A Saturday of Exploring

Baby Arden. We went over to our friends Morgan and Kristina's house for dinner last night. Babies are always the highlight.

Sunset from our apartment window.

Dinner at one of the best restraunts in Kiev. QSI took all the new teachers out. It was a great time. There are a lot of us!

Jon and I at the WWII memorial.

Holly, Jon, me and Rachel posin'

The starving girl statue reminds us of the seriousness of the Ukrainian past.

Great church domes!

View from on top. You can see the river and then the "new" side of Kiev over the far banks.

Great sidewalk picture. Cobblestone streets in this part of town. Not ideal for heals, but very cool to see.

A Russian Orthodox monk that was willing to take some time to address all the many women coming up asking for blessing and such.

A huge circle made of the "Ukrainian" Eater Egg! Love the colors!

Jon being oh-so-serious with the cannons.

The Iron Lady overlooking the city of Kiev.

Sunday, August 22, 2010

Hello from Ukraine! Things are shaping up around here and getting closer to falling into place. For one, the weather is finally cooperating! The heat spell broke earlier in the week and it has been refreshing since then. With highs in the mid-70’s it makes it so much more “pleasurable” to cram into a bus or practically sit on someone’s lap in the metro. So, that is great for a change!

This week was mostly made up of orientation days at school. All of the new teachers are here now and we have been busy, busy trying to make everyone feel welcome and comfortable. Seems like every night after school we would either go over to someone’s place for dinner or have people over to play cards and have ice cream. So, we are enjoying having so many friends to choose from and keeping busy trying to ignore that school is just around the corner!

Yesterday was a big exploring day. We meet up with a handful of people in the park close to our house at about 9:30am and made our way downtown on the metro. It was so nice and cool that I wore a jacket and at some points in the shade, a light scarf! We got down town and first came across a monument commemorating the deaths in World War II. There was an eternal flame at the foot of the monument along with a number of headstones that we couldn’t read. The view from the monument was spectacular. You could see the river that runs through the city (The Dnieper River), a couple of golden domes that we were on our way too and the “new” side of town on the left bank of the river. Very cool on such a spectacular day. In the background of the monument you could see another structure dedicated to the “artificial famine” that Russia enforced on the people of Ukraine in the 1930’s. During this time of oppression more than 3 million Ukrainians starved to death. There is a statue of an emaciated young girl at the front of the memorial site, very touching and will take your breath away. The people of Ukraine have been through a terrible history of struggle and oppression.

Our destination for the day was the “underground cave church”. It is kind of a compound of golden-topped churches that is the “Mecca” for the Russian Orthodox religion. Under the main church there are catacombs where the Russian Orthodox monks have been mummified and kept in glass boxes for thousands of years. Ladies had to wear a skirt and a scarf over their heads to do down. It was best if you paid a couple grivna to get a candle because there were no lights underground. The tunnels were tight and small and there were different chambers that held different monks. A little creepy. Most people were there on a mission, kissing the monk’s boxes and stopping to pray at every one. Very interesting.

We also stopped at a miniature museum. There was a man who made things that were microscopic. For real! The museum had about 25 different exhibit spots set up with microscopes. Some of the craziest that I remember were: a chess board, with all the pieces, made from gold, sitting on the head of a PIN; an Egyptian scene of 3 camels, a pyramid and a palm tree, also made from gold, in the eye of a NEEDLE; a portrait painted on the cross section of a POPPY SEED; a small rose made inside the strand of a human HAIR… and there were soooo many more. My eyes left that place being confused and fussy. Crazy weird.

One of the last places we walked to was to visit “Mother Russia”. We don’t know much about her, put she is part of the museum of the Great Patriotic War, stands at 62 meters above Kiev and is known at the “Motherland Monument”. At the spot where she stands, there was a battle of 4 million troops between the Soviets and the Germens in World War II. Fatalities were estimated at nearly 3 million.

Tomorrow, Monday, the 23rd, we start another round of orientation with all of the returning teachers back. So, a whole bunch more people to meet. We have kind of forgotten that out little group of new teachers aren’t the only teachers here… so it will be interesting once we all get together. Still don’t really have my office up and running. The school is pretty much still a mess. We went in this afternoon to help Rachel, the Preschool coordinator move some stuff around in her room… and every room looked the way it looked on the first day of summer. A long way to go still. So Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday will be HUGE days of preparation. But looking forward to getting the kids in on Thursday! We’ll keep you posted!

Hope all is well back home! LOVE, Alyssa and Jon

Week One in Ukraine!

St. Andrew's Cathedral, a top the hill. We haven't actually made it up there to see it up close, but that will happen in the near future - when it cools off!

The Metro! A LOOOONNNG way down!

Another golden topped cathedral. More pictures to come!

Jon and Adam stopping for a picture in the metro.

Independence Square. Water fountain. Much needed in the heat!

Jon getting a taste of almonds from a man at a market downtown. We ended up buying a huge bag of almonds and have been snacking on them all week!

The Market. Huge mural in the background. Pictures are slightly weird....

Jon, Rachel and I downtown.

At the metro by our house - Svatoshen - Cybertown. Great flowers for sale there!

August 14th, 2010

We are melting! I didn’t think that moving to Ukraine would be THIS similar to our first months in Puerto Rico, but, the weather is brutal. It has been 100 degrees nearly every day this first week. We are on the 10th floor of our apartment building, so I don’t know if that is bad because heat rises or good because we get the occasional –very occasional- breeze. Weather-wise, things are fairly miserable right now. Luckily, we have stolen a couple fans from the school, but are obligated to give them back in a couple weeks when kids start to come. It is my thought that public transportation is going to be considerably more bearable when the cooler weather comes. Right now, the b.o. on the metro could kill a person and the marshootkas (little slow busses that drive you around town for $.20 and stop every other block) are stifling. Normally, the Ukrainians don’t believe in the “draft” and do not open windows or crack doors for fear of a breeze getting them sick… but now, because of the 100 degree rarity, even the babushkas don’t complain with an open window or two on the trolley bus. Thank goodness!

Okay, enough about weather! Everything else has been wonderful. We love our little apartment. It is pretty little, especially compared to some of our friends, but we are looking forward to making it our own and changing it slowly into a home. One bedroom, an office with a pull-our bed, a very nice kitchen, a bathroom with an excellent tub for taking cold baths, 2 enclosed balconies, a living room with another pull-out couch, and a built in chin-up bar for Jon. We have plenty of storage and were able to put everything we brought in its place and store away the oh-so-many suitcases that we checked in. So, that was great. The location is perfect for us. We are close to the school – only meters away – which is what we requested since Jon will be staying late with sports and such.

The school… I think that it is going to be great as well. Right now, the school grounds are definitely in summer mode as there are many projects that are still in progress and rushing to be finished and cleaned up in the next couple of weeks. There is a new turf going in on the field, a new bubble gym being built, a new section of pod classroom and offices off the MS/HS wing, new flooring in the classrooms, a shipment of 40 Smart Boards that need to be installed, 50 new computers that the Tech. guy is building, …. And probably a lot more that I don’t even know about. So, things are moving and grovin’. … and may I add, a heck of a lot more efficiently than they moved in PR, which is a treat. Jon is falling into his role as the AD and I think with each passing day becomes more and more comfortable and excited about the year to come. My counseling room is still a little up in the air so I haven’t totally started to unpack and set up yet… but maybe that will be settled by this week. I am excited to get my flowers up and my turtle rug out!

The people have been wonderful. We have been so luck y to meet some great returning staff already that have showed us the ropes and done a great job of making us feel welcome. We have eaten out with different friends nearly every night we have been here – that is going to have to stop – but it has been a great way to walk around town and get some exploring done too. I know that the friendships we make here will last a lifetime, I can already tell. And that is a great feeling and such a blessing.

Kyiv is great! Of course, when the weather cools off a little it will be more enjoyable to tour around, but what we have seen already of it is very encouraging. We did take the metro downtown one day with Rachel (the new Preschool coordinator) and Adam (the returning MS/HS counselor) and that was really great to get out and see some of those icons that we have already seen in tour books and internet pictures. We took a boat tour on the river this morning with all the new teachers that got in a couple days ago. That was a little cooler option to seeing the sites and fun to be on the water.

Thanks for keeping up-to-date with the Mudds Blog! We are happy to share our adventures with you and hope to give you a taste of our life here in Kyiv. Hope all is well where you are! <3

A new adventure to come...

Jon and I have taken positions in Kyiv, Ukriane for the next couple of years. Jon will serve as the Athletic Director and I will be the Elementary Counselor. We are excited for what the future holds in Kyiv, the people we will meet and the challenges that taking a new job brings. Thank you all for your support!

I will try to be more diligent with this blog since we will have limited ways of communication this time around. Check back a couple times a month for updated photos and the .. adventures of the Mudds!

The above pictures were sent to us from the school and are pictures of our apartment. They provide and pay for our housing. It is only a couple blocks from school. Looks to have a couple bedrooms and a couple bathrooms. It will work just fine!!

Playa Sucia and Scuba diving for Valentine's Day

We had a great time on the west side of the island this week. Jon had booked a hotel room for 2 nights at Turtle Bay in La Parguera, a little beach side town. In the morning at 7:30 we met at West Side Divers and jumped on the boat with 4 other guys to explore the underwater world off the coast. Our first dive was on "La Pared" the wall - a 18 mile reef wall that runs along the south side of PR. We got to the depth of 125 feet on the dive (it was noticable the further we got down, it was like sucking air through a straw - a bit of an asmatic feeling I would guess) but we saw great fish and awesome, colorful coral. The second dive was called "Chiminey Rock" (go NE) and we went into a cave"ish" thing and inside was a chiminey in which you could exit out the top. If you have ever seen "Little Mermaid"... well, picture the scene where she is in her secret cave with the surrounding watcha-mich-callits and thing-a-ma-giggers and she swims up to this light, singing (of course) and stretches her hand up to the sun.... "part of your... wor-l-d". Are you picturing it. Well, that is "Chiminey Rock". ... only we swam out the top. We saw an eel, a sting ray, and again, great fish and coral. It was a good time, and a great birthday/v-day gift.

After scuba diving, we went to Playa Sucia for the afternoon. We were both exausted and it was nice to lay down and read a book.

El Yunque - South side - the best side

We took the Peak/Kaufhold's to the rainforest. They had been here 6 months and had never gone, so we showed them our favorite spots. The best waterfall hidden on the unpopular, forgotten south side of the forest. We had great weather so we were able to climb the rocks to a further up waterfall. We were the only ones there the entire day and the water was perfect. Next, we took them on a hike that we discovered with Kort and Kayla last year. Again, we made our way to another waterfall and breath-taking views. Great day with great friends.

Viaques, Puerto Rico

There is Puerto Rico - the big island - off in the distance.

Barbara, Jon and I took a long weekend and went camping on one of Puerto Rico's island: Viaques. We had been to Culebra many times and thought it would be a good time to visit the bigger island. We had great weather - sometimes spotty - camped for free on a beach, with nats and ants. Saw many wild horses, which was fun. Did a little "off roading" in our rented truck - the road won. Did some great snorkeling and exploring.

Three Kings Day in Juana Diaz

Yes, I LOT late, I realize. We spent Three King's Day (January 6th) in Juana Diaz the "birth place" of the 3 kings here in Puerto Rico. It was a great time filled with tradition and culture. We bought some 3 kings treasures to take to the Ukraine with us and remind us of the great festivites of PR.