Evacuation

I know many of you have been following the situation in Ukraine, probably through the 24 hour hype-fest that is the American media circus. You will not find that here, nor will you find real journalism. You will, however, find one man's unaccredited view from the ground, as has always existed on this blog.

Start at the beginning? (If you don't care about the run up, skip down three paragraphs). Right after Thanksgiving of 2013, then President Viktor Yanukovich passed up an opportunity for closer economic ties with the EU in favour of strengthening relations with Russia. Among his detractors, this, for reasons unknown, was the last straw. Protests broke out on the main square in the capital Kiev, demanding that the EU deal be reconsidered. Yanukovich chose to ignore these protests. To his credit, I would have done the same in his position. The opposition leadership had little control over the demonstrations, demands were unclear, the weather was turning, and a series of important familial and religious holidays were fast approaching. No one expected this to last into 2014.

Then it did. The protest movement warped from one focused economic grievance into a broad revolution that would not be stopped until a change in leadership came to pass. This was about the time (latter January) when Yanukovich started suppressing demonstrations, protesters started capturing government buildings across the country, and the Western media began to pick up the story. We Peace Corps volunteers in Ukraine were placed under travel restrictions, and everyone watched to see what would happen next . Still, there was minimal violence, no looting, and all happenings were isolated to protest zones. Regular life seemed unaffected, especially in the traditionally pro-Russia and apathetic East where I live.

Then the fever broke. Yanukovich began to make concessions. Prisoners were released, laws repealed, and Independence Square quieted. Everyone in country breathed a sigh of relief, ploughing ahead with plans that would have been disrupted but now seemed in the clear. Unexpectedly, the situation erupted again, this time more violently. One minute, the opposition was pulling out of occupied state administration buildings, the next there was a death toll. Then roadblocks. Then the President fled.

I had a feeling that this time things were more serious. Violence had begun to spread outside of the capital and transportation was being disrupted. There were incidents of threats toward or injuries incurred by Americans. The opposition leadership seemed to be losing control of the momentum of their movement. The President's colleagues were abandoning the party by handfuls. All of these developments would be noticed by Peace Corps, and wouldn't be taken lightly. As a member of the security framework within Ukraine, I knew it was time to pack my bags and prepare for the worst.

On Thursday the 20th, we were told to congregate in our state capitals and await further instructions. Together with 14 other volunteers from my state, we holed up in two small apartments, baking cakes and listening to Chumbawumba to keep the mood light. Monday, at 3:30 in the morning, we boarded a bus for Donetsk airport. Most incidents of violence against Americans occur during the evacuation process, so everything had to be kept secret. We rolled past the Lugansk square, where 6 pro-government protesters stood wearing Balaclavas and brandishing wooden swords and shields, which I can only assume had been procured from a Soviet Renaissance Fair.

We flew to Istanbul and then to D.C., where a conference awaited us. It's hard to describe the feelings. It's a strange mix of reverse culture shock and survivor's guilt. No one was given a chance to process what was happening, to say their goodbyes, or to prepare for life and future in America. At the same time, it feels so completely selfish to complain about how "it's so hard in America because there are too many types of cheese and I'm used to just one" when in fact we did the easiest thing. We ran away from the country in which we had invested years of our lives in building relationships and fighting uphill battles, now when they seem to need us most. Why should we get yanked away when everyone we know is left behind?

There's still a considerable chance that Peace Corps will return to Ukraine, and I am not alone in holding on to that hope. Many of us are continuing to organise our summer camps, to plan projects and seminars with our partners overseas, to host English clubs via Skype, and to support Ukraine here in America through public presentations at schools and churches. I hope as I always have that Ukraine can find its common identity and a path forward with neither violence nor oppression. My heart goes out to the friends who comprise my Ukrainian family.

EuroMaidan Protests: A Few Eastern Perspectives

For the last full month, protesters have stood in the main square of Kiev in what started over a botched trade union deal with the EU but now more broadly demonstrates displeasure over Russia's influence in the country, general unhappiness with the current administration, and the deepening schism between East and West about what it means to be Ukrainian. You can't live any further east than I do, and the following (while not my opinions) are true conversations I've heard first hand since this whole thing started in November.

Elderly teacher, in the office:

Sure, I agree with the protesters, but their tactics are ridiculous. Why stand around in the cold doing nothing? They should sit down together and negotiate rather than freezing and yelling, accomplishing nothing.

University student, posted on social media:

This conflict isn't about economics, culture, Russia, the trade deal, or Timoshenko. This is about the fact that our government is criminal and incompetent. President Yanukovich has been in jail already, and is supported by his mafia family. The Prime Minister is so devoted to Russia that he can't even speak our national language. Nothing short of a regime change will end these protests.

Worker, at the House of Culture:

Western Ukrainians have no right to make demands. All the industry, all the jobs, all the money: it's in the east. We work, and they live. We're the ones who actually defended our homeland in WWII. Meanwhile, Westerners greeted the Nazis with bread and salt, to this day celebrating collaborators like Stepan Bandera. I'll be proud of my country when we have a decent wage. Until then, I'm not changing languages, I'm not praising Shevchenko. We were better off when we were close to Russia's great strength. Why abandon that relationship for Europe?

Young teacher, in the cafeteria:

I support the opposition leader. I think he's very smart and I hope he will be our president soon. However, the Party of Regions was offering almost a thousand gryvnia for participation in their pro-government protest. It didn't accomplish anything, it wasn't ever going to accomplish anything, but why leave money on the table? I suspect the anti-government protest is the same way. None of this would exist if people weren't being paid. This is just a new way to earn money in our country.

Worker, at the House of Culture:

I don't really care for these political issues. I just want to live my life and not argue about whether or not bread prices would increase if we signed the agreement with the EU. However, I don't think Ukraine should ever have existed. We have no common identity, no common history. We were able to unite against a common enemy during WWII, but now we don't understand each other. It would be better for everyone if we were two different countries.

Elderly teacher, in the office:

We must join with Europe. It is the only way forward. With Russia, we will always be kept down. They will never see us as an equal nation, but always as one that they used to control. With Europe we have a chance to play on an even field. Russia only wants to use us: to use our port on the Black Sea, to use our factories, to sell us the oil that they've stolen from Kazakhstan. We must leave this relationship and start fresh with Western Europe. It worked so well for Poland, after all.

These are a few of the mixed opinions here in the East. Though the oblast as a whole is much less political and engaged in this conflict than other oblasts are, I hope this can help characterise the details of the conflict. To my volunteer friends in the West, who can from time to time be quick to judge the Donbas, I hope this shows that there are all sorts of people out here, and most of them are not dyed in the wool fans of this administration. As for my own opinion? I'll never tell. As I'm not Ukrainian, it's not my place to say what this country should or shouldn't do. They have to find their own common goals and make choices for their own future. All I can say is that I hope only the best for Ukraine. Счастье, здоровья, спокойства, достатка.

I mean, who couldn't love this country?

Defence

Government funding here is not, as you might expect, doled out evenly regardless of merit and without incentive for improvement. Government employees, let's use teachers as an example, are asked to "defend" their skills every 5 years. If a teacher can prove that they are implementing modern methodological methods, improving students' abilities, and successfully imparting the required national curriculum, they receive a raise. If not, they are stuck at entry level pay for another 5 years. This process is called "defence," and it entails a lot of preparation, stress, and observation by important officials from the capital.

Just as teachers' pay is determined by these demonstrations of success and improvement, so is the House of Culture's funding. Any HoC receives a base budget from their local administration, in our case the Lutuginsky Region. However, if a HoC has dance, theatrical, or musical groups that are performing at a particularly high level, those groups can earn the status of "National." This means that the local administration's base budget is supplemented by a federal bump. This is rewarded since, aside from encouraging excellence, it is also assumed that excellent groups will need better costumes, transportation to festivals, and registration fees for competitions. The more National groups a HoC has, the more its overall funding.

Okolitsa (The Outskirts) defended its National status last Monday. Given that we are a "Cossack Folklore" group, we not only had to build a vocal repertoire, but also weave it into a skit that demonstrated traditions, told popular stories, and showed dance styles. We even prepared a spread of Cossack foods for the judges (which seemed ever so slightly like bribery).

Our local newspaper Glorious Labour, quoting the Director of the Lugansk Oblast Centre of National Arts, Honoured Employee of the Ukrainian Department of Culture, and Representative of the Certification Commission Vasily Yarovoy:

Today you have demonstrated the traditions of Ukrainian musical art, and what I've seen today has simply touched my soul. Yourperformance had wonderful voices, it had the beautiful spirit of giving, a high level of mastery and just a shocking atmosphere....It had soul, and that's all from you. Thank you for bringing our culture - Russian, Ukrainian, Don Basin Cossack - to the people. I'm proud that I myself have the opportunity to congratulate you. Such a young group, which means you are going to go places. Best of luck! Be creative!

 The result: we succeeded in defending our National title.

You can find more from the Okolitsa defence performance here.

2nd Cross-Ukrainian Open Competition

My collective and I were recently featured on the town culture blog for having come in second place in a major competition in Lugansk. Google translates the page pretty well, but that one sentence pretty much covers the gist of it. We sang not in Russian but in Ukrainian. It was a traditional a capella piece called "Hermit." Enjoy!

Fine Arts Camp

With my first week of summer, I conducted a day camp for kids in my town. Tired of the same old family tree project and discussion of sport, I planned a camp that used English to teach music, skits, and dance. With the help of a few other volunteers and community members, 30 kids learned step, Elmo's song, the gingerbread man, and others. Parents were happy with the performance, it was great to have some friends in town, and the students were happy to be part of something different. Here are some performance pictures.

 Step

 Hip-hop

 The Ants Go Marching

Gingerbread Man 

 Who Will Bell the Cat?

Look at Me Now, Look at Me Now...

I'm makin' papers!

My first week in the town, it was my terrifying privilege to conduct an English Camp, one of the aspects of this job at which I have absolutely no experience. Not 3 days at my site, still crashing on the couch of my counterpart, and I'm expected to organize a 3 week, 6 hour per day English camp for kids I don't know starting tomorrow. Yeah, right.

Thanks to my killer negotiating skills, I managed to get the camp down to a more manageable duration and enlisted some help from my awesome site mate and the other English teachers in my school. Distilled down to a week of getting to know each other for an hour each day, the students and I had an excellent time introducing ourselves, playing charades and pictionary, scavenger hunting, and talking about everything from hobbies to family.

It was a nice first attempt, but nothing remarkable. What shocked me was being presented with this page of the local newspaper now, so many months later, which the physics teacher saved for the whole summer. Hopefully this is only the beginning of a long string of good news.

YeongPyeong Island

As usually happens whenever the North does something wonky, there's been a wave of concern from people stateside about the well being of people living in Seoul, namely myself, were war to break out on the Korean peninsula.

In case you've missed it, the North fired live artillery shells onto an island off the east coast of South Korean shores in what may be considered disputed waters.  The incident left four dead, including two civilians.

On our side of the DMZ, reaction has been mixed.  It's true that the civilian deaths have sparked some contained outrage here in the city, but the overall response has been to criticize President Lee MyeongBak's failure to act more swiftly and forcefully.  In my opinion, the Korean people would rip him to shreds no matter what reaction he had; he's not a very well liked president.  In any event, the administration sacked the Minister of Defense.  There has been little activity since the first bombing save some ramp up of defenses on the island and the typical squabbling over who provoked who.  Aside from that, everything has been business as usual, with the local media and civilian population going back about their lives as if nothing has happened.  If there's anything the nuclear tests in 2006 taught me, it's to worry when the locals do.  If that philosophy holds true, then all's well.

I'd like to recount a story I read in a local newspaper on Saturday.  According to the paper, the U.S. General in charge of forces in Korea visited the scene of the bombing to survey the damage.  Shortly after his departure, the North began firing artillery again, but this time into their own waters.  This behavior says two things to me about the North's mentality.  The first is that they know they've rattled some cages and they want to let the South (or perhaps even their own citizens) know that they're the ones in control.  The second is that they're too timid to stick their tongue out while the parents are watching.  That is to say, when the States are on the scene, they can behave themselves.  When we've got our backs turned, the North Koreans start teasing again.

Given that there's an evident fear to provoke the U.S., I highly doubt that we'll see another incident until the media turmoil tires of the uneventful.  If this is truly a solidification of strength to pass power to Kim JeongEun, then  we can be sure to see at least a few more hawkish moves on the part of the North, but contrary to popular belief there's nothing crazy about Kim JongIl.  He's calculating and he knows how to keep his power.  If he appears weak to his people, he loses the underpinning of his cult following: the deception that he could topple the U.S. at any time.  He must keep poking the tiger without ever waking it up, because then he knows he doesn't stand a chance.  So far, he and his father have gone almost 60 years without losing it all.  Kim JongIl's more than aware that there won't be anything for his son to take over if he oversteps the boundaries while trying to pass the torch.

My final word would be to not believe the hype about riots in the city, devastation on YeongPyeong island, or the brink of war for the region.  The panic stateside wasn't half as bad in March when the North allegedly sank the Cheonan, resulting in 46 casualties.  Sometimes the things American media chooses to run with can be as arbitrary as a slow news week.

The Kimchi Crisis

Being a member of the inner city and not of the sky scraping suburbs, I have not personally seen much effect of the recent outrageous prices of kimchi, the most integral food to every meal of Korean cuisine. The long story short is that something to do with the weather this year has left a shortage of radish, garlic, and (most severely) cabbage in Korea. This has led the prices to soar and, despite government subsidies, the production of the dish this harvest season to decrease. Being that it's a fermented food and usually takes months if not years to make properly, I hadn't predicted much effect on the consumer side of the market for at least half a year. However, last week I was refused kimchi for the first time in a restaurant, with "high prices of cabbage" cited as the excuse. Jaw-dropping.  I had hoped to take part in some kimchi making this year.  We'll see if the festival still takes place.

K-pop

Being that I teach primarily 4th-6th graders, I'm constantly inundated with and benefited by knowing a little something about the Korean popular music (K-pop) scene. I've also been here long enough to start seeing a shift in trends and an emergence of something new.

Korean music has, for as long as I've witnessed it, been characterized by excessive cuteness and feelings. As a whole, there is nothing in the mainstream outside of love ballads and dance music. Even the dance music has always been lyrically identical to the ballads, with only the addition of a Backstreet Boys style collective dance to go along with the beat. The whole "scene" is fairly shallow and unoriginal, to speak plainly (not to say that the American pop scene is any different, but just to characterize).

Lately, however, I have seen a shift in Korean music that has been noteworthy. There are three parts to this change. The first step was 2NE1. Whereas for ten years, the artists have dressed similarly and safely, 2NE1 brought a whole new style to the table. Since their introduction of vertical hair and outrageous outfits, the entire music industry has followed closely behind. Half the time they look like George of the Jungle should have watched out for that 5th Element. The pictures speak for themselves.

Debuting early last year, 2NE1 is certainly no longer a latest development. However, I think that their advent paved the wave for what was to come. What started as simply different clothes and attitude soon spread into the lyrical aspect of K-pop.  In the past several months there's been a shift from the typical, ballad style lyrics to a new format.  Korea, for some time now having been dominated by the girl group, has constantly been plagued with the same song to a different tune.  Either "omg I like him soooooo much.  what should I do?  my heart won't stop beating!" or "we broke up!  there's no one in my heart but you!  even now I can't stop thinking about you!" (sadly, the format barely differs when guy groups perform).  Lately, however, I've witnessed the emergence a new trend toward songs about women standing up for themselves, much in the style of Beyonce.  The prime examples of this would be the nearly simultaneous releases by groups SNSD, Kara, and now Lee Hyori, all of which saw the once cute-to-the-max take on a role with more independence, maturity, and substance.

This week I've seen what I hope to be the next step. Fairly new group f(x) releases their song NU ABO with positive reception. Blood type in Korea acts as a substitute for zodiac signs, predicting a person's personality and relationship compatibility. In 4 varieties, this uber-homogeneous society has summed up all personality possibilities. Finally, f(x) steps up to the plate and questions this "ABO" system, claiming that they are not A, AB, B, or O but in fact an entirely "Nu" blood type. In a country where sharing and following is a powerful cultural status quo, a dominant pop group is directly challenging the uniformity. High five to these girls for doing something original in K-pop (gasp!), though in my eyes they may just be a vessel for the build up I've been witnessing off and on for almost 5 years.



In completely related and yet still unrelated news, apparently the President has decided to use K-pop group 4minute as broadcast propaganda to the North?

Kim Yuna

Perhaps I missed the international blog wave by a few months, but this chronicle would be incomplete without an entry about Yuna Kim (henceforth to be referred to in the order I'm used to: Kim Yuna).

For the vast majority of Americans, Kim Yuna is a name we can't recognize, much less identify. She is the 19 year-old Korean girl who won gold in the Vancouver Winter Olympics, beating out her only slightly more well-known Japanese rival Mao Asada.

Kim Yuna (center) with Asada Mao (right) and some white chick

Kim is a national celebrity here like nothing I've ever seen.  Seoul is an extremely wired city, and gadgets are the name of the game.  More so than in the states, TV on the cell phone has really taken root here.  I happened to be out and about on the day that Kim Yuna was skating for the gold.  I saw cars pull over in the already unusually empty streets to watch the action on their cell phones.  Coffee shop employees had laptop wires running across the espresso machines: coffee stopped for the viewing of this program.  Bus drivers, while still keeping on their route, refused to be the only ones on the bus not watching a cell phone.  People clustered around TVs in windows, and everyone stopped talking.  The third largest city in the world literally stood still for 6 minutes of figure skating.

Some of the commercials featuring Kim Yuna

The popularity of Kim Yuna is twofold.  First, there's the enormous weight of being a country's sole representative to the international world.  Among Korean people, there are only maybe 4 who have achieved any measure of notoriety outside the peninsula.  UN Secretary General Ban Ki-mun, Manchester United team member Park Ji-Sung, and Korean pop star Rain (who has been part of a mock rivalry with comedy talk show host Stephen Colbert as well as star of several bad Hollywood movies) are the only other South Koreans that any one in the West has any real chance of knowing.  Aside from that, Korea is always burdened with its negative association to Kim Jung-Il as well as hidden in the cultural and economic shadow of its number one rival Japan.  Kim Yuna not only beat Mao Asada but also brings international attention to Korea, and therefore is practically royalty.

The other side of Kim's appeal is her personality.  In a country where some of the biggest stars have been cast aside because they became recognized for bragging, bad-mouthing, or womanizing, Kim Yuna has managed to charm the nation with her innocence and humility.  She is very respectful to the people who have helped her get this far and seems to disbelieve the success she's gotten.  She has tasteful and conservative outfits, and her "signature" 007 move has swept the nation.  The cynical American in me is quick to jump to the conclusion that she's just another pretty face, but Koreans will readily tell you that they don't think Kim Yuna is pretty at all.  "Her eyes are much smaller than Mao Asada's."


In her short lifespan, she's managed to not only win medals and set records, but also land some of the most sought after advertising spots. In Korea, there are not many people whose faces you'll see more often than Kim Yuna's. There's a permanent advertising slot left open for the hottest girl and boy groups of the moment, but nothing comes close to the mountain of sponsors heaped on this girl. She's the Korean face of Nike, top cell phone provider Anycall, Hyundai motors, Hausen air conditioners, Smoothie King, numerous makeup products, Samsung, school uniform company Ivy Club, those softening dryer sheet things, local bakery chain Tous Les Jours, a brand called Everyday Milk, Kookmin (citizens') Bank, and Whisper feminine products, to name what I can think of. You can basically see her everywhere you go, all of the time.

You can currently buy the Yuna "Be White" smoothie (not as racist as it sounds), the pink Yuna Haptic smart phone, or bite into the only bagel with a name branded on it. Can you think of another human in history who has been so idolized that their names were burnt into pastries?  Interesting fact about Kim Yuna: she's officially a student at Korea National University, though I can't imagine it's anything more than another advertisement.  How could she set foot on campus between the time constraints and the drooling fans?