Let me first say, that I will send some kind of small Ukrainian gift/souvenir to the first person* who recognizes the movie I'm alluding to in this post -- by yourself without Googling it or anything -- and names the movie in the comments below. *Excluding our Kharkov mission team members and my mom and stepdad, all of whom have either watched this movie with me or heard me talk about it. Our good local friend, Valeriy, works with a couple of Christian camps every summer. One of these is unique in that the camp is primarily for orphans, and although the camp is publically-funded, they allow Christians from America to come and serve the children and teach them from the Bible. This is a great work. Part of Valeriy's job is to round up local Ukrainian translators who can translate for the Americans who come to work in the camp. For this year's camp, for example, he needs around ten translators. I already knew several of the translators, and Valeriy invited me to a meeting a couple of months ago to meet a couple more of them. Then a few weeks ago he asked if I'd be willing to drive the translators who are from the Kharkov area to the camp, which is near Poltava, a city about a two-hour drive away. Some of the translators Valeriy lined up are coming to the camp from other places in Ukraine, but four are from Kharkov. Two more are from Kramatorsk, a city which is a few hours from Kharkov the opposite direction. Those two, Sasha and Lena, came into Kharkov by bus yesterday. Denyce and I hosted them in our home last night and had a good time getting to know them. So that made six translators in total, plus me, for a vanload of 7 from Kharkov to Poltava today. Now, a few of these translators had worked in this same camp last year, and as Valeriy wasn't aware of any written directions of how to actually get to the camp, they were supposed to be my primary guides to find it. All I knew going into this was the name of a tiny village -- Golovach -- located near the camp, and an approximate location of that village on a road map. And outside of major highways and roads, road maps in Ukraine should be considered approximations at best. However, I was the driver, and didn't want to be frequently taking my eyes off the road or pulling over to scrutinize the map, so I decided to just let my translator friends guide me. The drive from Kharkov to Poltava went completely smooth and fine. Enjoyably, really, and along the way we were treated to passing panoramas of pine groves and sprawling fields of wheat, corn, and -- my favorite (especially in light of the movie I'm referencing) -- sunflowers. Pictures in a minute, but first things first. Once we got to Poltava, though, it was clear that the translators couldn't even figure out where we needed to turn off the main highway, let alone what route to take through the myriad tiny, unpredictable, often uncharted little roads that snake through the countryside beyond the city. Thus began our very rigid search. (These words are to be spoken with a thick Ukrainian accent).
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