13 november

Ukrainian is a difficult language to learn. If it’s your native language, and you’re starting at an impressionable age in the right environment with a blank slate, all of that helps considerably. If not, it’s a lot slower.

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Learning it was hard. It’s still hard. I don’t mean to imply that I’m now brilliant at Ukrainian. Hardly. Despite the generous comments of my humble and self-effacing American friends, eager to dismiss their own language skills and push me out in front into whatever rapidly developing situation seemed to call for a translator, my Ukrainian language skills are not amazing.

Since my return to the US, people I’ve met have consistently asked one question about my language skills—after learning that I studied Ukrainian, and not Russian, anyway: “So, are you fluent?”

The first few times, my response just consisted of laughter.

Then I realized how awkward and potentially offensive this could be, so I changed my tactic.

“’Fluent’ is a realllly strong word,” I would answer.

This answer would always be met with a titter, if not a stronger form of laughter, as if I had been trying to be funny. Really, I was just trying to point out a simple truth. Fluent? Fluent, like fluid, like flowing smoothly through any situation. Really? Please. I studied Spanish for four high school years and three college years, graduating with a real live minor in Spanish. Was I fluent? I’d hardly say so.

One Volunteer, whose name I will not mention but whose entire story is fascinating, was fond of recounting the experience of waking up one fine morning, probably a little less than a year into her service in Ukraine, and realizing that she was fluent. In Ukrainian. Bam. Just like that! With just one minute of her life holding so much potential to amaze, you can believe that the rest of her story is completely spell-binding. Alas, that would be her story to tell, and I can only tell you the truth as I see it in my own personal experience. Therefore, I’ll have to leave our friend’s story to her own recounting, should you be so lucky as to encounter her and her many compelling tales.

Fluent? Let me tell you another tale…