And 2 hours later get thrown out. That’s right kids! I’ve officially been thrown out of my first Ukrainian bar! Granted, as always, it wasn’t my fault, but hey. Here’s what happened:
This weekend was the Gender and Development Committee meeting in Kiev. I’m on the council (it was a pretty competitive application process). The council meets quarterly and discusses gender and sexuality issues in Ukraine and what we can do to make the situation better. The committee is split into sub-committees, including: trafficking, women in the workplace, domestic violence, LGBT, GADfly (the newsletter) to name a few. Anyhoo after the meeting, we all went back to the one apartment we rented for all of us. Apparently the chick who rented it said there were only going to be 4 people living there. HA! As it turns out, there were 20 people in a one bedroom apartment! Some of them weren’t in our working group, but the HIV/AIDS working group, who was also meting last weekend. Problem number one: get 20 PCVs together, and you’re bound for trouble. Now, I wasn’t actually in the apartment when the shots of vodka started. I was too busy walking around with Rachel and Elizabeth, getting the most amazing cheeseburger I’ve ever tasted (from a real hamburger joint. . . NOT McDonalds!), and finding a place that Rach and I could have ourselves a wiskey.. Problem 2: whiskey. . . sometimes I forget that whiskey is my danger alcohol. And yet I refuse to not drink it. . . because it’s so tasty! And because I hadn’t had a decent whiskey in what. . . 6 months?
So after our whiskey, we’re not drunk by any means but are nicely buzzed, and walk up Independence Square to the bar where the vodka-in-apartment people have gone, called O’Brians. Everyone in there is either a foreigner or an ex-pat. Or a Peace Corps Volunteer. I literally felt like I could’ve been at any Irish pub in New York. It was heart-warming. What was even more heart-warming was one of the chicks on GAD who was fall-over drunk, telling me all night that as soon as I walked in the door that morning she knew I was cool, telling everyone in the bar I was awesome, and then promptly starting to flash everyone in the bar. Mind you, she wasn’t wearing a bra. So, the entire bar saw her boobs. . . . 5 times! And then we were asked to leave. This was the most heart warming part because I REALLY felt like I was at home (soccer girls. .. you know what I’m talking about). So, me being the good little DD, I am holding this chick up, while we stumble our way to McDonalds, and have to feed her a hamburger and fries. When I say feed, I mean just that- literally every 2 seconds saying, “bite”.
As chaotic as this all sounds, for some reason it brought tears to my eyes and for the first time since I’ve been here, I really felt like I was at home having a drunken night on the town with my girls. It was really heart-warming. Is that weird? I don’t think so.
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