Summer 2010 [Part 6]

The Summer came to an end. I had joined the course on 1st of June, 2010. It was the middle of  spring. Then the summer came. It was quite hot and the temperature kept climbing till it reached 40 degrees Celsius. At the beginning of October it suddenly started dropping. I have never seen such temperature fluctuations in my life. In tropical South India, it always between 22 deg.C in winter to 42 deg. C in summer. The average temperature was around 32 degrees Celsius.

   In Ukraine admissions usually occur during the summer with classes starting in autumn. But for PG students they can join anytime as the system was one-on-one mentoring. So my guide arranged my postings for summer at CT, MRI, X-ray and Nuclear medicine. It was at the Dnepropetrovsk, regional hospital and I made the most of the opportunity given to me. Not everyone was willing to teach. But the majority made room and adjusted with us for the few hours I spent at their reporting rooms.

  I shopped at Varus and ATB supermarkets at the city center and Gagarin Boulevard. The trams were cheap and affordable. The marshrudkas were congested and humid during summer. But they served to reach those remote parts which were not connected by the tram road. Dnepropetrovsk has a Metro but because of water logging problems it did not serve the entire city. It was very short route.

   I had spent enough time with Arabs, Africans and Chinese. But still I was yet to meet an Indian in Dnepropetrovsk. I had navigated admission, and first half of the first semsester. In summer, most of the doctors went for vacation to Crimea, which is now part of Russia. So I was more free to stay in the department and do my own studies. I completed Musculo-skeletal system and part of Radio Physics.

During the evenings I had my quiet time at the Church of the Transfiguration and even recorded a few multimedia messages which I have uploaded in  youtube.com.

http://youtu.be/Y6SVXsTp8Mw?list=UUK98FlSCdkS7fu9ZPERZr1A

http://youtu.be/3P4JQeKW-Cg?list=UUK98FlSCdkS7fu9ZPERZr1A

http://youtu.be/wU6wwUTwiLc?list=UUK98FlSCdkS7fu9ZPERZr1A

http://youtu.be/eYG5UQhNkSU?list=UUK98FlSCdkS7fu9ZPERZr1A

I communicated with my family regularly on skype. I thank God for skype, which allowed free international video calling. It was a tremendous help in keeping me updated with my family.

When I went for shopping or to hospital posting I always carried a Russian - English, English - Russian phrase book. Whenever I wanted something I would show them the word or read the transliteration. It was very use and essential book, which I carried around. Apart from that I had a nice time and enjoyed cooking and eating and relaxing with the good smooth internet which I received through People Net 3G. Compared to that Indian 3G looks like 2G. I always keep wondering if Indian telecom companies are cheating us in the name of 3G. God only knows!

I went for daily walks and even as I enjoyed these little things, the thought of leaving it all and going back would interrupt my enjoyment. But then I still enjoyed it anyway.

Summer 2010 [Part 5]

Now I met Bro. Andrei Konkov when I went to the meeting of the Charismatic churches. He was not a charismatic but Pastor Isaac was helping him. He introduced me to him and we chatted up and became friends. I did not know at that time that he was searching for a partner to share his flat. He was a staff worker with Campus Crusade, Ukraine. He was actively involved in taking the Gospel to the students in the Dnepropetrovsk universities. Andrei told me about his need for ministry support and he took me out as he would any would be supporter and explained his ministry and need. I was hesitant as I had just settled down and started my studies. I explained my situation and he offered to take me to his flat which he intended to share with me. He asked me to stay for a night and see for myself how it would workout. I went and stayed, all because he was very persistent. I had no intention of moving out. I would be far away from the place of study and it would expensive too. His last pitch actually changed my mind. He said that if he cannot raise support before the academic year begins he would not be allowed to start ministry with his Campus team. He also offered to teach me russian and I would have some bible studies with him. That was an attractive deal. I discussed the situation with my mother, without telling here these things and told her that I am planning to stay with Andrei in a flat. She did not object and by the end of summer and beginning of Autumn I made arrangements with the hostel officials to leave and shift to live in Dnipropetrovsk city. I think this decision was a very important one because it exposed me to the city life, people and their culture. This interaction on a daily basis for the next one year shaped a lot of my ideas about Ukraine. It also made me adapt to the new circumstance in a biblically appropriate and God honoring way. In this process I was becoming something, an international citizen and paradoxically an alien in a foreign land, who was stared at suspiciously and given a cold shoulder, whenever the oppourtunity arose. But I was not new to these. I had my fair share of cold shoulders from the Hindu society in India and I was ready for such eventualities. It was new but only superficially and peripherally. At the core, humans beings everywhere were the same without Christ and with Christ they were struggling to overcome their own sinful selves and their cultural conditioning as they tried to relate with me as well as their culture. There was always a tug of war in their mind, in relating as Christians to foreigners who were also Christians. The summer came to a close and I was in a new environment in a new house with a new person, among people who spoke a new and strange language not their own and were upset that I was not speaking their language. We were not much different. I was speaking English and they were speaking Russian, both of which were foreign languages. But that is the irony of life and the paradox with which I learnt to live and witness for Christ. It is Christ who made everything meaningful and significant and shaped me and moulded me through these interactions so that I can fulfill his plan for my life. Let's face it. It is a fallen world. We are not living in heaven. It is filled with meesed up people whom God loves and whom God wants to save. In this understanding everything was as it should be if it was a fallen world.

My face book post read
"all dues paid....will leave hostel tomorrow....." on 27th August, 2010. Pastor Isaac has given a like.
"shifted completely to apartment...praise GOD...." on 28th August, 2010. Andrey Konkov has given a like. 

On 31st August 2010, I was in my new apartment studying metabolic bone diseases as part of my study of the Musculo-skeletal system.

The summer was good, with lot of pace and action. Lot of changes occured in a short time. I met a lot of new people from different parts of the world from Middle East, Pakistan, Africa and China. I visited a lot of places in Dniproperovsk and was totally ignorant what they thought or spoke. I enjoyed my summer of 2010 and by the blessing of God I was at the end of summer in a new flat, learning a new language navigating my life around people of strange languages. I liked it. Praise be to God. 

Summer 2010 [part4]

Pastor Isaac, the Nigerian student Pastor who picked me up from the railway station when I first arrived to the city and who also introduced me to Mr.Sergey my agent, who helped me get join my course in the medical academy was my first friend in the city. He was my interpreter to the warden and the hostel owner. He invited me to his Church which met every Sunday in a nearby hall. It was very different experience for me every time I went to any African congregation. There was lot of energy with the music and dancing and the preaching. But I can never vouch for the accuracy of the teachings which came from the pulpit. The basics were right and in place. 

One day Pastor Isaac took me to the Christian Medical Association of Ukraine meeting in Kiev. It was a planning meet. Student leaders from around Ukraine both Ukrainian and foreign were gathered there. We reached Kiev early and stayed in an African students flat for the night. The next day, we traveled by Kiev Metro and reached our destination. The meeting went well. I got to know a lot more people. The meeting itself was a flop for me otherwise since I was just sitting around and was not able or allowed to contribute. So I decided that would be my last planning meet, and so it was. Then I met an important person Dr. Jim from US. He was the adviser to the Christian Medical Association Ukraine. He was a missionary who came to Ukraine after heeding to God's call on his life. He sold his private practice in U.S as a Pediatrician. He was a very experienced person and he knew a lot about Ukraine which we did not. As we were travelling in the Metro, we saw an old woman (Babushka in Russian), Dr. Jim told us how many of these babushkas get abused physically by their drunk husbands. Though they looked contended, there was someone who knew what was really going on, the problems of the Ukrainian society. 

Then another day in Summer we also attended a meeting of all the charismatic churches in the city. Before the started I was introduced to a Ukrainian missionary from Campus Crusade for Christ. He was a young man in his early twenties, he had an innocent baby face and was around six feet in height. He spoke fluent English along with the usual Russian and Ukrainian languages. His name was Andre. We sat together in the meeting and the Charismatic leaders prophesied on us. He was not comfortable with that. I was very comfortable and the prophecy given to me was that everything will be new for me and that God will bless with a new life. Well  a way it IS true in that I am a Radiologist now and I do have a better  and new life as a Radiologist. God only knows whether that prophecy has anything to do with whatever happened in my life.  

On the International day of prayer, there was again an meeting of all the Churches of the city in a stadium nearby. As a group from the Church, a bunch of African students attended the meeting and I tagged along with them. There was prayer and singing and it was a good time of blessing and fellowship. 

But it was a particular theological persuasion which these people shared which I believe gave a twist to the whole Gospel. So I shared my difference of opinion with him and he introduced me to another student who attended another Church nearby.

 Mr.Oku, was another Nigerian student who was attending this Church. I was all excited about visiting an Ukrainian church. Sunday morning came and off we went. It was more like the Church, I wanted to worship in. It was a lot quieter and the music was mild and acoustic. It was started by an american missionary who belonged to the Calvary Chapel. It is an American Evangelical missionary Church. They have missionaries all around the world and this missionary after establishing the Church in Dnipropetrovsk has shifted to another city in the west to do the same. Now he had trained another Ukrainian to be the Pastor in Dnipropetrovsk.

Now this Ukrainian Church's new Pastor Vitali was an ex-convict whom God met in the prison. He was planning some crimes and preparing himself for his future plans, when God met him through the prison ministry. After accepting Christ, he was discipled and now he was given the responsibility of leading the Church and taking care of the flock. He was a kind man, but spoke only Russian and Ukrainain languages. He had a wife and couple of children. This Calvary fellowship church met in the hall a few blocks away from the international medical student hostel. A few African students regularly attended this church and there were bunch of tranlators there to help us as the service was in Russian. I met and made a few friends there and. also attended a few of their bible studies and met the founding Pastor's family.

One day I was taken to the village church by Pastor Vitali and his team. There I met the rural ukrainians in the rural church. It was a new experience. The sights, sounds and smell of the place was totally different. Here people lived along side domestic animals like chicken, ducks and cows. The barn was close to the living quarters. The people were warm and served us snacks and I preached there for the first and last time in Ukraine. My preaching was translated by Dima, a middle aged translator. He was quite friendly and helped me out a lot. 

Summer 2010 [part 3]

Making Friends

Dr. Binay was from Nepal, the Hindu himalayan kingdom, which recently became a republic. He was a high caste hindu, a Brahmin i.e priestly caste. He was supposed to be a vegetarian, as all the Brahmins are, but he was not. He was fair skinned, looked more Indian than Nepali. He had completed his Medical School from Dnipropetrovsk Medical Academy and was two years younger to me. He had returned to Dnipropetrovsk Medical Academy, his Alma Mater, to pursue his Post Graduation or Residency as we called it. He was not married at that point and stayed in a different hostel, hostel 1 which was two tram stops away from Hostel 4. where I lived.

Meanwhile I was steadily coming to get to know Mr. Pierre. In the evenings, we would chat a bit and I would try my elementary french on him. Learn some new word and brush up whatever I thought I knew. He was a Tupac fan and would boo some pretty interesting numbers in the evenings. Late afternoon, he would go to the University gym and execute his body building plan. One day he took me to the gym and introduced me to the instructor there. Well, I just chatted with him as he did all the lifting and I also learned about the rules of the gym. I heard from him that the university swimming pool is just on the other side of the wall and that it would be open during summer.

Mr. Pierre was a Roman Catholic. He had his own values. He was very particular about not paying money to pass the exams, even if the examiner would fail him. So he did fail a couple of tests because he refused to pay up but made it during the supplementals which followed immediately. He had an ukrainian girl friend and sometimes she would visit him. He wanted to be alone with her and we had understanding among ourselves and so whenever his guest would come, I would go for shopping and site seeing, so that he can entertain his guests and enjoy his time with them. One day after I returned from a walk in the nearby 'Schevchenko Park', as we had our evening chat, he advised me not to go to those areas alone. He had been to the park one day and some people came and attacked him and warned him to return to his country. He said that people have a xenophobic orientation and they hate black skinned people. After that experience, Mr.Pierre joined an Aikdo class and started learning self defense skills to gurad his life. That was quite a warning for a new comer who had no experience whatsoever with racism. 

Now it made sense to me as to a certain occurance which happened within a week of my arrival in Dnipropetrovsk. There is a small shop where I ususally had my food from during these early days, roasted Chicken and Pilav rice and one morning as I proceed to this shop, a white man was standing in the corner just opposite the side of the shop. As I about a 20 feet away from him, he started staring at me with an angry face as if he is going to attack me next. My naive mind could not make sense of this and I gave a smile and proceeded to the store. The 'cold stare' which he gave me did not disturb me, but I was certainly puzzled and was overcurious as to know what the matter was. Ofcourse, I never came to know what it was and so my hypotheses as to what it might me is based on Mr. Pierre's experience which had more direct communication. I now firmy beleive it was an act of brazen racism and xenophobia. 

Summer 2010 [part 2]

A few days before the commencement of the course, I was introduced to Dr. Tatiana who was to be my guide. She was a russian with Masters degree in Radiology. She was very good in her subject and also friendly with students. She instructed me on what to wear, when to come and whom we will be meeting on the first day of the course.

The person who introduced me to her was my agent Mr. Sergey and his assistant Miss. Sophia. Sergey was a middle aged man in his late forties spoke only Russian and Ukrainian languages. But Sophia spoke fluent English with an Ukrainian slant in the accent. She was tall, lean and wore tight short dress in the late spring when I met her. She had long nails, which upon inquiry I discovered were fake nails stuck to the tip of fingers for style. These appendages also had some art work on them. She helped me around the University area and showed me the route to many important places which I needed to know.

Towards the end of May 2010, I submitted my educational documents for verification and it was despached to Kiev, where the Department of Education and the Ministry of Health would verify my credentials through the Indian embassy. I was also asked to deposit the fees with my agent who would pay it on my behalf. Sophia also told me that from next year I will have to deposit my fees in the bank and she is helping me because of my ignorance of both the language, the procedures involved and the location of the bank. In short, because of my ignorance about everything. So she did everything necessary and also instructed me about the Marshrudka (local tempo traveler) numbers which I will require on the first day of my course.

The Marshrudkas were Mercedes tempo traveler vans with a seating capacity of about twenty. They also had a number plate along with the name of the destination in the front. The name was always in Russian, so the number was the only clue I could use.

Sergiy and Sophia also took me to the Medical Academy Hostel for foreign students. I met the owner , a lady in her fifties, Alyona and the warden Natasha, who a platinum blonde in her thirties. I signed the agreement, submitted a copy of the proof of fees paid for both the course and the hostel and I was allocated a room along with an African medical student from a francophone country in West Africa. Mr. Pierre, was in his second year of medical school and had a good reputation with the warden and the owner. He was  clean and did not smoke or drink and so they reasoned that he would not be of any nuisance to me. That turned to be true as the days went by.

All was set for me to start the course and the day of joining dawned on me. I am not sure about the details how I reached where and with whose help. I met the HOD in hospital number 4 and he introduced me to Dr. Binay, who was had already joined the Radiology residency program and was six months ahead of me. The boss asked him to help me out and from then on he helped me till I left Ukraine in 2012 July. So we became good friends.

According to the European system of education, the student has to decide the sylabbus and design his course. The head of the departement and the guide would facilitate the learning process and arrange posting for me in the various modalities of Radiology like X-ray, Ultrasound, CT, MRI etc. At the end of every six months I would be submitting a report as to all the postings I underwent, all the presentations I gave, all the course work I did and all the seminars we had. Thus I would be evaluated on my progress every six months and any issues or problems I had would be analysed and solved. 

Summer of 2010 [part 1]

It was late spring 2010 and I had joined the course to pursue my post-graduation. The medical jargon for the post-graduate course is 'residency'. The course commenced on the 1st of June and the city of Dnipropetrovsk was to be my home for the next two years. The city is located on the banks of the Dneiper (pronounced as 'Knee-per') river. The river runs north to south diving ukraine. Two-third of Ukraine is to the west of the river and one third of the country lies to it's east. Dnipropetrovsk Oblast (Oblast = state/region) spans on either side of the river. It lies in the temperate belt and the weather is hot in summer, very cold in winter and mild usually worsening as the autumn progresses and improving with the progress of spring.

Dnipropetrovsk's historic name is Yekaterinaslav, named after the Russian Czarina Catherine. The city center has some buildings which date back to the 1700s. It is Ukraine's third largest city, after Kiev and Kharkov, with around 1 million inhabitants. Dnipropetrovsk is named after the Bolshovik hero Grigiry Petrovsky. Thus the imperial name Yekaterianoslav changed into Dnipropetrovsk. Dnipropetrovsk houses a missile factory and was a closed city during the Soviet era. The city boasts the longest embankment in all of Europe and is an important industrial and commercial center.

The Dnipropetrovsk State Medical Academy (DSMA) is one of the largest and important universities in Ukraine. The city also is the location of numerous engineering, arts, science and industrial educational institutions. Students from China, India, Middle East, Egypt, Africa and Central Asian post Soviet countries congregate here to prepare for their careers and future life.

The people of Dnipropetrovsk were mainly Russian speaking and belonged to the Orthodox Christian faith. They were all stripes of characters ranging from liberal to conservative, from racist to multicultural, from russians to africans, from filthy rich driving Porsch to destitute poor.

Dnipropetrovsk is filled with Churches and shrines. The Churches were from different stages of the history of the City and commenmorated different events in history. Dnipropetrovsk was one of the battlefields during the second world war and the war museum is quiet popular with the tourists.