WITNESS

I posed a contest to my students to write the best travel-blog-post about a travel destination in Ukraine.

“Well,” said Pooh, “If I plant a honeycomb outside my house, it will grow into a beehive.” Piglet wasn’t quite sure about this. “Or a piece of a honeycomb,” said Pooh, “so as not to waste too much. Only then I might only get a piece of a beehive, and it might be the wrong piece, where the bees were buzzing and not hunnying. Bother.” We drove into a village …

She motions for me to follow her around the back of the house. “That’s the fence” she says, in Russian. “Yep. Fence,” I think. She tells me, “This is a well,” but the word escapes me as soon as I hear it. I already understand that this is a well. It greets me every day (along with that kooky dog and its muddy paws) with its closed mouth, painted the same blue as …

“My fingers against rust, up and up…”

Hello … Здравствуйте! I’m Cait and I currently live in a town called Ohktyrka in northeastern Ukraine. I am serving as a Peace Corps volunteer, which, for me, means that I work at a local school as an English teacher, facilitate teacher and student camps, and work for two different Peace Corps groups: the HIV/AIDS Working Group and the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) Committee (a grant …