Once again, hello to you all!! Ben Irwin here for a another round and a brand new country. We are now in Kiev, Ukraine for the second day and we have had the opportunity to stay at a local Christian university in the dorms. It was an early morning for the team coupled with an early breakfast of a medley of mushrooms, rice, cucumbers, and of course a cup of delightful Ukrainian tea. After breakfast we rushed to gather our baggage into the one van we had. The one van we had that carried allllll our baggage in addition to around fourteen of us. I that we would all admit that it was cramped ride, with all of our luggage stacked in the aisles, under the seats, and in our laps. Once in the van we drove to downtown Kiev for a short sightseeing tour of the old historic section of the city. What an opportunity it was to see the beautiful architecture, old but majestic Orthodox churches, and the center of Ukrainian livelyhood and culture. We wandered the streets and took a trolley to the top of hill that overlooks the river that divides the historic old city and the modern new section of Kiev. After a good amount of walking and picture taking we eventually settled in a cafe for some more Ukrainian cuisine of chicken, potatoes, and bread. It was around 2pm when we all loaded back in to the van and began our trek to Cherkasy. A trip that was supposed to take about 3 hours in total drive time to get us there around in time for our game that evening ended up dragging on for an extra hour or two after a few wrong turns. You see in the Ukraine for some reason very few roads are labeled with signs designating road name. It would indeed be impossible to Google map any destination in the Ukraine. The results of this of course are our driver aimlessly wandering through Ukrainian countryside with his passengers stuffed like sardines in the back. Regardless of this we eventually made it to Cherkasy, albeit an hour or so late, in time to hop of the bus, change and warm up quickly, and then play.
The gym we played in was definitily the nicest one we have played in yet, complete with individual stadium seating and smooth flooring (no bumps or chipping which was commonplace in both Russia and Ukraine). This actually was our first officially officiated game of the tour, and surprisingly a decent crowd had stuck it out and waited to see us play. The team we played was a bunch of seasoned veterans most of whom had athletically seen better days but were as crafty of players as they come. I think they may have been some sort of professional team on the Ukrainian volleyball circuit, regardless they turned out to be quite a formidable opponent winning the first two game right of the bat. After those two games Steven Kehoe had the opportunity to share his testimony to the players and the fans, and he was well received. They then took the last game and the match. It was a disappointed loss and frustrating because we knew that we could play much better as a team than we did, however it was a valuable lesson for us all in what we found our value in, the win for ourselves, or competition for an audience for one.
After the game we departed to a local church to eat some dinner (a church who we eventually found out were all vegetarians, thus depriving is all of meat of the next few meals) and have some fellowship. They put on a small concert and then it was a off to bed for us all.
It has indeed been a great tour to this point and it is such a blessing for me to be able to be placed in this situation in a country which I am not able to speak the language but nonetheless am able to communicate the love of Christ through the medium of volleyball. God is doing a great work through AIA and this volleyball team for local Russian and Ukrainian ministries, so I thank you once again for your continued prayers!
God Bless You!
Ben Irwin