millions of creatures could open my eyes

The weekend was wonderful. My first successful train ride in Ukraine. I enjoyed the wonders of Platzkart which to be honest wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. I took a train after my classes on Thursday and then had a run in with the trolley police. Well, not police but controllers. First my trolley didn't come. Then after walking to where my connection was I got on. I was a little flustered and well, I'm generally bad at punching my trolley ticket. Like I should definitely go to remedial punch my trolley ticket school. Nevertheless, the controllers showed up, told me my punch wasn't right. I insisted that I had bought the ticket and punched it there. The lady DID NOT believe me. I told her again that I had that I wasn't from Lviv, but that I had tried my best to do it. She again did not believe me pulling out her very thick glasses to check it and count the dots. She called her friend over, I acted like I was really upset about the whole ordeal repeating that I wasn't from Lviv. They eventually must have thought that no Ukrainian would've put up such a stink and let me go without a fee or any issues. For teh record, I did buy and punch the ticket that day, I'm just really really bad at punching trolley tickets. New skill list to acquire.

After that, I stopped to buy a drink from a lady at the train station and as I didn't have correct change and she being a place of business obviously had NO kopecks, she paid me my 45 kopecks of change in what, that's right strawberry candies. BONUS! a little bit like Christmas not going to lie. After a long wait for the train I have a habit of showing up to early because I get nervous about being late. I got on the train and enjoyed three hours of looking outside at the Ukrainian country side. Side bar: the snow in Lviv had melted giving way to spring, seeing earlier notes. I arrived in Ivano-Frankivsk to snow covered sidewalks much to my anti delight. Joe's bus ended up being late, um a lot late but we'll get to that. SO I took a taxi to John's house, the wonderful volunteer who put us up. I hung out with John a senior volunteer from the middle of Iowa who was fantastic and wonderful. Joe showed up at the place an hour and a half later. Turns out Joe was supposed to get in at 7 or so some Baba on his bus told him. Then when 705 came around he called me to tell me that she said they'd be another 20. Or she wrote down 20 and he wasn't sure if she meant 20 minutes or 8oclock. I waited until about 735 when joe texted to say I could leave if I wanted. Anyway, Joe arrived and it was great to catch up and have time with him just like cluster. SO, we were told some people would be getting in around 6am. Andy being the joy of life he is texted me at 4am asking me where I was. At 6am a head pokes into the room and who is it but an ELATED Andy at seeing Joe and I asleep in the room. Andy proceeds to first jump on Joe exclaiming, "oh my god it's Fluffy." and then heads for my bed. We woke up the next morning had great omelets and then headed to teh warden meeting. Always a joy to spend time with Serhiy Pashinskiy. After all the discussions, I told him I'd be willing to take on a project, sounds like I'll be doing something with a girl's guide to safety. Joe is doing a much cooler project on re-vamping the Emergency Locator Form.

After the meeting we went for waffles/lunch and then headed to bazaars while we waited for John to get back from a meeting. I had fun just wandering around talking and not talking to people. It made me realise as I was walking that everyone else was always looking for someone to walk with or follow. Unfortunately I was not born with this trait. Sometimes it seems like my ability to be just fine on my own can be detrimental. I can't help that I don't mind just being on my own. Life is what it is. On the good side, I got some fantastic gloves and learned the lesson, never settle for the over priced gloves on the stairs when there's probably a half expensive pair in the back stalls. Luckily, I got the back stall cheap gloves. Made John dinner and met Ruth and Alexis who were fantastic.

The next morning, Serhiy Pashinskiy drove us to Kolomiya where the other region had "meet your neighbor" I enjoyed the company of their region and most of all really felt like I was on a vacation for the first time in a long time. we stayed at a great b&b and I laughed teh whole time. I missed being with my boys; plus I met some really great people. The bed and breakfast in Kolomiya was fantastic and if you ever want to go to the Carpathian foothills in a cute town I recommend it. That night we went to dinner and bar where I had a great time and a russian guy grabbed my butt. Awesome. Spent the next day in town with Erin a volunteer from Zakarpatzka oblast who is organizing a half marathon that I'm volunteering at in April. Had a fantastic time. And then, I enjoyed the many joys of taking a late train back and fell asleep on the train. I was sitting up with my head resting against the side of teh car and I drooled down my sleeve, CLASSY! The guy across from me looked at me like I was nuts. So much for good impressions and cross cultural learning. Got home late and woke up to teach. Luckily, I got to sleep in a little.

Unfortunately, after my 3rd form class, they told me that my new counterpart is out sick as in in the hospital. Awesome, I'm a total curse on these teachers I swear. So, I'm covering her classes for who knows how long. That brings me to 21 hours of English (no more French since I'm covering all teh English classes) and then I'm doing 1 hour of English with my director and starting Friday will be doing one hour of English with the director of Education in Lviv. Work is work! Kids are good and bad, but nothing beats it when I feel like we're getting somewhere or they're learning. So that's life, a full schedule. Lots coming up actually. But I'll spare you the plan of the next few weeks. Also, the vice principal asked me to run a demo lesson for the other teachers of foreign language so that they can see my style of teaching, ask for details if you want to know but not something i'm going public with.

In other news, I hate teh fact that there was a freaking snow storm and now Lviv is once again covered in heavy wet dense snow. PLEASE SPRING COME PLEASE!