My life in a box

This past Saturday I began the week-long task of placing all my material possessions into 6 boxes and 3 suitcases. Why only 6 boxes and 3 suitcases? Because that is how many boxes and suitcases I have and I really don't want to go to the moving store to get more. I am hopeful that with thorough purging, that I can condense my life to those requirements. (Thankfully, moving every year for the past 6 years doesn't allow you to keep too much unnecessary junk around).

The biggest headache I'm faced with in my packing is how to separate my stuff by the following criteria: 1) what I will need for the next 4 weeks/what I will need in Russia/what I will need for WV/what I will need when I return in August vs. 2) What I will not need at all for the next 4 or 5 months. As I will be placing a (hopefully) significant amount of my clothes and other items in storage, I need to designate what I really need and what I really don't. And since I will be relocating to a studio apartment which is already filled with my roommate's own clothes and stuff- and in an attempt to not aggravate the current the new roommate by bringing too many items - I will be severely decreasing my "needs" pile.

For some reason, unknown to me, my new roommate is less than thrilled with my suggestion of bringing my lovely decorations and knick knacks to the apartment. They are perfectly lovely decorations - photos of me and my girlfriends, a framed picture of my dog, some memorabilia from my sorority days, scented candles- items that would make any home happier and brighter! But my roommie says no, so it is not to be.

My "don't need" pile will be placed in a storage unit from this weekend until..... ummm, until I get a a new job and an apartment and I can take my stuff out of storage.

Soooo... maybe in January 2011 I'll be able to crack open the storage unit and bring my lovely decorations out again :)

Russian Word for Today

In an effort to master Russian before I go - or at least be able to understand a street sign - I will post a word of the day/week/hour for my education, and everyone else's enjoyment ;)

The tricky thing about the Russian language, besides the fact that it's in Russian, is that they use the Cyrillic alphabet (at least the Czechs had the courtesy to use letters I knew!). So besides just learning new words, the "H" sounds like "n", the "P" sounds like "r" and the "Y" sounds like "o".... not to mention that there are a bunch of interesting looking symbols that apparently are letters too.

I'm not trying to rag on the Russian language too much, it's obviously worked for them for thousands of years and hundreds of millions of people around the world speak it. And if they can learn it, so can I...right??

We'll start with the basics..... The words are listed in English, Cyrillic and Russian

Hello Привет Privet

Goodbye До свидания Dasvidania

And one which will be very important for me...

Do you speak English? Говорите ли вы по-английски?

Govorite li vy po angliyski?

Homeless & Unemployed

Although I wish I could "have my cake and eat it too"... it is not the case when it comes to my job. While I offered to come back after my program was completed, unfortunately they could not hold my position for the 2 months that I was going to be away (In my perfect world they'd say "Yes! Go have an amazing time in Russia and your job will be waiting when you return"). Nyet! So my boss has been interviewing and June 15 will be my last day. While I am sad to be leaving and am obviously scared to not have a job when I return, I have come to peace with the fact that this is what I have to do, in order to have this experience...

Sitting in a cubicle all day in suburban Chicago.... volunteering in Russia.... hmmmmmmm......which shall I choose

It also happened to work out that my apartment lease is up on May 31 and both of my roomies pursued and found other living arrangements (I hope I wasn't completely screwing them over by not living in the apartment anymore! Guys...? :(

Now don't worry, I won't be out sleeping on the Lincoln Park benches for 3 weeks til I leave. Lucky me, I happen to be dating one of the nicest people EVER, who has generously invited me to stay with him before and after my trip! While I am a little nervous that he will get sick of me and my incessant need to clean, I think it will be fun and I am very much looking forward to it!

I have begun to realize that preparing for this trip might in fact be as stressful and time-consuming as the trip itself! While the idea of 'volunteering in Russia' seems like a simple enough idea, it's actually quite complicated. Here's a list of the steps I've had to take before I can actually fly off to Russia...

-Select a program with which to participate in - this began in ...oohhh.. sometime in 2009

-Pay program fee - alot of people are very surprised when I tell them that not only do I not receive any compensation for my time but I actually have to pay to volunteer... and a significant sum at that! Actually the majority of the programs I looked at had some sort of program fee associated with it. My fee pays for the full-time in-country staff (which really makes me feel alot better than going to the middle of Russia by myself with no support system), they also employ chefs to make three meals a day (no trips to the grocery store), as well as a security guard at night and a "home base" where all of the volunteers live (most of the other programs placed you in a homestay with a family - because my Russian is non-existant at best - I thought this was the better option), finally they also provide translators which accompany a group to the volunteer placement, to assist in communicating with the children as well as ALL transportation to and from placements and "Excursions" once or twice a week to museums, nearby villages and guest speakers. To say the least I am also paying for the experience. I don't think there'd be another time when I lived in Russia for 2 months with this much support.

-Letter of Invitation & Visa - anyone who travels to Russia must be invited; this is done by a Russian institution, family, school or in my case, volunteer program, submitting paperwork to the Russian govt to "invite" you. The letter takes about 8 weeks to get (and surprise, it's in Russian!) only after you get the invitation can you apply for a Visa. A few hundred dollars and a week later and a Visa you have! Seeing as how this entire process took about 3 months to complete, I imagine it is almost impossible for Moscow to be a "weekend getaway" destination for anyone outside Russia.

-Shots - Since I'm volunteering with "vulnerable populations" the Russian govt requires that all volunteers have a series of blood tests and vaccinations prior to volunteering. These included a TB test, blood test for Measles, Syphilis and HIV, as well as recent immunizations for Measles, Tetanus and Diphtheria. Having everything else within the time frame needed, I ventured to urgent care last night to get my blood test for Measles, Syphilis and the TB test. Keep your fingers crossed I pass :)

-Flight - one of the other benefits of my program is that they pick everyone up at the airport, so there is no worry about how to get to Yaroslavl. Which is good because I don't know how great I would be trying to navigate the Moscow train system or hiring a car after a 11 hour flight! So I need to be at the Moscow airport Sheremetyevo (Международный) (one of 3 airports Moscow has) by 3:00pm on Sunday, June 20. You'd think this would be a simple enough thing to do... but as I have learned, most flights to Moscow arrive after 3pm. Therefore, it took several months of scouring the Internet before I found a suitable flight - one that had good connection times and got me to Moscow in plenty of time.
So now I will be departing O'Hare at 6:45am on Sat, June 19 (Thanks for the ride to the airport k :), arriving at JFK at 10:10, departing JFK at 4:14pm and arriving in Moscow at 10:10am!! After that it's only a 5hr wait in the airport and a 5hr ride to Yaroslavl!

I'm sure I'll be completely cohereant and alert, and not suffering from jet lag or culture shock at all...

Despite of all the hoops I've had to go through to prepare for this trip, I do not have a doubt in my mind that it will be 100% worth it.

Location, Location, Location...Ярославль

I thought that I should post a map and a little bit of info about the city I'll actually be living in! I figured that few people (at least few of the people I know) actually know where Yaroslavl is - I certainly didn't either! (You can see I did alot of thorough planning before I decided to go :)

From my research, aka Wikikpedia, it is city of about 650,000 people on the banks of the Volga and Kotorosl Rivers. It was founded in 1010 and apparently is a big industrial center. It is also home of the Yaroslavl Lokomotivs hockey team - Russian champs from 2003 :)

Here's a map of the Western part of Russia. It looks like it's pretty close to Moscow but from what I've been told it's about a 5 hour drive
(depending on traffic). And if you look over up and to the Left you can see where St. Petersburg is on the map. I thought, "Oh! Well that'd be fun! A nice little weekend getaway to St. Petersburg! Lovely!"Don't be fooled! St. Petersburg is a 13 HOUR train ride away!! I've ridden a night train in Eastern Europe once before and let me tell you they are an experience! The night train I took from Prague to Krakow actually is up there with one of the worst experiences of my lifetime. Seriously. But, never one to miss out on an exotic destination, St. Petersburg is calling, so to St. Petersburg I will go (or at least try to go).

Here are some other photos of famous landmarks in Yaroslavl. I'm sure there will be duplicates of these as I take my own pictures when I'm there :) Below is the Kremlin - apparently historic Russian cities have one , not just Moscow - built as a fortress to protect the city from outside invaders.

To the right is (I'm told) a typical street in Yaroslavl...

And this is one of the "suburbs" of the city... notice the Soviet-style apartment buildings.

It looks like it will be an interesting city to live in and I'm hoping that my experience living in Prague will prepare me at least a little for what it's like to live in Russia. It definitely can be a serious culture shock and takes a little bit of getting used to :) The people, the languages, the weather, the 'interesting' food, the infamous customer service, the bureaucracies and the red tape. Ohhh Eastern Europe. Love it :)

Every life comes with a story ...and possibly a great adventure

So here it goes - I am about to embark on a crazy, challenging, emotional and no doublt life-changing experience, so I figured that for my own sake (and bad memory) I should write down my thoughts and experiences...and for the few people (aka my parents) who may be interested in what I'm doing. Most everyone who knows me already knows that I am going to travel to Russia this summer (at least anyone who has listened to me in the last few months should know!)... but I have always said that I would keep a blog while I was away and I figured no better time then the present to start! For anyone who isn't familiar, from June - August I will be living and working in Yaroslavl, Russia - a city in Russia's "Golden Ring" a 4-5 hour drive northeast of Moscow. I am participating in a volunteer program and will be working in several homes for children and a hospital for women while I am there.

I have learned that whenever you tell people that you will be traveling deep into Russia for an extended period of time, questions enevitably aris - I think it might have something to do with the whole Communism-Cold War thing. Some of the more common questions I've received are "Why would you go to Russia...What will you do there...What about your job?" and my favorite.." Wait - you're doing what?!"

Now by my own admission, I am not a spontaneous person - to me, spontanaity is not looking at the online menu before going to a restaurant - and make no mistake that I have given this decision alot of thought over the past few months. This is not something that I could take lightly - I will be leaving my friends, my family, my job, spending most of my life savings all to go to a country I've never been to, whose language and customs I don't understand to work, unpaid, for 2 months. Why would I do this? For the simple fact that if I don't do it now, then I never will.

I have only been in the "real world" for two years and although I have a great life in Chicago, a loving family, wonderful friends, a fun city to explore, I have come to realize that it would be very easy to get caught up with the routines with which it comes with... sitting in my cubicle day after day, thinking of something better, something different and not doing anything about it. I do not want to look back when I am older and have a family and wish I had done something different. So I will go to Russia. I have quit my job and will move out of my apartment and say good bye to everyone and go on a trip across the world to see these things and work with the children and hope that my short time will make a difference for them...because I know without a doubt they will make all the difference for me.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I -
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.