And now, on what Iam actually supposed to be doing here...

Hey y’all—this entry is from my meeting last week. More to come about the weekend in the country later on this week…

Today I met with the workers of Crisis Center Ekaterina for the first time. After spending the morning in bed, sick and exhausted, I somehow mustered enough energy to go and meet the women at a local library. There I was met first by the center’s director, Ludmila Ermakova. I was a little confused as to why we were meeting at a library [since the crisis center, as I understood, had some office somewhere in town]. I was also scared that they would tell me that they didn’t have work for me or that they would see that I couldn’t understand or speak well in Russian and say that it just wasn’t practical for me to volunteer with them. Alas, my fears were finally quelled by the two hour meeting that began upon my arrival.

First Ludmila Ermakova told me about the center’s two main projects. The first project includes several different kinds of support for domestic violence survivors. The staff psychologist, Olga, provides free consultations with domestic violence survivors every Monday in a little office at the front of the library where we met. During this meeting a female lawyer visited, who is also going to start offering free legal consultations for domestic violence survivors twice a month. In addition to this, the group has a one-room office somewhere else in the city that runs a domestic violence hotline for four hours every day—this is mainly staffed by Anya [who I met at my university, where she works in the social department] and Nadezhda, the other staff psychologist.

The second project focuses on trafficking of women. Part of this project is education of police officers, students, teachers, etc throughout the city. Right now, Anya and Nadezhda are organizing a training for different professors and workers at universities throughout the city; it is set for the end of October and I am planning on sitting in on it [although Olga kept joking that I would give a presentation on anti-trafficking work in America during it]. They are also in the process of making a brochure to hand out to girls throughout the city with information about trafficking, along with a list of crisis centers in major cities throughout the world—with the depressing but necessary idea that if a Russian woman is trafficked, then if she has the brochure she will have information about where to receive help in the city that she is trafficked to. I am planning on helping them search the web for these crisis centers.

The first main task that I am going to get started on for them is translating their website into English [after I am satisfied with the work, I’ll let you all know the website address]. Ludmila Erkmakova also mentioned several times that it will probably be interesting me to follow them around the city and watch the work they do [she is absolutely right about that]. I had been worried that they would not want me in their hair as they worked, so I am very excited to discover that they will are willing to let me trail after them.

In all, the women are hilarious, kind, and seem happy enough to have me around. It was pretty cool to sit down with them and talk about their activities and women’s activism, because it again felt like a comfortable and familiar environment, despite the fact that they were speaking Russian a mile a minute as we froze in a room that was mysterious 10 degrees colder than the balmy weather outside.

Coming soon, updates on my weekend in the country, my first experience in a Russian banya, and a lesson on how to drive a car in Russia.