KickingbyLenin

So it has been a little bit too long since the last blog post but I will try to give a decent update on my life.  My school has been in quarantine for three weeks due to many children getting sick with the Flu and apparently flu shots are not mandatory for school children here.  At first, the school thought it would only be a couple of days which then turned into weeks.  I initially found this out when the cashier in Sadove looked at me and asked me, "What are you doing here?"  I started to go in to my decision to join the Peace Corps when she told me to stop and told me there was no school and that it was in quarantine.  I then called my counterpart who proceeded to tell me that about a third of the children had the flu and that school was postponed until further notice.

I then went to Lugansk for Women's Day and had a blast with the people there.  We went to a new restaurant with teachers from school and proceeded to dance the night away.  The next day was Maslanitza which is an old tradition that celebrates the beginning of Spring and was incredibly fun to be a part of.  We met up with Hailey's counterpart and her counterpart's husband and walked around seeing what was available.  There were many people selling shish kabob's and there was a large ominous pole in the background with trinkets hanging off of it.  Oleg proceeded to tell me it was waxed down and people climb it to win chicken, geese, ducks...or a DVD player.  Oleg and I along with another volunteer were then drafted into a tug-of-war match and came in second place which resulted in us being presented a bottle of beer!  Very good times were had and all was well on the Eastern Front.

There was an HIV/AIDS conference that volunteers attended with their partners about a month ago that was incredibly interesting and helpful for volunteers to plan events with their counterparts.  It was my counterparts first time going to Kiev and to his displeasure the conference was 20 kilometers outside of Kiev.  He was great to have along and we are receiving a trainer for the students on April 8th to kick off some HIV/AIDS events we have planned that I believe will be a great success.

I have now received all the funding for my room renovation project and we are getting everything organized and ready.  It is hugely exciting and everyone is very excited to complete it and start enjoying it.

All in all life is good here despite the bouts of boredom and frustration that everybody goes through!