Now to share what we do from day to day. Although we walk often, it’s not just a walk in the park. Slavutich is a town that was built in the late 1980’s and was considered a very modern town. At the time they planned for phone and cable for every household, I’m glad they did because I can share all my experiences with you. The streets and sidewalks are a bit of an obstacle course at times, with a sudden down pour a new pothole can appear at anytime. This year is an extra hot summer according to locals, so I am very thankful for the two rooms in our cottage that have air conditioning. Our American friends have come over a few times to escape the heat and humidity. The girls and I have not managed to do our shopping early enough yet, we go to the store or market about every other day and we melt the entire time. I need to plan our meals for the week and shop better on Saturday at Reenach, but meals our proving to be a small challenge of their own.
I have tried to make some of our own meals from the states, but finding all the ingredients is next to impossible. I usually get about ¾ of the ingredients so we have something close to the same. Cream cheese is tough to find, their “cheddar” cheese is mild and except for chicken I don’t know what to do with the rest of their meat (many versions of pork). Even spaghetti (American style) is proving hard to make. I am sure I will learn how to cook some of the local food, but that will take time in the kitchen with my neighbor ( I don’t believe they write a lot of recipes dow
n). We have had many wonderful meals already, and our new local friends have shared homemade syrups and jams with us that are delicious!! I wish I had a bigger freezer to hold all the fruit for the winter. Going to the market for me is like walking through the candy store, but you can only buy as much as you can carry and as much as you can eat in a couple days (or prepare to store for the winter).
We had tea with the other American mom’s and kids last week. We had apple crisp (I donated brown sugar and the recipe) and I enjoyed visiting with new friends and Sister Anne and Sister Mary Teres. I will be hosting tea at my house this week. Hopefully I can bake something yummy, but that would mean that I can find all the ingredients as well as figure out my oven. It’s a nice new oven, but it’s convection I think, it has about 6 different picture options (which I only understand one, the OFF dot) and boy does it cook hot! Baking is my thing so I have got to figure it out!
Laundry has been going pretty well. My washer is also fairly new and holds one medium laundry basket worth of clothes. I learned quickly that as soon as we had a hot day with no humidity that is the morning you wash your sheets to hang outside and dry. On a humid day you just don’t bother with laundry, it’ll never dry. The girls have splashed in the local fountain (it’s washed daily) with other local kids and they run through the sprinkler in our “garden” (back yard). Our local friends are worried that the water is too cold for the children and they may fall ill. I let them know that it is an American passed time (running through the sprinkler) and our kids are just fine, still healthy!
The girls were so exhausted one evening on our first week that they fell asleep at the restaurant right as their dinner arrived. Between recovering from jet lag, the hot humid weather and all the excitement they literally crashed that night. It was pretty cute, if we hadn’t helped them their faces would have fallen straight into their plate of food!
We enjoy the local bakery, local restaurants, all the fresh food, trying out our Russian, and visiting with our
neighbors. Oh yes, our neighbors, they are absolutely delightful. Anna (pronounced Ah like the short “o” sound) and Victor. Their daughters Tania and Sasha are grown and live in Kiev so Anna and Victor are excited to have two little girls living next door. They speak English which helps out a lot! Anna shares her clothes pins with me and loves having the children play in their daughters’ room. She wants the girls to practice their lessons on her piano anytime and I look forward to practicing my Russian with Anna. Ellie and Rylie were excited to help Victor pick cherries and apples from their trees. We then made a cherry apricot cobbler to share with them. We met Tania this last week and had more laughs and more visiting with our neighbors. Tania is a piano teacher and an interpreter. She studied opera in school, and when she played and sang for us we had goose bumps it was so beautiful (what a treat that she would perform for us)! We look forward to going to Kiev to visit Tania, meet her sister and have the
m show us around town!
We are quite busy with our daily activities, from trying to set up house (still waiting on the shipment), getting food in the house, cooking meals and staying on top of laundry; to attending birthday parties, visiting the local museum, learning the different shops, seeing the bigger cities, and attending more parties. We even had a potluck at our house the other day, the food and company were great! We haven’t quite been here two weeks, but it feels quite comfortable like we have already been here a month. I really hope to learn the language better and of course I need to learn how to ask them to slow down when they speak! It’s pretty funny that even the dogs know Russian better than me (tee hee).
I have many local people who are willing to help us out. Alex, our Russian instructor, Anna and Victor our neighbors (they even have a car), and Nastya, our landlord’s daughter. Without Nastya I may have never found a broom, we looked at 5 different stores and market vendors before we found one! Our neighborhood is very quiet and very pretty. Our neighborhood is all built of red brick from Estonia and all the plants are just beautiful. It is very pleasant here. We have been blessed every step of the way and I am trying to enjoy every moment for I know this time will be gone in a flash.
I have tried to make some of our own meals from the states, but finding all the ingredients is next to impossible. I usually get about ¾ of the ingredients so we have something close to the same. Cream cheese is tough to find, their “cheddar” cheese is mild and except for chicken I don’t know what to do with the rest of their meat (many versions of pork). Even spaghetti (American style) is proving hard to make. I am sure I will learn how to cook some of the local food, but that will take time in the kitchen with my neighbor ( I don’t believe they write a lot of recipes dow
n). We have had many wonderful meals already, and our new local friends have shared homemade syrups and jams with us that are delicious!! I wish I had a bigger freezer to hold all the fruit for the winter. Going to the market for me is like walking through the candy store, but you can only buy as much as you can carry and as much as you can eat in a couple days (or prepare to store for the winter).We had tea with the other American mom’s and kids last week. We had apple crisp (I donated brown sugar and the recipe) and I enjoyed visiting with new friends and Sister Anne and Sister Mary Teres. I will be hosting tea at my house this week. Hopefully I can bake something yummy, but that would mean that I can find all the ingredients as well as figure out my oven. It’s a nice new oven, but it’s convection I think, it has about 6 different picture options (which I only understand one, the OFF dot) and boy does it cook hot! Baking is my thing so I have got to figure it out!
Laundry has been going pretty well. My washer is also fairly new and holds one medium laundry basket worth of clothes. I learned quickly that as soon as we had a hot day with no humidity that is the morning you wash your sheets to hang outside and dry. On a humid day you just don’t bother with laundry, it’ll never dry. The girls have splashed in the local fountain (it’s washed daily) with other local kids and they run through the sprinkler in our “garden” (back yard). Our local friends are worried that the water is too cold for the children and they may fall ill. I let them know that it is an American passed time (running through the sprinkler) and our kids are just fine, still healthy!
The girls were so exhausted one evening on our first week that they fell asleep at the restaurant right as their dinner arrived. Between recovering from jet lag, the hot humid weather and all the excitement they literally crashed that night. It was pretty cute, if we hadn’t helped them their faces would have fallen straight into their plate of food!
We enjoy the local bakery, local restaurants, all the fresh food, trying out our Russian, and visiting with our
neighbors. Oh yes, our neighbors, they are absolutely delightful. Anna (pronounced Ah like the short “o” sound) and Victor. Their daughters Tania and Sasha are grown and live in Kiev so Anna and Victor are excited to have two little girls living next door. They speak English which helps out a lot! Anna shares her clothes pins with me and loves having the children play in their daughters’ room. She wants the girls to practice their lessons on her piano anytime and I look forward to practicing my Russian with Anna. Ellie and Rylie were excited to help Victor pick cherries and apples from their trees. We then made a cherry apricot cobbler to share with them. We met Tania this last week and had more laughs and more visiting with our neighbors. Tania is a piano teacher and an interpreter. She studied opera in school, and when she played and sang for us we had goose bumps it was so beautiful (what a treat that she would perform for us)! We look forward to going to Kiev to visit Tania, meet her sister and have the
m show us around town!We are quite busy with our daily activities, from trying to set up house (still waiting on the shipment), getting food in the house, cooking meals and staying on top of laundry; to attending birthday parties, visiting the local museum, learning the different shops, seeing the bigger cities, and attending more parties. We even had a potluck at our house the other day, the food and company were great! We haven’t quite been here two weeks, but it feels quite comfortable like we have already been here a month. I really hope to learn the language better and of course I need to learn how to ask them to slow down when they speak! It’s pretty funny that even the dogs know Russian better than me (tee hee).
I have many local people who are willing to help us out. Alex, our Russian instructor, Anna and Victor our neighbors (they even have a car), and Nastya, our landlord’s daughter. Without Nastya I may have never found a broom, we looked at 5 different stores and market vendors before we found one! Our neighborhood is very quiet and very pretty. Our neighborhood is all built of red brick from Estonia and all the plants are just beautiful. It is very pleasant here. We have been blessed every step of the way and I am trying to enjoy every moment for I know this time will be gone in a flash.
No comments:
Post a Comment