As for me and my house we will serve the Lord....



Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Photos- work in progress











Here are those photos- up to the new working in the house toilet- as of Monday evening! This is Seva and Timor working on the septic system ( Garry is working on his Russian) Garry building cabinets, and the toilet and tile in the bathroom. Now we are waiting for the plastering to finish- which may take a while- the carpenters come back again on Friday.

Saturday, September 19, 2009

Progress

Wonderful progress being made we have walls' the carpenters are starting to tape and plaster on Monday. The septic system is all dug and the walls bricked up thanks to the hard work of Timor and Seva (both attend Morningstar church) so we should have a working toilet in the house next week. Unfortunately I don't seem to have loaded the most recent photos from the camera into the computer so I can't show you. The lights are working in the other side of the house now, we even have eaten in there a few times, when its too wet or dark when work was done for the day.
Garry has been working very hard on his Russian lessons, he knows more words than I do! We met the grade 7 class at school we will see how many come next week when we start the English club. They were having a picnic for one of the boys birthdays, with hotdogs over a fire built by the boys, lots of other food and a huge cake.

Thursday, September 17, 2009

Top Ten Noisy Things in a Ukrainian Village

Top Ten Noisy Things in a Ukrainian Village – as selected by Teresa

10. Garry says the 6 am bus to Zaporosia-there are cars, motorcycles, scooters, trucks and the noisiest tractors roaring past at all hours- maybe not the tractors at night, but everything else

9. Doves- it sounds silly but who woo ccccoooo cooing is really noisy

8. Renos- if not here then down the street- drills, chain saws, and the rumble of cement being mixed.

7. Pigs- there is a pen next door and when they are being fed or chased- pandemonium

6. Geese- geese (in a group) are very noisy, when something is happening near them, or they think they are getting fed in the pen next door, or when they are let out to play in new puddles after it rains.

5. Chickens- roosters- crowing from about 3:30 am (when it is not light) to 4 in the afternoon. Hens clucking to gather their chicks as they hunt bugs around our yard -no we don’t have chickens- they are mostly free range, only penned up at night. Neighbour lady calling her chickens home at dusk – coo-coo-coo- rist-ta!

4. Cows –it is not so much the cows letting out a bellow as they go past the gate twice a day as the dogs all barking as they go past-

3. Dogs- the dogs’ only job in a Ukrainian village is to serve as an early warning system to scare off intruders- and they take it very seriously – they bark if something or someone comes into their yard, passes their gate or looks like they are thinking about it, and sometimes run down the street chasing bicycles and barking

2. Car horns- people announce their arrival and sometimes departure when visiting by blowing their horns- in case no one heard the dog going crazy- maybe so someone will grab the dog ( most large dogs are tied- little ones run around) They blow their horn to say I’m going around you. One Saturday a constantly blowing car horn announced the presence of a big white limo with a bridal party driving around the village.

1. People selling stuff- if you want to sell live chickens or the pig that is cut up in pieces in your trunk, or are buying old metal junk, you need to tell people in their houses that you are out on the street to do business, so you drive slowly down every street in the village, either blowing your horn- normal or clown car version, yelling Chickens- not expensive! Lucky sales people have loudspeakers or sirens to alert everyone from the other side of the village to their wares. One day a hardware store on wheels- a large truck –with a trailer stacked full -rolled past announcing his wares with his loudspeaker- nails, tools, drywall- not expensive.

Friday, September 4, 2009







Here we are at the western point of Crimea where we swam near the cliffs. The other photo is of an Orthodox monastary in a cliff.



Trip to the Black Sea

Last week of August 2009
Garry finally felt better on Monday, after spending the previous Tuesday evening in hospital, where he was told he might have food poisoning. They wanted him to stay for three days so they could make a definite diagnosis, but with Victor’s help he convinced them to let him go on Wednesday afternoon. After getting out of bed and helping too much, and still having a stomach that didn’t think much of food, Garry worried me by sleeping nearly all day Saturday. However he was feeling better when Victor phoned on Sunday to say that the landlady where his family was staying had an open apartment for Tuesday- Thursday nights in Krematrosk. We drove down- an adventure in itself- our atlas is in Russian- the road signs in Ukrainian and we still think in English. But we made it with minor detours and had a wonderful time as you can see.