Off to Kiev

Well it's been real, it's been fun, but it hasn't been real fun! Just kidding.. sort of. Kharkov is great but rather lonely and so tomorrow morning I'm off to grand ol' Kiev to meet up with Darren who will be flying in tomorrow afternoon from London. He and I will kick around that city for a few days (and hopefully this time I'll have a lot more enjoyable time) and then return to my new adopted city for another two days at which point Darren will have to return to Kiev to catch his flight home. He'll only be here for one week but we're going to have a blast every day and enjoy the precious moments as best we can. Look for some amazing blogs when I return and the continuation of - Ukraine Unraveled!

Chapter 5 - Nikolai - encounter in the metro

I’ve become acutely aware how reading an English language book in the metro can single you out as either a foreigner or snobby Ukrainian learning English. Unfortunately the minute I open my mouth and say anything in Russian, everyone realizes that I’m of the former group. This is what happened one late night as I was returning from work.

I was standing on the platform of Sovietskaya metro, minding my own business, reading a bit of Plato’s Republic when this young man came up and stood very close to me reading my book over my shoulder - a disconcerting action in and of itself! Then just as the train pulled up and everyone on the platform pushed and shoved their way into the carriage this bloke starts asking me about my book.
- What is it? "Платон, Ресбулика."
- Have you read Stephen King? "Нет."
These questions lead into the obvious…
- Are you Canadian? "Нет."
- Where do you come from? "Америка, Колорадо."
We push and shove our way onto the train carriage…
- What are you doing here? "Я учительница Английского языка."
- How long will you be here? "Шесть месяца."
And so on and so forth…

This went on for the duration of the metro ride back to my stop - Холодна Гора (Cold Mountain). Finally as we arrived at the station before my own the stranger introduced himself as Николай (Nikolai). He expressed his excitement for having met and talked with me and I reciprocated, though with less enthusiasm as I was still rather wary of meeting strangers in the metro. He exited the carriage, the doors closed behind him and I was able to again concentrate on Plato. About five minutes later we arrived at the end of the metro line and my stop. As I left the station I was relieved not to be accosted by anymore English language enthusiasts. It was another interesting experience in the day of the life of a Native Speaker in Kharkov.

[Disclaimer: The conversation quoted above took place entirely in Russian (and pigeon Russian), I have translated parts of it here for those readers who do not speak that beautiful language.]

Chapter 4 - Life as a teacher

Long ago when I was about 7-8 years old, I remember very clearly a day when Katie Groke and I were playing "pretend", one of our favorite games. Rather than being model homemakers and mothers as most other little girls were pretending to be, Katie and I decided even back then to be professionals. She was a doctor, typing up a diagnosis and prescription on my old-school Toshiba laptop. And I was a teacher. Through the subsequent years my career goals came and went, from teacher to actress to politician to global peace-maker. But it seems I’ve come full circle now and am starting right where Katie and I left off - as a teacher.

I have to admit that when I first arrived and another Katie - Kate my boss - started detailing lesson plans and grammar points to be covered my heart leapt into my throat. Not from excitement of fulfilling a life-long dream, but from sheer dread realizing that I really have no idea what I’m doing or how I got here! However after a full month and a half of trial and error I believe I’ve gotten the basic hang of things and my classes seem to enjoy themselves which is always a good sign! Another good result from all this is that I’m finally learning about English grammar myself. Something I seemed to have missed out on when I was in school.

As for the details of my teaching, I have one class that is mine alone to teach. There are technically 8 students but usually only about 5 or 6 show up. They are at the upper intermediate stage so that means they understand most everything I say and have a good command of the language. I teach them three times a week for 2 hours, other than that I go and visit other teacher’s classes and act as an audio aid - a.k.a. "the native speaker". Also since I arrived I’ve had the great responsibility to be substituting the other American’s classes, one conversation group and another upper intermediate class. It’s been a great challenge - "battlefield experience" as Kate called it - and a lot of fun to get to know the students, and learning as I go how to teach them. Luckily I have a Coloradan accent which is much clearer to understand whereas the other American is from Minnesota and has a lisp as well. This has helped to ingratiate me to the students and covered up the fact I’m clueless about clauses, the ‘third form’ of verbs, and present perfect continuous tense.

Classes will end in June for the summer and then I’ll be doing mostly summer conversation groups and going to the summer camp in the Crimea, a peninsula in the Black Sea heavily fought over throughout the centuries and Ukrainians’ favorite holiday retreat. I’ll be there for about 10-20 days depending on how many camps I go to. It will be lots of fun and hard work but I’m really looking for to it! Also I’ll be starting some private lessons as well to supplement my meager income. Now that means I’ll have to learn how to teach one-on-one, as if I didn’t have enough challenges! Well back to the grind, have to work my way through this wide, intriguing world.

Chapter 3 – 5 kilos of potatoes

So I finally found a supermarket near my home. Let me explain first what a market is like and then how it can be made ‘super’. Markets are made up of kiosks, some more permanent structures, some merely metal rods fitted with plastic coverings which are disassembled each night. They are everywhere, a stall or two here, a whole strip of them there. The goods are displayed with the prices and you must tell the prodavets (salesperson) how much of what good you’d like, they dole it out to you and then you pay. (Note: Here you do not hand the money directly to the cashier. There is almost always a little dish that you place the money into, they take it from there and deposit the change in the dish again. I’m not sure why they do this, possibly to make it easier to count the money both for you and the cashier.) Anyways, in the more permanent structures everything is placed behind a glass partition so you have to either say the product’s name clearly or you can revert to pointing and body language. Needless to say much of my shopping is done by the latter process. Keep in mind all products are sold this way, fruits and veggies, bread, pantyhose, shampoo, everything.

A Supermarket is therefore super due to the fact that most of its products are placed on shelves where you can actually just go and pick up what you want and place it in your basket. Amazing concept!! Then you go and pay for all of it at the end of the shopping trip. This is a fairly new style of shopping brought in from the west during the wane of communism. However there are still some products that you need to go and ask the prodavets for, such as meats, candy and – ta da! – vegetables. I believe that is because they are the more expensive products (except for candy) and the supermarkets here are much more diligent in preventing theft, or at least don’t have the luxury of cctv everywhere, unlike in England.

So now my story… I go to the supermarket, excited by the prospect of not having to bother actually talking to anybody and grab what I need, until it comes to the time to buy vegetables. Well I definitely need at least apples and potatoes, my staples for life. I get five apples no problem. I ask for 5 potatoes (5 individual, little potatoes), what do I get instead? Five kilograms of potatoes. As the prodavets is scooping out more and more of the versatile vegetable into a bag, my eyes grow wide and my mind is searching desperately for the words to say “No, I only wanted 5 individual potatoes!” Unfortunately the salesgirl’s hands were faster than my mind and as she handed me my sack of spuds, I was forced to hand over my meager gryvnias and begin contemplating what to do with the 5 kilos.

Chapter 2 - Walk around the city

The second weekend I was in Kharkov one of the teachers I met, Julia, invited me to go to an art exhibition. We met at one of the metro stops and proceeded to walk first to the central market to buy me a new alarm clock as mine had just broken. The central market is huge, crowded and filled with ten stalls all selling exactly the same products for a difference of one gryvnia. You can get food (freshly picked or killed), electronic goods, household goods, heels and soles for shoes in case you need to repair your own. Basically anything you can imagine or can’t even imagine, you can get here.

After that we walked back to the central part of town, past the opera house and a little park with a fountain that when functioning creates a mirror-like surface, thus giving it the name of "Miro-jet". Arriving at the museum we walked through the small two-room exhibition displaying photography by a Ukrainian artist that depicted life in various parts of Ukraine. There were pictures of Cossacks, Tartars, men playing violins and accordions in the Carpathian Mountains, beautiful girls seen through decaying windows in Lvov and parades of firemen through tiny towns. It was a lovely little exhibit.

Not wanting to end our day out quite yet, Julia and I walked to Gorky Park where we took the cable car ("rope road" in Russian) across the forest and ended up on the other side of town. Then we walked back and popped into a coffee shop (first one I’ve actually seen here) and had a coffee while the rain had its way out on the street. Finally walking back the rest of the way we eventually made it to Lenin - a central landmark. We then departed at the same metro station where we had met. In all we had spent the better part of a day together and about 5 hours of walking, which was the most I’d done in one stretch in a long time so needless to say I was absolutely beyond tired. But it was one of the best days I’ve had here so my worn-out limbs were well worth the experience of speaking Russian with someone and learning more about the city.

Chapter 1 - Living with Babushka

Ludmila Semyonova is a stereotypical Russkaya (Ukrainskaya) grandmother. She’s wears the same two or three outfits around the house everyday. Changes into her Sunday best, including little hat, when she goes strolling or to buy drinking water from the local water truck. She’s lived in this same flat for about twenty years. I actually don’t know that much about her beyond her age (75), the fact she has a daughter living in Kharkov and that she likes to watch the Russian version of The Nanny (complete with Russian version of Fran Drescher, who is just as annoying to listen to except without the distinctive laugh). She and I don’t talk all that much, mostly because she knows no English and when I try to use my fledgling Russian with her she doesn’t understand me. I like to think that is more because she’s hard of hearing than any deficiency on my part, but I’m sure it’s a bit of both.

Since I work primarily in the evenings I spend my mornings at home where she and I stay out of each other’s way. She doesn’t cook much for herself let alone for anyone else and after the first week’s confusion as to the exact arrangement of things, I’ve been providing my own means of sustenance which makes for interesting trips to either the supermarket, preferably, or the regular market place. Because of this my diet is a simple one of sausage, bread, and eggs, oh my! Along with cereal, coffee and (thank god for frozen foods!) pelmeni, the Russian equivalent to stuffed tortellini and vareniki, the Ukrainian version. Unfortunately for me, pastries and cookies are many, various and everywhere, usually involving some sort of cheese (they have a dozen types of cottage cheese). My will power has left me since I learned how to say “Give me please…” Also candy of all sorts can be found here. From 1,001 chocolates to a hundred types of caramels, if you can imagine it, they probably have it.

As for my flat… I was lucky enough to get a whole room to myself, a fairly good-sized one as well. It has a twin bed-futon like thing that’s falling apart and the pillow is I’m sure made of sand in a bag but hey, at least it’s something. There is a nice empty (until my excessive amount of luggage filled it) wardrobe and a table where my laptop, books and work stuff all sit in some semblance of order. I live on the 10th floor of a 12-storey Soviet-era building. Meaning – a big white block that looks like every other big white block on the street. There is a doorman and woman who monitor who come in and out of the building. Usually there are quite a few babushki (plural of babushka) sitting out in front of the door so it’s like walking the gauntlet when I wish to enter or exit. One day the head babushka asked me my name on my way out and I said “Dasha” (which is a real Russian name and easier for people than Dacia). So now the head grandmother recognizes me and greets me as Dashenka (the diminutive of Dasha). The gauntlet has thus been breeched.

Дядя Ленин – Uncle Lenin

The largest square in Europe is located in Kharkov – Freedom Square. During the Orange Revolution it was packed with young people in orange, jumping, shouting and dancing at one end and on the other, old ladies in red who were trying desperately and not achieving success in counterbalancing the energy coming from the sea of citrus colored supporters. I walk through this square everyday on my way to work. Everyday I’m greeted by my good old friend, Uncle Lenin. That’s right V.I. still has a place in the hearts – or at least squares – of Ukrainians. A large statue placed on top of a huge granite block engraved full of proletarians marching to a better life stands at the far end of Freedom Square. His hand outstretched pointing to the golden future Communism promises. Of course nowadays his hand points to the public pay toilets.

Passing through the park area behind Lenin, I come to an extraordinary building. One of the first of the modernist style in the former USSR. What does that mean now? It’s rather weird looking and decrepit.

N.B. Modern Architecture – the buildings and building practices of the late 19th and the 20th centuries. Famous architects of the Modernist style include Charles Rennie Mackintosh whose influence can be seen throughout Glasgow, Scotland and Frank Lloyd Wright who pioneered modernism in America by designing houses with flowing interior spaces and projecting roofs. Notable structures include the Crystal Palace in London (which, for a time I lived only three stops away from its former location) and the Eiffel Tower in Paris.

What makes this building that once housed governmental departments and now offices of the New Russians, so unique is the building materials used in its construction - concrete and reinforced steel rods. So in effect it is a massive building, interestingly designed, with a dark grey color that matches the cloudy skies here and does not give off a friendly vibe. Last year the city of Kharkov celebrated its 350th anniversary of being a city (amazing how one relatively new city in Europe predates my government’s erection and even my family’s immigration). Since many a VIP was to come to Kharkov to share in the festivities this building got a bit of a face lift – literally. Now as you approach this marvel of modernism the façade that welcomes visitors is a slightly brighter shade of grey, not so imposing or somber as its original. However as you retreat farther underneath it’s high-flying bridge connecting two halves of the structure you find the remnants of its creation myth. The old dark and rather chilling grey of Soviet times. The contrast of a newly painted face hiding the hard truth of decay is a tribute still to the Potemkin villages of old.

But enough of that. You didn’t come to read about architecture and hypocrisy. Or maybe you did.

Coming Next time:

Ukraine Unraveled [I’m a big fan of alliteration, in case you didn’t notice]
Chapter 1 – Living with babushka
Chapter 2 – Walk around the city
Chapter 3 – 5 kilos of potatoes
Chapter 4 – Life as a teacher
Chapter 5 – Nikolai – encounter in the metro
Chapter 6 – Toilet Tales
Chapter 7 – Metro vs. Tube – Mind the Gap
Chapter 8 – Communing with Nature – or – Insect air stream
Chapter 9 – Kharkov: Denver with a metro