Something to think about: consumerism in Ukraine

For those of you who don’t know me personally yet, you might be wondering why in the world I am writing about consumerism?  Well, first off, I am a consumer, and a pretty good one at that.  I have already ‘consumed’ quite a bit sense moving here and setting up life.  Second, sometime during seminary I had a huge burden laid on me (by Jesus) to become an informed consumer.  I needed to know as much about my consumption as possible, and make some Christian decisions about some of what I was finding out.  Where things are made, how they are made, how the workers are treated, the impact on the environment, etc. are some of the things I began to research.

Well, I wanted to continue living as much ‘in the know’ as I could in Ukraine and that has proved a bit trickier.  Labels are sometimes missing, and when they are in clothing, they are not a big enough brand to be on the internet so I can’t follow them up.  A lot of shopping is done in markets here, and that also makes things challenging.  I’ve tried to ask some of the bigger stores about their clothes and they look at me like I’m crazy.  There is a good chance that my words didn’t come out exactly right either, so I’ll chalk it up to that.

However, when asking my Ukrainian friends and the students I work with about these kind of things, they just laugh.  Well, they don’t really laugh, they say 1) I’ve never really thought about it or 2) Shannon, we have bigger things to think about.  At least now I can say that I have shed some light on a topic that has never been introduced to them before.  

I had an experience over the summer that reminded me that this is a passion of mine (yes, sometimes even passions get forgotten when you move to a new country, with a new culture and new language, to start a new job with a semi-new husband).  I was shopping in one of these markets with the American team that came this last summer.  One girl saw a dress, picked it up, looked at the label and said this is the exact dress that I bought in Texas before we left.  She said she paid $16 for it, and wanted to know how much the dress was selling for in Ukraine.  The seller of the dress said $45.  Yes, $45 and that was in USD, not hrieven, which is the Ukrainian currency.  I couldn’t believe it, I was furious.  The girls thought they were coming to the market to find some deals.  We pretty much stopped shopping after that…they said they would wait until they returned home to buy anymore clothing.

Well this sent me into a whole new realm of ‘enlightenment’.  Ukraine has a crazy high import tax, hence the $45 dress that is only $16 in America.  All imported goods are spiked in price relative to the cost of goods produced in Ukraine.  The only thing that I have actually found in Ukraine that is cheaper than in America is food, electricity and water.  Furniture is generally more expensive, rent is the same, clothes are higher, drinks are about the same, electronics are higher, entertainment is the same.  

Being exposed to another group that is being taken advantage of, even though they are the consumer in this go ’round, is sad for me.  You might be saying, that is just how it works.  Maybe, especially if we all say that.  But it will continue to baffle me that in a place like America (average household income of $50,000) people are able to buy cheap clothes while Ukrainians (average individual salary being about $6,000) have to pay three times as much for the same dress.

Pilgrim’s Kick-Off

 

Pilgrim's Kickoff 2009

Last Thursday was our first service of the year!  Our turn out was great, our students were excited, and everything went smooth for our first meeting of the year.  Last weekend we had a leadership retreat and were able to mold a group of young leaders (ladies actually, it’s all girls) that are ready to serve and lead this student ministry.  Shannon and I feel more organized and ready now than we have since we got here.  We are really excited about the new year and seeing what God has in store for this ministry.  Pray for us and the students as we all work to bring in the Kingdom of God here in L’viv, Ukraine.

 

Preaching: Be Strong and Courageous!

 

Listening

 

Lily giving a testimony

Ihor

If you are seeing a photograph that doesn’t make much sense, it’s about Ihor.  Ihor is our local homeless guy who has decided to make the student center landing his resting place in the evenings.  At first I had no problem with it.  Instead of going the regular route and just kicking this guy off our landing, Lubomir, Shannon and I tried to do something in order to extend Christ’s love and we decided to strike up a deal with him.  The deal was that Ihor could only spend his nights there.  He had to leave before 8a.m. and come no earlier than 11p.m.  He agreed, of course, and was about as cordial a homeless, drunk fellow could be.  And so, for maybe a week it kind of worked out.  Ihor would come in the evenings and the only hang up was that sometimes he would bring his friends.

Things changed.  Ihor started coming more and more often and then regularly during the middle of the day.  Even during heavy traffic hours at the student center, I would sometimes catch Ihor trying to get some shut eye on the landing.  So, Ihor and I had a talk and we really talked; I made him talk to me and repeat what I was saying so I knew it at least had gone in his ears, through his brain, and out of his mouth.  He had three tries, three more times to be there during the wrong hours and then he couldn’t come again.  I thought that the new plan might work, but it didn’t.  In three days there were three incidents and so I told him it wasn’t working.   He wasn’t keeping up his end of the deal, and that was that.  That last time I sat there and watched him collect his boxes and odds and ends and walked him down the steps hoping not to seem him for a while.

That didn’t really work.  Ihor is still around.  His evidence on our landing is patently Ihor and some of it is visible in the photo: his cigarette butts next to where he sleeps, old used plastic bags he accumulates, cardboard boxes he uses as mattresses, his pillow which he hides in the attic door, and of course his pee on our wall, that unfortunately is both visually and nasally evident .

Considering that initially the few students who vocalized wanting to disallow Ihor to stay in the first place seem to have been right, we probably will have to take some steps to prevent further sleepings on our landing.  Considering also that our student center entry and door were severely vandalized a couple years back,  we have all the more reason to protect our space.  I wish there was another way, to both show Ihor Christ’s love and protect our space, but for someone who doesn’t want to listen, who doesn’t respect himself or others, who shows no indication of wanting to get better, I am scared we might only throw our pearls to swine.  God help you Ihor.

Mushroom Hunting

Bounty!

While I have often been discouraged by the complete lack of wildlife in Ukraine, one national pastime that has surely benefited from a lack of  mammals is mushroom hunting.  While most Americans in the woods have almost no idea what is fair game for food, when you take Ukrainians into the woods in the summer everything suddenly become edible.  As for mushrooms, everyone seems to know which mushrooms are the tasty mushrooms, which mushrooms are going to make you sick, and which mushrooms will make you fly and then crash and burn.  I went mushroom hunting with Lubomir and we did well, two big medium sized bags full of fungi.  Here is some of our bounty.  The big white one in the middle is the diamond in the rough: a white mushroom.  Apparently they get to be double that size.  That one was delicious and I look forward to eating his fungal relatives again soon.