The Lightyellow Journal

The regular disclaimer: The views expressed on this website are my own and in no way reflect those of the U.S. Peace Corps or any agency of the U.S. Government.

The Entries
August to September 2004 - Getting Ready to Leave ~ October to December 2004 - Training & the Orange Revolution ~ January 2005 - Arrival in Chernomorskoe ~ February 2005 - Settling In ~ March 2005 ~ May 2005 ~ September and October 2005 ~ January 2006 - Bird Flu and Other Stories ~ February 2006 - On the Train ~ September 2006 - Final Projects ~ November 2006 - The End

May 2005

Tuesday, May 03, 2005

Catching Up

Well, I am behind myself. I had meant to tell you about the spring snowstorm with snowflakes like mini snowballs; the trip to visit a friend in Stariy Krym, where we found "Cognac Country"; and my second trip to Kyiv, during which I found out just how boring a 15-hour train ride can be. But I'm going to limit myself to just a few topics.

This is still going to be long.

New Apartment

March 27 was the day, Moving Day. I longed for it, dreamed of it, worried over it. From the day I arrived in Chernomorskoe, I had kindly souls telling me, "You need an apartment in the summer? Impossible!" My host mother, my coordinator, and the principal of my school all told me not to worry, but said nothing else. In February I heard that an apartment had been found, then two weeks later heard it had been rented to someone else--news heard only from indirect sources. So I stressed, and waited, and counted the days.

In the end, everything pulled together at the last minute, like a miracle. I saw the apartment on the 27th and moved in on the 28th--only one day late.

How to describe the apartment? It's in a small building, three stories with only about 9 apartments in the whole building. The bottom floor is given over to shops, most of which are empty. There's a small food store (I want to type "magazine," which is Russian for shop) and a store called "Everything for Home," but which didn't have any extension cords the one time I went in there, and only small sponges. My apartment in on the 2nd floor and the shop space underneath me is empty. Broken windows show a dark space, but I haven't looked too closely. It doesn't interest me.

The apartment itself is two rooms, which makes it a pretty big place by local standards, especially for someone living alone. Of course, two rooms doesn't mean two bedrooms. It means one bedroom and a living-room, plus a kitchen and bathroom. All this space is stuffed full of everything I could want, and then some. For example, I have two TVs, both about as old as you can get and still have color. One of them even works. (I get two channels.) I have an iron that stains anything it touches. I have probably 500 dusty old books...in Russian, of course. If I ever feel up for some light reading--Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, or Pushkin--I've got a whole library to choose from. (This is, by the way, highly unlikely to ever be within my reach.) When I first moved in I pulled seemingly unlimited quantities of books off shelves and stuffed them into closets and cabinets, until I ran out of closets and cabinets. There are still a couple of bookcases sagging under several layers of books, but I was able to clear off enough to leave plenty of room for my own things.

The TVs, books, fancy shot glasses, and piles of old linens that threaten to rip when you touch them...well, they're only the beginning. There's also the abundance of furniture. Some Volunteers have empty apartments. I have so much furniture I don't know what to do with it. After I'd been here for a couple of weeks, my landlady told me that the neighbor, who had apparently planned to buy a couple of armchairs that were in the apartment, had changed her mind and would be bringing them back. I had no idea where they were supposed to go. Eventually I shoved them into a corner, displacing two regular chairs, which are now blocking one of the two doors to the balcony.

The upside is that I've got a nice big, unused table in the living room, and I bought a jigsaw puzzle to do. It's a perfect table for a jigsaw puzzle.

Still, there are surprising things missing. For example, I have only two teaspoons and only two knives. The knives don't really surprise me, actually--no one seems to have sharp knives--but considering how much tea people drink in this country I'm shocked about the teaspoons.

I had a friend come visit me the first weekend I was here. She was the first Volunteer to come see me in my town, let alone my apartment. She agreed that my apartment is very nice, for all the full cupboards and over-abundance of furniture. (We both got a good laugh out of the at-least-12-year-old sugar, "Made in the USSR," when we found it in the kitchen.) But she wasn't particularly impressed by my town. Her advice was to send lots of pictures home for sympathy so I'll get more care packages. It's certainly worked for her, because when I went to Kyiv last weekend she had 4 or 5 packages, and I had to help her carry one of the boxes home. She couldn't manage them all herself. (The joy of opening a package from home, by the way, is fabulous--even when it's not yours. "Is that peanut butter?" "Three jars! And peanut butter cups!" "Can I have one?" "Oooh--are those magazines?" "Julia Roberts had twins?!" "Look at all these spices!" "Hand sanitizer. You want some?" "No thanks, I have." And so on.)

I know my town isn't beautiful, but really to me it looks just like everywhere else I've seen. Sure the apartments in the Dimitryva district are ugly, but I don't think they really rate the Ugliest in Ukraine award. There's an awful lot of competition for that prize. Besides, I have a beach! And things are starting to clean up nicely as people prepare for the summer tourists, and all around things turn green. For a couple of weeks every tree in sights seemed to be covered with thousands white or pink blossoms, which--if a couple of freezes didn't kill them all--will turn into apricots and other fruit. There are no ornamental trees in this country.

The Walk to School

My new apartment is further from my school from where I lived with my host family. Actually, it's in a whole different town, called Novoselskoe--although I don't really see how it's any different from Chernomorskoe itself. But it does have it's own dot on the maps.

And I now have a much more rural walk to school, or at least the first 15 minutes of it. My walk takes me down a dirt road and past a small field where there are generally animals grazing--geese, chickens, and some bird that I think must be a turkey. (Guess I'm not a country girl if I don't know for sure!) Lately there have been sheep grazing there, strange long-haired animals that don't look like they've ever been shorn. I wonder what they're for? But they do have lambs that look the way lambs are supposed to. Sometimes I see cowns wandering around.

I walk down this little dirt road, and up a short hill that is so broken up and torn that I wonder how any cars manage it. (I've only seen one try it in the month I've lived here.) Someone told me that the kids use this as a sledding hill in the winter, even pouring water down to make it more slippery. It looks like a pretty dangerous and rocky sledding hill to me. Don't you generally want smooth hills?

Next I walk through the field of trash. It saddens me to see all the litter everywhere in Ukraine, but this field is worse than most. It borders the big apartment farm called Dimitryva, so I guess it must attract the debris from all the people living there. There are hundreds of plastic bags snagged on the grass, scraps of paper blowing here and there. Empty bottles. I would like to see Ukraine start up a public awareness campaign, begin to change people's attitudes. Some people realize that it's a bad thing, all the trash everywhere, but still they will throw a wrapper on the ground even if there's a trash bin two steps away. It makes me sad.

After this field I am in Chernomorskoe. It takes me about half an hour to get from my apartment to school, which is not a bad walk at all. There are also marshrutkas (busses) I can take, but I'm resisting figuring out their routes. The walk is good for me, and I have a feeling that once I learn how to take the marshrutka I'll walk less and less.

Teaching

I am ready for summer. The last day of school is June 1st, and I am anxiously awaiting it. Teaching has been hard and frustrating, especially now that the weather is nice and all the kids are halfway out the door to vacation. I don't feel like a real teacher, either--more like an imposter. I don't get the respect that other teachers get, which I suppose is natural. It's difficult to impose discipline when you can't fluently communicate. And since I'm on my own in the classroom most of the time, there is no other authority figure to make sure that the kids behave. Everything is made worse by the boys in the back of the room. Every classroom has a hefty percentage of students who have never bothered to learn any English but, because of the way the education system works here, are still in the same class as the kids who are interested and have learned a lot. The boys in the back of the classroom constantly talk, throw things, roughhouse, and just disrupt everything. They're very hard to deal with.

We Peace Corps Volunteers use the "Communicative Method," which means we try to make learning fun and play a lot of educational games in class. I draw pictures, play Bingo, give weird assignments like "What would you do if you had a million dollars." (Which ties in well with the If I had a Million Dollars song by Barenaked Ladies.) I hand out chocolate Easter eggs my mom sent me from America when one of the 7th formers tells me how they celebrate Easter (which was Sunday in Ukraine), and the prize for winning a game of Bingo is one playing card from a deck that has pictures of America on it. This is very different--most Ukrainian kids are used to learning things by repetition and rote memorization. It's exciting and they like it, but it makes they see me as something other than a "teacher," and more like a joke. I remember one of the Spanish teachers in my high school. She was from Uruguay, and everyone wanted to be in her class? Why? Because she was an easy grader and you wouldn't have to work very hard if you were in her class.

I am now that teacher.

These days just the thought of school makes me grumpy, so I've been pretty grumpy for the last month or so. (This is why I haven't been writing. I can write when I'm depressed. I can write when I'm happy. But when I'm grumpy? Impossible.) Completely normal, but it's one of those endless loops of grumpiness. I'm in a bad mood. I know I'm in a bad mood. I can't do anything about being in a bad mood, which just puts me in a bad mood. Agh. This is why I'm looking forward to summer, to a couple months to clear my head and get things back in perspective.

Because really I know, intellectually, that they are learning from me. There's a lot a native English speaker can offer.

I wanted to share with you all one of the reading selections from the 9th grade textbook, used in almost all schools in Ukraine. (I have typed this very carefully to make sure I got it just right.) No author is cited, but it's the standard V.M. Plakhotnyk 9th form textbook, used everywhere in Ukraine. For your enjoyment...

THEY All ARE CRYING

Once during a family quarrel little Jim was punished by his parents. Being offended he decided to run away from home. By doing so he thought he would teach his parents a lesson. It turned out, however, that he could hardly stand even one day absence from home, especially when he learned from his neighbour that all home were crying after him. That is his story:

"I was slowly walking in the direction of Fryingpan Alley when I suddenly met Jerry, my next door neighbour and a good friend of mine. He embraced me with his arms, showing that he was glad to see me.

"What, Jim? Where are you going?" asked Jerry.

"I really don't know where I'm going, Jerry," I replied (answered) shaking hands with him. I am thinking of going home just to see..."

"Then you haven't been at home since the morning," Jerry's voice was trembling as he asked the question.

"No," I replied, "I've been away all day. How are they all, Jerry?" Jerry made no reply to my question. "If you haven't been at home, you had better go now," said he, giving me a jerk in the direction in which he wanted me to go. Jerry's behavior at once aroused my suspicions.

"I can go without your pulling, Jerry. What are you pulling me for?"

"Why, they are crying after you at home."

"Who is crying?"

"Who? Your father, and your mother, and young Poll."

Everyone is crying for me! My eyes filled with tears.

"Are you quite sure, Jerry?" I asked getting on my legs.

"Absolutely. I am telling you. They are all crying after you, and are waiting for you to come back."

Monday, May 9, 2005

Some Thoughts About the Summer

I'm on a bus, heading to Simferopol. It's travelling very slowly, and I wonder how long it will take us to get to Yevpatoria, where I'll switch busses, or maybe take a taxi instead. I can share a taxi with a few other people for not much more than a bus ticket, and the ride is considerably faster. (Only sometimes the taxi drivers are scary drivers.)

This bus is probably the oldest bus I've been on in Ukraine, which is saying something. I always breathe a sigh of relief when a bus here starts; it seems a chancy thing. On this particular bus I'm happy with both halves of the door slide closed--partially--as we move on after a stop. There's about a a 50-50 possibility that one side will stay stuck open. The passenger in the seat by the door pushes the open side closed (mostly) when it doesn't shut automatically. Only now that passenger has moved, so I wonder what will happen after the next stop? Not that I blame him for being nervous. This is not a smooth ride. I wouldn't want to be near a partially open door either, no matter how slow we're moving.

The landscape out the window has changed considerably since I last wrote to you from a bus. There are leaves on the trees lining the road, and green fields. To the left, until the road branches away, is an endless seeming field of bright yellow flowers. Too thick and even on the ground to be anything other than a sown field. What are they? The only yellow crop I know is mustard flowers, but I don't know enough to tell if that is what is growing there. I wish I had my camera. It is astonishingly beautiful.

The last time I took this road most fields were plowed a rich brown; now most are growing plants of various shades of green. Every field we pass I wonder what is growing there. What green thing is growing, and when will it show up in the bazaar for me to buy? Every day now I make myself a salad of cucumbers, tomatoes, and green onions. It is so good to have something other than potatoes. Each week now brings some new vegetable into season; soon I expect the fruit to begin appearing. Part of me wishes I could be here this summer to see everything as it ripens. But most of me is glad I will be gone, travelling, for a good part of June, July, and August.

I am going to Simferopol today, a 3.5 hour trip each way, to buy a train ticket. I might be able to buy one in Yevpatoria--I'm not sure, and it seems unlikely--but I'll be travelling with a friend and we want seats together. In Ukraine you can't buy a train ticket without showing your passport, so both of us must be there to buy the tickets. And we need to buy them early, because we've been told that the trains too and from Crimea fill up early in the summer. So we're buying out tickets a month ahead.

Where am I going? To Odessa by train, and from there by bus to Bolgrad. Bolgrad is a little town south of Odessa, near the Moldova border. (We can't go to Moldova. It's impossible for Americans to get visas.) A friend of mine lives in Bolgrad, and I'm going to work in the summer camp she's having. We Volunteers can't just travel where we like during the summer, even though there's no school. We actually have to take vacation days--we get 24 of them a year--if we want to go frolicking about. ("Frolicking" is such a good word!) Working at summer camps is a way to do a little bit of travelling throughout Ukraine without using our vacation days--which are best spent on international travel, if you ask me! I'm going to work in two or three camps this summer. (Two for sure; I'm waiting to hear if the third has room for me.) Next summer I'd like to have my own camp, once I've figured out exactly what a summer camp is. So this summer is research.

I've been fantasizing about summer travel in all my recent daydreams. I have lists of all the places I want to go:

June: Odessa, Bolgrad, and Cherkasy in Ukraine.
July: L'viv and Crakow. (Poland! Crakow's supposed to be a great city.)
August: Romania? Remote possibility of Georgia and Armenia.
Fall break: Egypt, if affordable and we can find a few guys to go with us.
Christmas break: St Petersburg. Or maybe Turkey? Nepal? (Supposed to be beautiful in early January.) Somewhere!
Spring Break: Turkey? Russia--Trans-Siberian Railway?
Next summer: Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania? Must be around for people to visit me! (And if I travel with them, I won't have money to go anywhere else.)

More places or dreams than I have the time or money for--and I could add another 6 countries to list easily. But one must prioritize, even daydreams. They're more fun when they're somewhat realistic! I definitely want to take the Trans-Siberian Railway, if I can find someone else to go with. Not something I want to do on my own--too much time on a train, and there's no way I could bring enough books to keep myself occupied! (Anyone interested? Say next March or early summer? I'll speak Russian really well by then....) I want lots and lots of stamps in my passport by the time I leave Peace Corps.

And going to Simferopol to buy a train ticket is the beginning of it all. At least, that's how it feels today, on this bus, with the green fields rolling past. It's a beautiful day!

Thursday, May 19, 2005

I am Absolutely Insane

I'm sitting in the salon getting highlights. These are not minor highlights; they're half-my-hair-in-tinfoil highlights, and I'm afraid it was a very bad idea. It's too late to change my mind, of course. I suppose if they're really awful I can dye my hair again, but probably not today. Not before the whole school sees me tomorrow.

I'm afraid they're going to be pink.

This whole thing started a couple of weeks ago. I decided I was tired of the red and that I'd let it grow out. Of course that would leave me with major roots, so I thought maybe I'd try getting highlights, to help blend everything together. I discussed the idea with a friend who came to visit. We were watching The Terminal, admiring Catherine Zeta Jones's hair: straight shoulder-length cut with bangs at about eye-level. (Catherine Zeta Jones looks particularly gorgeous in The Terminal.)

My friend thought I wold look good with that hair style. This friend is very fashionable, and has been trying to make me a little fashionable, too. She encouraged me to go red in December and was thrilled when I bought the tight jeans. ("Carrie, those are not too tight.") Her long-term goal is to get me to pluck my eyebrows. I'm not ready for such a major step.

Still, somehow I found myself in the salon last Thursday getting bangs cut. Bangs! On me! I haven't had bangs since I was...13, maybe. And here I am today getting highlights. (Some of the tinfoil just came off. I can't tell, but it doesn't really look pink. Definitely yellow. Oh boy. What am I doing to myself?)

I'm not sure how I feel about the bangs, although I've had them long enough to get a little used to them. I don't freak out anymore when I feel them on my forehead; that was only the first couple of days. They don't look anything like Catherine Zeta Jones's, of course--they're very Ukrainian bangs--but I've received a lot of compliments on them. I met a few friends in Yevpatoria on Sunday and they all told me how good I am looking. (And since I don't get unprompted compliments from boys all that often....)

But now I've gone and gotten highlights! I'm sitting here waiting for the rest of the tinfoil to come out, and I have knots in my stomach. About hair!

What's come over me?

Upadate, Thursday: I don't like it. Highlights are always harsh at first, of course. I know that. I've seen friends get them. So I'm hoping they kind of blend in a bit more over the next couple of weeks. They're not pink, exactly, but the way the yellow lightens my hair has a pinkish tinge when seen all together. I'll try to get a picture to show you all.

Wednesday, May 25, 2005

Contemplations and Quotations

The sky is overcast and the sea is a pale, pale blue. Two men are swimming. A woman sunbathes. An old man and his grandson walk in the sand. The tinny sound of bad Russian rap drifts down the beach from one of the cafes, where workers are cleaning and readying for summer tourists.

I come here to sit when I have a spare hour between classes, time to wait before the next activity starts. I like the solitude and the openness of the sea. Soon, I know, the beach will be crowded, full of towels, blankets, speedos, and bikinis, and I'll have to find my solitude somewhere else. Even at 9:30 on a Tuesday morning.

Today I am here with a bottle of water and a Snickers (breakfast of champions), waiting for the post office to open. They are on a cleaning break or something; the sign does not say why they're closed, just to come back later. But I could see someone inside mopping the floor, so in my mind I call it a cleaning break. I wrote two letters last weekend and need to buy envelopes. (Why can you buy envelopes only at the post office? This makes no sense to me. They must be for sale somewhere else, if I can only discover where...right?)

This morning I went to school to meet with one of the teachers whose classes I teach. We were deciding final grades for each pupil.

"He is strong in speaking and understanding, but reading and writing?"
"Yes, I know. He never does his homework."
"She is very shy. Sometimes I forget she is there."
"Next is your favorite..."
"Sasha."
"Sasha."
Sigh. "Oh, Sasha. What can we do about Sasha?"

Grading is difficult for me. Beyond the fact that I still don't remember everyone's name (I'm a horrible teacher), beyond grading using a different system, I sit there debating. A 9 or a 10? A B or an A? What does this grade do to a student? What does it mean, coming from me? Will a low grade turn this student off English? Will a higher grade motivate, make him work harder next year?

Strange maybe, to worry about grades, about the permanent impact of a number of a piece of paper. Does not my behavior in class have a greater effect? Yet sitting there I feel a fleeting sense of misplaced power: what I say today could effect a child's entire life.

Ridiculous. And not ridiculous.

Now I am on the beach with my sleeves rolled up, golden tan hands (from being so much outdoors in long sleeve shirts), pink arms, white shoulders. Watching the changing colors of the silent sea (oh how I miss the sound of waves): light blue, turquoise, navy, a hundred shades I have no name for.

I finished a book today, Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder, by Lawrence Weschler. An endnote quotes Albert Einstein. It is one of the more wonderful quotes I've read in a long time:

The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. Whoever does not know it can no longer wonder, no longer marvel, is as good as dead, and his eyes are dimmed.

The sun is out and the sea is a bright azure blue. Down the beach someone wades cautiously into the water A woman plays in the sand with her daughter. The sunbather has put on a green sundress and is packing up. A truly awful cover of George Michael's Faith drifts down from the cafe....

Monday, May 30, 2005

Something Smells

The heat is here, and it's driving me nauseous and lethargic. You know how I said, back when I was first taking about Peace Corps, that I didn't want to go to a hot country? That I don't really like the heat, and that Eastern Europe appeals in part because it's not...say...Africa? Since I got to Crimea I've been wondering how hot it really gets here. I can't really trust the locals. First of all, when they give me numbers they're always in Centigrade, not Fahrenheit. I haven't figured Centigrade out yet. Plus everyone gives a different answer anyway--no one really knows, I don't think. Then there's the whole exaggeration thing. Sure, it gets hot. But how hot? Ukrainians probably think 80 degrees (Fahrenheit) is sweltering. What can they really know about heat? I've lived in Hawaii. And most of you reading this probably remember a few years ago, during California's rolling blackouts, when it was so hot the train tracks warped. Now that's hot. Nah, I thought. It'll be hot here, but not THAT hot.

Then, about two weeks ago, the weather turned and I started to worry. Don't ask me what the temperature is, but I'm sweating a bunch. (Not any fun when you're having water issues AND hand-washing your clothes.) One woman I know tells me she loves it in July and August because it's hotter than this. "So hot you can't breathe." I might have chalked that up to exaggeration two weeks ago, but now? Hotter than this? This is plenty hot enough as far as I'm concerned.

A friend of mine, who arrived in Ukraine the year before me, says that last year it wasn't too hot. But then, she also says last year at the end of May she could still wear a light fleece and be comfortable. This year I'm desperately wishing I had more than one tank top, and at least one more short skirt--although by the time I get to the market I'm too hot to want to shop for new clothes. No, this is much hotter than it was last year.

I met a few friends in Simferopol on Saturday, and decided to wear my one tank top. This was really the first time I'd worn it outside, since it's not really school-appropriate. I almost wore my one short skirt, too, but decided I'm too white to show off both my pasty legs and my chalky shoulders. The old babushka (grandmother) who lives in my building and sits outside my entryway lectured me on my lack of color and told me I need to walk more in the mornings and evenings. And go sunbathing, of course. Ukrainians are big on sunbathing.

Well, I thought, I'll wear my tank top while we're walking around Simferopol, and after an hour I'll put on sunscreen. That'll get me a little pink, but nothing painful.

You all know where this is going, right?

I forgot the sunscreen.

I should note here that Ukrainians don't believe in sunscreen. The only reason I have any is because Peace Corps gave us some in our medical kits. You can't buy sunscreen in most stores here--it's more like a specialty, or even a luxury, item. So it's not like I could stop by any produkti (little store) or magazine (also a little store) in Simferopol and buy myself some sunscreen. So instead I just tried to stay in the shade or indoors as much as possible.

Didn't really work, although of course my sunburn could be much worse. I've had worse burns in my life. In fact, this one probably doesn't even make the top five. (Though possibly it's in the top ten.) But I'll definitely be peeling next week. Definitely. Only on my shoulders, though--my face is already so tan that it didn't get burnt. At least, not so I can feel it.

The heat has intensified the "aromatic" atmosphere of Crimea. A while back I went on a picnic, up the coast from Chernomorskoe, where the steppe meets the sea. Walking through the green grasses on the steppe, crushing them under our feet...it was a wonderful smell, so fresh and spicy. It could be the most wonderful thing I've ever smelled. That was the beginning.

Walking to school I smell a sweet, damp, musky scent, almost like fruit decaying. It's the soil, I think. The fruit is not ripe yet, much less decaying. Trees heavy with flowers and bees scent the air as I pass them. An intermittent breeze from the sea brings that salty fresh smell of water and seaweed, sand and sun.

And then there's the spicy, unpleasant smell of sweaty people. No one in Ukraine bathes the way Americans do. A shower every day? Not likely. Every other day? Remote possibility. And clothes are worn (and sweated in) multiple times before they are washed. So almost everyone smells, and not in a good way. And it's only going to get worse as the summer gets hotter, and more tourists descend on Crimea. Busses will be over-crowded and stuffy, with not nearly enough windows open (Ukrainians believe drafts make you sick), and unwashed, smelly people everywhere.

And, sadly, I'll probably be one of those people.

The problem is with clothing--I have only a limited amount. And Only a limited amount of time to do laundry. It's not like in America, where you can drop a dirty outfit in the wash as soon as you get home, make dinner while the wash swirls everything clean, then throw it in the drier while you eat. No, doing laundry by hand means filling up a tub and soaking the clothes for an hour or so, then scrubbing them (and why don't Ukrainians have washboards?), then rinsing them, then wringing them, then hanging them to dry on the balcony. It takes me a good half a day to wash one or two "loads," and then I have to wait for the clothes to dry.

And since I don't have much summer clothing, I always run out of "clean" things before I have time to wash the dirty. Especially since, unlike in winter, a shirt gets all sweaty and gross after I wear it just once.

I hate knowing that I smell. I hate smelling myself! And most of all I hate that I can do nothing about it.

This week I'm going to permit myself to buy two new sleeveless tops and a skirt or pair of shorts at the bazaar. I'm hoping if I go in the morning on a weekday there won't be too many people. Crowds make me claustrophobic. Wish me luck!