that moment you realize it's negative 8 degrees outside.

its always somewhat of a let down to wake up in the morning. i get so warm, so cuddly, and after 8 hours of restless sleep, i swear RIGHT before my alarm goes off is the exact moment that i get in the most comfortable position EVER. and could probably sleep for 8 more hours.

but. my obligation to teaching, and my desire to explore this ever-so amazing country gets me out of bed every  morning.
i dont know why.

i roll out of bed, turn my computer on to check the weather, and dart to the bathroom to shower. i think getting out of the shower is even more disappointing than getting out of bed. i dont know about you, but for me, showering solves all life's problems. it's warm. you feel so much better about yourself, it soothes your aches and pains, anddd...you kinda get to be a vegetable for 10 minutes (okay, maybe 20). there's not much better in life than that.
except for maybe the fact that i've eaten two loaves of bread in three days. but that's a different story.

anyways, i shower. i come back to my room to get ready, layer up, and get my butt to school. while doing this, i like to gauge how many layers to wear, so i check the weather. 99% of the time it's about 3-7 degrees outside---barely bearable. so i put on my tights, leggings, leggings (again), and then my thermal pants. my two pairs of socks, my boots, my thermal shirt, my over shirt, a sweater, scarf, then my coat. and i'm ready to go for the day!

but today went a little differently. my internet at home had been down for a bit, so when i finally got it working i hurried up and skyped with ryan before he went to bed (it still trips me out that my mornings are his nights, and his mornings are my nights) but then i remembered to check the weather to be prepared for what was going to come. it was more disappointing than you could imagine.
negative.
there was a negative sign. i dont think you all realize how cold that negative sign automatically makes it.

i remember being in utah, driving around in my super cool mini van and gasping at the fact that it was 28 degrees. barely below freezing.i literally thought death was going to come upon me. but now i have a new appreciation for utah weather (especially since i hear it's in the 30's there!...i hate you all).

i would give anything to have my car that has a heater.

let me run you by what's been going on for the past week (has it really been a week!? man, i need to remember to blog more..i'm just so busy!)

okay, so last week of teaching went...okay. it was better than i expected but it still sucked. we were blind sighted quite a few times, and had to overcome a few obstacles with our lessons, the school, the kids, etc. but we worked through it. i mean, half the fun of doing something like this is figuring out what the heck you're doing!

i kinda got in a rut of feeling sorry for myself. oh poor me. this is really hard. it's really cold. i dont want to teach. and then i realized this is what i signed up for! i better figure it out or else i'm gunna wanna die for the next 5 months every day that i come into the school (even though every day i secretly wish all my kids are sick and cant come to class). but i didnt wanna sit here and be miserable at school, waiting for the time to pass, doing mediocre lessons. NO WAY, NOT ME! that's not like me anyways. we all know about my ocd problems. so i finally buckled down. did some studying. planned my lessons for the rest of the week, and put a smile on my face!
and it totally worked.

so teaching is going pretty good. it's really hard, still. i didnt really think about how hard it is teaching another language, especially to the itty bitty kids. they're more interested in headbutting each other than they are constantly repeating what i say. but we make it work.

anyways, so i am trying to remember what i did for my lessons.
my itty bitty class is kinda hard, mostly we just have been winging it (except for today) but it's been fun. and then my older class, i chose to do kitchen activities with them last week. so for wednesday we made a fruit salad,  cut up apples, oranges, and bananas and stirred it all up and make a really delish salad. then for friday we made jello jigglers! it turned out a lot of fun, except for some reason at the bottom of my jello bowl there was a thick layer of uncutable jello. i dont know what it was, but it was hard. and disgusting. so i kinda had a pukey face and wanted to die, but it helped me not eat it! :)
they rather enjoyed the jello time, and of course made a mess of it, but it was fun. i'm still getting used to the teaching style of constantly talking 24/7 and being really annoying about everything. but i'll get used to it.

anyways, it's been way too cold to really do anything so i usually would just go home and chill. read a book, take a bath...all the good things in life :)

but saturday i decided to venture out and have some fun! my head teacher had invited us all over to her apartment for a little shindig, so a few of us decided to meet up there. i was a little nervous to leave the house (my host family is out of town, and i wasnt quite sure which bus to take to get to the metro, or how to get back...but i KNEW i needed to take the bull by the horns and stop sitting around feeling scared and sorry for myself) so i layered up, and ventured out. i started walking in the direction of what i remembered the bus stop to be at, and i looked up and saw the holy grail of holy grails.

"fitness life" 

ah those sweet words! i finally found somewhere that i can escape. release my anger, and actually sweat for once. (besides having to wear all those layers then walk up a gigantic hill of death...three times...but thats a different story for a little later.)

so i ran inside and asked the girl if she spoke english, which she did..kinda. good enough to give me a piece of paper about the place and so i thanked her and told her i would come back later (i wanted to get back on with my adventure of finding the apartment before it got dark outside)...and yes. i did have that little faith in myself that i thought it would take me 3 hours to reach my destination. 

so i walked back over to the bus stop and stood there pondering what bus number i should get on. i wasnt really sure, but i just decided that it would be a really good idea to get on the first one that came. i had this logic for a few reasons. 

1. i was cold, and wanted a warm(ish) place to sit...

2. i figured..all the buses have to end up at the same place...and last time i went to the metro there were twelve million buses of all different numbers gathered..so i figured at one point or another i would end up at the metro. 

3. that's really all my reasoning that i have...

so i stood there for about two minutes, and saw a bus drive up...so i frantically waved it down and hopped right on. (i had perfect seat placement. four rows back, next to the window. far enough away from the driver so nobody would pass me their money, but not too far back that the ukrainian stench would gather (which is in the back of the bus). 

okay, side note really quickly. ukranians have a very distinct smell. it sometimes depends on the time of day, but it usually involves this: sausage, B.O., and alcohol. 

the strength of alcohol is what makes it depend on the time of day. the later at night (aka the colder it gets) the stronger people smell. allllll the time. 

okay so anyways, bus placement=good. so i sat on the bus for a good 30 minutes, but i wasnt too worried. i was just happy to get some sight seeing in. i found a lot of cool little street shops near my house, and i wouldnt have been able to find them if it wasnt for this nice little bus ride! and i FINALLY made it to the metro stop. and there it was, mcdonalds. 

i dont think i had ever been this happy in my entire life. it was downright amazing. 

so i ran inside, and realized it was going to be harder to order than i thought. i had no idea how to say "chicken nuggets" in russian. soooooo i did what i do best here, and played a little game of charades with the girl. 

it worked out magically, and i was so happy to finally have some food in my tummy! and if you were all wondering what ukranian chicken nuggets are, they're the EXACT same as american ones. 

but..they did have something quite interesting on their menu that caught my eye. they looked like samoa cookies..but they were chicken nuggets with sesame seeds on them. i was intrigued...but not enough to actually order it. 

so i gobbled down my meal, and remembered that i needed to reach my destination before nightfall. 

so i waltzed my way over to the metro and got on. then i remembered i had no idea which stop i was getting off on, so i stood over by the map following with my finger where we were after each stop. everyone kept looking at me, but the longer i'm here..the longer i realize that i dont care what people say or think about me..i'm just trying to survive this place..and i'm going to do it MY way. plus, i have no idea what anyone is saying to me when they talk, so i just smile and say "english only" and then they talk more and i smile and pretend like they're telling me how pretty i am. 

so i got off on the right stop, and pulled out my very in depth directions of how to get to the apartment (it was probably a 20 minute walk..that i turned into a 40 minute walk very quickly). 

i followed the directions to the T. and got to the movie theaters, and turn right. but i wasnt quite sure..do i turn right before the movie theather, or after? so i assumed after...for some stupid reason. then the next item on the list was "hike up the giant mountain hill of death until you cant breathe anymore, and then keep hiking until you wanna rip your clothes off and die of heat stroke, and then keep walking because you'll almost be there"

okay, it didnt go exactly like that, but that's how it was. 

so i hiked up the mountain, and made it to the top and i was so proud of myself. i felt like a champion. i couldnt breathe and my butt burned, but i had reached champion status. 

but then i realized i wasnt at my destination. i had made it to this strange road with a lot of scary houses, and that wasnt in the directions. 

so i called the head teacher and asked her, and we figured out that i HIKED THE WRONG MOUNTAIN. i was supposed to turn before the movie theater, not after :( so i hung my head in shame and walked back down the mountain. 

twelve million hours later, after rehiking that mountain, i made it to their apartment. happily. 

and they had made the cutest fort EVER. when i move home and have my own room again, i am making a fort in my room. i love the feeling. plus, it trapped in all the heat so it made it a little warmer in the apartment!

okay, i feel like i have been blabbing forever and ever. if you have reached it to this point in the story, i love you forever. and i will give you a second to stand up, touch your toes, spin around three times, and jog in place for a second. everyone needs their wiggle time. 

dont worry, i moved from the table, to sitting on the floor, to laying on the floor, which then i felt obligated to take a nap. but i'm back and feelin good!

so anyways, we all just sat there and watched a movie, and chatted about our week. it was fun to see some of the people from the different schools. 

so blah blah blah. we were all sitting around, and i was getting HANGRY. (like always) but nobody wanted to go out and get food. 

so finally i got a few of us to get our shoes on and go venturing out to find food, we walked forevvveeerr and couldnt find anything, but we made it to the movie theater, so we decided to go in there and unthaw. 

we found out that this was not only a movie theater, but it was THE place to be on a saturday night. they had bowling, an arcade, food (which was gross looking and over priced, so we didnt eat there), annddd movies, and everything else you could have imagined. 

this is me being cute with a statue outside the movie theater: (p.s. thats my new coat!) 

 okay so blah blah blah, we walked more. and it was cold. so we made it to the train station (NOT the metro, the train) so we went in there hoping they would have food..like an airport. they had like two places to go..so we went to the place that looked italian. 

after five minutes of charades we got our pizza and salad ordered, and we were feelin pretty good. 

blah blah blah, we got our food, and ate. and it was awesomely delish. i dont know if it was because i was hungry, or if it was because it really was good, but my tummy was happy. but not that happy. it was a tiny pizza. i could have eaten the entire thing by myself and still been hungry, so i voted we walked a few more littles and go to mcdonalds, but they didnt want to. so i was sad. but then they ordered another pizza, and i just had a bite of theirs. 

so all was good in the hood. 

we walked around the train station and looked at some souvenir shops and then decided to head back. 

i forgot that we had to hike up that mountain, but i did it! with a smile on my face (to tell you the honest truth, it felt good to walk and stretch my legs....but nobody told me i would be sore in the morning! hahaa..pathetic) 

so we got back, watched another movie, and kinda just talked and went to bed. everyone was pretty beat from the week, so we just chilled. 

i did paint my fingernails and toenails though! 

so thennn we woke up, and it was freezing, and i wasnt feeling in tip top shape and i knew that if i wanted any chance of fighting off this cold, that i had to go home and sleep allll day. 

so i went home, and everyone else headed off to church. 

my head was feeling so heavy, and i had that awful tickle in my throat. and i didnt want that to carry over into the week (which it has anyways) 

so i went home and chilled at home. it was saturday night for ryan, so i skyped in to him and his lovely roommate and friend and we played never have i ever aannd i watched them play just dance :) it was a fun day. it was kinda fun to hang out with people other than...the people i am with 24/7...i had so much fun! then i ate an entire loaf of bread, and cheese..and got really really fat. :( bad idea. 

after that i slept a lot, and mostly just slept. and watched a movie, i think. that day was kinda a blur of events to tell you the honest truth. but i do remember being very very happy! :) and that's all that matters to me. 

so then monday decided to come, and i wasnt as ready as i thought i was. we still struggle with the itty bitty class, knowing what activities to do to keep them interested..and involved..and to use language that they understand. it's just difficult all around...but we figured it out. and then with the older kids i made..jello. oh yeah, i think i already told you about that. 

i was supposed to go to the gym, but because i was tired. and cold. and not in the mood. i didnt go that day. 

tuesday came around..and that's my day were i get to sleep in and go to ele (which is at a public school..and i was not looking forward to it because the kids were beasts last week) so we got there, kinda bs'ed our way through the classes and came back to the school for lunch and really exciting training meetings! :) 

they're not that exciting..but they help..so that's good! 

so thennn we went to the gym and i felt like i could actually breathe here! it was the most exciting thing EVER. but we had to actually obtain our passes, which was a work out in and of itself. the girl didnt speak english, so after charades for a bit, finally some girl that spoke really good english came and helped us and it was really nice. 

it felt soo good to finally work out. it's nice to have a place to go and let off some steam and feel better about myself eating a whole loaf of bread. 

so then after, i went to the store and bought..a whole loaf of bread..and some oatmeal :) 

so i ate the bread (almost all of it..i resisted the rest to save for breakfast) andddd cleaned the apartment (it was getting BAD) i had clothes everyweher from doing laundry and then laying them all out to dry. and guess what? the washing machine was nice enough do dye ALL my white clothes..PINK. how sweet of it..NOT. ugh. oh well, i'm over it. at least it wasnt brown ;) 

so anyways, i cleaned, i sat there, i read, i watched movies, etc. it was exciting. 

blah blah blah. now i have been sitting here for two hours typing this whole thing. and i am done. i kinda got lazy at the end, so i am going to try and be better and write at least every other day soooooooo you dont have to read this marathon of a blog, and i dont have to type one! :) 

mmkay adios. 

send your love, on this lovely love month.