flights of stairs, and onto a train at 3:43 in the morning when the train only stops for 2 minutes? How? Well another PCV comes to the rescue with her Ukrainian counterpart at 12:30 am and they help me with the help of two taxis and drivers on one end and one taxi and drivers on the other. This was a real Ukrainian adventure.

The day after my RM called to say he would not help me, my new site came through with temporary housing. So he told me to saddle up and get to Lugansk and that my new people would pick me up from the train station. Well, this was impossible on my own. So a 69 year old PCV volunteered to bring her 22 year old friend on a middle of the night train adventure. They took the train from Lugansk to my town (a 7 hour train ride) and arrived at mine at 12:30 am. We had a beer, shot the shit, I finished packing and we met our taxi drivers outside with all the bags at 3 am. The taxis brought us and all the junk to the platform and we hoped that we were in the right place since you have to get on the correct ticketed car and running with 4 large suitcases and 3 small bags was not an option. We were about 30 feet off the mark, but managed to get everything and ourselves on the train in the two minute window. I bought an extra berth for the baggage, the train attendants were not pleased, but all in all, it worked out. Seven hours later, we were in Lugansk and thankfully that was the end of the line for the train so we could take our time unloading. We manage to hail a cab, he helped us with the bags and we crammed all the bags, plus the three of us, plus driver into a car the size of an early 80s Toyota Corolla hatchback. It was really amazing. On the Lugansk end, Caroline, generously volunteered a corner of her living room for my stuff and a couch for me to sleep on until my people picked me up.

At this point, the operative question was, when would they pick me up? First it was Tuesday. Then it was Wednesday. Then it was Wednesday or Thursday. But finally it was definitely on Friday. So on Friday, I was ready to go. My friends came over to help again, with the 22 year old Ukrainian very graciously translating everything so everyone could understand. The car that came to pick me up was the equivalent of a mini-Jeep. The mini-Jeep had a huge spare tire in the minimal trunk space. My new people also packed 3 people in the car. So, there was only room in the car for me and one suitcase. This spiraled into a quick panicked negotiation where they agreed that they would come back the following day with an empty vehicle and that I would just bring the one suitcase and whatever I needed for the night. So I did. I hopped in a car full of strangers with only a few of my belongings and set off on a 2 hour ride.

We arrived in town and I would be renting a small house for two weeks until my permanent apartment was ready on March 25th. Well, let’s just say for two weeks the house was passable, but not comfortable. I equate the experience to indoor camping. The bathroom and the stove were in a converted porch (this means these two rooms are FREEZING at all times). There were three rooms in the house, but for heating purposes we kept my one with the fridge and the table closed off from the rest of the house. They moved a divan for me to sleep on into the room and closed the doors to the other two rooms and sparked up the gas heater. I could see my breath. It was freezing in the room and there was some kind of miscommunication between the Peace Corps and my organization. They didn’t have sheets, blankets, or even pots and pans for me to use. So, here I was in this freezing house with no blankets and no kettle, no nothing. At least if I had my stuff, I would have had a sleeping bag and a little pillow, but it never occurred to me to pack that in my overnight essentials. I called my RM and he said, ‘Amy, ask them to take you to the bus station and catch the first bus back to Lugansk and stay with Caroline for the night. They are not prepared. Let them get prepared and they can pick you and the rest of your stuff up tomorrow’. At that point, I just wanted to scream. What a nightmare!?!

This is where I am repeating to myself in my head all the Peace Corps mottos… ‘It’s the toughest job you will ever love’, ‘How far will you go?’, you should be prepared to serve in hardship conditions, etc… I took a deep breath and went to the bus station, bought a ticket, and headed back to Caroline in Lugansk.
Prior to my Peace Corps experience, I considered myself to be a very patient person. This past year has taught me that I am capable of so much more. If I ever doubted my strength, this proves that I am one tough cookie. Something kept me going. I knew that if I could get through this without going totally bonkers, it would be worth it. New site, new people, new beginning, new opportunities, and most importantly a new adventure. It will be worth it. I just kept repeating that over and over again.

The next day would be a new day, they would pick me up and everything would be fine. And for the most part it was. They picked me and my stuff up, we side-tripped to pick up the driver’s son. He squished in with my stuff in the back seat. The house was still freezing despite the fact that the heat was cranking for 24 hours at that point, but I had my thermals and my sleeping bag to make it work this time around. My Director brought me a kettle, a pot, bowl, cup, set of utensils, sheets, pillow and light blanket. I had my Peace Corps space heater. Hey, it’s just like camping indoors, right? It’s only for two weeks and the people I met were amazingly kind. The vibe was completely different from my last site so I knew that as long as I rolled with the punches things were turn out to be alright. And after a little more than a week, it has turned out to be much better than I could have ever dreamed.

Medevac

Holy whirlwind Batman. After packing up my apartment in Balakleya, I hurried back to Kiev and got ready to head back to Washington, DC for medevac. I slept in the Peace Corps office in sick bay and they drove me to the airport at 3 am or something and then wham bam thank you ma’am, later that same day (due to the time change) my brother picked me up at Dulles and we grabbed dinner before he drove me to Georgetown to the hotel that I would be living at for the next three weeks. I should note that the dinner tasted like the most amazing thing I have ever eaten. It was grilled salmon over a bed of mixed green salad with blue cheese, pieces of boiled potatoes, pecans, pine nuts, figs, tomatoes… it was amazing. Salads in Ukraine tend to be simple, either tomatoes and cucumbers, or cabbage, or something not all that vegetable related and mayonnaise laden (i.e. cubed lunch meats, kielbasa, peas and mayo or something gross like that). Lettuce is not readily available in most places and as for mixed greens and baby lettuces, forget about it. Blue cheese is hard to find and at the point I ate this magnificent salad, I had not eaten grilled salmon since I left the States at the end of March last year. Needless to say, it was quite possibly the best salad I have ever eaten. This is something you can only appreciate if you have been deprived of or are not able to access the food stuffs in that salad.

Much of my medevac was an exercise in food porn. I had a list of certain foods I HAD to eat while I was in the States and overall, I think I did a good job. It only helped my cause that I was in Georgetown surrounded by tons of good eateries. In addition to food, I had a bunch of whirlwind visits with my friends. Danya came to DC the first weekend I was there. Elizabeth was in town for work my first week. My second weekend, I took a train to Connecticut to see the folks, family and friends. The third weekend I took the Megabus to NYC and caught up with my friends there. I was constantly busy. One of the days in NYC, I had a lunch date, followed by a coffee date, followed by drinks and dinner, followed by a jazz concert, and I crammed in a manicure all with different sets of friends. I definitely made good use of my time and still managed to eat a NY slice and NY bagel at some point.

In addition to all the travelling and visits, I also caught up with friends in DC and took some pretty amazing walks around the city since the weather was just starting to open up to Spring. I had an amazing roommate at the hotel who helped me keep things light and assisted me in taste testing the various cupcakes, cookies and pies in the immediate vicinity of the hotel. We bonded over trash TV and lounging on the couch. What could have been a very stressful experience was made all that much more comfortable by someone I just clicked with. It was a great three weeks and now, if I want, I have a PCV to visit in South Africa.

While all this sounds great and fun, I was also going through a barrage of tests that were neither easy, nor pleasant. I left Ukraine very uncertain about my health and almost certain that I wouldn’t be allowed to return to Ukraine and finish my service, but as it turns out I was perfectly healthy and all the cause for alarm was just dated mammography and ultrasound equipment in Ukraine. In DC, I got poked, prodded, biopsied, squished and scanned and everything turned out to be okay. So guess what? I was headed back to Ukraine. But the operative question was, where was I going when I got back to Ukraine?

Right before I left on medevac it was determined that I would be changing sites and moving somewhere else due to the problems I was having with my organization in Balakleya. I had emailed the Peace Corps the week before I returned, but to no avail since people were on the road travelling. So when I arrived I had no idea where to go, and as I soon learned, they didn’t know quite where to send me either. So the adventure continues.