The past week is a blur. I remember the major outline, but the details are lost. We landed in Kyiv Monday morning and I was in the office by lunchtime. I finally stumbled home about 9pm, after several meetings to confirm plans for the regional workshop we were hosting in Kyiv, with about 40 people attending from all over Eastern Europe and the CIS, 1-3 July. I changed our vacation plans to be in Kyiv for this workshop, and although I really hate that we missed 4th of July in Columbus, it was important to be here for this event, even if I wasn’t anywhere near my best for most of it.
Tuesday morning Igor and I were both wide awake at 4:00 am, and finally decided to get up and go to the grocery store around 4:30. First time we’ve never had to wait in line there! I was at the workshop early, and had a long spacey day. Despite being exhausted all day, I suddenly was wide awake once I got home and couldn’t sleep hardly all night. Wednesday was similar, but I really wanted to visit with my UNV colleagues so I pushed through a long evening and had some friends over for dinner. The workshop wrapped up on Thursday, and we had a nice reception in the evening for everyone. I regretted leaving early, but I was near dead from exhaustion.
Friday we had an important meeting with the Ministry of Family, Youth and Sport about a project I’ve been developing for most of the past year. The project was approved! Just need to finalize the financing, which should happen next week. So, I could finally relax Friday afternoon. I met up with a couple UNV colleagues for a quick beer.
For the first time in 3 years, I was invited to the big Independence Day party at the American Ambassador’s residence. Although I was still really pooped, and was hosting a colleague overnight in Kyiv, I felt I just couldn’t pass up the invitation. It was a fun event, and I enjoyed spending a couple hours with American friends and making some new acquaintances. After that party, I met up with some UNV colleagues for a late night. We stumbled home around 1 am (I think) and collapsed.
Igor went to Korosten on Tuesday, planning to be there a day or two, but that turned into the whole week. After seeing my UNV colleagues off to the airport, I drove to Korosten to finally visit with his family and friends. I had really been looking forward to listening to Igor tell everyone about our trip to the US. I love to listen to him tell stories, for one thing, but also I learn a lot more about his impressions and perceptions when he tells other people about what we’ve done and where we’ve been. Unfortunately, I missed most of his stories this time since he’d been there a week and seen most everybody by the time I got to Korosten. I did hear a couple stories, though – like how awesome Niagara Falls are, and that Ohio is a great place for retirement ’cause everything is set up for comfort (drive-thru banking, drive-up drop off for the library, etc). Igor was also immensely impressed with the vast array of gardening tools my Dad has – a tool for every task, he said.
We had dinner with Igor’s family, then rushed off to meet up with some friends who were waiting for us at their dacha outside Korosten. I was driving, which meant I didn’t have quite as much fun as everyone else, but I honestly didn’t mind the excuse to not have to drink vodka. Time to dry out for a bit.
We slept like the dead Saturday night, and for the first time in weeks I felt like I had a full night’s sleep. We woke up at 9:30 – jumped up is more like it, since we had an appointment at 10. Neither of us could believe we’d slept for over 10 hours! After running some errands, we spent an hour or so picking raspberries and blueberries in the yard – yum! There are still some cherries on the trees, but we decided to pass this time. Igor’s mom made a fabulous spread for lunch (as usual), with the highlight being vareniki (dumplings) with cherries, blueberries and mullberries. We stopped by Igor’s college roommate’s house on the way to Kyiv to visit them and Igor’s godson, and of course a “quick stop” turned into an hour and a half and another bursting table of goodies. We finally made it home around 7:30. The first time in nearly a month when we are home alone, and what do we do? I start the laundry and he starts scrapping the ice out of our crappy freezer – the things that desperately need to get done but we haven’t had time to do for ages. Finally we settle down, open a bottle of wine, and he’s watching boxing while I catch up on my blog.
It hardly seems like we were in Columbus just a week ago.