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About a month ago our church assembly met on Sunday evening, as we normally do.  This particular Sunday we were meeting in Ivan and Sveta's apartment.  Ivan and Sveta are two Christians who moved to Kharkov late last year and have become special people to us, some of the core members in our new church plant.  One of the positive developments we've seen in the last couple months has been increased frequency of meeting in Ukrainian homes, as opposed to just the homes of us American missionaries.  So this was a wonderful occasion for us all to get to assemble in their apartment.

When my family and I got there, we met a young lady we had never seen before named Sveta.  Sveta is a very common name in this part of the world, so it wasn't at all a surprise that in such a relatively small group we had two Svetas.  So for the rest of this post I'll refer to them as "our Sveta," in whose apartment we were meeting, and "Moscow Sveta."  Yes, she was from Moscow and the two Svetas knew each other from the recent past when Ivan and Sveta had lived in Moscow, and these two Svetas were co-workers.  They became friends and now that our Sveta is living in Kharkov, Moscow Sveta had come to Kharkov with her sister to meet up with our Sveta and her sister, Katya (who is also a Christian sister in our group).  The two Svetas and their sisters were leaving the next day, if I recall, to vacation in Crimea together.  

Interestingly enough, I didn't even find out until after we had left later that night that Moscow Sveta had a sister present that evening.  Apparently Moscow Sveta's sister was so disinterested in meeting anyone or in being a part of a church assembly that she stayed in a back bedroom of the apartment and never once came out.  But thankfully Moscow Sveta was fine to visit and get to know all the new people there, and then she sat in on our assembly time and even tried to sing along a little I think.

We're waiting for our ride to the seminar, which is already late and will be here any minute, so this will have to be a very quick post.  I just thought I'd type up a quick summary of how things have gone in Moscow our first 48 hours here.  We came to Moscow to kill two birds with one stone -- to participate in a church planting conference that the church here is putting on, and to renew our visas for Ukraine, which were expiring soon.

Brother Volodya, who works with the church here (the same church that Denyce worked with when she was in AIM working in Moscow), picked us up from the airport and took us to his place for a quick breakfast upon arrival (we had started getting up before 4 AM to catch our 6 AM flight out of Kharkov).  He then brought us to the church's meeting place here, where we are staying.

Yesterday I applied for our visas at the Ukrainian consulate and that went very well.  Since the normal processing takes 10 business days, this time around we decided to pay more for the expedited processing so we wouldn't have to stay in Moscow for two weeks.  The expedited processing is supposed to take 3 working days, but after I finished turning in everything required, the lady at the consulate asked me if I'd like to pick up the completed visas later the same day.  Wow!  So we actually ended up getting our visas in a total of just over 5 hours' processing time.

We've enjoyed spending some time with Gary and Danita Jackson, former missionaries in Moscow and mentors of ours, who are also here for the seminar.  The seminar begins today at a retreat location outside of Moscow.  And having said that, our ride is here at last.  Time to go.

But one more very important thing that must be said: Today is Malachi's birthday -- 5 years old!  Happy Birthday Malachi!

Friday nights are date nights for us and the McDougles.  We switch off keeping each other's kids while the temporarily kid-free couple goes out for the evening.  In a place where you have just a fraction of the support network (especially without any grandparents or family at all living nearby), this is invaluable for keeping our sanity and helping our marriages stay healthy.

Tonight it's the McDougles' turn to go out.  I snapped these photos a few minutes ago while the boys were playing.  

The four are remarkably evenly spaced:

• Malachi - 5 next week
• Canaan - 3 yrs 9.5 mos
• Silas - 2 yrs 8 mos
• Max - 1 yr 6 mos 

Actually, the literal snapshots I'm including in this post were taken in July.  But now I'll paint you a picture in words of what things are like here this August weekend.

Saturday morning is my time for my weekly trip to the open market to stock us up on all kinds of fresh food, and yesterday was no exception.  We do some shopping at the supermarket, but this time of year that takes a backseat the amazing variety, freshness, and localness of what's available from the old Ukrainian babushkas and the Central Asian emigrants at any of Kharkov's open markets.

This year, since we recently bought a stand-alone freezer, I'm buying not just for our household consumption in the week ahead, but select items I'm buying for Denyce to prep and freeze.  A usual market trip for me begins with parking the van on a side street near the market, then walking through part of the market to the building where the meat and dairy sellers are.  On the way I scope out prices on vegetables, which will be my next stop.  Once in the building, I go straight to my milk guy, who has always sold out of milk (and usually butter) long before I get there.  But I ask anyway.  Yesterday I was a little earlier than usual, but this didn't help.  Then I looked over and saw my honey guy, Sasha, who is only there on certain Saturdays.  It's always a treat to see him.  Last time I saw him I started asking about where he cultivates his honey, and he ended up inviting me and the family out to the countryside for a day later in the season.  This time, yesterday, we nailed down a tentative date for later this month.  Looking forward to that.

Since my preferred milk guy was out of milk, I then went and just randomly walked up to some old lady who was selling her dairy products (there are dozens of dairy sellers), sampled her straight-from-home milk and butter, and bought some of each.  The milk actually ended up being quite good, so I might be looking for her again.

Then I walk all the way to the other end of the building where the poultry sellers are.  It's a long building and on the way I walk through the beef/pork/etc. section, which is definitely the most interesting.  All sorts of crazy animals, hard to identify in their skinned-and-chopped states, and various parts and products of them for sale.  I do occasionally buy beef steak at the market, but not too often as I usually get quite a bit of it and we just keep it in the freezer.  

Once I get to the poultry section I walk down the main aisle there and ignore the sales pitches of various sellers who want me to look at their stuff.  I know exactly who I'm looking for.  There is a certain babushka there who, for some reason I can no longer remember, I just started buying from at some point last winter.  I enjoyed briefly visiting with her and her chickens and eggs always have seemed really high quality, so I've stuck with her.  She always looks glad to see me too.  We talk some but her Russian is extremely hard for me to understand.  The week before last she was trying to tell me something and was asking me about something, and my best guess is that she was telling me she suspects I'm German and have Nazi ancestors.  Now you'd think that would be something someone would say to you only if they don't like you, but I tell you, this lady likes me.  Anyway, I never quite figured that out, and then yesterday when I went back to her she started in again on something seemingly related to my ethnic background and this time I thought she was guessing that I had Tatar in me.  Now it's actually not at all infrequent for random strangers (mostly old ladies) here to wager guesses at my ethnicity -- most frequently the guess Polish or Czech -- but Tatar is the most unexpected guess I've heard so far.  Strange.

Anyway, I said goodbye to my babushka carrying a whole chicken (prepared but not cooked) and a carton full of the best eggs in Kharkov (always deep golden yellow yolks, which is not what you get when you buy them at the grocery store).  My next stop was my friend Farkhod, a young man about my age from Central Asia (one of the "stans," but at the moment I forget which one).  Farkhod is perhaps my closest buddy there at the market, and it's really a treat to touch base with him.  He's interested in learning English and though he's never expressed any interest in God or His word, I believe there is an open door there.  Anyway, Farkhod is one of 8 or 10 different people scattered around the meat section who sell all varieties of spices (seriously, just about everything I think).  He table is covered with open containers full of various spices of all kinds of shades of red, brown, yellow, and green.  The majority of Ukrainians, I've noticed, just walk up and tell him what type of meat or dish they want to cook, and then he'll quickly and methodically heap little spoonfuls of maybe up to a dozen spices into a paper cone-shaped envelope for them, mixing it as he goes.  Denyce, however, prefers to compose her own combinations of spices at the time of cooking, so Farkhod knows that when I walk up, all I need is each raw ingredient I ask for in its own separate packet.  And he usually knows that I'm going to need garlic powder.  Farkhod knows Denyce because she's been to the market too, and he always asks about her and the kids.

Once I say bye to Farkhod my business is done there in the main building of the market, but I've only done a small fraction of my shopping.  That's because the majority of what I'm there for, especially during the summer months, is produce.  And all the best produce at the best prices are for sale across the market in an area on the other side, closer to where I parked.  I park close to that part of the market because I know I'll be making multiple trips between that area and the van as I fill up my bags with fruit and vegetables.

There in the produce section I have certain sellers who I normally give preference to and who know me, but I still usually survey the whole area (at least 100 sellers, probably quite a bit more during this peak season) a bit just to get a feel for the going prices for various things each week (they change weekly as things go in and out of season), and to look for stuff that looks especially good.  I then buy things fairly methodically, trying to buy the heavier and more durable things first so they can go in the bottom of my bags, and then work my way up to the softer, more delicate things that need to go on top.  Yesterday I repeated this process three times, going to the van after each time when I had filled bags.

To give you a sense of things, here is a run-down of the majority of what I bought yesterday in the produce section (this may not be a complete list):

• Vegetables etc.
  • 2 kg of onions
  • 1 kg of potatoes
  • 1.5 kg of carrots
  • 4 heads of garlic
  • 3 kg of red bell peppers
  • at least 20 hot chili peppers
  • 6 squash
  • 1 head of cauliflower
  • 2 kg of tomatoes
  • 3 cucumbers
  • 1 eggplant
• Greens
  • 2 bunches of lettuce (smaller than in the US; lettuce is not as popular here)
  • 1 bunch of parsley
  • 1 bunch of basil
  • 1 bunch of green onions
  • I was supposed to buy a bunch of cilantro but I forgot.  Can't imagine how with such a short shopping list.
• Fruit
  • 8 or 9 bananas
  • 10 oranges
  • 8 apples
  • 3 kg of peaches (these are at the peak of the season right now!)
  • 3 kg of plums
  • 1 lemon (was supposed to get 3 ... oops)
  • 1 watermelon
  • 1 of some other kind of melon ... not sure what it is
• Other stuff
  • 300 g of walnuts
  • 300 g of almonds (imported from California)
  • 300 g of raisins
  • 1 kg of beans

As mentioned, peaches are fully in season right now, so yesterday was stock-up time for freezing peaches.  Our freezer is already filling up with good amounts of other things that were in season earlier in the summer (raspberries, strawberries, blueberries, cherries, squash, maybe more I can't remember).  Also, the 3 kg of red bell peppers yesterday were for freezing, as well as most of the chili peppers and plums. 

If you've read this far and you didn't already know this, you probably don't need me to tell you now that food is pretty important to our family!  I could probably write another post this same length describing some of the cool things Denyce does with all this loot once it crosses the threshold of our apartment door.  She worked really hard much of the day today and some great stuff is in the works in there.  We're wonderfully blessed to have a kitchen that is well-equipped, spacious, and useful (much more than the average Ukrainian apartment kitchen).  Denyce puts it to fantastically good use.

Well, I had planned to write some about the day today and what's planned for tomorrow, but looks like the market took all the space I'm willing to give tonight.  In the meantime, here are a couple of random, unrelated photos to end the post:

  I grabbed this candid shot of my beautiful wife while she was tying her ponytail.  Isn't she great?

Speaking of my wife looking beautiful, how 'bout this one too?  This was while we were out on our day off and we went for a ride on this sort of children's railroad, that you can see in the background.  

  If this isn't the best picture ever of Silas, I can't think of what is.  What a little charmer.  Call now, operators are standing by.

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).