In general, my life in the summer consists of long periods of boredom punctuated by periods of intense action. Right now I'm in the doldrums of a boring period. It's gotten to the point where I am even anxious for classes to start just to give some structure to my day. Thankfully I will be leaving for a camp on the Black Sea coast in a little over a week, and shortly after that our group will have our close of service conference out west.
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Two of my brothers, Sam and Zack, came to visit. I met then in Kyiv and we spent a couple days there before coming to my village. We also saw Yalta and Lviv. Zack sustained some minor head trauma. It was great.
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My friend Mike married his longtime girlfriend, Alina, and I was asked to be best man. Sam and Zack's visit coincided with the ceremony, so they got to witness firsthand the chaos of a Ukrainian wedding.
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My host sister Masha graduated from high school as a "gold medalist," the Ukrainian equivalent to our valedictorian. She wants to study at Shevchenko University in Kyiv, like her brother Vova, and will most likely enroll in the fall.
I went to a three-day folk music festival with some other volunteers a few weeks ago, which was awesome. We camped out and everything, just like real hippies. Unfortunately I don't have any pics, but there are some posted on the festival's website: www.sheshory.org
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So that's my summer in a nutshell. To those of you who were looking for a more detailed update, I'm sorry, but I'm lazy. I should get a few more updates posted before my term is up, which is not too long from now. I don't find out for sure until August, but it looks like mid-November I will be saying goodbye to Ukraine.
Alright.