Blog for the dates of 6-11 March 2003

We began our language training, technical training and medical exams (read, many needle pokes) the next day. We also had many interviews to try to fill in information about us for the decision making process to place us at our permanent sites.

This week was a surprisingly (to me, anyway) difficult time. I kept thinking that it should be so much easier and shouldn’t feel so emotional, as I was in a nice hotel-like situation, surrounded by Americans, being fed three square meals. Probably I was decompressing from the last few days in Colorado, all the logistics, all the work, all the goodbyes, all the mourning and loss. Ugh. That sucked, but I know was a necessary evil.

The bright sides were many: the interesting and wonderful grocery store nearby, our amazing Language and Cultural Facilitators (LCF’s), the interesting seminars about Ukrainian culture, economy, government and current status, slowly being able to read signs in Cyrillic, trying out Ukrainian champagne. Checking out the expo grounds each morning. The party we had the last night for our LCF’s in the lobby of our dorm. Meeting people, hanging out, etc.

After a week of this, we were scheduled to first find out what site and city we’d been assigned to then leave for our clusters for the remaining 3 months of training. “Clusters” means that we’re broken into groups of 3-5 people, each assigned a host family to live with, and each cluster has one LCF to teach whichever language is requested by our site, e.g. either Ukrainian or Russian.

The day before we were to depart for clusters, we were gathered in the afternoon in a large auditorium at the PiGy to find out our site and locations. The auditorium stage was laid out with paper to form a not-to-scale map of Ukraine, with major cities indicated by pieces of paper.

The Peace Corps has divided the country into regions not along oblast (like states) lines. I think there are 6-7 regions per the Peace Corps. In any case, the PC directors of these regions were there. Our training director, Andrey, read out our names, then the regional director for our site read out the organization name and city. It was rather like a game show and there was a keen sense of anticipation and nervousness among us.

I was really, really, really shocked when my name was read out attached to “Kyiv.” I stood on the stage in awed silence, growing increasingly upset as I read the sheet of paper that had a description of the organization I’d been assigned to.

Even though I knew from our training that little of what was written on the sheet of paper would really be true in our experience at the organization, I still was quite upset. The organization, the Consortium for the Enhancement of Management Education, works to promote increased and standardized business education in Ukraine. It seemed like a very generic, business assignment and I couldn’t tell at all what part of my experience was related to business education. Further, how could I learn Russian if I was in Kyiv? My paper listed the fact that all the staff members spoke English and that the director was American.

Everything seemed so contrary to what I’d been preparing myself for: a mid-sized city away from the international, urbane capitol, in a situation where I’d absolutely HAVE to learn Russian/Ukrainian, somewhat isolated from Americans or other expatriates. How could I have this super-posh assignment and really have a true Peace Corps experience? I was going to be a complete lazy, English speaking moron, working for a business education organization.

Thus, I had my first proper meltdown. It was somewhat public, as I have never been skilled at hiding my emotions. Some comments about how my meltdown was received. The LCF’s were around, probably on purpose as I imagine I’m not the first PCT to meltdown at this stage. When I was trying hard to get out of the building to compose myself in private, a couple stopped me with concern. That was lovely, despite my utter incoherence at the time. I also was really touched by how supportive some of my fellow trainees were, especially the ones that were really excited by the page of information they received.

I did get to my room, drank some water, tried to calm down. I went to the session the Kyiv regional manager was having to orient us. I was still really upset and couldn’t speak to anyone without crying.

After the session, I left and soon realized that I needed to talk to someone about my concerns, because otherwise I was going to *really* freak out. Peace Corps is pretty touchy-feely for a government organization and encourages “reaching out.” However, I really hate being very teary in public and further really hate to complain about things that don’t feel justified, so it was difficult.

I was able to talk privately with a Peace Corps employee who’s helping with the Kyiv region and he was not touchy-feely, but very helpful. I needed facts mainly and also a bit of time to wrap my head around this concept of working in the capitol and for an American-lead organization.

He was a skillful salesman, and helped me to see the potential in the site placement and also told me that it was a high-profile job that could give me excellent contacts within the international development community. He could have sold me prime farmland in Chernobyl Zone 1 at that point, but it calmed me and allowed my reasoning functions to resume and my body to leave the stress zone.