Money Madness, or What Is It Worth Tomorrow?

I wish I had been born ten years earlier (to have been a twenty-something during the 1990s). That way I would be either rich or dead by now.

  - D's coworker

Following the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991, the rest of the 90s were a time of chaos and hope for Ukraine. Obviously I wasn't in Kharkov then, but a friend of mine was. Here he shares his thoughts on the kupon karbovanets, a currency briefly used during those years before it succumbed to hyperinflation. 

What was your reaction when this currency was first released? Do you remember the reactions of others?

I was more than hopeful, but it was only me. Others were just interested and older people were suspicious. Faith in the soviet currency was immovable (until the annihilation of Sberbank accounts).

From the late 80s I was a great supporter of the idea of Ukrainian independence. In 1987, I dared to predict that Leningrad would soon become St. Petersburg. No one believed me. And they were right, it was beyond their imagination at the moment. So, when the news about our own Ukrainian currency appeared, I was very excited. We were allowed to have only a hundred kupons (that was the name, karbovanci was the Ukrainian word for soviet ruble) when they were released. A person was given a hundred kupons and the rest of their wage in rubles.  

 
Why did the government begin printing the karbovantsiv in the 1990s? What was their explanation? 

What it's like to work at American English Center

A snapshot from training days!

*Note: I'm no longer with this school. This post covers my experiences up to early 2013. For the most up-to-date info, try contacting the school directly. Happy job hunting!! :) *

There's a lot of negativity on the internet about working at American English Center (AEC). Before coming to Ukraine, I scoured the internet for clues about what it's like to work at AEC. Perhaps a similar search query is what brought you to this post. Now that I've spent 19 months teaching at this national chain, I'd like to balance all those venomous forum threads with my experience. After all, lasting 19 months at our local branch of AEC puts you squarely in the "old-timer" ranks, if not the ranks of "ancient elder".

A passion for fashion?

As a girl, it's intimidating to move to a country rumored to have some of the most beautiful women on the planet! I hoped that some of this legendary beauty know-how would rub off over time, but it's doubtful. Yesterday a student gifted me a gorgeous blue scarf, which I immediately hung around my neck. At the end of class she approached me- no, no, no. You should loop the scarf like this and pull the ends equal here. Oops!

Just to shock my English students, sometimes I'll lower my voice and whisper evil stories of American fashion. And on occasion, university students will actually wear their pajamas to class! Students here love Friends and Sex and the City, and they'd never imagine that this kind of crazy pajama absurdity can happen in the land that brings you Jennifer Aniston and Carrie Bradshaw. But I assure you, students, happen it does.

It's not that Ukrainians are totally obsessed with appearance. In a class last fall, one woman bragged about never having worn makeup, not even for her wedding. Others- male and female alike- eschew trends and prefer comfy clothes. Last night I saw a scruffy kid wearing a Cannibal Corpse backpack. But perhaps I have become obsessed with fashion, for I pay attention to it everywhere I go. I can name the big differences between Ukraine and the US off the top of my head:

Women here tend to wear bangs and high heels and dye their hair with wild abandon.

Men wear bangs too and pointy shoes and rather form-fitting jeans. Not gonna bring up the mullet. It also happens.

Overall, both genders put a lot of thought into their appearance. It's not rare to see people polishing their shoes with Kleenex before entering a building. Ukrainian friends routinely show off more extravagant manicures than friends back home do.

Here- see for yourself.

Two young women preparing to ride the rickety cable carts in Gorky Park. The man is wearing an outfit typical to the older Kharkov male: leather cap and jacket.

On Thirty

 A friend called me up the other day. To paraphrase our conversation:

Him: Hey, your birthday's coming up!
Me: Oh, you remembered! Thank you : ) (yes, I even talk out loud with emoticons, so :p)
Him: How are you doing? I thought you might want to talk about it....
Me: Hmm? What do you mean?
Him: My older brother just turned thirty and he freaked out about it for a little while.
Me: Oh, I feel fine about it.
Him: But why did you come to Ukraine? What do you really want out of life? Is this it?
Me: (internally: hey, I think I'm supposed to be asking myself those questions!)

Isn't that what we are supposed to do? Treat big numbers like 25, 30, 40, and 50 with extreme caution? Tread carefully and kind of cringe when anyone brings it up? But I don't feel like that right now; actually, I feel positively flippant about thirty.

What REALLY happens in Kharkov...

Want to see what life in Kharkov is really like?

Take 30 seconds to find out, courtesy of the Harlem Shake!


The Winter

And yep, that's the Bridge of Love in the background.

The Shopping Mall

Filmed in a parking lot of the massive Karavan/Daffy mall.

At the Office

Looks like a local IT company.

Honorable Mentions:
Public School
The Metro
Saltovka (a region of Kharkov)  
Verhovna Rada (Ukrainian parliament)



Not sure what the Harlem Shake is?
Great, that makes two of us who are seemingly the last people on the planet to find out! :p

12 Words You Should Learn Before Coming To Ukraine

Yep, this one's important- the restroom!

Most of us do it- buy textbooks, enroll in classes, drop big bucks on the latest version of Rosetta Stone, all in hopes of learning a smattering of the local language before we arrive. Any one of those resources can teach you "Where's the bank?" or "Nice to meet you", but here are 12* useful Russian words that you probably won't learn from your class, book, or computer program.

 *erm, make that 12-ish words

To those about to rock, we salute you

Hooray!, for we've survived the worst of it. Already I can feel a change. The snow remains only in sludgy, dirty piles. Some women are vetoing tights and fur coats in favor of bare legs and skirts. There has been actual SUNSHINE sparkling down upon the city recently. And that four week no-holiday stretch has finally passed and another holiday (perhaps the first holiday of spring?) is upon us.

This one is for the guys-

The holiday was formerly known as День Красной Армии (Red Army Day) and День Советской Армии (Soviet Army Day).

Glory to the military forces of the USSR!

Now it's reincarnated as День защитника Отечества (Defender of the Fatherland/Motherland Day) or sometimes just flat out День Мужчин (Men's Day).

Congrats on the holiday, men!

Cell phones are buzzing with congratulatory texts, holiday cards are being sent on vk.com, and- according to one of my students- anyone who can drink, will be drinking today... if they didn't already start yesterday! In fact, by 4 PM yesterday, D and his male coworkers were already enjoying a feast of various dishes cooked up by their female coworkers.

My English class last night only had 2 men in attendance. The coordinator pulled me out into the hallway: "It's the holiday, the men are celebrating", she whispered. The office sported various balloon soldiers standing at guard-

Admit it, your first thought was St Patrick's Day too :p

Artem, one of the two male students in class, was gracious enough to reveal his holiday gift from the company-

"The real man's toolkit"

A hammer, a pacifier, and a nut were in this burlap sack.

"son, tree, house" (implying perhaps that every man should have a son, plant a tree, and build a house)

So to all the men out there, Happy Holiday!!!

And women, don't worry. Our day is coming up soon... March 8th, International Women's Day! : )