I would give my left arm for a metro map of Kyiv. Or a bus map. Or a trolley map. Or any map. Google maps-Kyiv reveals just a large grey expanse of nothing with a little star in the middle to signify that, oh yeah, I guess you're located somewhere in there. I have been kind of blindly wandering around the city, making use of my ever-so-helpful "how do I get there?" vocab, which is, of course, completely UNhelpful when I forget the response vocab. So I was puzzled and slightly offended when I saw an enormous map of the New York subway system on my co-worker's office door. I had traveled ten hours and an ocean away and all this city could provide me with was a NEW YORK subway map? I had just finished being completely lost in THAT city, and here was a map. Sorry, but too little too late, Kyiv. Nice try.

It's equally disorienting when my other co-worker admits to me that he and Olha and Bohdan and Olena and just about everyone else get together frequently to talk about "the States." And when the Ukrainian interpreter with the project-- born and raised and educated IN KYIV-- sheepishly calls himself a "California Boy." And my Ukrainian friends puzle over why I would ever come to Ukraine (one girl asked me if I was trying to be "extreme"), that is, when they're not talking about how they want to move to London or Germany or New York. I came to Kyiv to get the Ukrainian experience, and what I am finding is that I am learning more about the good side of the United States and Europe than I ever knew existed.

This West-philia is not rooted, however, in a hatred of Ukraine, at least not as far as I can tell. Ukraine has only existed as a nation since 1992, and while there is certainly a really strong sense of Ukrainian national identity (some guy yelled at me the other day to "learn Ukrainian" when i spoke in my pathetic broken Russian at the nationalist university that I attend), there isn't a really clear idea of what sort of shape that identity is going to take in terms of a nation. Ukraine has, in the past, been dominated by tsarist Russia, but Poland, and even by Nazi Germany. None of these regimes were particularly beneficial to Ukraine, and in fact, often really awful (Stalin orchestrated a nationwide famine to "put Ukrainians in its place" and Germany turned the population against itself). But the Ukrainian population and identity continued to develop, and was, in fact, even fortified by some of these experiences.

And now, Ukraine is pretty unique in the fact that it is a very "developed" nation with a highly educated population, some very modern cities, and no real state history to speak of. The big question in Ukraine is not about "bringing the country into the 21st century"-- it's already there-- but instead establishing some sort of paradigm for it to exist in. There is pressure from some of the country to re-align with Russia; many think that even though Putin is kind of a dictator, at least he is a strong leader with some vision for the country. However, much of the country wants nothing to do with Russia, and instead wants to join NATO or the EU, following the example of other ex-Soviet states such as Poland and Romania, but alienating Russia and Belarus. Meanwhile, the Ukrainian government has shut down for a few months post-election while each party either prepares a remix of the Orange Revolution or challenges the results. This uncertainty about where the country came from and where the hell it is going is the source of New York subway maps on walls and longing for Germany. It's not so much yearning for those PLACES as it is yearning for a model.

In the meantime, however, people go to work, raise families, and hold conversations where one party speaks in Russian and the other responds in Ukrainian. They watch Italian movies with English subtitles and a woman translating those subtitles into Ukrainian over a loud speaker. They complain about the government, the "Soviet attitude" of waitresses or guards, but they just sort of get on with their lives. In a way, it seems like Ukrainians are kind of used to being people who speak Russian, watch movies in Italian, wear clothes with English slogans, and plan to move to Europe or America, but are still very much Ukrainian.

photographs of my street and apartment

arrival et. al.

Hello Everyone,

While I mean this blog to be more than just a virtual way for me to spill my guts to who ever will listen, I did want to start off with a general notice of my arrival, safety, and relative happiness. I arrived in Kyiv about a week ago, and I was taken directly to my apartment in the center of town by my company's driver-- pretty corporate for a reproductive health NGO, but I'm beginning to realize that "professionalism" is kind of distilled down to symbolic things here. And I was certainly greatful for a ride, so I am not complaining.

I live in the middle of the city, about 4 blocks from the main drag (Kreshatik street) and about 10 mintues from all of the major attractions (mostly churches... cathedrals sort of dominate the landscape. Actually the architecture here and in Russia sort of tells the story of the history of the place: there are all sorts of cathedrals left over from when the church really ran the show. These sit next to larger Soviet concrete buildings-- the ugly, gray kind-- left over from the USSR. And now all sorts of enormous glass and steel buildings are shooting up, exidence of the growing wealth (in some parts of the population) and arrival of business. Anyhow, I live right downtown in a "historical building" in a comfortable apartment with tall ceilings and big windows. It's pretty chilly right now, since the city does not turn on the municipal heat until mid-October. My roommate is great, very easy to live with.

My job is proving to be a lot different than I thought it would be, in a good way though. The reproductive health situation here is completely different from that in the US: the abortion rate is far higher than any other European nations or the US and there is little to no stigma attached to it. However, the majority of the population relies on traditional (rhythm method, LAM, and wihtdrawal) rather than modern (hormones, IUDs, condoms) contraceptives. The goal of the project that I am working with is to lower the abortion rate by instead promoting modern birth control, primarily the pill. (I have a little bit of a problem with this, since I have some objections to the pill and the way it is widely and irresponsibily prescribed.) This is difficult though, since the Ukrainian health care system is completely top-down and "free," meaning that doctors and buildings are paid for, but nothing else. We are trying to promote government, clinical, and pharmeceutical reform, but it is difficult when there is political chaos in general and no incentive for the system to change. The project has done quite a bit though, including training several health care practioners and pharmacists, helping to pass the Reproductive Health of the Nation Program, and establishing a partnership with pharmaceutical companies to get affordable birth control into pharmacies.

My job consists mostly of writing, and right now I am working pretty closely with a consultant who is helping the Medical Post-Graduate Institute to develop a new kind of approach to teaching health care management. It sounds dry, I know, but is actually pretty interesting. There is all this talk about how the health care manager is really the patient advocate, which is half stupid business school speak and half kind of interesting.

Another interesting point that I will elaborate on further: NO ONE speaks Ukrainian here. In fact, I spoke Ukrainian in a restaurant and got laughed at. All of my Ukrainian friends speak Russian, and so, it seems, does everyone except for the people at my nationalist-leaning university (I got yelled at for speaking Russian there... jeez louise).

In any case, this place is a trip. In the two weeks I have been here, I have seen a bar fight (some guy ripped off his shirt and broke a chair over another guy's head!), a Communist party rally (Fascism will not stand!), a Ukrainian Nationalist rally, and been snuck into a concert by a creepy-looking guy with bad teeth. So that's that for now. I'm still having difficulty understanding that I LIVE here, but I assume as more of my dreams occur in Russian and I start to curse Ukrainian bureaucracy the way the locals do it will sink in.

Rachel