Birthday happenings:

С Днём Рождения! Here's a rundown of my Birthday weekend:

-Early celebration at Lviv Handmade Chocolates

-Daisies, Malina berries, and a book of Pushkin Fairy-tales from my Russian Teacher

-Long text messages wishing me success, beauty, happiness, love, etc. from 3 of my previous students who remembered my birthday

-A Putin/Cheburashka themed Birthday card (score) and Crocodile Gena stuck in my head for hours

-A bottle of Champagne, chocolates, and a birthday song from my Coworkers

-Ukrainian-style pie after work with a good Ukrainian friend (and the cat who sat next to us)

-American party at my apartment with Kievskiiy Cake (actually, the cake is kind of weird, but cool that it was Kievskiiy!)


Amazing weekend, but tomorrow it's back to work. I love my students, but for some reason I haven't been given the schedule for classes tomorrow, so I just have to get there early and hope that I can find out where to go/what to do with enough time to spare for planning... I live life on the edge! (literally, because the name "Ukraine"/"Украина" means "On the edge") Wish me luck!

Life is good, my friends. Жизнь --- хорошо.
Sarah

P.S. I forgot to mention one of the best parts of last week, which was when the great April Curtis came to Kiev from St. Petersburg and hung out with yours truly. What a Дама. Had some beers, shot the breeze, listened to some cool, cool jazz in the city center. SO glad she came!

It's the moooost wonderful tiiiime of the yeeeeeeear!

Dear Wonderful World,

It's my BIRTHDAY! I'll update you on how it goes later, but first I need to fill you in on what happened before I turned 22... in numbered format.

1. Master Class on Ukrainian Cooking: Sharlotka and Draniki. One of my students invited me to meet his family and learn some Ukrainian home cooking skills. We made a delicious apple cake called Sharlotka and grated potato pancakes called Draniki (or in Ukrainian, Deruni) SO good, and also the most adorable family I've ever met in my life. I have a soft-spot for Eastern-European children. LOVE them. The baby loves the apple cake. The boy likes staring contests (seriously, that's why he's doing the crazy eye thing).


2. Halloween! We had a party at work with some students form the Naval academy and our awesome receptionists. We carved pumpkins, played never-have-I-ever, had vodka with tomato juice (supposed to look like blood?) and went home early since it was, unfortunately, a Monday. But look how cute our sad pumpkin is! (btw, we did all the carving with that blue bread knife and a butter knife covered in old paint. We're pretty skilled.)


3. My birthday in the Philippines: As a good friend informed me, my Birthday began in the Philippines about 6 hours earlier than in Kiev, so when I met with my Ukrainian friend we didn't have to worry about the common superstition of celebrating a birthday early being bad luck. A poor excuse, but my Birthday lasts longer this way! We went to a famous Chocolate cafe called Lviv Handmade Chocolates where they also have great coffee (which we both love), and later I ordered CHOCOLATE TEA. Seriously? Yes. Chocolate tea. I have no idea how it works, but it was pretty good. In Russia and Ukraine you can put chocolate in anything and it will make it better, just like sour cream. Chocolate tea? Oh yeah. Chocolate condensed milk? Good idea. Chocolate Butter? Why the hell not. Chocolate is always good.


I love everyone here so much. I love chocolate and coffee. I love Kiev. I love my life.
Sarah

p.s. --- On Monday I have a skype interview for a teaching job in Georgia... Wish me luck!

My Dearest Readers...

...I am in love with Kiev right now. I can't even explain it. What we have --- it's something special. I had a wonderful Saturday exploring the north-east corner of the city center with my new Ukrainian tour-guide friend. We walked through Andreevskiy spusk/uzviv/street/whatever, which is a famous old street that turns into a giant flea-market during the day. We also found our way on top of an abandoned building to take some sweet pictures of St. Andrew's Church:


Afterwards my fellow intern and I went to the Kiev National Opera which was BALLER as I'll get out. We saw Tchaikovskii's "Yolanta," about a blind princess who grew up not realizing that there was such a thing as light. It's a crazy plot, but it got lost in the fact that they were singing complicated unintelligible arias... I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have understood it even if it was in English. Good thing I read the synopsis on Wikipedia beforehand :) Anyway, it was really fun, and a good excuse to get dressed up. Ta-da!


The other day I FINALLY was able to explore my neighborhood a bit, and found out that there is a GIGANTIC park just a few blocks away. I spent my Sunday afternoon walking around the trails there, people-watching and listening to the Russian and Ukrainian conversations around me. It was kind of nice. Also there were lots of dogs, ducks, and babies which made me happy :)

Then Monday happened, and now I'm back at work. I loooooooove my students, they are so COOL! (some of them are reading this... Hi guys!) They tell me that they will celebrate my birthday with me, with poppy-seed pie, pirozhki, coffee and 3 liters of milk. We might celebrate at McDonalds, but perhaps we'll go to Barcelona. It's all up to Serendipity. My life is fantastic.

Sarah