I just had to let you in on a few interesting sayings that, well… they are just interesting.

The most recent one that I heard was this past week. We had a girls night* on Tuesday and some of you may know the main topic of discussion when a bunch of mostly single girls get together is. Yes, we were discussing guys, nothing strange or over the top. Just what we like in a man, how do we imagine a future families, etc. etc. etc. Well one girl was explaining the qualities that she would want in her future husband and it went something like this “I want a man who is neither fish nor meat.” Hmmm, that gives a clear picture of the kind of man she wants doesn’t it? I guess it has something to do with not a wimpy guy, but not an overly manly guy.

Some others that I have heard are:

• If you are asking a question about ‘who’ then you can respond with “the horse in the coat.” That would definitely narrow it down.
• If someone is just not understanding something you can say “even the horse understands!” That would make me feel real smart.
• If someone asks a question about ‘how long until…’ you can respond with “until the cancer whistles on the mountain.” I don’t even know how to explain that one.

*Every night is kinda a girls night here, but this was an officially organized one. There’s a difference.

The title would imply that I have had caviar and that yes, I am still alive. For all you North Americans, I would like to say that… cough, cough… mumble, mumble… cough… caviar is kinda… good. Whew, there I said it, I would have a second helping of caviar if it was offered to me. Allow me to tell you the tale of how I came to eat my first helping of caviar.

It was a bright sunny day, fairly warm out, and Joanne and I were on our way to have lunch with Liliya’s uncle and his family. Liliya is a fellow student who is from Ternopil. We were informed that he likes to fish in his free time like many other men like to do around the world. He was going to grill the fish on the barbeque which would be a rare treat for us! Mmmmm, just the thought of grilled fish made us salivate.

Learning from the master

We arrived at his house in Ternopil on the far side of the lake just as the barbeque was ready. His wife had already prepared the fish in a yummy marinade and they sizzled as he laid them on the grill. Now, what should we do while we wait for the fish to cook? Gut the catch of the day! He had just returned from fishing that morning and had a whole new batch to prepare.

Here I am gutting the little fishy.

Vova (Liliya’s uncle) offered to teach me a quick and easy way to gut the fish. I thought, why not? So we started to slice and dice the little fishies so juicy sweet! As the guts came out, (sorry for those with weak constitutions, I don’t know how else to put that) he spied the precious cargo and gently picked up the little sack of fish eggs. He smiled at me and simply said “caviar.” It had not occurred to me that we might be eating fresh caviar, I never even thought about looking for fish eggs. To tell you the truth I probably would not even know what to look for had he not picked them out first.

Ok, I guess I will be eating caviar. We finished gutting about half of the Pike, when the grilled Perch were finished to perfection. [Technical note: yes, you can argue that I did not eat “real” caviar since we did not eat sturgeon roe, but either way, I ate fish eggs and the locals called it caviar.]

Nice and fresh and so juicy sweet

We scooped up the caviar and headed into the house to enjoy our grilled fish and caviar. Now I am sure you are picturing a big pile of raw red fish eggs in a little dish with a fancy spoon. Luckily, there is more than one way to eat caviar. They rolled the little sack of eggs in some flour and fried them. Pretty much anything is good with flour and fried in oil and I can say that would be true of caviar.
Later that evening after fellowship and good food, we headed out. Vova gave us the rest of the fish he had caught that morning, so when we arrived at home we finished ripping out the guts and uncovering more caviar. Liliya then took all the caviar and blended them in the blender and mixed some mayonnaise in with it to make a paste, this was then put over toast. I like it better fried, just for the record.

If you think that anyone would like caviar fried, Joanne will tell you otherwise. She was not a fan of caviar in either form. So I will tell you that if you are ever in a situation where you might have to eat caviar, politely suggest that it be fried, it is really good that way! And if you just can’t wait to try some, I recently discovered that there is a caviar house in Seattle. Yep, The Seattle Caviar Company can help you out.

Jesus pulled a coin out of a fish, I pulled out caviar!

Who knew mashed potatoes could cause such a ruckus? In Ukraine they’re all the rage. Behold the mighty potato! I did not think to write about this since it seemed like such a small funny moment, but I am still hearing about. So it now warrants a place in the blog.

Last Sunday I was on dinner duty with another girl named Inna. She wanted to do some kind of fried wafer thing. I will tried to explain this as best I could but it took up way too much space. Just know that it involves cooked rice, mixed with diced hard boiled eggs, sauteed mushrooms and onions sandwiched between two crispy round wafers and fried. Sounds crazy, but it was really good.

I volunteered to make American mashed potatoes. What are American mashed potatoes? I figure they’re mashed potatoes with the skin on. No big deal to me, but I discovered it’s a big deal here.

Lena was going to help me by pealing the potatoes, but I stopped her and said “no, no, no, we’ll leave the skins on. It’s easier.”

I should have gotten the clue when she said “with the skins? Mashed potatoes with the skin on?”

I kinda laughed at her simple question. Until I realized her shock was sincere. She asked “how do you do that? Oh, you mean you cook them first and then peal them.” Nope, I meant to mash the potatoes with the skins on and then eat them with the potatoes. She went on to explain she had never heard of that and that she was very curious how that would turn out. She left the kitchen with that look like she needed to be prepared with plan B incase these crazy American mashed potatoes did not turn out.

Well the shock and horror continued as various people filtered through the kitchen hearing of the rumored American mashed potatoes. There were not too many comments at dinner, but most people seemed to enjoy them. I only saw one young man picking out the skins from his mashed potatoes, but I know he picks out a lot of vegetables from his meals so I don’t count him. I actually got a few compliments.

This was all over a week ago. Middle of last week, I hear from my DTS directors that it can be offensive to some people to eat the skins of potatoes. It is more a sign of being poor. The first time he was in the states and was served mashed potatoes with the skins he was mortally offended.

Today was the clincher. I was informed that several people thought the grayish brown things in the potatoes were mushrooms. (That’s actually a good idea when you think about it.) They recounted their stories of eating mashed potatoes with skins for me just tonight. They told me they thought ‘hmmm that’s not mushrooms. What could that be?’ When they discovered that they were potato skins, they thought ‘that’s funny, why would she mash potatoes and then put the skins back in?’  Hahaha, I chuckled out loud at this.

We have one staff member who is the mother of our base director, she is grandma to everyone. This rumor of mashed potatoes with skin reached her because I guess she asked someone else “is it true, did Megan really make mashed potatoes with skin?”

Another student told me at first he was shocked. He probably would not have eaten the potatoes had he known what was really in them. He informed me that in Ukraine potato skins are what you give the pigs. GREAT! I just called my entire class a bunch of pigs!! He relieved my sudden feeling of horror and desire to sink into the floor with saying that he liked them. Whew, I may have called him a pig but at least he liked the slop I gave him.

I may have just  started a revolution with my mashed potatoes! What other kind of revolution can I start? Hee hee hee…

I forgot to mention one funny cultural moment.

It has gotten colder here in Ternopil so people have been a little cold. I asked one girl if she was cold and I kinda pointed at her clothes since she was wearing a long sleeved shirt, a sweater and a scarf.

She said “yes, yes kabage, like kabage.”

I gave my smiling blank face look. “..kabage? Sto kabage?” [What is kabage?]

There have been a few times when I am confused on whether someone is telling me a new word in Russian or they are mispronouncing an English word. This was one of those times.

She repeated this mystery word again and followed it with some hand motions.

I was still lost. And she said, “you know many clothes.”

It came to me. Like a candle being lit in a dark room, I saw the light. CABBAGE! She was talking about wearing many layers like a cabbage is wrapped up in many layers.

I found this really funny. Only in Ukraine would it make sense to say you are wearing many layers like a cabbage. I am quite positive North Americans would not think of that.

What would we say? Any thoughts on what North Americans would compare themselves to if they were wrapped up in many layers?