Thursday…a laid back day in Chernivtsi

Goodness, my life is SO MUCH more laid back here than it is in the US.

I slept late, woke up, and got a phone call from my student Anna. I had asked her to help me mail some letters to the US. We arranged to meet in 30 minutes at the university. I put on some workout clothes, quickly wrote some postcards, and started up the hill. Anna and I went to the Main Post Office, a pretty building that seems new. Anna later mentioned that Chernivtsi was denied UNESCO Heritage status a few years ago bc there are many modern buildings interspersed with the historic ones.

Evidently this is how mail to the USA works. This was not explained to me back in February when I mailed a bunch of things to people in the US. Back in Februrary, I bought a lot of stamps and was told I needed to put at least 5.50UAH on the letter for it to get to the US. So, that is what I did. I was also told that postcards won’t go through the mail; they have to be in an envelope. So, I bought these cute postcards with Chernivtsi buildings on them.

The letters never arrived, and still haven’t. It is now late April. I mailed them in February. Anna told me that the 5.50 is for mail that goes on a ship, which takes at least 2 months. HA! Wish I’d known this then. The difference between 5.50 and 12 UAH is less than one USD.

So today, I took my letters to be weighed at the post office. Then, I bought 12UAH stamps and the lady stamped them Avia/Air so they will go by airplane this time and should arrive in 10 days. Yay.

After that she went with me to the bank to help me exchange traveller’s checks. Why use travelers checks in this day and age? I received them as payment from the US State Department for our orientation in DC. Don’t ask me why they use them, but they do for certain things. The woman who owns the building prefers to be paid in USD, hence the reason for the transfer over here. I asked yesterday if she would take Euro, given that I had a good amount leftover from Italy and the people who prefer something other than UAH usually don’t have a preference between USD and Euro. She wanted USD, however. She said she had reasons, which is totally fine and completely her prerogative. I’m sure her reasons have something to do with Greece and Spain.

So Anna helped me, bless her, until the bank lady said that they needed to restart the system and I should come back in one and a half hours. Anna needed to go run errands bc she is leaving to go to her village for the May Day holiday. I went to work out and went back later. I was so hungry, having had a banana several hours earlier that AM, and the line at the bank was facing my favorite place to get holubsi, right across the street. So I went there after the bank. We popped into a new market on Olga, and I was pleased to see trustworthy-looking chicken at this place. I frequent Olga more than Vul Ruska.

I was also pleased to see this new movie advertisement!

Yes, there they are...Mirada and Carrie. Hopefully I will be home for this one. Another movie with Amanda Seyfried. You can see her name in Cryllic:

This afternoon I did some work on the internet, took a bath, drank some hot tea, had one of those cheese biscuits that Anna and her godmother gave me yesterday, and relaxed. I am getting lots of sleep over here, which has also been a very nice departure from my life in the US, where 6 hours had become the norm. I still stay up late here (that is when people in the US are more available) but I sleep here as well. Then I usually get up and go to the gym, and come back and start the day. It is nice.

This is where I often sit, computer in front of me, looking out the window:

Tonight, I made salmon with grits and steamed vegetables for dinner. My family brought lots of packages of grits over. I love all the fresh fruits and vegetables I eat here…makes me feel healthy. I’m worried that it will be too late to plant my vegetable garden when I get back and that I won’t have the tomatoes and peppers I had last summer. We’ll see.

I am enjoying the slower pace of life. Because my world is comparatively very small over here, I have learned to take joy in and look forward to the small things in life…setting workout goals for myself, cooking healthy food, having a cup of hot tea, reading my daily devotional, taking a walk around town, getting my daily email from my Dad and Aunt Sandy (and now my Mom, who received a new computer for Mother's Day!), and seeing what else is going on in the world through the web. Slowing down is definitely one life change I hope to take back to Gville with me.