Connections in Kiev

It's A Small World

The expression above has proven itself true for us several times since we made the decision to come to Kiev.  Some of these connections we should have or could have known about, if we had remembered, and some of them were a complete surprise!

1)  The first connection was made 20 years ago!  In 1993, when we were living in Blossburg, PA  Jay's brother, Bob, who is a yoga instructor, stopped by our house on his way back from a yoga workshop.  He had another guy with him named Andre, who had been one of the guest instructors at the workshop.  They spent the night with us, and I remember how kind and appreciative Andre was.  I remember him telling me that our home had good energy and he felt very comfortable staying with us.  What I didn't remember was that he was from Ukraine.  As it turns out, he still has a yoga center here in Kiev and still teaches.  We were hoping to take yoga classes with him, but he is on the other side of the city from us, probably an hour ride on the Metro---too far!  HOWEVER, our school just hired a local Ukrainian to teach phys ed.  She has also volunteered to teach yoga classes after school twice a week for teachers who are interested, AND she is one of Andre's students!!  We are still hoping to see Andre sometime in the near future.

2) In June I attended a workshop in Washington DC for international counselors.  There were 25-30 guidance counselors in attendance from international schools all over the world, so you can imagine how surprised I was to find out that there was another counselor there from Kiev.  Ingrid and I connected right away and spent a lot of time that week talking about living in Kiev.   She is the counselor at the Christian school, and she lives only 3 Metro stops away.  She took me shopping the second week we were here, which was a huge help.  I will be seeing more of her both in and outside of school.  She will be bringing students to my school for SAT and ACT testing, and we hope to get together with our husbands for dinner once in a while.

3) Another connection, also yoga related, was through a woman at our church in Surfside Beach, SC.  When she found out that we were moving to Ukraine, she told us that she knew someone from her yoga class who had been to Ukraine many times on mission trips.  We swapped contact information and that's how we met Nancy and Dick, who visited us before we left and shared pictures and stories from their trips. 

4)  We were reminded about another connection just last week.  This connection was made 13 years ago!  Again, I remembered the person but not the fact that she was from Ukraine.  Katya was an exchange student and graduated from North Penn High School in 2001 while I was the guidance counselor there.  Through her host family and Facebook, she found out that we were here and contacted us.  What a nice surprise!  Even better, we spent the day with her yesterday celebrating Ukraine's Independence Day and exploring the city.  She lives and works in Kiev and really knows her way around.  Plus, she speaks English very well and was very informative.  We will be spending more time together, I'm sure.  She is going to teach me how to make borscht and I am going to teach her how to make homemade brownies.

Will there be more connections??  I won't be surprised if there are.  It makes us feel like we made the right decision to come here and that we're supposed to be here for some reason.  Very interesting....