back from the mountains!

so i'm back from our mid-trip adventure and about ready to have another one in the next few weeks!


tuesday night we boarded a train that took us to a village about 2 1/2 hours outside of zhytomyr. there we waited for our big train which took us all the way to another village (i don't remember any of the names of the cities we were in except l'viv. apologiez) closer to the one we were staying at. ooh this is confusing and not fun. 


it was a night train, so we got to sleep on it! fun! i climbed up on the top bunk thing and the window was open right by my face the whole night sooo aside from the snores of the train and the bursting of my eardrums as we passed other trains, it was fairly nice. i didn't sleep sooo well, but it was pretty kewl. also, i realized that snoring completely grosses me out. no offense to anyone who snores, i'll just sleep in a different room. honestly it makes me want to gag. and then punch someone because it keeps me up worse than anything else.


anyways, so we got to this town and boarded a mashutka (yeah i dunno) which is like a mini charter bus a little bigger than a 16 passenger van. we rode that for a few hours to this beautiful log cabin in the foothills of the carpathian mountains. i wish i had pictures, but i used the ole canon all week so i'll have to wait to get those developed. it was completely beautiful. and it was rainy and cold the whole time, which sounds super lame, but it was actually so refreshing. 


the three days there consisted mainly of taking naps, reading, relaxing in general and eating. it was so great. highlights: we went souvenir shopping in this little market place near a suhweet waterfall. i got several pretty neat things for people. don't be offended if i didn't get you anything. kbyeee. also - i lead the way through a mountainside hike. well, like part of the time. but still. a)i went mountain hiking. in my sporty shoes, obviously. that was the most legit outdoorsy i've ever been i think. b)i embraced the role of fearless leader for a period of time. and no, there was no trail. i was very sacagewea. 


lets see...we also got lots of ice cream all the time and were loud americans very often. but it was okay because tanya liked it i think. she's the best.


alright so then saturday morning we loaded up on another mashutka at 6 a.m. to go to l'viv. imagine 65th and allisonville headed towards binford. you know how awful that road is? like you feel like your car is going to fall apart driving over it? that was my life for 3 hours. it was the most ooc road i've ever been on. like every time i started drifting off to sleep, i got whiplash and was jolted awake. i bet it was funny to watch. chris actually fell out of his seat and onto me at one point. the good news is that we thought it would take 6 hours and it actually took 3. soo someone was wayyy off.


l'viv is sooo beautiful. it's really european (apparently) with tall buildings and cobblestone roads and balconies and all that. we walked around and saw some great churches, went to a marketplace, coffeeshops, mcdonald's, ect. 


another highlight: we got accosted on the tram. this is the picture. four americans and one ukrainian. we get on the tram with our money out, ready to pay like good citizens and tourists. in zhytomyr, the conductor person will come and take your money and give you a ticket. you just stand there and do nothing. so we assumed it was the same in l'viv. suddenly two women appear on either side of our group and start saying words to us that we obviously don't understand. i just look down or at tanya wide-eyed and oblivious, duh. she says that we are going to be fined because we didn't pay at the beginning. we had no idea that was the rule, it wasn't written anywhere and no one was there to tell us what to do. so tanya tells them that we're sorry and we'll pay our 1 gryvna (eh, spelling?). they say more things which i assume are "no no no, you're american so you'll pay us 20 each as a fine or we'll call the police." actually i don't assume, that is actually what they said. so instead of jumping off the tram at the next chance and running away, we ended up paying 100 gryvna for what should have been 4. welcome to l'viv! we hate tourists!


so that was fun.


the rest of the city was beautiful and fun and we saw some great never nudes, the grim from harry potter, and masha! she met us there. how fun!


so right before we're about to head to the train station, it is decided that chris is headed straight to the sea with haven, a part of last bell he's working with. so that was fun/stressful/exciting. also, we had a version of mexican food for tanya's birthday. it was really pretty good. 


okay so other best part of the trip: we may or may not have almost gotten deported. 


we're standing in the train station at 9:20 p.m. - our train leaves at 9:40. we're saying goodbye to chris, and figuring out where he's sleeping, ect. right as we turn to leave, two men in armed uniforms walk up to us and start saying things that we, again, don't understand. when they realize we can't understand, they just look at us and say 'passport.' 


uh oh. we don't have our passports with us. they're tucked away in a safe in zhytomyr.


so we're all like, 'heh....uh... what? we don't understand you...?"


tanya gets in feisty mode and starts talking with them, and by this time another police officer has walked up and people are looking. there is minimal translation going on, so we're all standing there dumbfounded.


all we hear is that they're going to kick us off our train that now leaves in 15 minutes and with no refund. and that we're going to get fined - later we find out for 340 gryvna. ouch.


we all get out our paper copies of our passports which is all we have and i hand it to one of the officers. he obviously isn't satisfied with that and says something about how he doesn't know what could be in our bags or if, who knows, we could be part of al-quaeda. we tell him that he can look through our bags if he wants but can he please hurry, because our train leaves in 10 minutes.


as more confusion ensues, masha hands the phone to one of the men - she called ira. duh duh duhhhhhh. it's going downnnnnnnnn. ira is THE MAN. 


she talks to one of them and like 5 minutes later he hangs up the phone and says that we can go this time, but next time you better have your passport and all your paperwork with you or you'll be in big trouble, mister. 


i'm still not quite sure what she said, but ira worked her magic. of course.


so all that to say, we need to carry our passports from now on. oopsies. 


it did make for a good story, though. and an interesting insight into the inner workings of that side of ukrainian culture/politics, ect. maybe i'll try to explore that later.


anways, i slept like a baby on the train until 3 a.m. when we had to switch trains, which is when i started feeling like i actually got hit by one. but then i took a nap in my bed at ira's and had a yummy breakfast and now i'm at the mall doing work before we leave for camp tonight! 


sheesh! it's craziness over here and i love it.


so anyways, i probably will have little to no internet until july 16, which is when the second camp ends. maybe i will in between camps, but i'm not counting on it. 


we'll keep pumping out articles, so keep a lookout for those!


sorry for the mass information overload! 


i don't really know how to end this....


talk to you in 3 weeks ish!


love you all byeeeeeeee.