Ukraine Cribs

this is upon Todd's request. We figured this would be a good way to show you our place and my sweet acting skillz, editing awesomeness along with Jo's video skillz. Enjoy and comment!

Aside from this video making. We have been taking it easy the past couple days, cause it's been not the best weather to work in the villages. So we have spent an afternoon doing a prayer walk in downtown Zap where we live. We had a prayer meeting this morning along with a sermon via a video which was really good and made us think about our apathy towards things that make God upset and hunger for his own creation such as poverty, alcholism, addictions, and even church's that ignore their communities needs. There was so much more to it but it is hard to explain. we spent this after preparing for this sunday which will be spent at a MB church in a neighboring village. We are preparring testimonies, music, and even some sermons. We have already given testimonies every sunday but we (me and Jo) have yet to give a semon ourselves. Then this evening (friday) we spent split up. Jo went and taught english to some locals who work at a bank we frequent. Three ladies in their mid twenties who are not church goers. I and four others went and played our friday night soccer, but this time I brought the "A" Game. Let's just say we went on a little streak and some fancy headers, along with sweet passes and other Canadian skillz were served up as a taste for the locals. All was good and we look forward to serving the next couple days with a busy schedule of labour, travel, and preaching. Well hope ya'll enjoyed the video, hope you let us know what you think. Unless it's not good thoughts. Then keep them to yourself! In other words if you don't comment i assume you dislike me and the work we are doing, and probably even Europe. Just kidding! But seriously comment!

March 20-26

Seeing as how the internet is working rather quickly right now, we figured it would be a good time to make a new post about the past week.
Last Friday was a free day. Free days usually include grocery shopping because the only fridge that is working in our apartment is a bar fridge, so most things we buy fresh. We got a surprise that day as well, McDonalds for supper! It was such a treat! John took Kristine, Steve, Joel, Dan and Travis to Nicolaipolia for another Friday night of soccer and Petra and Jo headed to Anya's for a Mennonite youth group meeting (Anya is another one of John's interpreters). It was okay but because Anya was leading the group she couldn't interpret so she would give a paraphrase of what she was going to be talking about and then we'd sit there for 20 minutes while they conversed in Russian. The other crew had a great time at soccer. We guess the word is out that some Canadians are here to play so the crowd was apparently larger than normal!
Saturday afternoon was spent cleaning up around John and Ev's apartment. Petra and Jo were raking leaves in front of the building for probably about an hour when a group of young boys walked by. It's quite unusual to see people actually taking care of the common areas around Zaporozhye; we were told that the people who are paid to do it don't even bother. So we think these boys were making fun of us at first, and the people here usually pick us out as foreigners really quickly so they said hello in English. Petra immediately started talking to them, and another woman who spoke limited English stopped to talk as well. John came over and they small-talked for a while, basically saying why we were cleaning and what we're here for. Eventually, we invited the boys to play some soccer so we ditched cleaning up and went to play soccer instead. "Team Canada" won (mostly because they were too busy smoking to pay attention), but fun was had by all and another game was planned for later on.
Sunday was a church service in Bolkova which is an hour and a half south of Zaporozhye. The Mennonite church they have there was built by some Canadians and it's a beautiful huge building but they have to have services in a tiny upstairs room in winter because they can't afford to heat the whole place. They really enjoyed having us and invited us back to visit. We offered to do some work for them so we are planning on going back April 7th to spend a few nights there and help get some stuff done. Jo found out when we got home that the village where her Grandpa Voth was born is 3 villages away from Bolkovo, so when we go back in a few weeks we plan on stopping by there as well.
Monday we had a Russian lesson with Olga first thing and then we headed out to Morozevka to do some work. There wasn't a whole lot to do, and Sasha's wife Luda insisted on making us borsch for supper so it was a good day! She also make cabbage perishky (capoosta perishky) and we had bliny for supper (which is a deep-fried pancake that you put sugar on....SO good!!). On the way home John stopped for some gas for the van and Steve went inside to buy us all some Milka bars (best chocolate bars on earth) and he found Vanilla Coke! Ukraine just went up 10 points in our books!!
Tuesday was a working day in Nicolaipol. Their church building isn't nearly as finished as the one in Morozevka. They bought it as apartment buildings and ripped down all the brick walls with the intention of refinishing all the rooms. So the task for the day was to carry all the bricks from inside to the outside and to put them in a trench dug for the foundation of a future building. Then we mixed and poured sludge over the whole thing and that took the whole entire day. We were so dirty and messy it was ridiculous.
Wedneday was another free day!! Free day means grocery shopping which is always an ordeal because the food is packaged differently for example, milk is in bags, cocoa is in tiny jello-like pacakges, brown sugar is horribly expensive....we could go on. In the afternoon we had an adventure taking the bus to the Columbia store and then we walked back in the rain. For supper Jo went all out and we had Christmas dinner in March! Chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, homemade cranberry sauce, stuffing and chocolate pie for dessert!
Thursday - today!! We had a Russian lesson in the morning with Olga and then were supposed to head to the villages. It's rained a lot in the last few days so a lot of the things we would have to get done couldn't be done, so we had another free day! We had a team time till noon, ate lunch and then spent 1/2 hour in prayer before splitting into small groups and heading out to walk around the neighbourhood. Our intention was to pray for the area and the people and see if we could find any ministry opportunities! All the groups came back excited with what had happened during our short 2 hours on the streets.
Tomorrow we have a Bible study planned for 9:30 and then the afternoon is free. Petra and Jo are teaching an ESL class tomorrow evening while the rest of the group is in Nicolaipol playing soccer so they'll spend some time prepping for that tomorrow as well as the usual grocery shopping.
We also have a few prayer requests:
- Jo's legs still hurt from the manhole experience so pray for healing
- Steve's chest is still not fully healed (it pops when he stretches)
- pray for ministry opportunities in the community
- pray for healing for Travis's hand, he injured it today and we think it's broken.
- pray for Steve who's finding it hard to not be in a leadership position
Hopefully we'll have some pictures to post for next time and check back soon for our video blog of our apartment!

2 Weeks in 1 Blog?

So it's been a while but we now have some internet in our apartment by way of a USB stick so I can finally make a blog!! We left Vancouver at 7:30 on March 8th and had a 9 hour flight to Amsterdam. I thought the flight was pretty good, we flew with KLM and they were constantly handing out drinks and the food was pretty good too. However, as in all airplanes, leg room was severely lacking for Steve and as a result a stretch-out was needed in Amsterdam when we got there.

We had a 5 hour layover so Steve and I took the train to Amsterdam Centraal and walked around for a little bit. There were TONS of bicycles!

From Amsterdam we had a 4 hour flight to Kiev where we were met by John Wiens who herded all 13 of us onto a night bus bound for Zaporozhye.
Our first real experience of Ukraine came about half way through the night when we stopped at a bus stop and went to use the bathroom facilities. We had to pay 1 greevna, which is about 12 cents USD and were given a little bit of TP to go and use a lovely squatter potty!
We arrived in Zaporozhye at 8 Tuesday morning and went to John and Evelyn's apartment for a wonderful pancake breakfast. Afterwards we were shown to our apartments. Evelyn gently told us that the smaller apartment is "a little bit like camping"....and it kind of is, although very clean and livable. Not sure who picked out the sparkly pink wallpaper, but I'm beginning to see that they do things differently here! The larger apartment where Steve and I are staying with Travis and Dan is actually quite nice. I haven't taken pictures yet but I will one of these days.
After dropping off our stuff and cleaning up, John came by for a walking tour of the market which is right outside our apartment. I was a little surprised but not really shocked at the variety of items available. It's open Tuesday to Saturday until 3pm.
The first evening we were at John and Evelyn's apartment for supper and then we walked back to our place which is about a 20 minute walk. The sidewalks are terrible and I was mentally telling myself to watch where I was stepping. Those thoughts just passed through my mind when I stepped on a manhole cover and fell in!! My right leg went in and the cover slammed shut over it, and it was quite terrifying although really funny afterwards. Steve lifted the cover off and gave me a few minutes and then I was able to hobble home. I had the sweetest bruise and lots of cuts and scrapes to show off for the next week. The pain however wasn't quite so cool.
First day of work was Wednesday, March 11 where all 13 of us loaded up into a van/bus owned by a friend of John's interpreter Olga (who also came with us) and headed to the villages of Morosevka and Nicolaipolia. Team Ukraine did the most work in Morosevka while Team Lithuania worked in Nicolaipolia for the next week and a half until they left on March 18th. The following are a few pictures from working and stuff.
The first day some of us girls sorted donated glasses by prescription. Needless to say we had a lot of fun!

Most of the work in Morosevka was building a fence around the backyard area to plant potatoes. The village has no running water and is very poor so the pastor of the church there, Pastor Alexander has set up a place in the church where the women of the village can come and bring their children to bathe once a week. He's also planning on planting potatoes to help bring these people through the winter. This is the back of the church, which is an old Mennonite school building.

This is Pastor Alexander - or Sasha as he preferred to be called. He was in charge of all our work projects for the week and is the coolest guy ever! We all cheer everytime we see him. We laughed a lot at his t-shirt this day and we asked him if he knew what it said in English...he didn't so that made it all the more hilarious.

 

Alexi, our van driver for the time we were working out there, stayed during the day and worked with us. After the first lunch of sandwiches I guess he decided we weren't eating enough so he started cooking periodically for us! The first day was kartoshka - potatoes cooked underneath a metal bucket in the fire outside, and the next day was Ukrainian borsch (no "t") complete with chicken necks!!

Alexi also has a Bandoora - a Ukrainian instrument with 55 stings which he brought in and played for us and showed Dan how to play.

A lot of the work was cemented different areas of the church yard...which is a completely different story that Steve will have to explain to all of you someday....

Sasha's sons-in-law were also there helping us work, Roma and Vassa, so we got to know them pretty well too. But keep in mind that these people all speak no English so we had an interpreter some days and others, we just played charades and laughed a lot.

Friday night in Nicolaipolia there is a soccer night. It's in a Mennonite church converted into a gym but it has a lot of the original woodwork and fixtures. The guys have played there 2 Fridays now and I think it's definately a good ministry opportunity.
This is a lovely picture of the factories pumping smog into the city. There are good air days and bad air days. Bad air days it kind of smells like sewage.

Last Sunday, Team Ukraine went to Nicolaipolia for the church service in the morning and then afterwards we spent time with the kids of the church, singing songs together and having tea.

Sunday afternoon we were at Morosevka in the afternoon for a service with the people there where Sasha got us all to give our testimonies and then afterwards we had tea for a different Sasha's birthday party. In the evening we went to a youth group that Olga (our interpreter)'s son goes to and then afterwards we all went to McDonalds for food! It was cool to hang out with people our age who speak English so hopefully we'll be able to do that again.
This is the main drag in Zaporozhye, Lenin Prospect. Notice the cars parked parallel and angle, it doesn't really matter.

Last Day of Trek Training

Today was the official last day of Trek training! Crazy how fast it's gone by!!
We had one short little blurb this morning on packing (#40 on the list of things to pack was a suitcase and I kind of wondered what the airport security people would say if I wandered through with an armload of clothes and toiletries) and the rest of the day was free to do last minute errands and start the cleaning process.
Steve and I also had our last meetings with our mentors today which made me a little sad because it feels like everything is over when really, it's just beginning!
This evening at 7 was the commissioning service which consisted of worship, a slideshow, a short message and prayer for each team. It was really awesome to see all the people we've gotten to know in such a short time there supporting us. Afterwards there was punch and brownies and then we went with James and Vanessa to Tim Hortins for coffee.
We sent off all the stuff we won't be needing (bedding, binders, shoes) with James and Vanessa and tomorrow will be the ultimate laundry, packing, cleaning day! Pray for peace and clarity as we pack tomorrow! I'm starting to get nervous at times so pray that we'll both remember that God is Bigger and is on our side!!

Last Week - Oh My!!

This week is Practical Prep week!! Week 8!! We can't believe it went so fast!!

This morning was our last Trained by Jesus session with Steve Klassen so we celebrated Trek style - by having Chai tea - Steve K's special! I also went down to the kitchen earlier than usual and baked some banana chocolate chip muffins for the occassion. The passage we studied today was Mark 14:1-11.
This afternoon we had some people come in from Drime (disciples ready in mobile evangelism) to come and teach us a few drimes (plays set to music). We learned 2 that will hopefully be useful seeing as how we don't speak the language in Ukraine and these are word-free!! The rest of the week is ESL teaching classes and more preparing to go stuff. Friday night we have a Commissioning Service at 7 pm at CBC so if anyone wants to come you're more than welcome!

Wednesday-Saturday

Wednesday it started snowing....

We thought we should take some session pictures. This session was Thursday on cross-cultural stuff with Bryan Born.

Lunch is always a good part of the day...this is Gay our cook, who you can tell by the blurriness is always busy in the kitchen.
Thursday after it stopped snowing Phil and Steve had some fun in the snow and hot tub.

Friday morning it was back to sunny and melty and most of the snow is pretty much gone.
Friday night there was a shower for Vanessa at her parents place. I went as a representative of the Voth family (we got them an exer-saucer). This cake was made by one of Vanessa's aunts and it was so cool! She makes homemade fondant and the little babies are made out of sugar!

Me and the Mommy-to-be!Saturday the plan was to go horse-back-riding but it was windy and cold so the owner of the horses was worried about them being skittish so we rode their pony instead. But not really. But this pony was hilarious! It was loose and free to run around the yard as it pleased, it was like a guard dog, but a horse. Or maybe more like a giant mouse.
I think we should get one. It was very cute.