Day off at K Y I V.

Yesterday was our day off and we got the opportunity to visit the capital. Kyiv, Ukraine. 

The plan was to take a train - about a 2hr ride from our small town Ніжин to Куіv. 

4 of the youth counselors got to go with us. Vanya, Ruslan, Nadia, and Alina. The day started off right - more or less 

When the train arrived at the station we walked up all the way to the first cabin because that's where our ticket seats were. However, the man at the door checking the tickets would not allow us to board because some of us Americans forgot to bring any form of I.D. with us and that's how they confirm the name on the ticket. Time was winding down and Vanya was trying to explain that we were not aware and to excuse us Americans. But he wouldn't. We jogged to the next cabin but no luck there either. The man said we can try talking to the woman in charge of that train but she was all the way at almost the last cabin. We had about a minute before the train departed. We ran the full length of the train and it started to move - talk about suspense - I don't know what Vanya told the lady from out the train as it was moving and picking up speed. But he gave us the signal to jump on. So we did as it was in motion!

Funny thing is we then got upgraded to rooms instead of seats lol - funny way to start our day. 

Ukrainians drink a lot of tea. Delicious mint teas, Indian Spice teas, Tai teas, etc,..we even got complimentary teas on the ride. 

Sort of felt we were to hogwarts riding on this train haha

Arriving to the huge city of Kyiv was a beautiful sight. We rode over the lake Дніпро to enter it. 

We finally arrived. You can notice very quickly the difference between a small and this massive city. So many types of people moving along back and forth - coming and going. First thing was to get on the subway to our first destination. We got to the station to take to escalators far down underground. I found out later that this station was the world record deepest subway station in the world. 

Once we got to our stop we still had to walk a bit to get to our first destination.

After walking a bit we arrived the Lavra. A beautiful monestary constructed almost 1100 years ago. You see monks walking around this old monastery. We weren't allowed to take pictures of them because according to them it takes their soul and they die. Of course I was tempted so much to take a picture. But I was afraid they would just collapse and die in front of me lol 

We weren't allowed to take pictures of the first museum we visited but it was a beautiful exhibition of miniature microscopic pieces. Hard to explain but the only way to see the art pieces was through a microscope. 

We visited the War museum as well. A display on the events on World War II. Again we weren't allowed to take pictures inside the museums but they were pretty cool and sad at moments. 

Especially two rooms where they had an authentic guiatine that the german Nazi's used to decapitate the people. But the most troubling was seeing the actual machine known as a bone crusher. Men, woman, children would be put one by one into this machine on one end and basically would be spit out in bags on the other. Sorry for that graphic thought. It just boggles my mind how heartless and evil the plot to murder was during the war. 

A couple of subways later, for lunch. Couple of subways later for the Chenorbyl museum. Ukriane is home to the greatest nuclear accident in history. Learning about what happened was really interesting. I'm a nerd for all these things. 

 

Finally went back home. No jumping on moving trains this time around. Rested after a long day. 

This morning church service was awesome. Got to see a lot of the kids one last time before the new set of kids come in for week 2 of camp tomorrow.

Had the Lord's Supper together with the church. 

This is the last Sunday for a service here with them.  

End of Camp week 1

What a week. Seriously, I am exhausted. But I literally loved every second of it. 

I will miss the kids I was with this whole week. I will miss teaching them english. They have impacted me so much. The love they constantly show me is overwhelming. 

 

Week 2 of camp is all brand new kids. So although I will miss the ones I became friends with - I am excited to meet the new comers. I will be given the chance to interact with the kids even more this time around. 

So many memories have been made this week and I've still got a whole week left. Honestly, I will definitely be leaving a piece of my heart in Ukraine. I love the people, pastor, youth, couselors, church, food, everything! 

Camp is 7 straight hours of interacting, playing, teaching, and learning with the kids. There are 2 snack times - one in the morning and another late afternoon. Lunch is at 1:30p everyday. Before I begin teaching my English class I am a leader in team green (Zeleni). 

This is Anya (red) and Vera (green). They would literally slightly argue to constantly sit next to me for every activity throughout the day. If one of them won the battle of sitting next to me the other would just sit on my lap lol but I learned a lot of Ukranian cause of them. 

During this week at camp. We were all given a 'secret friend' in which everyday of the week we would anonymously give a small gift to our secret friend. And today - Friday -  we would find out who our secret friend was. 

Some of the gifts I recieved from my secret friend was a Lipton Green Tea, a Kiwi, and a Nezhin souvenir magnet. They were awesome gifts with a note everyday. I found out today it was a Enya. Enya is great! I call her the craziest girl out the counselors. She's extremely funny and hyper! She studies jazz music at the university. We've already had our music jam sessions. She also makes fun of me and gave me the nickname Krasnii Shorts which means red shorts in Russian. Because the first night we played volleyball with the counselors my team would crush her team and I played good that day and she would mock me. I wore red shorts that day. 

I had Enya's sister as my secret friend. Some of the gifts I gave her was a famous Ukranian chocolate and a huge lollipop, etc,..  

Volleyball is like THE sport we play for like 3 hours after camp. It's so much fun just laughing and having a great time. We are playing basketball next week! 

Today I got to walk around the city on my own a bit. Got on a bus and went to other side of town. Went to a few markets outdoors and indoors. It was great just trying to communicate lol 

At the end of camp today, all the kids parents were invited to come to the church for a special celebration -  To show the parents everything they learned in the camp. I lead a worship song today at the celebration. I co-lead it with Vanya. I sang the first half in English and he the second in Ukraine. 

We are finally here at mama Luba's house for a much needed rest. 

Tomorrow will be an awesome day! We are taking a 2 hour train ride to Kiev. We are going to a couple of museums. And walk around a bit

Can't wait. 

Angleski (English)

Just finished day 2 of camp. 

Camp is crazy - I love it! about 180 kids running around a church building. 

This week, my role at the camp is the English station. I have never really taught kids before but I am really enjoying it. And it feels good when they all say they want to hang out with me and like 30 kids come to give me a massive hug at the same time - or how I have about 20 different secret handshakes with so many of them haha 

The day starts off with all the counselors meeting at church at 9a where we spend time doing a devotional (which reminds me I should be giving mine soon...), praying, and talking about the days tasks. Then at 10a kids arrive and camp starts. The first couple of hours they are split into bible lesson class, music, games, etc,.. During that time I am seething up my class downstairs. My class starts at 12:45p. After that I am pretty much teaching English till about 3:30 to different groups. 

I was nervous and excited but I survived - thought I did pretty good for never teaching kids lol - and according to the team leaders, the kids ask for my class since the moment they arrive in the morning so that makes me feel good haha. 

When the first day of camp was over the couselors played volleyball for a couple of hours. It doesn't get dark here until about 10p - crazy - so the days are really long. 

Today, for the second day of camp I felt more comfortable and confident. Once again enjoyed teaching them basic English like the days of the week, numbers, phrases. We are actually working on a project in my English class where we are making a scrapbook of a 'pretend' trip my class is taking to the U.S.A. It's fun. 

Two pretty cool things happened to me today. First was...well, there is this prayer room we have upstairs and all the couselors are to sign up to spend 15 mins of their day in that prayer room. I signed up to pray at 2p. It's during my lunch. I try not to eat much at camp because we already get fed mountains and mountains of food at mama Luba's house. In my 15 mins of seeking God and just praying for the camp, and the kids, my family and all...I felt such a strong presence just come over me. It was heavy. I actually didn't want to leave that room. My 15 mins felt like an hour. It was such a great feeling. I prayed for a lot of things. The one thing I felt the strongest was such peace. I left the room feeling new. Back to the craziness of teaching and chasing kids around. Or in this case...being chased by them.

The second thing, and this is random, is that i got to play guitar and sing in Russian today in front of all the kids haha we do a skit for the kids everyday at the end of the day and for today's skit I had to pretend I was in love with a girl and played guitar and sang the chorus of a song in Russian. Which I literally learned 5 mins before that. The kids seemed to love it they all cheered lol that was fun! 

Day 3 tomorrow.

Had no time for pictures. Will try and take some tomorrow