Kyiv. By Alison.

This is the apartment that I live in. 

It's on the street Dragomanova. There 

are apartment buildings like this literally 

as far as the eye can see. It's pretty far 

away from the inner city which looks 

very, very different.

This is Anton, Marianna, and Zhenia on our Sunday afternoon walk yesterday. This is in the courtyard of Anton's school. My host family is so great to me and have given me an entire room to myself. I am very blessed to associated with this family. The only thing I would change in my family is their absolute addiction to put heapings of mayonaise into everything we eat. :)

My host siblings Anton and Zhenia are very cute kids as you can see. Every time I come home I hear Zhenia say, "Ali-sa, Ali-sa" and I love it. We play games where I sneak up on them and scare them. Of course whenever they try to sneak up on me when I am reading, I always have to pretend to be scared or else Anton gets mad at me and pouts.

Here I am at the "Gates of Kyiv" Museum. It is pretty cool. The museum is actually built around the old gates which are old, thick, and tall brick walls. So this gate is not actually the real thing, but looks exciting enough.

This is one of my favorite classes. This is Polina, Zhenia, Ivan, Tonia, and Yeva. Yeva and Polina are sisters and they want to have the same everything. If Yeva wants a pink pipe cleaner, then Polina has to have a pink pipe cleaner. The most frequent phrases I hear during this class is, "I want to pink!" and "No Russian!" and "I no this."

Apparently this is supposed to be the "heart" of Dresden, but really it's just french fries exploding out of a sphere.

This is Michelle and I bratwurst fighting. Chanell is between us. The man that sold me a bratwurst was the nicest old man ever who spoke no English at all. When you buy bratwurst in Dresden, they give you a huge long bratwurst and then a roll to eat it with and ketchup on the side. It was an interesting way of eating, but it worked. 

Right here is the loudest kid in the school (Tyoma, on the left) and the quietest kid in the school (Igor, on the right). They are both adorable, but Tyoma drives me out of my mind somedays. I swear the only volume he knows is full blast, because he doesn't speak English, he yells English.

This is me in the Ukrainian snow! This was a great day! My jacket is absolutely perfect here. I am also grateful that Carrie and Mom made me buy ugly warm boots. I love my boots! The fur on my jacket however, looks like greasy rat fur compared to the AMAZING fur coats I've seen here. Everyone wears fur, it's a huge deal.