Big City?... Irony

So before I left my apartment on Sunday morning to go the Bazaar, I was a little worried that I would get lost. OBVIOUSLY, I have a minor language barrier. But even more of an issue is coming from a county of less than 5,000 people back in the US and not knowing how to navigate in what seems to me like the city.

Here, my Ukrainian “village” of 35,000 people seems a little like the big city to me. In Boguslav, I live in a high-rise apartment. Apartments are practically unheard of in Bath and the term alone “high-rise” hasn’t even been added to the Bath County dictionary- we’re about a couple centuries, maybe even millennia from that lexical expansion. Here, I may not drive a car, nor do many people even own a car. But I take regular taxi rides. Previously, I might have taken one taxi ride in my entire life – and that’s a benefit-of-the- doubt estimation… honestly, I can’t even remember one time. Now, I’m becoming a taxi-calling/whistling/money-haggling pro despite being close enough to walk everywhere I need to go – an added wonder that I’ve only had the joy to experience while in college. In Bath, there was one pharmacy. Here, per European standard, there’s an “apteka” every few meters on the road. I live an hour and a half’s Marshryptka-ride from one of Eastern Europe’s most mesmerizing cities. And being bombarded by women’s “city fashion” is a source of as much daily awe as it is a cause of my own discomfort and embarrassment about my personal appearance. I’m a hole-in-the-knees jeans and hoodie, rainbow flip-flops, winter UGGS, dress-shoe Danskos or Nine-West flats wearin-kinda-girl. Here, knee-high black boots with 4-inch stiletto heels are the norm for even a Sunday stroll to the bazaar. I’ve never been so keenly aware of my Deep South/ Big Country/ Appalachian Mountain genetic and cultural Roots before in my entire life.

But so NO FEAR, I made it to the Sunday Bazaar b/c even a country girl can survive. … but on the real, the bazaar took up about six streets in the historic district of Boguslav; and from about 6 am to 12 pm, there was a MASS public exodus by foot to the top of the city where, despite the below freezing temperature outside, the market was hot in action. No navigational trouble at all.

Anyway, I just have to laugh at my lack of experience with city life. I’m in a third-world country on the other side of the world and I’m learning as much about how to navigate and survive in the city as I am about how to give aid to an under-served, underprivileged population. Oh, the irony of it all.