Only one week left!

Time is just flying by! I can't believe that training is almost over! Sorry I haven't posted in awhile, thing have been very busy here!

First, we had our summer camp for the children at school. Let's just say that organization here is much different than it is in America. The Friday before summer camp started, we got a call saying that the first day of camp would be cancelled and possibly the third day as well. That put a damper on our plans, but being the flexible trainees we are, we rearranged the schedule and went ahead with the camp on Tuesday. We were expecting to have about 45 6-8th graders, but when we showed up we found that we would also have the 5th grade. You really just have to go with the flow in this country. So we had our first day of camp on HIV/AIDS. We actually spent a lot of time writing a grant for this day and we got about $50, which is a pretty decent amount in Ukraine for one day of day camp. Everything went well and the kids loved the games that we played with, especially red rover! Tuesday, we also found out that we would be having camp on Wednesday. That was a bit stressful because we had to prepare everything basically the night before, but I think we pulled it off well. We taught the second day on Alcohol and Smoking/Drugs Awareness. There is a huge problem with drinking and smoking in Ukraine, so we thought it would be appropriate. The last day combined nutrition (the topic of the first day that ended up getting cancelled) and the environment. We have encountered the question "What do you do with the trash?" many times throughout training. There are no garbage trucks in the villages. You pretty much either throw your trash into the woods or burn it. Littering is a pretty huge problem here too. I think there is a place to take your trash near the big town that's about 30 minutes away, but for people that don't have cars, they don't really have any other option other than burning the trash.  Anyway, the kids seemed interested and they of course loved the games we played with them outside like kickball and "steal the salo" and whatnot.

Besides summer camp, we are also working on our community project (technically our second community project as the HIV/AIDS day was considered a community project as well). For our project we are creating listening activities for the school. The school has one English teacher whose background is in German, so we thought it would be good to leave them with a sustainable way of listening to native English speakers talk. We each came up with different topics and dialogues and have been recording them.

Also, we had our site placement interviews last week. They told us at the interview (on Wednesday) that they would know by Friday, but we wouldn't get to find out until June 13th. THREE DAYS before we leave for where we will be living for 2 years. So nerve racking! They asked everybody general questions like what your biggest achievement/challenge has been during training and other questions like that, but some people got questions about if they would like to teach literature or history. It's all really based on your teaching and educational background. At the end, you can request different things, but you will end up being sent to wherever you are needed. I requested to live by myself (not in some family's house) and to live in a city. The interviewers gave us the impression that we will all be living in a homestay, but we will see about that. When I asked about a city, they asked if a village near a city would be ok. So, I'm pretty sure we're all going to villages as well! Well, no use speculating, but we all want to know!!

In other news, Matthew's birthday was last weekend and we all had fun celebrating with him in Obukhiv. Today is James' birthday and we're going to his family's house to have a BBQ and celebrate. We also swam in the river yesterday after class and that was lots of fun! Summers in Ukraine are so beautiful. Next week we will have our language test, so everybody is also getting ready to study for that. I know I haven't gotten any postcards out yet, but I will try to do so as soon as I can! It might not be until I'm at my site and things have calmed down a bit. I can't believe that will only be in a little over a week!

Ok, that's all for now!