five runs
Current mood: bouncy

on november 19, 2006 i got home and have not had a moment to catch my breath since then. my brother, my cousins, my mom, thanksgiving, more extended family, david, mikey, more friends, phone conversations with annie, carlsbad high, carlsbad high football, tahoe, my dad, my jeep, the bay area, danch, jr, the ocean, the desert, snow, the cell, the cell phone bill, trying to stay in touch with the old peace corps crew, losing my russian, reading, playing chess, smiling at people on the street, sushi, mexican, mexican, double doubles, 24, constant internet connection, tommy and amy's wedding, my birthday, neiman's, loren's fish joint, the five,  the four o five, the ten, the ninety one, the one o one...i thought that i would just "decompress" after my little stint in ukraine, but have not had a moment to catch my breath and let it really sink back in. of couse, looking at pictures and emailing the crew in ukraine helps remind me that an ocea (+ a lot more) now seperatesme from ukraine...but it still does not seem real somehow; i needed that "decompression" about which i so often fantasized about towards the end of my service.

i think that in a small (yet powerful) way, my most zen moments in the states have occurred while running. a few days ago i realized that in a span of about ten days, i went on five of the coolest runs that i have ever experienced and i'd like to share them with...well, whoever is out there.

run one: my mom now lives in this cool, brand newcondo complex in temecula. surrounded by rolling desert hills and brand new chain stores selling things like flowers, insurance and thai cuisine, i had a wonderful chance to run through some stereotypical ca suburbaness and a little desert action. nice combo. with my shirt off, tempin the high seventies, with my buddy dave, i ran a nice four-to-five miler through rolling hills and planned communities.

run two: on the beach, at dusk, temp somewhere in the high sixties or low seventies, i ran about five or six in carlsbad. from david's house i went down elm (carlsbad village drive) to the beach, ran the soft sand one way, the  sea wall the next and then headed back up cbad village dr. it was...idyllic.

run three: my brother lives in la. i ran on a treadmill. hey...when in rome.

run four: my dad now lives in lake tahoe, in this secluded little valley dwarfed by snow covered peaks about 12 miles from the lake. while snow gently drifted from the sky i put in a nice six mile through a national park. all alone, listening to coldplay live, this was probably the closesti could be to my old routine in ukraine....thankfully i could return to a warm shower though.

run five: while visiting robertson in piedmont, i got in a mellow six miles on an absolutely stunning all weather track. flanked by trees on all sides, in the mist, i pretty much lived great bay area running to that evening.

so yeah, i have not had as much time to just sit in a chairand reflect on it all...but perhaps that is a good thing. my life in ukraine (aside from a rough spot in the beginning) was full of constant movement and adventure. last year, a few times, i put down a string of runs which could just as easily embody the diversity of ukraine, and i think that maybe getting in such insaine mileage keeps the transition smoothe. at the very least, i'll stay in shape.

11:57 PM - 4 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

being sean markovich
Current mood: sad

i was born sean michael stephenson on december 15, 1981. with a few exceptions for nicknames throughout my life (moe, chico, junior, tank...) i've been pretty content going by just sean.

in my ukrainian high school, i initially went by mr stephenson as i wanted my students to try and adapt to western modes of speech. during the first day of every new class which i taught, i clearly wrote "mr stephenson" on the board, asked my students to repeat my name after me, and started the lesson.

now, as much as we take the prefix "mr" (or "ms" or "mrs") for granted, it's important to remember that people in different cultures use different words to address one another formally and informally. in russian, if one wishes to address someone formally, he or she would call said person by their first name and their patronymic. a patronymic is merely one's father's name with a suffix smacked on ("ovich" for men and "ovna" for women). thus, if vladmir has a son named michael, his son would formally be address michael vladimirovich; and vladimir's daughter, tatiyana would similarly go by tatiyana vladimirovna when addressed formally.

this being said, you can imagine how tough it would be for my students to understand that "mr sean" and other various bastardizations of my name are quite jagged when they reach a native ear. thus, my students gradually began referring to me as just "sean" and used the informal "you" when speaking to me. this slippery slope of familiarity had the potential to snowball into a full-blown classroom riot forcing the teaching faculty and myself to some up with a plan...i would need to get a patronymic. fortunately for me my dad's name is easily transliterated into russian and on a blistery fall day in chuguev, ukraine, "sean markovich" was born.

i loved having my russian name. after countless hours of tolstoy and dostoyevskey, i was one step closer to living in an idyllic 19th century russian dacha, complete with serfs, balls and duels. seriously, my patronymic made me feel kinds bad ass.

being back in california, i no longer have a need for "markovich". everyone here knows me simply as sean, moreover, no one around here even wants to address me formally.

i guess that i will just have to leave "sean markovich" behind, along with a kaleidascope of other memories which were my reality and my life for the past two years.

4:19 PM - 5 Comments - 1 Kudos - Add Comment

on rules, regulations and restrictions
Current mood: contemplative
Category: News and Politics

i once gave a lecture at karazin university in kharkov, ukraine about the american legal system. not being a lawyer, i pretty much rehashed what i remembered from ap government and what i had learned from wikipedia. the lecture went well (even though i did flounder in front of my students at times); however, i think that the biggest hit came during the q and a session. i was asked if i had ever been fined and it took me a moment or two to remember the half dozen parking tickets, the one speeding ticket and that damn safety belt ticket i had gotten, but i eventually answered the student as best i could. just before finishing my shpeel about how harsh traffic fines can become, i suddenly remembered the myriad problems and fines which were accrued by my family living in carlbad as we seldom obeyed our local home owners' association. my students got a huge kick out of hearing how my dad was fined for a basketball hoop in the front yard and a "beware of dog" sign which hung on the fence. the all-encompasing power of a southern california home owners' association was simply foreign to them (sadly, i'm sure that their parents would have understood all to well the onerousness of living under that kind of regime).

i didn't think that much of the lecture until a few weeks ago when i came back to the u.s. i began to experience a classic sympton for returned peace corps volunteers: i compared almost everything that i saw in the u.s. to what i remember in ukraine. for better or worse, ukrainians are much, much more relaxed with rules, regulations and restrictions. one of my peace corps colleagues took his teenaged high school students on a 7 day field trip across the country and didn't even get permision slips. when exploring the ancient cave city mangup kale, i noticed that there was not one single cautionary sign in the entire place (had it been in america, there would have most likely been more roped off areas than open areas as practically all of the entrances to ancient cave homes required shuffling your feet out onto pretty heinous cliffs). people aren't required to wear helmets while riding motorcycles...hell, i didn't even see anyone wering a safetybelt in the two years that i was there (less, of course, when i was in the united states peace corps vehicles...we always wore our safetybelts inside of them, and if we forgot there was a little sign posted reminding us).

simply put, ukrainians just did not have as many (nor do they obey as many) rules as us u.s.a.mericans.

i got the idea for contrasting our two cultures' differing respect to regulations and what not when i was walking with my brother the other day. i noticed that when i pressed a button to cross a sidewalk (something that no one really ever does in ukraine) that there were directions posted on how to cross a street. are you fucking serious?! i don't think that you should be walking if you need to read about how to cross a street; let's be reasonable here, it's just plain common sense.

today, i heard my dad yelling at the dog to come inside. usually, i would think nothing of it, but the decibal level in my dad's voice caused some alarm. it turns out that there was a police officer in the street (he was going to the neighbor's house to write him a ticket for illegally riding his snow mobile on a completely empty street...go figure) and had the cop cared to, he could have hit a double by writing up my dad for having his dog off of his property. it is illegal to let your dog on the steet. wow. i mean seriously, wow, you can't have your dog on the street here.

so yeah, what to make of all of this? in ukraine you can ride your bike on the sidewalk, while drunk, going against traffic, and naked if you want, while in the states, you'll get an $88 ticket for not obeying the bike lanes to a "t". hmmmm.

in the end, i think that living abroad, in a culture where respect for rules (and the rule of law for that matter) is totally antithetical to what is familiar makes us better people. in america, we worry way too much, and in ukraine, they just don't worry at all...oh well, i guess that we (and our societies) are all just a work in progress.

6:54 AM - 6 Comments - 5 Kudos - Add Comment

a new (look for) sean
Current mood: cheerful

i have a new favorite shirt. it's a red-white-and-blue lacoste rugby shirt.

the shirt is a little more preppy than my usual garb (although annie helped me progress leaps and bounds with my style). it suits me quite well. it goes brilliantly with my jeans, and  to be honest with you, i think that i look pretty good in it. moreover, as i have started a new "post-beard" phase in my life, i think that a little shnazziness will hit the spot.

i stole the shirt from my brother and i am going to great lengths to keep it. on the plus side, john thinks that the shirt doesn't fit him well because the sleeves are too short (i just roll them up).

the addition of this shirt to my wardrobe has caused me to rethink almost all of my clothes (i will never give up the button-up oxford blue though). now i have this ridiculous urge to buy cool new, stylish clothes. while in ukraine i went to great lengths preserving my american style (in spite of the peace corps creedo of assimilating to no end) and now that i am back in america i have no idea how a twentysomething southern californian should dress. i'll defintiely keep wearing sandals until i see snow falling from the sky, but perhaps bringing my clothes up to par and buying a few new shirts is not such a bad idea.

two days ago at about 6:00 pm i was hanging out with my cousin kim in la and was suddenly overwhelmed with a desire to buy a pair of shorts (i did own one pair in ukraine but i've since lost them as they aren't that essential during a blustery ukrainian fall). so there we were, in her apartment, a few hours away from a night out, and i just needed to buy a pair of shorts. it's as if the rugby shirt had infected my psyche like some nasty new computer virus. in my defense, i was planning on going to the usc-ucla game at the rose bowl the next day and the weather forecast predicted temps in the mid to high seventies.

so i hopped in my mom's car (her license plate now reads "o rosie"...but that's a different story altogether) and kim and i went on a search for a pair of shorts. our first stop was at a marshalls and i plan was very direct: enter the establishment like a navy seal team rescuing one of their captured comrades...we were to go straigh to the shorts, get a pair and leave. unfortunately a santa fondu set and some rustic pictures of paris distracted us on the way and the plan became compromised quickly. nevertheless, like the good soldiers we were, we pressed on. no shorts to be found though.

we then went to some mall in studio city, and walked straight to the macy's discount rack. i found a pair of shorts that had been marked down from something like $50 to something like $15. what a steal. after grabbing the shorts, we inadvertantly drifted over to the sunglass section (at this point, our military like discipline had completely eroded) and i ended up grabbing a pair of tortoise-shell fosil sun glasses priced at $26. when i went to the check out place, the guy said that my total was $30 and eighty cents. wow. it turns out that the shorts were even more discounted than printed on the tag and the guy, just to be nice (or maybe, as kim suggested, because i pronounced his name correctly...it was ivan.). anyways, i ended up with a nice pair of new cargo shorts and a great pair of sunglasses for less than i was expecting to pay for shorts. sweet.

the shorts excursion, combined with my new rugby shirt has turned me into a bit of a fashion whore. i mean serisously, i have a little money, am a bit older and live in the middle of fashion central (southern california).

but then again, i ask myself, "what the fuck are you thinking?" do clothes really matter at all? if i get caught wearing vertical stiped pants and horizontal stripes on my shirt, i can just fein ignorance and go into a shpeel about my peace corps stint.

tough call. i'm going to approach this clothes thing with caution, perhaps raiding my brother's closet some more and trying out some new stuff so that i don't have to waste a fortune...but would a stylish pair of new pants from banana republic really make me any happier? yeah, a real tough call.

i do really love my new shirt though.

9:54 AM - 6 Comments - 4 Kudos - Add Comment

two dates
Current mood: hopeful
Category: Web, HTML, Tech

i imagine that most everyone from our parents' generation cam remember where they were when they heard that president kennedy had been shot. similarly, virtually all of us (and our parents included) can remember where we were when we found out that new york city had been attacked on the morning of september eleventh, two thousand and one.

i can now add two more dates in my personal memory book which, while they do not appear to be as profound as the kennedy assasination or the destruction of the world trade center, are incredibly powerful to me. the first date is 12.15.05: it was the first time that i had ever seen myspace (living in ukraine kept me fairly well shielded from popular culture and technology) and i was simply awestruck when my buddy matt robison seamlessly floated from page to page, showing me our friends' sites and all the while speaking to me as if i were from the nineteenth century.

the second date is yesterday: 11.20.06. my buddy dan reynolds, a peace corps volunteer in ukraine, sent me a link to a short video clip of us doing some yoga/interpretive dancing/poetry reciting at a talent show. the clip was on this thing called youtube. while in ukraine i had read an article about this website but had never visited it and pretty much had no clue as to what it was about. i've spent the past two hours just cruising around this youtube thing and am...well...speechless.

so yeah, in the space of two short years it appears as though the civilized world has gone through a mini-tech revolution pitting us at the center. the web is so fucking personalized now. wild.

it will be interesting to see where this goes...

11:01 AM - 3 Comments - 3 Kudos - Add Comment

ukraine...a short list of things that i'll miss
Current mood: awake

two years is a long time to spend in any one spot. that being said, i have immensely enjoyed serving in ukraine and as such wanted to jot down a short list of things that i will miss.

(please note that if you have not spent a substantial period of time in ukraine, many of the things enumerated below will not make sense...but i will try my best to make it as reader friendly as possible)

tapachki, borshch, marshutkas, babas, the extensive peace corps network of friends and places to stay, the ukrainski stoll complete with all of the salads and cutlets and vodka and tradition, 10th formers, fresh train tickets, watching people drink beer at 8:00 in the morning, host families, LOST, softball in kirovograd, long runs in heinous ukrainian snow, watching ukr chicks stare at themselves in the mirror while they dance to shitty pop music in smokey discos, the kharkov metro (all of the signs are in ukrainian, yet every single person uses the russian names for the stops...this can be extremely confusing for us foreigners), obolon svetloe, olympiad students, signing autographs, the following questions: "how do you like ukraine?", "do you like russian vodka?" and "do you like ukrainian girls?", receiving letters from the states, learning about soviet history from people who lived through and loved the great empire, the crimea, the brown water that comes from mike's faucet, lots and lots of reading time, dispelling (or strengthening in some cases) myths about americans and america, writing emails, flying "under the radar" with regards to the peace corps staff, in-service training, speaking russian, hating on those who speak ukrainian (joking...nothing but love for you out west), green tea, bumming around central europe, nine story soviet apartment buildings, pot holed streets, chalk boards that don't physically work, learning about other volunteers' homes back in the states (i swear that i did not know where wisconsin even was on a map until mike showed me), climbing in zhytomr with dan and his "entourage", kegan calling me a bitch for not partying longer when it's 3:30 in the morning, teaching yoga to ukrainian high schoolers, talents shows, seth's guitar, winning (a lot of) chess games, losing (a lot of) chess games, my journal, frozen pelmeni, warm scarves, diana schmidt, vasyl romanyuk, shand singing johnny cash, milking a cow, reciting pushkin to ukrainian girls, sevastopol, art club 44, vesuvio's, groups 23-30, not eating mcdonald's (ok, i do every once in a whihle but only out of necessity), the atlantic monthly, nate's freedom, sleeping in, dachas in the summer, banyas and saunas (still not sure what's the difference), digital cameras (especially the fact that every single volunteer has one and is constantly using it), watching the simpson's with my students, teaching lessons in other cities, summer camps, newsweek, nushcho, getting a text message when i'm alone, the donbass, ok...western ukraine, planning out future trios around ukraine with my boys, travis' wooden robot, dunn's badassness, the bat wing, the bazaar, soviet kitsch, john asking me to run 20 miles at 23:30, korona chocolate, the new york times online, internet klub, jeremy's optomism, old maps, and of course...teaching.

2:46 PM - 4 Comments - 2 Kudos - Add Comment

on beards
Current mood: optimistic

so, as you can maybe tell from my picture, i've decided to grow out my beard. in addition to being constantly called karl marx, robinson cruso (and your occasional appostle), wearing a beard has myriad other benefits.

i get extra "pat downs" from riot cops accusing me of being a chechen separtist; i also have a lot more ukrainian "street cred" as i'm occasionally mistaken for a small wild animal.

however, due to harsh societal norms, my beard will sadly go the way of the dinosaurs...well, maybe not that extreme, i might break down sometime later and just let it go down to my knees...but, until the enevitable shave in the u.s. i'm just going to enjoy the simple bearded pleasures afforded to the "wearers": the contemplative stroke, the pencil and pen saver, the warmth factors, and of course...the excellent food storage benefits.

5:33 AM - 6 Comments - 8 Kudos - Add Comment

peace corps description of service
Current mood: energetic
Category: Jobs, Work, Careers

for those of you interested in what exactly a peace corps volunteer does (or if you have way too much time on your hands), i've attached my official description of service (dos).

Description of Peace Corps Volunteer Service

Name: Sean Stephenson

After a competitive application process emphasizing professional skills, cultural sensitivity, adaptability and medical fitness, Sean Stephenson was invited into Peace Corps service as a Teacher of English as a Foreign Language (TEFL). 

On September 29^th, 2004, Mr. Sean Stephenson joined the twenty-seventh group of Peace Corps Volunteers to serve in Ukraine. He entered an intensive 12-week Peace Corps Ukraine community-cased training program. The training program included 150 hours of technical instruction in TEFL methodologies and teaching practice, 200 hours of Russian language training, 100 hours of cross-cultural studies (history, economy, cultural norms). To reinforce language and cross-cultural learning, Mr. Sean Stephenson lived with a Ukrainian family in the town of Berezan, Kyiv Region throughout training.  

In preparation for his Peace Corps service, Mr. Sean Stephenson, while a trainee, taught at Berezan School Number Four.  While at Berezan School Number Four, Mr. Sean Stephenson student-taught English for eight hours a week and began implementing the various methodologies that he was studying during this period. 

U.S. Ambassador John Herbst swore in Mr. Sean Stephenson as a Peace Corps Volunteer on December 23^rd, 2004 in Kyiv, Ukraine. 

Mr. Sean Stephenson was assigned to the Chuguev Department of Education, and had three primary responsibilities at his site: he worked as an English language methodologist; he conducted conversational English courses at two universities; and he worked as a secondary English teacher in four different schools (one school each semester).   

During the academic year Mr. Stephenson conducted monthly English language methodological seminars for the teachers in the Chuguev region. Each seminar would last approximately a half day and Mr. Stephenson primarily focused on different approaches to language acquisition through games, photographs, music and primary source material; however, the topics covered a wide breadth of different aspects of teaching English as a foreign language such as country studies and media in the classroom.  

Mr. Sean Stephenson used the materials which he implemented in his seminars, along with a large donation of children's books from family members in the United States, to create an English language resource center at the Chuguev Department of Education. As a result of Mr. Stephenson's work with the Dept. of Education, English teachers throughout Chuguev have implemented a wide variety of new lessons into their classes. These lessons include a history of American music, a survey of America's largest cities, an introduction to American authors, an introduction to American baseball, and how to use film and digital media in the classroom. Moreover, Mr. Stephenson donated hundreds of magazines that are used by the region's teachers to refresh their English.  

In addition to his work at the Chuguev Department of Education, Mr. Sean Stephenson taught weekly conversational English courses at two universities in the city of Kharkov, The Institute of Municipal Development and Karazin State University. Each class lasted two hours and was open to any student who desired to improve his English, attendance varied from between 10 and 20 students. Mr. Stephenson provided each student with a photo copy of a recent article and led a discussion detailing the specific aspects of the article and how it affected contemporary Ukrainian society. As a consequence of these weekly lessons, Mr. Stephenson facilitated hundreds of Ukrainian students obtain a more global perspective of current events. Additionally, Mr. Stephenson held HIV/AIDS workshops with the students who attended his clubs and vigorously worked to inform them about the growing problem of this global virus and especially how it affects Ukrainian youth. 

Mr. Sean Stephenson worked as a part-time teacher at four different secondary schools (Schools 6, 5, the Chuguev Multi-Profile Lyceum and the Bashkirovka Multi-Profile Lyceum) in the city of Chuguev. These schools had an average student body of 200-300 students in grades 1-11.  At each school Mr. Stephenson worked closely with his colleagues as they were the teachers who attended his monthly methodological seminars. Mr. Stephenson taught eight hours a week at each school and energetically implemented the Communicative Approach into each lesson. So as to further pique the attention of his students and to broaden their understanding of the United States, Mr. Stephenson taught numerous country studies lessons which explored aspects as diverse as the U.S. Government and the Beatles. Moreover, Mr. Stephenson developed a strong relationship with his students and participated in myriad after school activities such as student run concerts and holiday celebrations.  

Mr. Sean Stephenson also developed and taught an advanced English language program after school for the cities' academic Olympiad students. Mr. Stephenson met with these students (attendance varied from 10-50 participants) four times a week for an hour in the fall and twice a week for an hour in the spring. These lessons involved a mix of methodologies including the Communicative Approach and Total Physical Response. His lessons fostered critical, creative thinking through interactive learning with a view towards civic responsibility and community action. As a result of these lessons, more students participated in the regional English Olympiad in the 2006 academic year than at any other time in the past. 

In addition to his primary responsibilities, Mr. Sean Stephenson demonstrated his versatility and high level of motivation in increasing the interest in English throughout his community by holding English clubs in every school in the city of Chuguev twice a month. An average of twenty students attended these bi-monthly English clubs.  

In cooperation with the City of Chuguev Municipal Development Agency, Mr. Sean Stephenson taught a five month long business English course. Classes met twice a week for two hours and Mr. Stephenson helped a group of ten adults with their professional English. Also, Mr. Stephenson edited an English language pamphlet detailing the economic aspects of the city produced by the Municipal Development Agency. 

Mr. Stephenson worked as a camp counselor for five different summer camps during his time as a Peace Corps Volunteer. During the summer of 2005, Mr. Stephenson worked at a week long English language camp in Sevastopol. While at this camp Mr. Stephenson conducted communicative English lessons and played numerous English games. During the latter half of the summer, Mr. Stephenson worked as a camp counselor for an environmental awareness camp in Kremenchuk, Poltavskaya Region. Mr. Stephenson supervised dozes of students as they picked up trash in local parks and learned about ecology and grass-roots environmental protection. 

During the summer of 2006 Mr. Stephenson was a camp counselor for an American sports camp held in Kupyansk Uzlavoy, Kharkovskaya Region. Mr. Stephenson taught 20+ students how to play baseball and ultimate frisbee during this week-long camp. In July of 2006 Mr. Stephenson worked as rock climbing instructor at a healthy lifestyles/rock climbing camp in Zhytomr. In addition to teaching rock climbing technique and safety, Mr. Stephenson taught morning yoga classes for the twenty students at the camp. In August 2006 Mr. Stephenson was a camp counselor at Camp Unity in Stari Krim, Autonomous Republic of the Crimea. In addition to teaching yoga and ultimate frisbee, Mr. Stephenson lead several discussions focusing on diversity and cultural sensitivity.  

Recognizing the importance of community integration, Mr. Stephenson actively participated in community organizations. He was a regular participant at a weekly chess club held at the student center and even took part in the annual Chuguev chess tournament. (he finished 12 out of 14 in the tournament…) Moreover, Mr. Stephenson attended weekly ball room dancing lessons while in Chuguev in spite of the fact that he had no prior dancing experience. 

Throughout the twenty-seven months that he spent in Ukraine, Mr. Sean Stephenson continued to learn the Russian language. At the end of his service, Mr. Stephenson received a score of Advanced High on the Language Proficiency Inventory. 

Following 750 years as a colony of other Eastern and Central European states, Ukraine decided in 1990 by plebiscite to be an independent country oriented towards Western Europe.  Ukraine welcomes change and encourages its people to open their minds to new concepts.  Mr. Sean Stephenson's work as a teacher of the English language, as well as his role as a transmitter of western culture and its approaches to problem solving, were part of a nation-wide effort in Ukraine to reorient itself towards the West. 

Additionally, Mr. Sean Stephenson fulfilled the goals of Peace Corps service by giving himself, both professionally and personally, to his site and the local community. His contribution, whether to the students of his site, to the pupils of the local schools or to the members of the local community, provided opportunities for Ukrainians and Americans to create common bonds and to gain understanding and appreciation for one another. 

Pursuant to Section 5(f) of the Peace Corps Act, 22 USC 2504(f), as amended, any former Volunteer employed by the United States Government following his Peace Corps Volunteer Service is entitled to have any period of satisfactory Peace Corps service credited for purposes of retirement, seniority, reduction in force, leave, and other privileges based on length of Government service.  That service shall not be credited toward completion of the probationary or trial period of any service requirement for career appointment. 

This is to certify in accordance with Executive Order 11103 of April 10, 1963, that Sean Stephenson served successfully as a Peace Corps Volunteer.  His service ended on November 14, 2006.  He is therefore eligible to be appointed as a career-conditional employee in the competitive civil service on a non-competitive basis.  This benefit under the Executive Order extends for a period of one year after termination of Volunteer service, except that the employing agency may extend the period for up to three years for a former Volunteer who enters military service, pursues studies at a recognized institution of higher learning, or engages in other activities that, in the view of the appointing agency, warrant extension of the period. 
 

5:25 AM - 5 Comments - 3 Kudos - Add Comment

i say kiev, you say kyiv

ukraine is divided linguistically. the mighty dnepr river runs straight through the center of the country and chances are you'll hear ukrainian on the western side of it and russian on the eastern part.

this may be a bit of an oversimplification. a large percentage of the people in zhytomer (an oblast' center in western ukraine) will speak russian on the streets, and likewise if you go into a village in the poltava oblast' (on the eastern side) ukrainian will be the lingua franca....or the lingua ukraina....not too sure how to say that.

but nonetheless, the country is truly bilingual. this linguistic division played a major role in both the orange revolution and in last month's parliamentary elections. viktor yushenko, the current president, used the ukrainian language as a spring board for his nationalistic messgae; in order to clearly distance himself from the oligarchy, pro-russian east, he spoke in ukrainian on national television (this might not sound too weird, but it should be noted that ukrainian is the minority tongue in this country and both of yushenko's predecessor's spoke russian). viktor yanukovich, the current head of the opposition and yushenko's arch-nemesis during the tumultuous orange revolution, capitalized on yushenko's pro-ukrainian (i mean ukrainian here both in terms of nationalism and as a language) positions. many people in the east fear linguistic discrimination (baltics?) and voted for the party which they could understand (literally). the older generation in the east can, as a whole, understand ukrainian pretty easily, but they can not, for all intents and purposes, speak it.

ukraine's linguistic divide was brought out into the open during the revolution, but little has been done to consciliate the two opposing camps since then. pro-russian forces remain vigilant in their fight for russian: the kharkov oblast' (where i currently live), recently passed a law stating that russian was the second official language of the region. on the other side, pro-ukrainian factions appear to be as strong as ever with their insistance that linguistic unity will spur national unity (or vice versa?).

this rift is epitomized (and cariacaturized) in the peace corps population. volunteers sent to the east tend to adopt strong pro-russian views and consistently argue for two national languages. volunteers sent to the west counter that if ukraine is to fully rid itself of the shackles of communism and becoe a truly independant state it must do so with one national language. the fact that these discussions usually take place in a loud bar with lots of obolon svetloe flowing doesn't help lead to much reconciliation.

so what is to be done? 

i propose a small compromise. the capitol of ukraine is transliterated from the russian language into latin letters as kiev. however, when transliterated into latin letters from ukrainian, the capitol is written kyiv. the mere spelling of the capitol is a large point of contention for both parties in this debate, thus in the spirit of king solomon, let's spell it kyev.

6:42 AM - 4 Comments - 0 Kudos - Add Comment

"lost" and found

they say that often the convert believes with the most fervor, and so it goes with me....

after not owning a tv for more than 4 years, i have prided myself on a hippie-esque detachment from what i thought was a pandora's box of laziness and apathy. tv, i once thought, was one of the primary causes for a slew of societies' woes, including low voter turnout, heart disease, gang violence, the bush presidency, teenage pregnancy, male pattern baldness and global warming. all of this, however, has changed.

this past month i watched all 24 epsiodes of the first season of "lost". wow. not since "war and peace" have i been so thoroughly entertained and emotionally attached to a work of art. the rich and moving character stories, the life-shaking drama surrounding the plane crash and isolation, the mystery of the island....the story unfolds brilliantly. the cinematography, character development and creative plot combine to make every episode a little piece of gold just waiting to be discovered.

the show blends a "lord of the flies" style inquiry into man's basic needs, desires and tendencies, with a rousseauian critique of life in the state of nature. leadership and servitude, love and hate, selflessness and selfishness...the writers bravely and intellectually explore a gambit of theoretical, humanistic issues which we must face every day. philosophies are explored, not preeched and every episode has the potential to leave the viewer reflecting on his or her place in the world.

while enjoying a few liters of oblon' svetloe with my peace corps colleagues, i realized that i connected to the show on a deeper level than just passive observer. in a way, all of us volunteers are members of our own little "lost". out here, we have radically changed our lifestyles and in the process have hopefully grown. we may not have been stranded on a desserted island, but wholing up in these dank little soviet apartment blocks and schlepping our own drinking water has surely isolated us from home much more that i could have imagined. often, pcvs (peace corps volunteers) get together for a few days in a far-flung podunk ukrainian village, town or city and during these intense yet short-lived extravaganzas we forge the type relationships which would have taken months (if not years) to cultivate in the states. we commonly spend every waking minute with these strangers-turned-best-friends and bare our souls in a manner which would impress even sigmund freud.

during these ephemeral hang out sessions we party, drink, swop ukrainian horror stories, relive past events from the states, play an obscene amounts of music, rock some chess, drone on about our friends, describe in detail our families, explain the textures of our home states and (most importantly) we simply enjoy the company of a countryman.

what further connects us to the characters of "lost" (this is the point which hit me while in the kitchen nursing my obolon) is that each time we hang out, our understanding of our colleagues' diverse backgrounds becomes much more rich and colorful. like the background asides which make "lost" the amazing piece of art which it is, hearing about my friends' lives in america is one of the unexpected treasures of life in ukraine. 

whether hearing about seth's obsession with the beatles, intricate tales of golf from shand, the nuances of joyce's "ulysses" from mike, keagan's foray into the world of a used car salesman, dan's dancing scholarship in oklahoma, jon's lacrosse highlights, gina's kansas-style hippiness, ryan's stint as a copy writer, raisa's hot miami nights, dunn's days as a painter, tony's life in san diego (a place which i can not hear enough about) and study of teeth, nate's love of all things colorado, carrie's days in silicon valley, abby's fiance's opera, beland's eclectic liberal arts education, jared's southern belle, howell's days on an oil rig, or popa bartkoski's days as a big-time hedge fund shark, it's as if every conversation with these guys about their pasts has given me a more full and intriguing picture into who they are. if it weren't for "lost" i might not have fully and completely realized how much i love hearing about my colleagues' pasts.

and for that, i will try and never speak ill of tv again.

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