Winter Break: Ice Skating, Eating Classic American Food, and Playing in the Snow

Over winter break, I spent a lot of time hanging out with my sister and our family since I hadn't been home for over 2 years. It has been great just relaxing at home, without worrying about things like if my internet/power will go out when it storms and whether today is the day that I have to finally handwash my laundry.

My sister and I had originally planned on going ice skating in downtown San Francisco on Christmas Eve - they have a cute little ice rink in Union Square, right across from Macy's. Unfortunately, that ice rink is really small and always overcrowded. We were about to head downtown when my parents reminded me to check tickets online, and the tickets were sold out until that evening. These photos are from a week before Christmas.

The ice is so busy!

But the rink is right next to the Christmas tree in the center of Union Square. 

So we went ice skating at a rink closer to our house instead, which actually turned out to be better since there were less people and the ice was much cleaner. My sister and I wore our Christmas-themed headbands haha. See how there is almost no one on the ice?

Throwing up the peace sign. 

Gotta love how the California flag flies everywhere. 

Happy holidays from the Li sisters!

Since I've been back for almost a month now, I've been enjoying all sorts of classic American foods that I couldn't have in Ukraine. Well, I guess I could have tried to cook these dishes, but they just wouldn't have turned out the same. Plus a lot of imported foods are expensive, so the cost of preparing American dishes probably would have outweighed the benefit of having comfort food. Anyway, here are just a few dishes that I've had since I've been home (apologies to my friends who are in Ukraine for making you hungry).

Quesadillas with steak - only in California can you find organic Mexican food. 

A Classic Chinese beef noodle soup with "bubble tea" (milk tea with tapioca balls).

A good Southern meal - pulled pork with BBQ sauce, macaroni and cheese,  fried okra, and a biscuit. 

In'n'Out Burger! My sister and I had a classic cheeseburger, hamburger, and cheese fries (from their  "secret menu"). 

BBQ riblets and fries from Applebees!

Boneless chicken wings with ranch dressing and celery from Applebees. 

Chicken tacos from Chipotle Mexican Grill. 

One of my all-time favorite appetizers: fried mozzarella sticks with marinara sauce from Applebees. 

We drove up to Tahoe which is about 3 hours away from where we live in California, and its in the mountains so there is quite a bit of snow there. They had over 3 feet of snow on the ground, but it was barely 30 degrees F outside. Since we don't "play" in the snow often, my sister didn't have any winter clothes and she borrowed my lime green ski jacket and hat :D

Lots of snowy trees along the highway. 

My sister sledding down the hill on our little dish. 

Even my dad went sledding a few times!

My sister and I.

Yup, thats one huge snowdrift about 3 ft tall. 

Kharkiv American English Club, Ice Skating and Going to the Theater!

I seem to be getting more and more behind in my blog posts. April was a really busy month for me, so here are a few updates on what extracurricular activities I've been up to besides just working in my school...

For the past few months, the Peace Corps Volunteers in Kharkiv Oblast have been organizing free English clubs at the Kharkiv American Center. We meet once monthly and usually we have about an hour of general speaking club, then we show an American movie and discuss different themes from the movie. This English club has been pretty successful, we started out in December with about 10 people and its grown to about 30 attendees.

February English club. 

In March, our English club theme was St.Patrick's Day! I told everyone to wear something green ahead of time, but some of the Ukrainians thought this was strange (because they didn't know the tradition of wearing green). We presented about the history and traditions of St. Patrick's day and then we watched the movie "Leap Year". Afterwards, we went to an Irish restaurant in downtown Kharkiv to celebrate.

March English club group. 

with my sitemate Sam, Byron and our friend Artom. 

Laura, Erika and Anton. 

 While hanging out in downtown Kharkiv, I've discovered a few cool things to do and places to see that I didn't know about last year... this is the advantage of making friends with more locals who know more about their hometown! I went ice skating with a few friends and some students in a huge shopping mall called Karavan which is located near the metro station Heroiv Truda (the last stop on the blue line). It cost only 30 UAH (about $3) for an hour of ice skating, which really surprised me because things are usually very expensive in the city.

with the ice skating group. 

Ty and Ira together. 

with Liza, Yulia, and Stas. 

I found another giant Adidas soccer ball in the Karavan mall! These things are oversized versions of the official EuroCup match balls and they are popping up everywhere now that EuroCup is approaching soon... I saw one of these first inside the Globos mall in Kyiv (located under Independence Square) and I've also seen one in Kharkiv near the main train station.

Just kickin' it. 

I also discovered a small Vietnamese restaurant very close to the center. Its called Fanzi Pan and located right down the hill from Pushinskaya Street, near the metro station Architectora Beketova (on the green line).  I ordered their Pho and some rice crackers, and it was great being able to eat some asian food! I hadn't had Pho since I left Atlanta about 2 years ago.

They also had some great floor-to-ceiling wallpaper so I couldn't resist taking a photo with it. 

my Pho and rice crackers! mmmmm.... 

Winter Adventures in Ukraine

Brrrrr... its so cold here in Ukraine now! It has been between -10 and -20 degrees C in my town, which is definitely a lot colder than winters in Atlanta, GA. Many children are getting the flu, and schools across Ukraine tend to either shorten classes or cancel school altogether when it gets too cold outside. Many of my friends who live in the Donetsk Oblast have quarantine at their schools, meaning that school has been canceled to prevent the students from getting sick from each other. Well, I'm not sure how cold is "too cold" to go to school, but my school is still operating normally for now. My town newspaper published an article about me coming to work at the Lyceum and about my sitemate Sam who works at the Gymnasium in our town. Here are two photos from the newspaper- I uploaded them and can't seem to rotate them back to horizontal (sorry, blogfail!).

My picture from the front page.

In the classroom with a few of my 8th grade students.

This past weekend, I traveled to visit my friend Alison in the neighboring town (about an hour away from me). Alison lives in an apartment building close to her town's Бокзал (vokzal - train station) and right next to a swimming pool! We went swimming with a few teachers from her school, which was quite the adventure... they made us take legit showers (including washing our bodies with soap) before we put on our swimsuits, only then were you allowed to get into the pool area. Most swimming pools have a rule that you should shower before swimming, but this was honestly the first pool that I have been to in many years that strictly enforces the shower before swimming rule.

The pool turned out to be a 3 lane by 20 meter pool, which was completely strange and foreign to me. I've traveled to quite a few countries and swam in their pools, and this is the FIRST pool that I have encountered that hasn't been one of the international standard lengths of 25 meters (short course), 25 yards (American short course), or 50 meters (Olympic size/long course). They only had one lap swim lane, and no T on the bottom or flags... but they did have blocks! I wish I could have taken a photo of the pool, but I forgot to bring my camera with me.

There is also an outdoor skating rink and football stadium near Alison's apartment. While the football field is completely snowed over, the ice skating rink is super cute. You can rent skates and go ice skating there for just $8 UAH (the equivalent of $1 USD) per hour. Alison goes ice skating there frequently with students from her school, and they invited me to go along with them!

Yasa and I - she is one of Alison's cute 6th graders.

Alison and a few more of her students.

Yesterday, Alison's sitemate Tiago met up with us downtown and we went to their Bazaar (open air market) to go shopping for some fresh food. We decided to make pizza using lavash (the Ukrainian version of tortillas) and random toppings such as pineapple, ham, cheese, tomatoes, onions, mushrooms, beans, and red bell peppers. The pizza was really easy to make and turned out delicious!

so many toppings!

Today, Alison and Tiago and I decided to go check out the old steel mill on the edge of their town. The Kharkiv region used to be a very busy industrial production area with many factories about 50 or 60 years ago. It used to be one of the biggest steel mills during Soviet times, and they employed around 35,000 workers. I'm not sure what happens in the steel mill now (since my industrial Russian vocabulary is pretty limited), but there are still guards posted at the entrances to the mill and the factory is still surrounded by barbed wire. We were hoping to be able to walk inside and take a look at their production lines or operations, but the factory is closed to the public so here are some photos from our walk around the outside of the steel mill.

This sign says that this is a Soviet factory.

maybe an old shipping/receiving dock of their warehouse?

One of the old gates to the factory.

piles of old materials covered in snow.

A crane and some sort of conveyor belt behind the gate.

This week at school, I taught the Past Continuous tense to my 5th grade class. I wrote out a bunch of different verbs, pronouns, and all the names of the students for them to come up to the board and build a sentence in the Past Continuous tense (disclaimer: the teacher that I work with wrote the stuff on the chalkboard). Also, I applied for Darien Book Aid and my request got approved! That means that 20 lbs of free English books will be shipped to my site soon. I'm really excited to see what they send us :)

Helping one of my students learn Past Continuouse.

5th graders love talking about playing football!

 One of the English teachers that I work with at my school was nice enough to give me a jar of pickles and a jar of pickled squash. Her name is Svetlana and she hosted the Peace Corps volunteer that my school had from 2006-08. She brought me pickles because she remembered that the other PCV girl loved pickles... I love Ukrainian pickles too! The pickles here are all home grown and home-made, canned in glass mason jars. And this reminds me of  The Pickle Project, a project by two girls who worked in Ukraine as Fulbright Scholars. You can check out their project here about the local foodways of Ukraine, including the sustainable food practices of growing and selling produce locally.

Mmmm... pickled squash and cucumbers!

Merry Christmas from Ukraine! С Рождеством!

So I have now officially spent my first Christmas in Ukraine! Classes ended at my school last Friday on Christmas Eve, and the kids were all so excited to begin the holiday season... I taught a 4th form class all 3 verses to Jingle Bells! And after they learned the english words, they sang the Russian version of the song to me!

Then they sang a Ukrainian New Year's song about a Christmas tree to me and demonstrated the dance to it :)

A bunch of kids stopped me in the hallway to take a picture in between classes.

  In Ukraine, they have a really intense holiday season. They celebrate New Years as Americans would celebrate Christmas, with a Christmas tree decorated with ornaments and lights and exchanging presents. The Orthodox Church uses the Julian calendar, which is 13 days behind the Gregorian calendar, used in Europe and North America. Therefore the Ukrainians celebrate Christmas on January 7, 13 days later than the Catholic world and then they celebrate the Old New Year on January 13th. Russia and Ukraine officially switched to the western calendar after the 1917 Revolution. My school held a New Year's party in their auditorium on Friday and invited me to sit with all the parents in the back.

Several teachers put on a short play for the kids.

All the children dress up as if it was Halloween!

My little town also put up a big Christmas tree in the central plaza and had a little celebration on Christmas Eve. They sang a few of the same traditional Ukrainian Christmas carols and walked around the tree.

Cultural Moment: This is the first time that I have seen Christmas lights strung on a tree vertically instead of spiraled around the tree.

All the kids linked hands and walked around the tree.

For Christmas day, I traveled to meet up with a few other Peace Corps volunteers in Kharkiv. It was interesting to make new friends and hang out in the big city! We went to a pizza parlor for Christmas dinner, which was nice because it was American food :)

They served ice cubes!!! This is the first time that I've even seen ice cubes here!

My neighbor Alison! She only lives about 30 minutes away from my town.

Yes, this is a dog wearing a tracksuit. Dogs get cold too!

On Sunday, we walked around downtown Kharkiv and did a little bit of sightseeing. We walked down Pushinska Street, known for its famous shops and restaurants. This is one of the famous statues in Kharkiv.

This is a GIANT thermometer, hanging on the side of the building! Seeing a 3 story tall thermometer was almost the best part of my day... though of course it was in Celsius and not Fahrenheit haha.

We also passed the famous Philarmonic Theater along our journey, which also had a really cool monument of four musicians in front of it.

I am dwarfed by the statues!

Two of the other PCV's in my region, Ty and Tiago, stopped to conquer the last remaining bit of snow on the ground.

We also walked by Kharkiv's Dolphin Aquarium! We didn't pay the admission fee to go inside but the outside reminded me a lot of the Georgia Aquarium. i was sad that all the fountains were turned off for the winter, but I'm sure that place will be really cool to visit in the summer. And apparently you can pay to swim with the dolphins too, which would be really awesome!

You guessed it... Dolphin is a cognate.

Rawr!

What an awesome blowfish.

And now for the best part of the day.... we went to the Shevchenkov Park and saw the big Christmas tree in the city center, then went ice skating! I haven't gone ice skating for a few years, and certainly haven't been to an outdoor ice skating rink in forever! I always wanted to go ice skating in Centennial Olympic Park (in Atlanta) but never had the chance to go.

Alison being a superstar :)

Our Ukrainian friend Vadym.

I love ice skating!

Alison and her sitemate Tiago.

Ty showing off his skating skills.

The big Christmas tree reminds me of the one in Atlantic Station (in Atlanta) and the big one in Macy's Square in San Francisco! This plaza was filled with lots of holiday festivities, including some amusement park rides and GIANT Russian dolls. If we had more time, I was going to go take a ride on a llama. 

Gotta love the artsy-fartsy angle!

Little kids are so adorable on the baby roller-coasters.

A baby pony, I was too busy debating whether or not to go have a llama ride to remember to take a picture of it.

Look how big those Russian dolls are!

So now that American Christmas is over... the Ukrainian New Years Holiday is coming soon and I am traveling back to Kyiv to visit my host family for New Years next weekend! I can't wait to see Mama Sveta and maybe tour some of the holiday festivities in Kyiv, I have heard they also have a huge Christmas tree on display in Independence Square :)