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?

Hooray for Kiev!

The conference was not the end of our adventures away from Ternopil! Oh we were there for a whole nother week!

After the conference, we joined forces with the Kiev DTS team to sit under the tutelage of the prestigious Al Akimoff. It was an honor to hear from such a man of God. He had worked in the Soviet Union smuggling Bibles in for years. Let me just say he was full of story after story! I though surely we have heard all the good ones, but no, there was always more.

The housing got complicated, it wasn’t like Ternopil. We couldn’t just wake-up, mosey on over to the shower, get ready for the day in a nice and orderly fashion, and meander down to breakfast. Nope, life just can’t always be that easy. [Note: Maybe I exaggerated a little bit on how “easy” my life is.] The YWAM base in Kiev is on a barge and yes, the barge is in the river. So space is limited needless to say and there was not enough room for us to sleep at the base. The staff graciously opened up their homes to us. We were all split up into small groups, some groups had 5 some had 1.

I was fortunate enough to spend the week with Lena’s family. Lena’s (our translator) parents allowed four completely strange girls to come and stay with them for a whole week. Yes, I meant to say completely strange as opposed to complete strangers- we can be strange. There were actually 6 of us total staying in a tiny Soviet apartment. Her parents were so incredibly loving, they each felt like they had adopted new daughters.

Outside of teaching times, we led different times of worship and fellowship with the Kiev DTS. It was overall, a great opportunity for the Ternopil team to see how it is being outside our comfort zone. We were not in charge, we did not know the schedule, we had to simply be ready and wait. Everyone is grateful to be back in Ternopil and we are even more grateful to be where we are.

Actually, I’ve been back. I have much to catch you up on. Right now I will start with the conference in Kiev.

It was an honor to hear from Loren Cunningham and his wife Darlene and to celebrate 50 years of YWAM!! I had actually just finished his book Is That Really You God? a week earlier so I knew a little more about how YWAM started. He gave a little history on YWAM, where YWAM is now and where they want to go in the future. Lots of vision and wisdom!

Our team was not the only team there of course. There were teams from Georgia, Armenia, Russia and naturally, Ukraine. Many people came just to hear from Loren but others came to reunite with old friends. We had a great time learning about the different cultures represented with in Eastern Europe. I discovered Armenians love to dance and Georgia is a very beautiful country. Russians and Ukrainians have a humor all their own. It was a great time of coming together.

We stayed at a retreat center which is a called a sanatorium here. I got a little worried the first time I heard that, but was relieved to find out we would be the only ones on the compound. It is a very old retreat center built in the 70s’ during the Communist era. Let me just say that I am quite positive nothing has changed since then. Same furniture, same appliances… it was old and very communist-like. I have to confess, I was excited to leave my squeaky bed when Saturday came.

I am going to leave you with a photo of everyone at the conference with Loren and Darlene Cunningham. Can you find me? I know, I just asked the impossible.

I will update you on the rest of my busy life soon!

(I know the picture is small, it was either a fuzzy picture or an enormous picture. Sorry!)

That’s right, my team if off to Kiev (the capital of Ukraine) tomorrow morning. As much as I hate to give an information dump, I am afraid that is all I have time for!

It is midnight here and I have to get up at 5:30. All of us girls are running around trying to get our bags packed and ready. We were just informed that our first night in Kiev will be a special formal dinner so now we need to pack nice clothes. For those of you who live with 13 girls you will know that this process will probably take a couple of hours. You know, trying on each others dresses, looking at everyone’s jewelry, playing with shoes and talking about hair-dos. Yes, this takes a couple of hours!

We will be in Kiev to celebrate 50 years of YWAM in Ukraine! How amazing is that?! We are all very excited about it. Loren Cunningham, the founder of YWAM, will be there and we will be able to meet him at some point during the conference. It is truly an honor for us to hear a message from him.

After the conference, we will head over to the YWAM base in Kiev to spend the week with their DTS team. We will all join together for some time of teaching and fellowship. We will return the 8th (so yes, it will be awhile until I can post anything.)

Ok, to back up a little. If anyone noticed I said there were 13 girls in the house, which means that another girl joined our team. Yep, one more girl has come to Ternopil! Her family has been in India for the past year and a half. Her and her father and some problems with their visas and so returned to Ukraine. While here they happened to remember about the DTS and thought they would call to see if there was still room. Naturally, there was one more bed in the girls room so of course she was meant to fill it. Now there are 11 girls (+2 staff girls who live here) and 3 boys (+2 male staff members.) We are very excited to have her here with us, I can already tell she will be a ton of fun!

A few cultural moments from last week:

1) Riza and I decided to hold an impromptu English class for other students who wanted to learn English. Riza is from Turkey and his wife Lena, is our translator. We were teaching a few key phrases such as “Hi, my name is ______. What is your name? How are you? I am fine.” All was going well until someone got a little mixed up.

Lena: Hi, my name is Lena. What is your name?

Marichka: I am fine.

It has become a running joke now.

2) On Sunday a few of us went out to pizza. The waitress was taking my order for a drink (I abstained from asking for tea with milk) instead I asked for water with gas. Her next question was a new one. “Do you want little gas or lots gas?” I was so dumbfounded that I could only give a blank stare and Dima (who was translating for me) just ordered for me. Apparently you can get water with lots gas of little gas. You learn something new everyday.

I am already accumulating Lost In Translation moments, so I thought I might as well write about them now since (seeing as how things are going) I will probably have more by the weekend.

#1) We were at a cafe this weekend simply to get to know each other. Everyone was giving their orders of yummy cakes and lattes. A few people ordered chai (Ukrainian word for tea) and naturally I ordered black tea with milk and sugar. Nothing out of the ordinary… if I was in the States or maybe England. The waitress didn’t know what to do with me. Milk with your tea? Who would do such a thing? The poor girl asked again to clarify and again Lena (translator) clearly said that I wanted milk with my tea. The waitress was so dumbfounded she had to go ask the cook if they do such a thing. She came back and reported that they would give me a little milk on the side. It came out as steamed milk.

#2) We have all been assigned different kitchen duties for the next two weeks. I am on a team with two other girls cooking breakfast. Lunch and dinner are prepared by our cook, but he gets the weekends and breakfasts off. The two other gals that I am with do not speak ANY English. They are wonderful girls and I am sure we will be able to prepare something for breakfast, but communication will be interesting as I discovered today. I thought we were going to be making croissants for breakfast, but I was informed at dinner today we are making pineapples. Pineapples? Yep, I was assured with sweet smiles we are making pineapples. I was missing something. Do you mean we are putting apples in the croissants? Nope, we’re making pineapples. Finally, we grabbed our translator  who then told me we are cooking apple pies for breakfast. This makes sense when you put your adjectives in the wrong place. Apples in a pie, pie in an apple. Mistake understood, except I’m making apple pies for breakfast? I’m still not sure about that one.

#3) While cleanign up after dinner tonight, I found a package of salt with the following label:

The White Food Common Iodine Salt: Salt for cooking, salting, and preserving of food-staff and for prophilaxis of thyroid gland diseases.

?????