Hannukah

HI! I know this is a bit delayed, but heres a fairly long peak into my daily life. Also, I want to wish a very happy birthday this week to Ruth Shavelson, who is turning 90 years young!

The eight nights of Hannukah

Wednesday, December 1:
I wake up around 630, which is a little later than I’d like, and then I proceed to lie in bed for fifteen minutes, which makes me later yet, still. I am tired, and I want to sleep. But there is no mechanism for telling the boss I’ll be in a few hours late. I throw myself out from under the covers and search for my slippers, because even with my gas heat at 40 degrees celcius it is still cold, very very cold, in my house. I throw on sweat pants and a JETS sweatshirt my mom just sent me, and I go into the kitchen to make breakfast. Today I am feeling rather lazy, so I fry some bread and glob some peanut butter on top afterwards. I iron my pants and sweater, throw some food to my dog Tuzik (the Ukrainian equivalent of the pet name “spot”) and head out to school. It is cold, so I wait for the bus to pick me up along its route.

I get to school, and I am immediately bombarded by my cadre of 6,7, and 8 year old female admirers. I must admit I rather enjoy their fawning---it gives me a nice ego boost, and it allows me to teach them as much english as I can squeeze out of the bottle. “Good morning!” They cry. “Good Morning!” I respond. I exchange a hurried rush of “Dobre Dien”s as I head up to my office, which is located on the second floor, near the director.

On Wednesdays I have the first two periods free, so I spend some time surfing my spankin’ net moderate speed internet in my office. You don’t know what you’ve got until its gone, let me tell you. I also attempt to prepare myself, as I know that during the break between first and second period, my counterpart will approach me with one of the following four criticisms:
I didn’t shave that morning. Which is true, but frankly I thought I had done a good job shaving the previous day and god damn it why the hell do I have to shave every freaking morning. If only I was somehow descended from a less hairy Jewish family. (Authors note: My wonderful gene pool has also kicked in as of late with my ever destined male pattern baldness. Hurrah!)
I did not adequately iron my pants. I actually did iron my pants that morning, but frankly I’m not very good at it, which is a ridiculous thing to say, perhaps. But I’m trying.
I look like crap. Which I do.
My clothes are dirty/they smell/I have absolutely no idea how to do laundry.

Today she decides to touch on all four, but she really emphasizes the last one. She insists I change my English lessons schedule that I hold after school, so she can come over and teach me how to properly do my laundry by hand. Forget the fact that I have been living here for about eight months now. I clearly have no idea what I’m doing.

I understand that she only criticizes me because she cares about me, and a part of me is flattered. She seens me as another son. But I already have one overbearing mother (love you mom!) and another one might just send me to the insane asylum.

At the end of 2nd period, the English teach arrives, only to informed me that she needs me to teach her classes for her fourth and fifth period because she is headed to the hospital. She recently became pregnant (shes 21 already, so a little behind the game on Ukrainian standards) and there was some sport of issue. I readily agreed, partially to help and partially because I really do enjoy teaching.

The res of my day was jam packed. 3rd period I had an individual tutoring session, fourth and fifth I taught 2nd and 7th grades, respectively, 6th and 7th period I had private tutoring sessions. This is not to mention the fact that during the breaks my guitar students wander in and out of my office in the desire to jam out a bit here and a bit there. It can get wild.

School was over at 230, and I missed the bus, so I had to walk home, about 12 minutes. It snowed for the first time the weekend before, and had done so continuously since then, so there was some sluddgery in my trek.

I got home, fed myself some bread and cheese (again, no time to cook) and I headed over to my counterpart’s house to get my water. My new house has pluses and minuses. A plus is that I now get my water from a faucet. A minus is that this faucet is in my counterpart’s house next door. So literally any time I want water, I have to intrusively enter their home and ask for it. It can get weird.

We fill up about 5 buckets of water as my counterpart displays the proper techniques for the washing of the clothes. Warm water for sweaters, hot water for whites, swish them around lots in the bins, scrub the edges together to get rid of excess dirt, pay careful attention to the armpits because I’ve seen you on hot days Jeremy and frankly your armpits ain’t so pretty.

We spent the next two hours with her barking orders at me, and telling me how bad I was at doing laundry. Luckily my ego has taken enough beatings over the last few months that I was able to take her criticisms in stride. Although, to be fair, I was incredibly tired already, and she certainly didn’t put her in a better mood. Her husband, the School Director (Principal), noticed my displeasure and said to me these golden words of advice, eerily similar to those of my own father: “Dzheremi. Tilky Skazhit Dobre.” Jeremy. Just say ok.

At a quarter to 5 I headed back to school. It was already dark so I brought my flashlight (the sun has been setting around 430). From 5 until 8 I proceeded to conduct English lessons from school. I got home around 815, and got ready to cook a little foot (boiled potatoes) when my mother called. She asked me if I had gotten her Hannukah package, replete with Candles, a Menorah, a few gifts, and a dreidel. I told her I had. She reminded me that it was the first night of Hannukah. I had almsot forgotten.My mother stayed on the phone with me as I set up my menorah and then lit the candles. We said the blessings together.

And it was evening, and it was morning, the first day.
Thursday, December 2: I again woke up at 630, because frankly I am just too tired to set my alarm any earlier. It is especially cold this morning. I almost crush my glasses while simultaneously looking for them and my slippers. I fry a few eggs but lack the effort to take it to a higher level. I make sure to shave, which I do without the aid of shaving cream. This is for two main reasons:
It makes me feel like a man
The shaving cream here makes my face break out. (Author’s note: Mom, this does not mean you have to send me shaving cream. Please do not send me shaving cream. If it will help, I will take out a billboard in New York City on the West Side Highway that will say “DO NOT SEND YOUR SON SHAVING CREAM.” But my Peace Corps salary of $150 doesn’t go a long way as it is, so maybe we can cut that one out.”

I get outside, and realize that this is easily the coldest day I have experienced thus far in Ukraine. I see my counterpart and Director waiting outside for the school bus, and since my hands are becoming frostbitten simply out of exposure to the air, I join them. Today there will be a small bazaar in the center of our village, where I have a weekly routine. I buy chocolates for the teachers lounge, and I buy my weekly allotment of cheese. I also realize the necessity of buying some new gloves. I brought some from home, but in wonderfully classic Jeremy fashion, I seem to have lost one. Exactly what I need to exacerbate my lifelong search for the one armed man who killed my wife and destroyed my pleasant life as a surgeon at a major Metropolitan Chicago Hospital. If only Tommy Lee Jones would get off my back.

I come to school to find that the English teacher is absent, and that there will be no English classes today. On some days the English teacher’s absence means that I have to teach an English class sans preparation. On other days it just means I have to find some other way to occupy my time. Ukrainians like to make decisions at the last possible moment. The whole notion of planning of advance is so foreign, that when I begin talking about events a month from now, I often receive quizzical looks. Its almost as if there is a glimmer of doubt whether a month from now, anyone will be here.

And yet my day is still surprisingly busy. I help teach a healthy lifestyles class, and I sit in on two geography lessons. Fortunately most country names are the same in both languages. I give three guitar lessons, and two individualized english lessons. During fourth period, I head to the first grade with my guitar. I have been writing simple english songs on my guitar to help them learn the language. The first was the alphabet song, albeit a Jeremy-Borovitz-variation. Then we did “I like to eat apples and bananas.” Now we are on “Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes.” I’m having all these flashbacks to Kindergarten. It can get nostalgic.

At the end of the day, my first post-school English lesson informs me she won’t be able to make it. I am disappointed and yet thrilled at the same time. This affords me the rare opportunity to actually relax for a bit when the school day is over. I head home and actually cook some food---fried potatoes with onions, garlic, mushrooms, and an egg cracked on top. My menu choices are somewhat limited, because I can’t really buy much in the local store. I am forced to eat whatever the locals bring me. Currently that means inordinate amounts of potatoes and apples.

It was supposed to be a light day, but I get a call from my neighbor as I am heading home from school. She has been trying to convince me to tutor her two cousins, who live in the village over. They go to a different school and frankly my time is scarce as is. But she guilts me into it, finally. So I head to school for two hours of english lessons, and then I head over to my neighbors house for one more. I am very strict with the girls, as this is our first lesson, and I don’t really want to do it. I tell them that homework is a MUST. The girls turn out to be both smart and motivated, though, so I get more enthused as the lesson goes on. Chalk another hour up to not having time to breathe.

I finally get home a little after 8. I am tired. I call my friend Stephanie, a fellow Wolverine and Jew. She will be going on her first trip to Israel in December with the Borovitz clan. I knew she didn’t have a menorah at site, so we said the blessings together as I lit the candles. I then informed her of my mother’s already laminated itinerary for our trip to Israel. (Author’s note: Mom, I apologize for all the references. i joke because I love.)

And it was evening, and it was morning. Day two.

Friday morning I woke up, for the first time, with the hope that I might actually survive this week. Not that it was ever in question, but, well, the morosity (jewish guilt) that occasionally consumes my being was becoming a little burdensome. I got to school and penned off a letter to my friend Vanessa. She suggested I write her a letter in Ukrainian cursive in order to practice my writing skills. A nice little exercise.

Friday was a lighter day. The snow was pretty thick so I spent much of my time playing in the cold thickness with children ages 6-9. I had three english lessons with students during the day. Friday is also the day where any teachers in the school who want an English lesson or to practice their English skills can come to me. There is one teacher, Ina, who has a dream of eventually starting a school for the deaf. She wants to learn english so she can learn American Sign Language, as well as be able to teach the kids how to read lips in English. You’ve got to admire someone who is trying to create a legion of bilingual deaf kids. Ina is an excellent student and truly wants to learn.

I also usually tutor Victoria. Victoria is 21 and is in University. She is doing a “work-study” program, where part time she is working in a school (her mother is the first grade teacher) and part time she is in classes. While part of her curiculuum is English, Victoria knows generally no English. Her English lessons consist of the following:
Victoria attempts her homework. Most if it is incorrect.
I try to teach her the basic grammar lesson that corresponds to her homework assignment.
After about ten minutes she asks if I will just do it for her. I tell her I won’t, and she begins to cry. Her husband doesn’t love her, her life is terrible, she can’t catch a break, she just wants a baby. That’s the basic jist, at least. Of course none of it is true; I’ve met her husband, he is a wonderful guy, and is enamored with her. But Victoria is adept at complaining, and eventually, I give in.

At the end of the day I had a lesson with Angela (pronounced An-Gel-Ah, with a stress on the middle syllable rather than the first), one of my star pupils. Angela is in the fifth grade and is easily the smartest student in her class. She is also incredibly driven, and has a remarkably clear idea of where she is headed in life. She is confident and a know-it-all, which could be annoying in some places but are exactly the qualities one needs to get out of the village. I have been struggling for some time now to light a fire under Angela, to get her to really study hard. I had remembered talking to Stephanie about a women’s empowerment summer camp she would be involved with. So I called Stephanie and asked her for more information. It turns out the camp is incredibly cheap but also requires the campers to be at a certain level of English. Perfect. I tell Angela about the camp, and she is enthralled. Fire lit (Hannukah pun not intended).

I go to my local store, and purchase grape juice and a challah. Of course they don’t call it a challah. They call it sweet bread. And they don’t talk about how its a Jewish bread. Thats largely irrelevant. I go home, clean my house, and set up my candles. I only have two candles left. They are pretty large, but I am unsure if I will have a chance to get out of my village to buy more before next Shabbat. I decide to cut them each in half. Hopefully, I am still Yitzeh, still adequately fulfilling the commandment. As per tradition, the Hannukah candles are lit before the Sabbath candles, because one cannot kindle a new flame after the Sabbath has begun. I call my friend Avital to see if she would like to light with me. Avital is in training as a PCV in Ukraine, and is also from my local area in New Jersey. In fact, we went to school together for about nine years. She unfortunately doesn’t have any Hannukah or Sabbath candles, so I figured it might be nice to do the whole shebang over the phone together. We light three candles and say the blessings.
We light the Sabbath candles and chant Lecha Dodi, welcoming the Sabbath into our midst. I say the Kiddush, the blessing over the grape juice, and Avital says Amen. I wash my hands and take the cover off my challah. I taste a bit for myself and a bit for her. And she says, Amen.

And it was evening, and it was morning. Day three.

I slept in on Saturday, which means until about 830. My mother had sent me a book that I wanted to read, and I resolved to finish it in one day. As a part of my ever evolving Jewish identity, I don’t use my computer on the Sabbath, which means I am unable to watch my plethora of TV shows and movies nestled into the safe confines of my external hard drive. So I cooked myself some eggs and then laid in bed for the next three hours reading. At around 1 some of the kids knocked on my door. They wanted to know if I wanted to go sledding. I acquiesced. Sledding in America is a lot different than sledding in Ukraine. In America, sledding often consists of one big hill with lots of little kids flying down it. In Ukraine, it involves children carving out paths on the hilly countryside and then seeing which of them can fly the farthest after being launched off of the ten foot ledge. I mainly watched.

I really rested on Saturday, which was nice, it being the Sabbath and all. I have really begun to appreciate since arriving in Ukraine, and really being on the job 24/7, the value of having a day of rest. I am tired a lot here, bordering on a state of exhaustion. It is so necessary to have time to shut the world off, to be able to flick a switch and ignore the crazy world outside your walls. Every day I am consumed with the lives and travails and troubles of the people of my village. Its nice to have on day just for me.

After sledding I went back home and did some more reading. Around 5 one of my neighbors called to invite me to dinner. Apparently it was sme sort of Ukrainian holiday, and they were celebrating. I should mention that Ukraine averages about 5-7 holidays every month, and they insist on “celebrating” every one of them. This consists of multiple shots of varying spirits and liquors, inordinate amounts of food, and minor hangovers. The sabbath nearing its end, I agreed, mainly because it meant I would not have to cook myself dinner.

The dinner ended up being myself with four other women and two small girls. I have learned my limit in Ukraine and drank only a modest amount. The women all drank me under the table, chastising my manhood in the interim. I went home and got ready to go to sleep, even going so far as to lie down in bed. Then I remembered it was Hannukah, and in my tipsy form I set up the four candles, lit them, and said the prayers.

And it was morning, and it was evening. The Fourth day.

Sunday I woke up with a bit of a headache. I dont drink much here, so even a smidgen can give me a wee case of the weelies come the AM. I took my time waking up but not too much time. Saturday is my day of rest, and thus Sunday is my day to work.

First I gave the house a good ol fashioned sweep. Then I collected all my carpets and hung them over the clotheslines, and I proceeded to beat them with a broom. It is therapeutic and exhausting, much like the Peace Corps in general. I then mop the floors of my house. I scrub down the counters and soak my dishes in warm water and soap. I scrape the bottom of my pans and change my sheets. Finally, I burn my toilet paper. Nothing life the sweet smell of your own burning feces to really get a start to your day.

After four hours of scrubbing my place clean, i take an hour or two to plan out my lessons for the week. Much of the lessons I give are ad libbing---I’ve always been a man who works well on his feet. But I have found it useful to at least mentally sketch out what I will teach for the week, look up any grammar rules I may not know (happens more than I’d like to admit) and write out my schedule that will undoubtedly change a million times.

It being Hannukah and all, and having some free time, I try to test my wit at cooking some genuine Latkes. I grate 10 potatoes and mix it with five onions, flour, and two eggs. I throw in some salt and pepper, and some chalula hot sauce for that extra kick (great care package, mom!). I then throw in some Kefir, which is similar to buttermilk. A smidgen more flour and then I fry it up. Surprisingly, they turned out delicious. I even brought one over to my counterpart, and she refused to believe that I had cooked it. Best compliment I could have received.

At around 4, Vannya calls. Vannya is the son of two of the teachers at school, and is in the midst of a pretty standard teen identity crisis. He is 15, his parents don’t understand him, and he constantly thinks about getting laid. The similarities are oddly familiar. As an outlet for his frustration, I started teaching him guitar. About four months in he has gotten pretty good, and he has even started teaching some of the younger kids in the village, including a pretty ninth grade girl whom he gives “private lessons” to once a week. Its definitely hard to change your image when you’ve grown up with the same 20 kids your whole life, but Vannya is giving it a whirl.

Vannya had seen on television that it was a Jewish holiday. So at about 7, I set up the candles and lit them and said the blessings. Vannya thought it was interesting, but his mother is very involved in the local church and as a part of his rebellion he isn’t much interested in God right now. I suspect that might one day change, but we will see.

And it was morning, and it was evening. Day Five.

Monday, Monday. The start of another week at school. Hurrah! The English teacher is absent again, which means I have absolutely no idea if I will be teaching English or not that week. They particularly enjoy keeping me in the dark. Additionally, the Vice Principal, who decides the work schedules, for some reason is not my biggest fan. I have tried my usual kiss-ass techniques but she is immune to my charm. Somewhat like most women I talk to in New York City bars. She lays down a decree that I will not teach any English classes while she is gone. However, the teachers of the younger classes (until fourth grade) still ask that I come in for 20 minutes, or longer. For them, I am double whammy: I teach the kids English, and they get a nice rest.

I talk to my friend Rachel today for quite some time. Rachel was in my training cluster, and is still one of my closest friends in Peace Corps. Rachel also has this wonderful habit of asking me for my advice, and then informing me she is going to do the complete opposite. I have a feeling she would get along well with some of my closer friends.

The teachers all saw a segment on the news about Hannukah, and they asked me to explain the holiday. When we get to the part about the oil lasting for 8 days, I am forced to head to the dictionary to look up the world miracle. Divo. They then proceed to tell me about a tree a few villages over that was struck by lightning, causing a formation that looks stunningly akin to the virgin mary to form.

I head home quickly after school, because my first English lesson starts at 330. I check on the clothes I washed the Wednesday before, and it appears they are still frozen. I also learn a brand new lesson: toilet paper can, in fact, freeze. Mental note: Bring toilet paper inside after pooping.

My lessons go well. Two of my students are Tanya and Alina. They are the smartest girls in the 11th grade, and they really want to make something of themselves. Tanya wants to be a lawyer. Alina does not know what she wants to be, but senses that she does not want to be beholden to a man for the rest of her life. I try my best to regale them with stories of my feminist mother. They still have trouble grasping why she kept her last name.

I head home at about 830 for the night. I am tired and hungry. I still had a Latke left over, and Tanya had cooked me Peroshki, which is basically a roll filled with either jam or cabbage. I call my friend Tommy before going to bed. He is smiling, as always. I put in the candles and say the blessings and kindle the flames. And then I head to sleep.

And it was morning, and it was evening, day six.

Tuesday was a mildly insane day. For some reason that I have yet to entirely gather, Tuesday there was a celebration at school. It involved the first graders receiving their first library books. Even though many of them can’t read. I think it might have been “library day.” One of the most interesting outgrowths of the Soviet Union is that almost every day is a holiday. Well, not really. But almost. We have women’s day, men’s day, policeman’s day, teacher’s day, student’s day, postal workers day, cossacks day, shevchenko’s day, artists day, politicians day, army day, victory day. The list goes on, and on, and on.

There was also a lot of snow, so during 4th period I went outside and built a Baba Cnih, or a Snow Grandmother (their version of Frosty) with the 2nd graders. I was especially useful in the molding of the bottom ball, and in the heavy lifting. Most of the 2nd grade girls have massive crushes on me, so they insist on poking me and then running away. Again, I do not remember being this popular in 2nd grade with women. In fact, if I remember correctly, most of 2nd grade was spent with my teacher trying to convince me not to cry so much.

I have four lessons in school on Tuesday, in addition to the holiday and my usual jovialty with the second grade. I go home and decide to take a bucket bath. Not to be confused with a bath of any kind, this consists of me heating up water, and then sitting naked in a giant bucket as I pour it over myself. Its pretty much the opposite of refreshing, especially when the freezing air outdoors creeps in through the cracks in the windows and I’m shriveling while curled up in the fetal position sitting in a plastic container in the middle of my kitchen with no door in a small Ukrainian village. Just another day in the life.

I go back to school and have three more hours of English lessons. I come home and call another volunteer, Rachel (a different Rachel than the one mentioned earlier, we will refer to this Rachel as Jewish Rachel). Jewish Rachel, through the wonderous system known as American Jewish geography, actually knows my cousin Cara. The first time we met, she informed me, “you have to call your grandmother more.” I figured Rachel might enjoy joining in on the Hannukah fun, so I give her a call. We light the candles, say the blessings, she joins in with resounding “Amens.” Then Vannya shows up unannounced at my house. He wants to have a guitar/therapy lesson. This will consist of him not understanding why Yulia, one of his classmates, keeps “playing games” with him. I do my best to assure him that I, 8 years his senior, do not understand women, either. I suggest he “plays it cool.” I later convey this message to my friend Vanessa, another Volunteer, over the phone, and she tells me I’m an idiot.

And it was morning, and it was evening. The seventh day.

Wednesday again, one of my busiest days. I have five lessons on average during the day, and then another three at night. Today it will actually be four because of scheduling issues. Also today some of the girls are practicing songs they will sing on Christmas. I am pretty content watching them sing songs in a language I can’t begin to understand (it is in old Slavic.) Apparently, on Christmas day, all the kids go around and sing songs to different people in the village. I am sorry I will likely not be there.

I end up playing basketball 2nd period with the 11th graders. I happen to be the second coming of Kobe Bryant (or perhaps Mugsy Bogues, but still he wasn’t so bad). None of them have any idea of how to dribble, so the game consists of my literally running circles around defenders and then getting my own rebound on my missed layup because they don’t know how to box out. Hell yea.

This week seems to be going especially slowly, and I am having one of my “what the hell am I doing here” days. I am tired, I am cranky, and I feel very unappreciated. Furthermore, I begin to wonder whether I am having any impact at all. One of Peace Corps’ big thing is sustainability---does this project have the potential to continue after you leave. Alot of the time I really am not sure if anything I do is sustainable. Rather I get the sense I am driving a bus and as soon as I stop everyone will hop out and no one else will get behind the wheel. This is very discouraging, and depressing. I want to do more, but sometimes I’m just not sure if I know how.

I am sitting in my director’s office, and our schools technology teacher comes in. He wants to start having a serious conversation with some of the local political leaders about building a monument at the old Jewish cemetery.

Andrei comes up to me seventh period. He wants to start doing English lessons. He says he knows he is lazy sometimes, but he promises to work hard.

Two first graders, Katya and Nastiya, approach me to show how they have learned the English Alphabet, although they mixed up M and N.

Igor approaches. We have been talking about restarting the school newspaper, and he wants to be Editor in Chief.

Vannya comes into my office. He has made up his own chord progression on the guitar.

That night, I have a lesson with the Verhulatsky family. They cook me Latkes. They heard I had cooked some myself (word travels fast in the village) and they wanted to show me how delicious they could really be.

My work here is no Hannukah miracle. An its possible this Oil isn’t going to last eight days, or eight years, after I’m gone. But I still feel like I’m doing something, as long as I keep focused on the small victories of every day.

I film myself lighting the eight candles of Hannukah. And it was morning, and it was evening, and it was the eighth day, but my story continues to day nine.

Hey all,

Here is a video I took from our Thanksgiving feast. In the video is Julia, Vanessa, and Paula, my three American friends, as well as Vannya, or Ivan, sitting in the corner. Vannya is a student in the tenth grade at my school. Playing the guitar is Vitaly, a friend of mine from the village who is studying to be a Veterinarian. And yes, ladies, he is single.

A rough translation of the songs chorus:
You are the sun, a gift from the sky
You are the early light on a spring's day
I want to love, but is it still necessary
For you have decided who will be with you, and it is not me

Thanksgiving

About 25 years ago, my Grandfather, Irving Appelbaum, had a heart attack. My grandmother, Cecelia, strong willed Jewish woman that she was (and is), resolved to keep him alive for as long as humanly possible. The staple of this effort lay in putting my grandfather on a very strict diet. No more cigars, no more scotch, no more cheeseburgers. And no more pie.
Cecelia was known the world over for her pies. Well, if not the world, then certainly some percentage of the population who would join my family for thanksgiving every year. My Grandfather accepted most of the restrictions, but on one he refused. He had to have pie on thanksgiving. And so my Grandmother found a not-too-fatty apple pie recipe, and a tradition was borne.
And so year after year in late November my family and I would trek to the airport and fly to Chicago, to spend the Thanksgiving holiday with my aunt and cousins and Grandparents. And year after year we would eat turkey and stuffing and sweet potatoes and cranberries and we would watch football and old home movies and we would be together as a family. And in the end, of course, we would indulge with Apple Pie.
This was my first Thanksgiving away from home. If there were two annual events that marked the consistency of my childhood, it was Passover in New Jersey and Thanksgiving in Chicago. I had missed this past year’s Passover by a nose, but I was so rushed in the jumble of excitement that was my initial few days in Ukraine that the shock of missing it all was hard to find. But this time around I am all ready well into my Ukrainian routine, 8 months in (man how time has flown, and also crept incredibly slowly) and thinking a lot more about home than I used to. It was hard to imagine that I wouldn’t be at the Thanksgiving table, that 22 years of tradition was coming to an abrupt end (or, optimistically, a pause).
The approaching holiday coincided with the fact that these past few weeks have been among my hardest in Ukraine. My workload has begun to spiral ever so slightly out of control. Full days at school, followed by 3-4 hours of English tutoring sessions at night. No one is pressuring me to take on such a heavy workload; I primarily bring it upon myself. But I can’t say no to these kids. My over bearing Jewish-White-Upper-Middle-Class guilt too much.
The perfect storm of stress and the sun setting at 4 O’clock and winter’s imminent arrival and Thanksgiving made me, for the first time since arriving, pretty homesick. I was, therefore, pretty glad when three of my Peace Corps friends, Paula, Julia, and Vanessa, decided to come check out my humble abode in Boyarka for the weekend.
I have a perfect place to host visitors. Plenty of room, extra beds, a welcoming community. The only problem lies, of course, in the fact that there is only one bus a day directly into my village, and it leaves from the Oblast center, Cherkassy, not far from where Vanessa is placed. Vanessa and Julia were arriving together late at night, and they were understandably nervous about finding the right bus. I assured them it would be easy enough. Just ask the bus driver if their name is Sasha or Petya, and if it is, ask them if they know Jeremy, the American who lives in Boyarka. Just a couple of small town folk’.
All worked to plan, and when Vanessa and Julia arrived, we set to work on a presentation, to be given at my school the next day, about the meaning of Thanksgiving. Wanting to balance American cliches of being grateful with historical accuracies of the desecration of a continent’s worth of inhabitants, we hobbled together a brief presentation that covered history, culture, and traditional foods. We topped it all of by drawing a “Thanking tree.” Vanessa sketched a beautiful tree with hanging leaves, and at the end of our presentation, we encouraged people to come up and write what they are thankful for. At first everyone was a bit hesitant, so I wrote down three examples: Cimya, Druzi, i Boyarka. Family, Friends, and Boyarka.
Then the crowd really got into it. First a few of the teachers came up, and then the oldest students, and then a group of seventh grade girls who have developed some affectionate feelings for our fair writer. (Author’s note: When I was in seventh grade, I couldn’t get a girl to talk to me. Now that I’m a teacher, they follow me wherever I go.) It only took a few minutes for the tree to get filled in. What are you thankful for? I was asking. Their answers were beautiful and humbling, honest and embarressing. Druzi, Cimya, Babusia, Zdorovya, Friends, Family, Grandmothers and Health topped the list. But not far behind were scribbled markings saying Dzeremi Natanovich, Jeremy Son of Natan. Our schools technology teacher even took it a bit further: I am thankful for Jeremy, and his parents, and his sister Abby, and his two grandmothers. Thousands of miles away and family was still around.
Its hard to speak for their impressions, but I think Vanessa and Julia were at least a bit jealous of my village. Vanessa and Julia had trained in a small village but now were placed in larger towns or cities, and they missed that whole “everyone knowing everything about you” feel. Paula, who arrived later that day, also lives in a small village, and she enjoyed comparing our various experiences.
While I love life in the small village, it can, at times, become suffocating. I know by face, if not by name, practically every person in Boyarka, as well as much of the surrounding villages. And I am known the region over, for there aren’t many foreigners, let alone Americans, dilly-dallying around this corner of the Ukrainian countryside. The Peace Corps has a set a core expectations they have given to us periodically through our service, and one of them is this: As a Peace Corps volunteer, you are on-duty 24 hours a day. In my village, this is very much the case.
The last few weeks have been exhausting. I have been working non stop, 12 hour days becoming a norm. I am always tired and I never seem to have a free moment to ourselves. I have been speaking and thinking and dreaming so much in Ukrainian that sometimes I forget English words. In the most innocuous way possible, I have been losing it, just a little.
I don’t really drink in my village. I try to always have a smile on my face and a positive attitude in tow. My frat kegger days are far behind me, and would shock any memebr of my community. My pessimistic sarcasm wrought from angst ridden teenage years watching too many Woody Allen films has no place in my new home. My doubts and fallibilities I try to keep hidden. I portray a version of my self I want them to see, for their benefit, for America’s benefit, for the Jewish people’s benefit. I am, at the same time, both more in touch with myself than I have ever been and farther from whom I know I am than I ever could have imagined. A life of contradictions is exhausting.
The girls coming to visit wasn’t just a break. It was a wake up call, a much needed injection of life and purpose and friendship that I desperately needed. Friday night we stayed up late, talking and drinking and laughing. We weren’t trying to escape the moment, however. The lack of running water and the outdoor toilet surely prevented us from pretending we were in some other place. But perhaps we were being just a bit more ourselves than our usual circumstances allow.
On Saturday, after taking a nice stroll through the village, the girls and I got down to business. We had all gathered as much food as we could---a giant fish my neighbor had caught for me, onions, carrots, potatoes, pumpkins, apples, soy sauce, more potatoes, cheese, bread, butter, flour, baking soda, more potatoes---and begin to cook a feast for the ages. We made stuffing and mashed potatoes and vegan gravy. I was in charge of making fish burgers, which was an interesting endeavour that luckily gave no one salmonella. And Julia, at my request, ventured to bake an apple pie. It just wasn’t Thanksgiving without Apple Pie, that much I knew.
We cooked extra food, in true Appelbaum/Borovitz/Jewish style, correctly anticipating that four or five of the locals were going to stop by to get a peak at the American girls. After the food was cooked, and the table was set, we each poured ourselves a glass of wine, and the girls asked that I make a toast. My exact words are long lost, but I can still recall the basic jist:
Its easy to get lost here. Sure my village is small and there are only three roads, but its easy to get lost. We drown in language and swim through this strange culture and gasp for breaths of respite from the comparative insanity of our everyday lives. And so its nice, once in a while, to be among friends, just to remember that we know who, and where, we are.
And so we clanked our glasses and we drank our wine. Some guests came by and they tasted our food and we taught them some english and they taught us some ukrainian. I pulled out the guitar and played some American songs, and then my friend Vitaly serenaded us in Ukrainian and Russian. We played Uno and we told stories, we spoke of our old homes and our new ones, we were thankful for we had, even more thankful for what we have.
And in the end we ate Julia’s Apple Pie. And it may not have been as tasty as my Grandmother’s (although it was damn close) and it may have desperately needed a scoop of ice cream on top. But as delicious as the pie was, what it meant to me to have it was so much more important. My Grandmother’s pie helped my Grandfather live a little longer. Julia’s pie gave me that extra little jolt that I desperately needed to push my own adventure a bit farther into the future.

Contradictions

It’s been a while.

This entry was supposed to be about exhaustion----about the jam-packed pace of my daily life that has made an perception of hard work I had experienced up to this point seem like a distant memory. But then a day like yesterday happens, a transformative day wedged in the middle of end on end of transformative days. There are some days when I think I begin to understand my surroundings, these people, this experience. And then a day like Sunday occurs, and I begin to come to the realization that I don’t know anything at all.

When I arrived in my current humble abode in Boyarka, Ukraine, I sent out some feelers, via the well-connected network that is the Jewish community, to discover whether I could find any information about any Jews who might live in my vicinity. My endeavours were met with questioning success until one day I received a call from a man named Piotr, looking for “Jemy.” He said he had gotten my name from an American Rabbi named Martin Horowitz (whom I heard of via Rabbi Michael Strassfeld) and identified himself as the head of liberal Jewish communities in the Cherkasska Oblast, where I was placed. He only lived about an hour or so away! I could barely hide my excitement. Here were a group of Jews, attempting to pray right under my nose.

We attempted (in vain) to meet up on a few occasions, but it kept falling through for one reason or another. Finally, we set up a date. In all of Cherkasska oblast, there is only one pre-war synagogue that is currently in the hands of the Jewish community. This is in a small city Zvenaharodka, less than an hour from where I live. The Sunday after Simchat Torah, the day where the Jews complete their yearly reading of the Torah, the whole community was going to meet at this synagogue, to talk, to eat, to pray.

As I entered the synagogue in Zvenaharodka, I was overwhelmed by a familiar feeling, the same emotions that took over the first time I went to synagogue in Warsaw and first prayed with a group of Jews in Kiev. It was this hard to define notion of being home miles from home, a temporary cure for the chronic displacement that makes it so hard for me to stay in one place.

The moment I found Piotr, he embraced me, as if we had known each other for years. He incepted this bond immediately, this feeling that we were two peas in a pod, he and I, that we were brothers, that he was my father, that he was my friend.

Piotr was feeling a bit rushed. Today was a big day, he explained. We are going to read Torah, and we are going to sing, and we are going to conduct a Bar and Bat Mitzvah for three of our teenage Jewish members. But no one could really read Torah and only a few people knew the songs and how in Hashem’s name were we going to conduct a Bar Mitzvah anyway. The serendipity of the moment was borderline hilarious. Finally, I thought, $150,000 and 14 years of Jewish education was going to pay off, not to mention that handy ol’ rabbinical lineage.

And so when the time came to read the Torah, I read the last portion of Dueteronomy, talking of Moses death and the fate that waited the people Israel. I repeated the words, Chazak, Chazak, Venitchazek, Strong, Strong, and may we go from strength to strength. I taught them how to properly roll a Torah scroll from the end to the beginning, I taught them about the circular notion of it all, I read the first few lines of Breishit and I incepted the cycle anew. I chanted for them a tune that many had never heard, I did my best to give them a glimpse of a Judaism they hardly knew.

For this group of Jews were largely uneducated. Many had only discovered their roots in the last twenty years, and those who had known longer often hid the truth. When the three teenagers approached to participate in a ritual that had defined our community for almost two millenium, this coming of age, they were about as clueless as everyone else, about as clueless as I was myself. But I had seen my father go through the motions a million times or two, I knew the basic gist.

Place the Tallit, the prayer shawl, on your head. Repeat the blessing. Say Amen. Collect the fringes of the shawl, and wrap it around your finger. Bring the fringes towards the words on the Torah scroll, touch the words (with the shawl, not your fingers!) and bring it to your lips. Kiss the word of God. Repeat the blessing, after me. When I finish, repeat the process once more. And let us say, Amen.

Then, in the best Neal Borovitz imitation I may have ever pulled off, I recited the Birkat Cohanim, the preistly blessing, my Tallit on my head and my hands stretched out in a manner that would have made Leanord Nimoy proud. May God Bless you and protect you. May God be kind to you and be gracious to you. May god smile upon you always, and bless you with peace. And let us say, Amen.

There were a plethora of amazing things about this experience, not the least of which was not only was this my first pseudo-rabbinical experience, but it was entirely in Ukrainian. As I returned home from synagogue that day, I was imbued with a feeling of warmth. I felt really, truly happy. I looked forward to being with my new family sometime soon.

Life is hard in the village. Obviously I already feel like an outsider, the sole American. Yet the compounding of being a Jew, the ultimate outsider, can sometimes make this issue even more difficult.

I have often spoke fondly on these pages of my School Director, a man whose ideas and energy in many ways keeps this town moving. He is a good man, an honest man. He is also a Ukrainian man, and thus, on occassion, enjoys a drink or fourteen.

On one of these oh so special nights, he paid me a visit at my house. He proceeded to give a brief lecture on Ukrainian history, focusing heavily on World War II, the great famine, tragedies, death, destruction, and other happy topics. Somehow he segued into a discussion of communism, and Marx, Engels, and Lenin began to play into the discussion. Then he threw it at me, with the force a cannonball: “Jeremy. chomu bci yiverei abo anheli abo demoni.” Jeremy. Why are all Jews either angels or demons.

Suffice it to say I didn’t really have an answer for that question, or even an answer of how to respond to that question, or really any idea of anything to say at all. I guess in a way he was complimenting me, as I’m assuming he does not place me in the demon category. But there are honestly so many levels to that statements, so many language barriers and culutural barriers that prevent a serious discourse. I didn’t know what to say. So I said nothing.

There is one family in the village over, the Verhulatsky family, who are exceptional exceptions. The family is guided by two brothers, one of whom has four children, the other who has seven. Six of these eleven students are at the top or near the top of their class. The others have either completed school or are under the age of 6. Nearly every member of the Verhulatsky clan comes to me on a weekly basis to have an English lesson. On Wednesday nights at six, one of the families comes to me in full tow: The first grader Luba, the fifth grade Lesya, the eighth grader Kolya and the eleventh grader Yuri, not to mention the father, Vitaly.

During our last lesson, the father asked me if my mother missed me. I responded with a bit of a joke, saying that my mother was a classic Jewish mother, and that she had been missing me since I left the womb (I swear it was only a joke, Mom!) This joke was followed by an awkward pause, and suddenly I realized: They had no idea I was Jewish. I hadn’t been keeping it a secret, but I hadn’t exactly been advertising it, either.

We began to have a discussion about religion, and God, and Jesus. They were a bit incredulous about the fact that I didn’t believe Jesus was the son of God. He was the messiah, Vitaly told me. You must acknowledge this.

I said that for me, when the messiah comes there will be peace on earth.

He told me that Jesus told us he would be back.

I responded that if Jesus comes back, I will be the first to admit I was wrong.

He retorted that then, it will be too late.

I stopped the conversation there in its tracks, knowing it can’t be leading anywhere good. I said that all people have the right to their own beliefs, to their own set of doctrines, to their own personal relationship with God. One thing works for me and something else works for somebody else. They were temporarily satisfied, but I could shake this notion that somehow I was now different in their eyes.

I had known for some time now that this area used to be heavily populated with Jews. In my village alone, 623 Jews were killed by the Nazis during the Holocaust. No one seems to know, however, where they were killed, where they were brought and shot or burned or drowned or who knows what or why or when or how. I had often asked my Director for more information about it, but his hesitance was often quite clear. There were places to see, things I could witness. Later, he said. Not now.

Last week, Piotr called me. On Sunday, he told me, there would be a conference in Korsun, his home city, about the Holocaust. He had arranged a ride for me, he had set it all up. He looked forward to seeing me there.

He gave me the number for Oleksander, a name that was to serve as my transportation for the even. We arranged to meet in my village center at 830 in the morning. I didn’t think it would be hard to find him, because, well, its pretty rare that there are cars and/or people in my village center.

My suspicions prevailed, and as soon as I saw the blue Sovietsky style sedan pulling into the village, I flagged him down. As soon as he saw the funny looking American with the messenger bag, he stopped. I got in, we exchanged pleasantries, and went on our way.

It took a few minutes into the car ride for us to get to the juicy stuff.

“Ti Ivreyi?” You are a Jew?

“Tak. Ya Yivreyi. a vi?” Yes, I am a Jew. And you?

“Moye Tato bulo. Ale ya chrestiyan.” My father was. But I am a christian.

The adamance with which he emphasized the last part of that statement left quite an impression on me, one that lingered for the rest of the time together. He did not seemed ashamed, like some Ukrainians I have met, of his Jewish lineage. But at the same time, he wanted to be clear that he was a Christian, that he believed in Jesus, that he wasn’t quite one of me, not anymore.

He began to tell me what he knew of the Jewish communities that used to exist here, what he remembered and what his father had told him. When he grew up, there had been four Jewish families in Lisyanka, my regional center, and one in my village itself. This was post war, post genocide, post destruction. Almost all had since fled to Israel. I asked him about the war itself, about the Jews who had been killed. He slowed down the car and looked away from the road, into my eyes.

“Meni Treba tobi pokazati schos.” I need to show you something.

He took us down a side road of the main one, and then from there pulled onto a dirt path that could hardly be called a road at all. He drove us into the woods, and I briefly considered the notion that I was about to be dragged into some abandoned cabin and forced to perform some acts straight out of the movie “Hostel.” Instead, he stopped in the middle of these woods, right near a small gated off area.

As we approached it, he tried to paint a picture. Here there was a well. Here is where they lined them up. They threw the old people in the well first, saving the children for last. They thought if they didn’t throw the children in first, the parents would cooperate. One by one they drowned them, shooting the few with the courage to run. One by one until they reached 300, they killed all the Jews of Lisyanka they managed to round up.

There was a small monument there, a tablet sized stone commemerating the event. On this spot, it read, the fascists drowned 300 members of our community.

I was shocked it didn’t say Jews. Oleksander was more upset by something else.

“Tse ne bulo fashisti. Ukrayintzi robili.” It was not the fascists. Ukrainians did this. Ukrainians killed these Jews.

I wasn’t shocked. I had hear this story before. But to a certain extent I had convinced myself it wasn’t true. Not these people, not in this village, not in my place. Here we had a good relationship. Here we were friends. Here...it just wasn’t like that here.

Turns out it was.

Oleksander and I continued on our way towards Korsun, Our range of conversational topics varied, from what he does in Lisyanka (he is in charge of the electrical grid) to his family (wife, two kids) to whether or not his siblings identify at all with Judaism (they don’t.) He asked me why I didn’t believe in Jesus, and whether or not there were alot of Jews in America who did believe in Jesus. He asked, I answered and on our conversation went.

When we arrived in Korsun, I was immediately embraced by my now old friends. We were glad to see each other, and we did what Jews always do when they meet up: We ate.

While I originally thought the conference was about the Holocaust in general, it turned out it had a much more specific theme: Jewish Heroes of the Soviet Union. This refers to Jewish soldiers who received the coveted “Heroes of the Soviet Union” medal for their service in World War II. Think Congressional Medal of Honor, but perhaps a bit more prevalent.

The whole day, weirdly enough, seemed to a mix between a celebration of their Soviet Heritage and a celebration of their Soviet Heritage. Different community members stood up and rattled off the accomplishments of various Jewish soldiers, how they proudly served their country in the war. And more often than not, that person’s history was included with a sidenote, that their family was all killed while they were out at war. These people were celebrating a country that at best failed to protect its Jews and at worst willingly participated in their annhilation. They sang the Soviet anthem and danced Soviet dances and reminisced about the good ol’ days bread was cheap and dissent was forbidden. What was I missing?

Towards the end of the conference, a man stood up dressed in full army garb. He is currently a Colonel in the Ukrainian army, and was an officer in the Soviet Army before that. He also had some sort of Jewish genealogy, although precisely how much he was a bit reluctant to say. He spoke of his own army experiences, his own knowledge of Jewish war heroes. But he kept beating around the bush about his own Jewish identity. He didn’t seem to want to talk about it, not too much.

Later on, after the conference, Piotr offered him a Jewish calendar. He refused. What if someone saw?

It was important to this colonel, this army man, that the contributions of Jewish soldiers be recognized. But he did not want to be thrown in with their sinking boat. He was deathly afraid that others would paint him for another stinking Jew.

At the end of the conference, Oleksander stood up to say a few words. He talked a lot about Germany, and how the German government admitted its atrocities during World War II and has tried to rectify some of them. This includes a policy in the 60s and 70s of allowing free immigration to anyone of Jewish descent. Most of the takers were people who were then living in the Soviet Union. Oleksander spoke of the German President visiting the state of Israel in the early 50s and openly weeping. He spoke of repentance, and forgiveness.

Look at the German country, he decried. Look at their economic success, at their business success. Look at how much they have been able to accomplish. They, a country who has admitted their mistakes and tried not to repeat them, has flourished. Ukraine, on the other hand, a country that has made it policy to turn a blind eye to any event where they are not themselves the victim, Ukraine, he told us, is stuck in the mud.

There was something very Christian in what he was saying, some Baptist tied belief in confession and forgiveness. And while I don’t prescribe to the ideology, and I don’t think that Ukrainian’s owning up to their past will change economic fortunes, he was making a point. This is a country with a very subjective view of the past. People on the left have one subjective view and people on the right another but overall few seem to be able to remove their emotions from their viewpoints, something I can strangely empathize with. Ukrainians have a selective memory. And for most, their Jewish past is something they’d like to forget.

While Oleksander was talking, he also identified himself using his patronimical name, as the son of Volf. The patronimical name is widely used in Ukraine---in fact, in school I am known as Jeremy Natanovich (Natan being my father’s Hebrew name). He wanted people to know that his father was Volf, his father was a Jew. Later on, when I was relating the story to my director, he mentioned that he knew the man, but that he often went by the name Oleksander Vassilovich, not Volfovich. With jews he was a Jew. With the gentiles he was one of them as well.

There are a lot of contradictions here, a lot of double sided coins and a lot of trickery and a lot of not being everything that it seems. Much of it I don’t quite understand. Are they anti-semitic or are they remorseful? Do they love my people or hate them? Is it fear or shame? Is it loathing or respect? Did we kill Jesus, or was Jesus a Jew? Am I an angel, or am I a demon?

I had to move recently to another house in my village. I was having a plethora of problems with my landlord. He wanted more money, he wanted me to take care of his yard, he saw this American, and possibly this Jew, and dollar signs flashed in his head. My landlord’s wife kept telling me to use less gas (when it is freezing outside), to use less light (when it gets dark at 4). There were problems.

The whole situation was stressing me out, so my director decided to find me a new place to live. My new house is much nicer than my old one (albeit still no running water, and the outdoor toilet needs some work.) I do, however, have a “sink,” where you pour water in the top, it comes out a faucet, and then drips into a bucket at the bottom. I’ll send video when I can, but it pretty much ahs changed my life.

This week, my director and I went over to my old house with my landlord, so we could walk through the house while they complained about how much they had to pay for electricity and heat and how much of the house they needed to repair. They were hurling accusations at me, telling me I was wasteful and despondent and irresponsible. I paid them their money and walked out of the house, too upset to deal with them any longer.

My director drove me back home, and he could tell I was upset. “Tze ne bulo ty.” It was not you. It was them.

He gave me a wide variety of consoling words, telling me how much good I was doing, how hard I was working, how much everyone appreciated me in the village. Then he brought up the landlords. Jeremy, he said, “Ty Yivreyi, ale voni Zhid”. You are a Jew, but they are Zhids, a derogatory term about Jews inferring they are cheap. Think of it as the Ukrainian version of the German “Kike.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. He was this man, who cares about me, who likes me, who was trying to console me. And how does he do it? By comparing those who work against me to my own ancestors. He tries to make me feel better by using a racial slur against my own people.

Some days the insanity and the contradictions and just everything I can explain and fail to comprehend becomes too much. But I think what I’ve learned is that I need to let some stuff slide. Intentions matter more than words. Maybe the past is dark and maybe the present is biased, but if I can laugh in the face of generations old anti-semitism, the future can’t be so bad.

62 years ago today, Decauter Illinois was rocked by the news that Cecelia and Irving Appelbaum welcomed into the world a baby daughter, Ann Harriet. History Hasn't been the same since.

Sorry I couldn't speak to you on your birthday, but I hope that Ukrainian kids trying to sing to you in english will serve as a sufficient replacement.

CATS

Hey all,

So about six weeks ago a couple of cats showed up on my doorstep. I gave them some food, and they decided to stick around. I named them Jeff and Ben, in honor of msr. Kaplan and Strassfeld, who have done quite a job calling me and keeping me sane these last few months. Then it turned out that Ben was a girl, so the kids started calling her Bella. Go figure.

ANyway, my cats are insane. They refuse to understand the notion of a litter box and so they poop all over the house. I lock them outside and they climb through windows. They are smart and devious and I love them dearly.

Heres a quick clip of my cat Jeff and an interaction he had with a possum. My counterpart explained that when cats kill animals and leave them on your doorstep, they are offering you a gift. Thanks, Jeff!

Jeremy Teaching!

Hey all,

This is a video of me teaching! And my 2nd graders! Enjoy!

Trash Pickup

Here is a slide show of my completed trash pick up project. It went great! More to come soon!!!!!

The round of applause was thunderously rowdy, men whooping from their seats, refusing to let the clapping hands cease. Usually there comes a moment where an applause naturally dies down, where there is a general consensus that enough praise is enough. Not here, however. For here these men were bearded Hasidic Jews, and it was God they were praising.

This was my first Rosh Hashanah in Ukraine, the Jewish new year. Rosh Hashanah has always been an important holiday in my feeling, this beginning of the Jewish high holy days. Even during my years at University, I almost always flew home for Rosh Hashanah, missing classes and even a football game or two.

Here I found myself, in almost the geometric center of Ukraine, a land steeped in Jewish history, praying in a converted warehouse with 1,000 bearded pious men and bald Sephardic Israelis and wayward Modern Orthodox teens searching for a way to God. In the tent up the hill were another 1,000, as eclectic as we, with another 30,000 or so wandering the streets, grouping together, forming Minyanim, prayer groups, impromptu and in some ways more meaningful.

When I was interviewed during my Peace Corps Training about the site where I would live for the next two years, I requested only one thing: to be close to a Jewish community. No running water? no problem. No english speakers? Bring it on! But I have always needed and will always need a place to pray, a place to be with my fellow Jews. For unlike many other religions, while we certainly can pray alone in Judaism to fulfill the full breadth of our requirement we must pray in groups of ten. For the Orthodox it is ten men; for more liberal Jews, such as myself, any ten Jews will suffice. The Jew needs a community, even a small one. I am a Jew, and thus I am no exception.

As soon as I received the name Boyarka in that slim White Manilla Envelope that contained little of use but much too be imagined, my regional manager, Iryna, approached me to assuage any fears I might have.

“Jeremy,” she said, “you are only two hours from Uman.”

Uman? What the hell is Uman? The name sounded familiar, to be fair, but I couldn’t quite place it.

I pressed Iryna for more, for any more information she might have on this community. “All I know,” she said, “is that every year a bunch of bearded Jews with hats come to Uman for their New Year celebration.” The plot thickens.

It didn’t take much investigation to find out the secret to this small Ukrainian city. Uman is centered about half way between Kiev and Odessa, and is most famous for two thigns. The first is Sofivka Park, a giant memorial of grandeur landscaping that was built by a Polish nobleman for his mistress whom he killed for sleeping with his son. (Follow all that?)

The second is that it is the place where the body of Nachman of Bratslav, the old Hasidic Rebbe, lay interred.

Anyone who has ever been to Israel, especially to Jerusalem, has undoubtedly seen the graffiti along the walls. Na. Nach. Nachma. Nachman. Nachman Me-Uman. I remember learning on my twelfth grade trip to Israel that the followers of the Hasidic Sect believed that if every Jew in the world were to say his name as such, he would return in Messianic form.

Nachman of Bratslac was born in 1772 in the heartland of Hassidic Ukraine. Hassidim was a movement founded by his great-grandfather the Ba’al Shem Tov, and it emphasized a revolutionary spiritual approach to Judaism. Personal communication with God became a must; being in touch with one’s Nefesh, or Soul, became a prerequisite. Nachman saw himself as the inheritor of his Great Grandfathers legacy. He often times claimed his own brilliance and even alluded to his own messianic nature, and believed that he and he alone held the truest and most direct path to God. He also suffered from bouts of melancholy, if not depression, and often times struggled with his own growing influence. At his height, he stood alone against the all of the Hasidic Rebbes in Ukraine, creating a revolution within a revolutionary movement, ever the more controversial.

Rav Nachman also holds an intense following of very intense followers. Breslav Hassidim, as they are called, stretch their influence across the globe and believe that Rav Nachman himself will return to usher in the Messianic age. They read his writings and follow his teachings and even are rumored to hold on to some of the Rebbe’s secrets that he only divulged to his most devout students.

When I told my friends and colleagues in my village that I was considering heading to Uman, they were all extremely supportive. But they also all made comments, I hear anti semitic jokes sometimes, even from people i have grown to love and respect. Its jsut an ingrained part of life here, as unfortunately linked to the Ukrainian mentality as assuming that the next winter will be even harsher.

I really had no idea what I was going to do when I got to Uman. All I had was a play to stay with another Peace Corps Volunteer who lived in the city. I had been there once before, so I knew my way around a bit. As I headed towards the town center to meet up with Joseph, my fellow American (and a non-Jew from Arkansas), I saw two dark skinned men in Kipput approaching in the distance.

I approached them and, in my best Hebrew, said, “Slichah, Adoni, aval ani mechapes meekom tefillah.” Excuse me, sirs, but I am looking for a place to pray.

I threw them for a loop, I think. They did not expect this blond haired fellow with the classic Ukrainian plastic-bag-serving-as-a-suitcase in tow to whip out some words in their native tongue.

They asked who I was, and I told them. An American in Ukraine, a Jew in a tiny village once imbued with Yiddishkeit long since voided. I got a flattering response from them, to say the least. “Atah Tzaddik.” You are a holy man.

One of them was named Shaul, the other’s name escapes me. But Shaul gave me the low down on services, how to get there, what time to go. It starts at 5 am, he said. Later than 7 and you’ll struggle to find a seat. Plenty of places to pray, plenty of fellow Jews to pray with. Shaul also expressed some interest in my village. He took down my number, and we made very rough and idealistic and naive plans for him to come back to my village with me. It all seemed so normal, fellow Jews bonding over shared experiences and shared values.

I set my alarm for 6 am, and I was on my way to the synagogue, which also happens to surround the grave of Rabbi Nachman, by half past. I didn’t precisely know where I was going. But I had confidence in my Ukrainian and in the fact that no one was going to try and beat up some 23 year old American who was asking for directions to the synagogue.

Eventually I heard it, the wails. And soon after I saw it, the men draped in white robes and curly beads, peis draped in front of their ears so as not to disobey the ancient decree. And the forelocks were many and the hats varied but I saw them, and as I followed them there were more and more, and as I went after them the Ukraine around me began to immediately transform.

Have you ever been to Me’ah She’arim, the religious neighborhood in Jerusalem? If you haven’t, then unfortunately I have an entirely insufficient vocabulary to describe to you the spectacle that is the square kilometer or so surrounding Rav Nachman’s grave. Men in long beards praying on street corners, Hebrew advertisements for day time excursions to Odessa and Berditchev, schedules of flights back to Israel and the appropriate necessary shuttles. I was in a different world, a Jewish world, and yet I was still in Ukraine.

Eventually I found a place to pray, a large converted warehouse with a Torah instead of a stone grinder standing in its center. I open up the prayer book my mother sent to my small Ukrainian village, and I began to pray. It is an Orthodox prayer book, and I am unfamiliar with much of the liturgy. The men around me are swaying and muttering and shouting, all of it in ecstasy. It is hard to find my place. But every now and then a familiar prayer will be sung or a Psalm I recognize will pop up in the page and these moments serve as a beacon, bringing back to where I am supposed to be.

And then when I least expected something I never expected, the men around me began clapping. It was mild and then thunderous, rowdy. It was combined with whooping and sheer joy. It was counter to most of Judaism’s taboos. A service is not a place for clapping, I had been taught. We don’t clap. We pray. Why here? Why now?

The confusion of the collection of moments became a bit much for me, so I cut out of the service a bit early (this was at 230, by the way, after a solid 7 hours or so of constant prayer). My soul was tired, and I wasn’t quite sure that this was where I belong. I decided to go back to the city center, back to my friends place. Something about being with another AMerican, another Peace Corps volunteer, felt more familiar than this group of bearded Hassidim. This was a new emotion for me. I was surrounded by a sea of gentiles, and yet I felt out of place in this small reserviour of Jews.

Dozens of policeman were surrounding this Jewish compound. The Jews are good for Uman’s economy, and they cops are under strick orders to make sure no trouble rears its ugly face. I approach one of the policeman, and ask, in my best Ukrainian, the best way back to center.

Jak ty znayesh nasha mova?” How do you know our language, he asks. Sure, some of these folks know Russian. But Ukrainian? Who the hell are you?

I brisk over my biography, that I teach in a small village school about 2 hours north. It turns out he has heard of my village. We begin to talk about places we have been, tourist sites we have both been forced to see. And all around us the Jews are staring and the other policemen are staring. Why is our brother in his Kippah, why is he talking to this policeman, and so jovially? Why is our comrade in arms making nice with this invading Jew?

EVentually the policeman sends me on my way towards the city center, and I weave my way through Hebrew signs and bearded men and Ukrainians with ID badges so people know its OK that they are there. And every Jew I see, I greet them with a hearty “shannah tova.” A Happy New Year. Most of them are surprised, surprised that I am one of them and surprised that any one spends their time on such casual pleasantries in such and such a day and age.

One man eventually stops me, hearing my accent, seeing my clothes, wanting to know my story. His name was Yitzhak, he was an Israeli from Tel Aviv, and he insisted I come to his house for a bite to eat. I tried to refuse, but I secretly knew it was to no avail. Jews are like Ukrainians, in at least this on sense: if they ofer you food, there is no way to say know.

Yitzhak is fascinated by my presence in Ukraine. Why wouldn’t you teach English in Israel, he wonders? Why help these strangers, who hate us, before you help your brothers? It is a question I have gotten before, many times, and the truth is I’m still not sure of the answer. But I tell hom that I walk around in this village that used to be filled with Jews, as a Jew, and I am imbued with a sense of Yiddishkeit. I tell him that the people in my village accept me as me and like me as me and they also know I’m a Jew and theres something in that, as well. I tell him I am a one-man anti-semitism fighting team, and I tell him that if we are to do as our tradition teaches us, to be a light to the nations, well then we may as well go to the darkest places in the hope of making the biggest impact. I tell him all this, and he is intrigued, and he calls my work holy.

He then makes a request of me. There are Ten Psalms, he says Ten Psalms that Rav Nachman felt were the Ten most important Psalms in the bible. Our Rebbe wanted us to say these Psalms on the New Year. Say them, he implored me. Say them, and your holiness will only be greater.

Unsure as I ever was whether or not such shenanigans really work, I say the Psalms anyway, partly to be a good host and partly because I simply enjoy Jewish prayer. And saying these Psalms in this place did feel just a bit magical, a mixture of tradition and mysticism that struck the right chord. But as I finished the Psalms and handed Yitzhak back his book, I noticed that his place was a mess. He was renting it, I knew, from a Ukrainian for an exorbitant price. And in his mind this price allowed him to treat it like his trash can. He showed me the utmost hospitality, because I was one of his own. These dirty Ukrainians, however, only deserved to pick up the trash after him.

Yitzhak’s mindset was seemingly shared by many of the Hassidim in town. Litter isn’t exactly a foreign concept to this country. But it truly pained me to see Hebrew writing on bags of potato chips, on water bottles, on candy wrappers, strewn across the Umanian landscape. They didn’t care. They simply didn’t care that this was still God’s earth, that these were still people. Even if we are the chosen people, isn’t that more a place of responsibility than a place of privilege? Doesn’t it mean we have to do more, not that we are simply better? How can our moral compass change depending on the person and who their mother was and who her mother was, as well?

The next day, I decided not to return to the religious services. Instead, I went to Sofiika Park, a monolith of nature that is the other famous part about Uman. My friend Stephanie, another Jewish volunteer whom I knew from the University of Michigan, came to meet me in Uman, and we went to the park together to participate in the Tashlich service. Tashlich is probably one of my favorite services of the year, because U can really feel its impact immediately. On the second day of the new year, Jews take pieces of bread and throw them into a body of water, physically casting away their sins. I always try and think of specific people as I throw these crumbs into the sea, of things I’ve done wrong and of how I can be a better son, a better brother, a better friend, a better human being. Its hard work, sometimes. But it helps.

So there Stephanie and I are, and I’m chanting some Hebrew and wearing my Kippah and Ukrainians are doing there best to stare. And yet I don’t care, because I am in the process of purifying my soul. And they don’t really seem to care, its just that its interesting and something to look at. And I throw my bread into this Ukrainian water and I feel better, and so does Stephanie. Sometimes its just nice to get the things that are bothering you about yourself off your chest.

And suddenly I remembered the clapping again, bringing holiness to a place that was void. And these sins I was throwing in to the water was a form of clapping itself, a tacit admission that this place is as much my home as any other place. I am a Jew and an American and also a human being and I am as imperfect here as I can be anywhere. But in this thought I was seemingly alone.

We were in the midst of ten days of forgiveness and yet these Jews had no interest in forgiving. These Ukrainians 60 years ago had watched the murder of their brethren, and some had participated. This country was full of jew-haters. This country was less than. This country was their toilet. These Hassidim, these so called righteous men, are clapping, but making only the bad kind of noise. They are ignorant to the disruptive impact they have on other people’s lives. They don’t care who they are hurting. They are clapping, and they think that is enough.

But was the clapping itself truly enough even for Nachman? Was it the act itself, or was the act simply a symbol for courage under fire, for letting your voice be heard in a hostile environment? Is the clapping similar to the sound of the Shofar, the ram’s horn, which signaled the ancient Israelites to approach the battlefield, to attack? Judaism does not have very many passive symbols; our holiest book, the Torah, is often referred to as being alive.

Nachman, in addition to the clapping, placed a huge emphasis on being alone, and confessing one’s sins out loud. He was a very tortured human being, constantly feeling as if he was not measuring up to God’s expectations of him. As a young boy, he used to enjoy rowing a boat to the middle of a lake, alone, and sit there all day, discussing with God his internal pain, his failures, his shortcomings.

A few years after Nachman died, not far from where he lived, was born a young man, Taras Shevchenko, who over the course of his lifetime would evolve into the voice of the long suppressed Ukrainian people. Shevchenko is more than a literary icon, more than a figurehead. He is a part of every man, woman, or child who calls themself a Ukrainian, he is more ingrained in the consciousness than Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and Abraham Lincoln put together. Shevchenko is not only a part of Ukrainian culture, he embodies it.

As a prt of my cultural integration in my community, I have begun studying some of his poems, albeit mainly the ones they usually teach in fourth or fifth grade. Recently I was reading one, and a passage caught my eye:

I sit in a boat
In a body of water
And there I will be alone
With only the sky to listen.

Two men, a few generations and a wide cultural gap apart, spouting the same ideas, the same philosophies, philosophies that were also being echoed on Walden pond half a world away. Two men, Nachman and Shevchenko, two strains of a similar mentality coming to fruition in the breadbasket of the world. And yet I can’t help but wonder how few people have read both these philosophers in their native tongues, or even at all.

When I returned home to Boyarka, one of the first calls I received was from Shaul, that nice Israeli man I had met on the street. I was excited that he had called, albeit a bit late. I was already home, I told him. If he would like to visit my village he may, but it would be a bit difficult to reach.

He asked me if I knew any village girls he could meet.

Because this was his trash can, his toilet, the sanctity of these women did not matter. Shaul was looking to praise Rav Nachman and he was looking for a good lay, and I’m not that confident it was in that order. This was in the ten days of repentance, the ten days when were are supposedly being judged by God. Shaul’s God, when it comes to Ukrainians, apparently looks the other way.

After I heard from Shaul, I headed to the house of Tamilla, my counterpart, and Kolya, my Director. We talked about my trip, about the experience, my impressions. Then they showed me an article in the newspaper. Two Ukrainian men were beat up by the Hassidim. The Hassidim thought they were being robbed, although they weren’t. Not, that I’m sure, most of them cared to ask, after they got caught up in the mob mentality of beating on a couple of Jew haters. They blame them for the fact that 70 years ago none of them asked why, none of them said stop. But who among US asked why? Who among US said stop? And yet these are my brothers, my achim, moyi brati.

Tamila and my director did not have very nice things to say about these Hassidim, these righteous men. But they didn’t just call them Hassidim. They called them Jews. They were not talking about me, I knew. They liked me. But those OTHER Jews, they are bad people. They cheat and they steal and they hurt and they don’t care who gets in their way. These are bad Jews, they say. These Jews are bad.

And so I say the Psalms of Nachman and I commit Shevchenko to memory. I try to understand Nachman’s relationship with God and Ukrainian’s relationship with each other. And I try to understand if I can bring some holiness to this place, infuse some Yiddishkeit without becoming a hated Jew.

The other night I headed to my Director’s house to drop off the money for our project. We received a $500 grant to build some trash cans, and try and clean up our village just a little bit. It was another one of those moments where I remembered how lucky I was to have such a strong partner in my Director. As soon as I handed over the cash he sat me down. “Nam Treba Napisatee Bizness Plan.” We have to write a business plan.

So there we were, writing down how much tools would cost and how much wood would cost and how long we have to do it in. Then he looked at me and exposed himself, just for a moment.

Jeremy, he said. There is a monument in the village over, a monument built to the holodomyr. The great Ukrainian famine. Millions starved to death by Stalin. Scar on Ukrainian history. There is a monument, Jeremy, and no one ever goes there. They just drop their trash there as they pass by. Lets build a table, and some benches. Lets build a trash can there. Lets clean it up. Whats the point of a monument if no one ever goes there to remember?

I readily agreed. It was still in tune with the project’s ecological theme. It was still making this a cleaner place. And it was important to him.

About an hour later, after eating dinner and watching some Russian TV that forced me to read the Ukrainian subtitles, my director went back up to me. Jeremy, he said. We could also build a Pamyat, a Memorial, at the Old Jewish cemetery. Who the Jews were. What happened to them. What was here.

I never brought this up to him, I never said that this was something I wanted or needed. He might make anti-semitic jokes sometimes, but he wasn’t talking to a Jew. He was talking to me, and he knew this was important to me, and he wanted to show that I was important to him.

I was in Kiev the day before Yom Kippur, wandering around with my friend Rachel searching for the El Dorado of Chinese Restaurants. She suggested we ask outside a music shop where a groovy Ukranian dude was smoking a pipe. He didn’t know where the restaurant was, but we went inside anyway. A man approaches me, says his name is Sasha. I tell him that I live in a small village and while I have a guitar, I’m in the market for another one. I’ve been trying to teach some kids to play, but it’s hard when you only have one.

We get to talking. Where is your accent from? America. I have relatives in America! So do all Ukrainians. My relatives are Jewish. I’m Jewish. So am I.

The next ten minutes are a blur, us comparing synagogues in Kiev, playing Jewish geography, talking about our favorite Rabbis. We start throwing Hebrew into our Ukrainian and English mix (he lived in Israel for 8 years). We are talking about our identity and our heritage and our religion and our atonements. He asks me how much I wanted to pay for a guitar. I said 400 hriven. He grabs one guitar. It says 600 hriven. Take it, he says. I can’t, I say. You are right, he says. Take this more expensive one instead. And a free bag to boot.

I don’t know how to repay you, I said. Achi, he says, Mi Brat, he cries, my brother, he proclaims. You don’t have to. You are doing good work.

In our parting words, after exchanging numbers, we wished each other the traditional Yom Kippur wish. Gamar Chatimah Tovah. May you be sealed in the book of life.

And here was Sasha, a man who had lived in Israel and yet chosen Ukraine as his home, a man who has read Shevchenko and yet surely knows of Nachman, a man who identifies as a Jew to a strange American he meets in his store. Sasha showed me I do not have to choose this world or the other, I do not have to be either a Jew or an American or a Ukrainian or one of them or one of us. Life can be much more inclusive, if only we open our hearts and minds to let it.

So I forgive the Hassidim for their Hatred and Intolerance, I forgive the Ukrainians for the Past and their Ignorance, I forgive Shaul for his over active Labido and I forgive my Director for his anti Semitic Jokes. What other choice do I have?

And so instead of concerning myself with symbols of things past I will continue to immerse myself in the actions of things present. I will keep giving guitar lessons and keep teaching English and keep throwing around the baseball and keep building trash cans and keep making the Ukrainian famine as important to me as it is to them, and keep on being proud that I am a Jew, and keep on lighting the candles every Friday evening.

This is how I choose to clap, this is how I choose to bring holiness to a place. And maybe, if I clap loud enough, the Hassidim and the Ukrainians and Shaul and my Director and the Jews of the world and the bigots of the world, maybe, just maybe, they’ll begin to start clapping, too.

Trash Cans (follow up)

Hey all! First off, great news. We raised the money for the trash can project! Hold on to your wallets for now, because for sure there will be more projects to come. On another note, here is the slideshow i promised a while back. First High Speed Internet Connection! Jeremy

trash project

Hey everyone! Below is a slideshow of when some kids and I picked up some trash on our street. We do bi-weekly trash pickups in the neighborhood. Litter is a huge problem here, and actually I have started my first project to combat the issue! I applied for a grant for $500 from this organization to build trash cans in the school shop class. We are then going to place the trash cans around the village, and have the kids set up a volunteer system to collect the trash and bring it to the trash hole that works as the dump.

Anyway, now I need your help! Please go to this website http://appropriateprojects.com/node/333 and read about my project. If you'd like, please then contribute a small amount of money to fund my project. I've already gotten the money, but this organization does its fundraising on the tail end. Please support my project so I can hopefully get more grants in the future. (Note: I am not looking for one major donor. In fact, I'd prefer smaller donations of about 10 dollars. This is a part of Peace Corps Goal 3, bringing it back home) Thanks!

(Note: Slideshow didn't publish. Will try again soon)

Big Sky

The sky looks bigger here.

Its hard to say why, its hard to pinpoint whether its a change in perception or a change in landscape or a change in my geometric position on the Earth. All I know is that every time I look up I am staring at something far grander than I used to see back home.

Then again, I’ve got some time to see what the sky has to offer. During Pre-Service Training, there was hardly time to breathe. Another lesson was to be planned or another noun tense to be studied. And I’m certainly busy here at site, playing with kids and meeting community members, writing grants and picking up trash. But some days, like today, a SUnday in late August where rain drizzles the day away, I find myself with some time. Usually all I have to do is poke my head outside onto the street and I’ll be bombarded by children, just looking for something to do. “Budesh Hulyatee, Dzeremi?” Won’t you come out an play? But today the calls are nought, today there is rain.

I think back to my own childhood, rainy days in Paramus, New Jersey and sunny summers at Camp Tel Noar and everything I had that they don’t. Every time I;m too tired to play, I remember that these kids can’t pop inside and look for a good movie on cable or surf the web for some cool new game. And for many of them, their parents can;t be there to occupy their time, because their parents are at work or working in the fields, or drunk, or 200 miles away, or 6 feet under ground.

When I was younger, my parents had a rule on school nights. One hour of television, no more. Want to be entertained? Read a book.

And read I did, devouring novels and biographies and mysteries and Anecdotal legends of American Folk Lore. But at some point the rules melted away, and Paul Bunyan and Pecos Bill and the Boxcar Children were replaced by Homer Simpson and Peter Griffin and the children of South Park. Suddenly, if I wasn’t watching the tube I was sitting on AOL, waiting for the girl I like to sign online so I could see if her away message reflected that inside joke we had made together in science class.

The Internet made my emotional teenage years at least a bit more full of angst. And I can only begin to imagine the compounding of this angst in an age of status updates and tweets and BBMs and a small black box in your pocket that irrevocably intertwines you and the world.
Its pretty easy to see the benefits of our newfound connectedness. The breadth of human knowledge is at our fingertips. We can find friends long since forgotten in an instant. We are never alone. And any time we need direction we can just flip on our GPS and that robotic female voice can tell us where to go.

I am of the last generation of Americans who will remember life without the internet. When I walk around my Ukrainian village, a place yet to be saturated with PDAs and IPhones, I try to imagine the pluses and minuses High Speed Internet will bring. We will expose the children to a world that they never knew existed. Yet at the same time, we will expose the children to a world we never knew existed.

A few years ago, a few of my friends started their own independent music label called Underwater Peoples. These entrepreneurs devoted much of their company’s time to producing actual Records, 7” and 11”, and CDs, mix tapes from High School days past. In an increasingly digital age, their endeavor was an ode to the tangible, and ode to the real.

On of the artists who has contributed to their label is a folksy guitarist and part time poet who goes by the stage name Liam the Younger. The first song on his album After the Graveyard has one of the most beautiful and prescient words about the internet I have ever heard:

“And some day the internet will be our version of the Wild West
And we will be remembered as we now remember them
Some will be folk heroes, and others will be villains
As we sing the songs, oh the song about them.”

We are entering unchartered territory, a great global frontier journey that lacks a GPS to guide us, no crystal ball or algorithm to tell us where we’re heading. And we’re heading there mighty fast, and I’m relishing the chance to slow down, just a bit, just for a while.

I’ve had this theory for a while now, this notion that my generation, that first generation who came of age along with the internet, can be classified as Generation Delta, constantly changing over time. Things are moving so fast that no matter how many times that robotic voice tells us to turn left 500 feet ahead, we don’t hear her. For as fast as we are going someone is inevitably going fast, and suddenly we here of some doomed Donner pass and we take it, all the while knowing we may be digging a shortcut doubling as a grave.

I recently read an article in the New York Times, about a group of prestigious psychologists who conducted an experiment with themselves as the test subjects. Leaving their cell phones and email behind, they went on a five day rafting trip, as a test to see whether people’s attention, and general brain function, has been altered by our addiction to technology. All the scientists, skeptics and believers alike, felt something change by the end of those five days. As one scientist put it, “you hear things you didn’t hear before.”

I hear things here I didn’t hear before. I go outside and I see a sky that stretches on forever, stars that give the darkness a glimmer of hope. Every day feels truly beautiful, and I just can’t tell if its that life is slower or that I’m not checking my email every five minutes or if the lack of pollution and skyscrapers has just upped this place’s rank of the visually appealing scale. Or perhaps its just a delusion, my own desire to try and be happy here fooling me into thinking that things are grander, all around.

My mother told me to take a kindle. “What will you do when you run out of books?” My father keeps pushing me to get internet access. “How can we talk to you? How can we see you?” My friends still think I’m crazy and maybe I am. And I could still get a kindle and I could still work on getting internet but I’m happy the way things are, and I think a part of me is afraid that if I get to connected, I’ll again be trapped by the yoke that forced me to flee halfway around the world in order to escape.

So when the Director of my school, who is slowly becoming my Ukrainian Folk Hero, talks of his dream of bringing high speed internet to the village, I am torn. I see his dream, I empathize with his vision. And yet I have come to truly appreciate this way of life, to value what it is they hold dear. I love that kids play together in the middle of the street and that neighbors don’t need to call before popping by and that everybody is in it together because, frankly, the same cold winter is coming for us all and the same gigantic sky looms above us.

Something about the internet changes all that. It makes the world go a lot faster and it makes the world a hell of a lot bigger and suddenly, when you can play chat roulette with people all over the world, when you can watch live views of the New York street half a world away and when you can let all your friends across the globe know what you are thinking and feeling at a given moment, the sky above just doesn’t seem so big.

Shared Experience

A few years ago, after returning from my junior year abroad in Warsaw, Poland, I concocted another in a long line of wild schemes pertaining to my future. Following a late night/early morning, alcohol induced conversation with my friend Sam, we hatched our plan. Over the course of a year, we would travel the world, each week visiting another Jewish community. In our minds the trip would take us from Melbourne to Mexico City, from Johannesburg to Yemen, from Lima, Peru to London, England.

For Sam and I, it was not simply a thirst for adventure that fueled this quest. We had both grown up in the Conservative Jewish movement, we both had Jewishly active parents and grandparents, and we both felt a personal connection to our faith and culture. Sure, we wanted to see the world, but we also were looking for something we knew existed, however veiled and convoluted this something may have been.

Eventually our around-the-world dream puttered out. Financing was hard to come by, a combination of a bad recession and the mild insanity of expecting wealthy Jews to indulge a couple of hyperactive upper middle class lost in the depths of their own thoughts and perplexed notions of society.

We wanted to see if we felt it. We wanted to know if we could show up at a Synagogue with a bunch of people who didn’t look like us and couldn’t speak with us and didn’t seem to be like us and still feel a connection. We wanted to know the strength of this shared experience, the Jewish experience, and to see how strong were these ties that purportedly bind.

Last week, I attended a Peace Corps conference in Kiev about volunteerism in Ukraine. The conference was great for a variety of reasons---I spent a weekend with Natalia, I got a lot of great ideas about volunteer projects I could start in my community, Tamila (my counterpart in Boyarka) and I were forced to really have serious conversations about what we could accomplish together. For me, however, the most jovial part of the conference was the chance to relax and revel and reflect with 30 or so other Peace Corps Volunteers in Ukraine.

The majority of the conference participants arrived with me in Ukraine just a few short incredibly-far-away months ago. But almost a third included stragglers from older groups, volunteers with a wealth of experience and knowledge garnered simply from living a life far different than most can imagine. I also had the chance to see many of my old friends for the first time in two months, familiar faces who I feel like I’ve known a lifetime.

Stephanie is actually the Peace Corps volunteer I’ve known the longest. She was my GSI (graduate student instructor) in a Public Policy class I took at the University of Michigan. In celebration of just another in a long line of understatements, we didn’t quite hit it off at first. As she alleges (and I hardly remember), after the first day of class I came into her office and told her she was being too intense. As I allege (and she hardly remembers) she once saw me out at a bar and refused to acknowledge that I was waving in her direction. Yet it was a brief conversation we had that pushed her to apply to the Peace Corps, and it was a bizarre turn of events that landed us in Ukraine at the same time. As a fellow Wolverine, a fellow Jew, a fellow American, Stephanie and I are able to share with and trust each other in ways I suspect is not often so easy among two strong willed individuals. Furthermore, we have seen each other perhaps a combined 10 days in the last 5 months. But something about being here, something about not understanding the same language and gasping for laughs at the same cultural misunderstandings, makes everything that came before matter a little less.

Bernie is 79 years young, and resembles a caricature of a Jewish grandfather one might find on a mildly hilarious TV sitcom. Back in New York City, where he is from, it probably would be a little strange for me to call him up out of the blue and ask him if he wants to head out to the bar. But that is exactly what we did, every night at the conference. As we knocked back the beers (as a side note, Bernie regularly outdrank me and lightly chastised my lightweight status) and scoped out Ukranian (and sometimes American) girls, it felt like just a few bros having a good time. I sometimes jokingly refer to Bernie as my Peace Corps grandfather. It is probably more accurate to just call him my friend.

Tommy was my roommate at Peace Corps staging in Washington, D.C., and just the simple fact that we knew each other one night before the rest of the gang assigns us to a level of “old friends” that is both completely ridiculous and makes perfect sense. Tommy thinks I’m hilarious, and he has a way of taking my jokes to a whole other level, raising our comedic duo to epic proportions. One of these days, we say, we will have our own t.v. show, our own stand up routine. For now, it suffices for us to keep each other on our toes, and happy.

Dan is practically like a brother at this point. We lived together in Borova during our three months of training, through our ups and downs. Although I am definitely the moodier of the two of us, so more likely my ups and downs. That man is a rock, a running back who pushes back against bullshit lineman thrown his way. His site has been less than ideal, his counterparts less than supportive, his language suffering greatly because they speak Romanian in his small village on the border. But Dan pushes through, because that is what Dan does.

Do i really know any of these people? Its hard to say. But just the chance to roar about football saturdays in the Big House or to klink the occassional glass or share the occasional smile or remember the battle before us is a nice respite from our day to day experiences and challenges.

We understand each other. We express a million emotions back and forth with a smile or a gesture or a Ukranian phrase or a less than desirable toilet.

It is nice to not always be an enigma, a puzzle, an alien, a foreigner, an intricate exhibit. For life is good when we can sit back and relax and revel and reminisce about our shared experiences, to have someone know who we are without it really mattering who we really are.

We are all changing, and yet we are changing together, perhaps not in the exactly the same way but certainly in the same direction, and its a road that no one who hasn’t been where we’ve been can ever understand.

Oh how it is nice to clink the glass and empty the bottle into the wee hours of the morning, discussing everything and nothing, Ukranian women and Ukranian Jews and Ukranian anti-Semitism and Ukranian neighbors and Ukranian smiles and Peanut Butter and Chalula Hot Sauce and the New York Jets and the Appalachian trail and the best Bagel with Cream Cheese and Lox on the Upper West Side of Manhattan.

And as we sit with the bottle gradually less and less half full we swap stories and lay future plans that weren’t quite like that and may never be we all seem to understand that we’re just trying to comprehend the shared experience and individual meaning of this wild ride.