Dasvidanya!

Ah man...Ive been having such a great time here. How could I ever leave?! Ha, alright, Im not in love with Ukraine THAT much. Im pretty sure that one of the reasons everything has been so good is because Im coming home and so Ive been appreciating things more. But really, I am going to miss living here. Maybe in my next blog Ill put up a full list of things Ill miss (like the culture, the metros, the kids I teach, Independence Sq...) and things I wont miss (undrinkable water, no washing machine or dryer, my matress, the pigeons...). It would be interesting to see which one was longer. ;)

Its crazy to think that today is my last day here. I couldnt feel further from home right now, but tomorrow, Ill be back in America. Last night I rode my last Marshrutka! Instead of being pissed that I was freezing my butt off and risking frost bite waiting for it, like I usually am, I was enjoying the wait by dancing. Haha, Ive been doing that a lot lately. I used to restrain myself because the people here dont even smile, let alone sing and dance. But Ive found that I honestly dont care what people think about me. And as soon as they hear that Im singing in English, and am probably an American, they seem to understand lol.
Im going to miss those Marshrutkas...


Ive grown to really love all those smelly Ukrainians that Im squished between. Now that there's snow and ice everywhere Ive noticed that usually a guy will get off first then hold out a hand for all the women getting off. Its sweet. One time, I totally fell out of a marshrutka and not one, not 2, but 3 people helped me up. (I would have said offered to help me up, but they didnt. They just picked me up, brushed me off, and went on their way.)
Oh and the metro...Ill miss the metro dearly. Ever since I first rode metro/subway in Chicago, I was in love. I wish every city had them instead of just those that are big.

Even though I WILL miss Riah, I think Im more happy to be rid of her. She's like that mean, stubborn grandmother that you never really wanted to have, lol. She's always pinching or slapping me. (and it hurts!) For reasons like if she thinks I put too much pepper on my food. She's also taken to knocking me on the head if I do something stupid...which I guess I do a lot, but they're just little things like forgetting my gloves or hat, tripping on the carpet, dropping something on the ground, putting my bag on the bed instead of the floor...you know, everyday things lol.
I wont miss her food. Well, except for her varenyky. But anyways, all I ate for 4 months was borscht, couscous, plain noodles, and mashed potatoes. No fruits or vegatables (except for what I bought, which was very little, b/c Ive been broke for a while lol) and no meat. Im practically a vegetarian now.

I thought I'd share with you the ONE time I had a breakdown. Yes, I had only one breakdown...Impressive huh? No, not really. I honestly rarely have actual tears come out of my eyes, (other than at church, i mean). Normally when Riah wakes up at 5 in the morning she'll leave me alone and keep her radio thing turned down but sometimes she'll be loud on purpose...she's very bipolar. This one particular morning she had turned up her radio as loud as it could go. I waited for an hour for her to turn it down, which she never did, before I got up and asked her to 'Puzhalsta (please) turn down the radio,' as I pointed to the radio. Riah started yelling 'Ya ni panimayu!' (which is her way of insulting me b/c I frequently have to say that.) I was like, 'Harasho, Ill show you,' and walked over to the radio and made the motion of turning it down. She started yelling at me again (actually she probably never really stopped) and grabed my arm with both hands to yank me away from the radio. It was at this point that I noticed she had a bunch of fish (that she undoubtedly bought from a place like this)

cut up on the table and she was holding and slapping my arm with bloody fish guts ALL over her hands.
I would be pissed in this situation at any time, but put it at 6am and well...
I went to the washroom (slamming the door as loud as possible) and washed my arm for 15 min trying to get the smell off, but it wasnt working. So then I went and sat on the bed crying angry tears for about half an hour. Sometime during all that Riah turned down the radio, so I layed back down and went to sleep. A few hours later when I woke, everything was normal. Haha...probably one of the funniest things Ive cried over.

So last weekend I went to Kamyanets-Podilsky.

Its a medival fortress built in the 10th century on a natural rock island with a large river for a moat. Pretty freaking awesome. We left Kyiv Friday night around 8pm on a 12 hour overnight train ride. We decided to make the trip as cheap as possible and opted for third class instead of second. Third class is not great...especially when youve got a top bunk in the aisle. I dont know why I didnt fall off. Because I should have, it was dangerous lol. The castle was amazing...I still cant believe it. They allowed us to go wherever we wanted, through all the passage ways, and into all the towers. We even had a snowball fight in the courtyard.

We climbed down into the ravine via some ancient stairs and crossed over the river on a rickety bridge. While down there, we also found a waterfall!

At night, Tina and I had a frightening experience in a graveyard in front of this cathedral:

Back in Prague, it was Tina that had gone on the ghost/catacombs tour with me so...we kind of bonded in that 'we've had some freaky experiences together' way, lol. On that tour, we learned that orbs are supposedly the engergy/soul that is released when someone is killed, or died in a violent way. We were in the graveyard (not really thinking about the fact that we were in one...) when Tina turns back to take a picture of the cathedral. I was standing right next to her watching her take it, and this is what she takes

(I recommend clicking on the picture to see the bigger version of it.)
At first I thought it could be snow, but then remembered that we had just been looking at the stars and pointing out Venus right next to the moon. We looked at each other and were like, whoa...weird. Well...there ARE graves at the bottom of this picture...and we ARE in a graveyard. Then we were joking about how it must be their souls. Tina was like, 'here Brea, you take one.' I said sure and walked forward to get more of the graves in the picture. So I hold up the camera, take the picture, and this comes up on the quick view:

I literally felt for a second that something was coming at me. Thankfully, I had the wrist band on, because I dropped the camera. I ran back to Tina and was like, 'Ugh!! Oh my gosh!! Here--take it, look at it. Ugh!' She hit the display button and I was half expecting that what I saw wouldnt even come up, but it did, and she nearly dropped the camera as well. She started running, and I was like, 'Wait!!! Dont leave me here alone!!' and grabbed her bag and ran after her haha. I had tears of like scaredness and 'is this freaking happening??' funny welled up in my eyes. (I dont think that sentence made any sense, but that works because what I was thinking wasnt making any sense either.)
So seriously...there is no way to explain that picture. There was NO mist in the graveyard, k? And it wasnt my breath either, I promise you. I think I might possibly, truely believe in ghosts now...and it only took taking a picture in the graveyard of a cathedral inside an ancient medival fortress city to get to this point haha.

Here are just a few random pictures that really scream UKRAINE! to me.

Walking home from school...

St Andrews

Haha...hahaha...

I cant tell you how many times Ive almost been ran over by cars driving on the sidewalks.

They love their painted wooden eggs here.

My time here has been unbelievably enjoyable. This has certainly been the best year of my life so far with college starting, Chicago, Ukraine, and all the traveling I have done in Europe. Ill always remember Ukraine and even though it may not be the prettiest place in Europe, Ill always have a soft spot in my heart for it.

I LOVE YOU UKRAINE!!! ^_^