Currents of people - Tiles

Currents of people, like currents of water flow over and around stones. Sidewalks in Odessa in the commercial areas often are paved with stone tiles. We are part of the current, so we spend a lot of time on these tiles. We thought we would share some of them.

Some are fancy and relatively new. 

Some are quite old. This picture doesn't begin to convey the unevenness of the road. At first we tried to imagine a wagon wheel rumbling over this lumpy, bumpy surface. Then one day we found ourselves flying over a section of road paved this way in a car. Our imaginations failed to describe the experience: full-body massage. Imagine a horse trying to navigate this road.

The tile layers are artists. Some work with conventional patterns.

Then you get some risk-takers...

Some classicists...

And then some free spirits.

There are also experiments with textures.

Our shoes are getting around a lot. We do not have a car, and our language skills are not up to working things out with a taxi driver, though we have friends who can do that.

We like the walking, though. For one thing, we are shedding pounds. Check it out.

More importantly, we are feeling more and more a part of the people we share the currents with. These are really good people. They are sometimes brutally honest, but when you think about it, who needs to be told "No, those pants don't make you look fat", when you both know they do? The honesty is bracing...if you are braced for it.

We have met people with enormous character and commitment: people who swim upstream and don't mind the hardness of it. Young people here are so desirous for an education, because it is the ticket to a better life, but many find it hard to afford. In one of our assignments, we are associated with an educational program that provides a leg up for those who really want it.

So, walking with them and around them and through the crowds of them over the stones is a pleasure. And if people see us looking at our feet as we walk, then maybe they don't understand what it means to us.

Currents of People - The Busses

Odessa is a living system. The currents of Odessa flow everywhere: some visible, and some not. The most powerful are the ones you can’t see, because they are in the hearts and minds of the people. But if you can't see the currents, then you can feel the breezes they produce. Take riding on the busses, for instance, which are called “marshrutkas”.

A fast-moving bus will pass you on a busy street almost every minute, in its wake, wind and dust. Take #145 to Suvorovsky; #191 or #221 to Tairovsky; #175 to the Boksal (train station), and then #25 to Illichyovsk. All of these are places we go, so we ride on the busses a lot. If the streets are the blood vessels, the buses are capsules or corpuscles of people moving along in bundles, very efficiently.  Everyone who cannot afford a car rides the bus, and that is most people. That means the buses are sometimes very crowded. The bus comes to you and stops, but you have to get on quickly, because the next bus is right behind. When it is time to get off, you make your way to the front, you say the name of your stop, and you drop the fare on the platform beside the driver. Exact fare, please, or you get a grumpy scolding. Also, tell the driver how many of you there are. Then when the bus stops, move smartly out the front door (always out the front), or you miss your chance.

When the bus is full on a warm and humid day, riding the marshrutka becomes more interesting. In a letter home, Marsha described what happens then as a “full-body contact sport”:

“Full Body Contact Sport:

Riding the #25 bus from Odessa to Illichyovsk

Duration: 55 very long minutes

Object of the game:  Cram as many people as possible into a marshrutka, and then have them exit the bus one at a time

Atmosphere:  Very warm and humid, no open windows

The Players:  SITTERS-People seated two-abreast on both sides of a narrow aisle in rows.  

                      STANDERS-As many as possible, facing sideways in the aisle until more players enter the game, at which point Standers must face forward or backward and stand as close together as possible while clutching bags and packages to their chests. The difficulty is that more Standers enter the game at every stop.

                      GETTER-OFFERS-Eventually all players become Getter-offers, trying to make it to the front of the bus to pay the driver and then exit the bus.

The Play:  Getter-offers push forward from the rear of the bus, twisting and turning, squeezing past the Standers in their path. Standers try to make way for them by bending over Sitters and squeezing in to make a way for the Getter-offer.

Scoring: All possible body parts should touch: fronts, sides, backs, arms, torsos, bosoms, hands, heads, and feet. (Maximum points awarded when 2 people actually occupy the same spot.)

Team Spirit:  All players remain friendly and cordial and helpful and patient. No harsh words are exchanged. This is a cooperative game. Everyone wins.

Uniforms:  Women: Beautifully painted and decorated fingernails. No gray hair allowed. All well groomed. Sleeveless for the heat. Mostly sandals. Shorts and short dresses for the heat.  

Men: Casual shirts and mostly shorts, all lengths.

Referee:  The bus driver. Don't mess with him. Virtuoso performer with the horn. (Do not yet understand the rules for lane switching and dominance over other buses, but the driver is clearly playing for points as well.)  Highly skilled: Can drive and make change for passengers at the same time.

Winners:  We all were. Illichyovsk is a quiet, pleasant town by the Black Sea. Quieter, with more families and open spaces than in central Odessa. We saw a large poster of the Family Proclamation hanging in the window of the chapel.”

People are very patient with these inconveniences. We have found the current of people flowing through Odessa on the busses to be very human and very likable, because they treat each other with honesty and mutual respect. One book on Odessa features it as a “city of thieves”.We have experienced just the opposite. When the bus is crowded and the riders can’t get to the front because of the crush to pay their fare, they give the amount to the person seated in the row in front of them and say the name of their stop.

The money is passed forward to each successive row until it reaches the driver, along with the name of the stop. The money never disappears into a pocket, that we have ever seen. This system works because of the honesty and mutual respect of individuals who are far from wealthy. A 5-hryvin (GR) bill (20 cents) could help a little to balance someone’s budget, but the money always reaches the driver. In one instance, Andy inadvertently dropped a 200 GR (8 USD) bill on the bus seat. As he walked away, he felt a tap on the shoulder and turned to see a hand extended with the money. One of our friends in the missionary work accidentally left her purse in a public place. Fearing it may have been lost, she returned the next day to find it unopened and all of the contents (including her papers) safe.

Odessa isn't perfect, but the majority of its people are good at heart. Of course, there are visible the same criminal elements and signs of corruption that you find in any big city of 1 million people, but the life-blood of the city that flows through artery-like streets in buses is good and honorable.

Stepping Into the Current

Everything is on its way somewhere. That is certainly true of the Ukraine. We feel like we have been swept into a fast-moving current, and we are fully-occupied trying to keep our balance. As we drifted slowly across the Atlantic in an air-ship, Marsha spotted the southern-most tip of Greenland. It flowed by in the reflection of a never-setting summer sun.

From Kiev, we flowed along on a train ride to Odessa. What a beautiful country. As we made our way to Odessa, the intercity train rolled past mile after mile of...sunflower fields. Most of the heads are by now full and drooping, but some of the late fields are still carpeted yellow. For miles and the terrain is perfectly flat, divided into enormous rectangles visible only from the air by windbreaks of tall, mature trees.

After a few hours, the surface turns into rolling hills and shallow valleys. Large towns and concrete block houses give way to small villages of older, well-kept homes, each with an outdoor facility. Vegetable gardens are everywhere, even alongside the track. Dense forest lines the track where there is no cultivation.

Odessa is on its way to somewhere in the current. In summer, a seaside resort; in winter a seaside port in repose, which we will see later. But for now, the summer city is full of currents that we will navigate. While the summer lasts, we will try to describe the tides of Odessa.

Our thanks: Our life raft for a few precious weeks, has been the Mikkelsens, Ned and Janet, from Bunkerville, Nevada. Thank heavens for them, for we certainly would have drowned without them.

M-Minus 0 - Day 1 - 18 July 2016

No more waiting. Today we signed in at the Missionary Training Center for five days of instruction prior to embarking for Kiev, Ukraine, for eighteen months. The day was unlike any we had ever experienced together. Yesterday we were set apart as missionaries, but today we got our "black badges", the symbol to LDS folk that a person is a missionary. Andy's reads "Старишина Гиббонс" (Russianized from Ukrainian), Marsha's reads "Cестра Гиббонс". Both of them then read, "Церква Иисуса Хриcта".

What an amazing group of senior missionary couples we met for the first time, each going to a different place, and each having fascinating stories to tell. We met cattle ranchers, school teachers, retired firemen, and retired business executives. We met the woman whose cancer is in remission sufficiently that she and her husband can accept a call. We met a lawyer who had taught law courses in Russia, and mothers with successful families and lots of grandchildren. Fascinating people, most of them past retirement and looking for significant service to their community and the world.

The variety of assignments these people have is surprising: women are traveling to Chicago to help with the needs of struggling single mothers, office clerks and organizational administrators, leadership support trainers, and gospel teachers. It was pointed out to us today that these missionaries are choosing a course that causes them to turn outward in service just at a time of life when most are turning inward and hanging up the gloves after a successful professional life.

We are humbled by the giving attitudes and vast and varied experience of this new set of friends, one of whom with his wife is being sent to rebuild homes in the Philippines, and others who will be English-language teachers in other countries.

We are most impressed by the assignment of some who will be assigned to work with a worldwide educational programs aimed at elevating the employability of people in many countries throughout the world, while providing the foundations for a lifetime of learning.