Drevyev

Here is a picture of the girls playing at a small playground in front of a mural of a woman working in a traditional village setting. When kids play they play hard. My kids don't veg out; they run or create or climb. I guess that sounds like work, but they're playing. The woman in the background: she's working for reals.

That's how I feel about my experience teaching in Ukraine. Teaching Hebrew in Ukrainian was so fun and fulfilling I feel a little guilty calling it "work." I taught for free, and I feel like I got the good end of the bargain. I can't imagine getting paid. I spend three months getting materials ready, fly many hours across the ocean, stand up in front of a class for 4 hours a day as I teach in Ukrainian, and it always feels like playing. In the background I see people all around me doing "real" work, but I feel like I'm in the front, playing and working.

I'm not as impractical as I sound. I understand the need for an income. I like to eat, as do my children. Insurance is always on my mind, as well as house payments and gas prices. Nevertheless, I would work for subsistance income if I could teach like I was teaching.

On some prime-time, "newsy" show (Primetime, 20/20, or the like) there was a guy who made a bazillion dollars by the time he was 21. He now writes books about how to make a bazillion dollars (for which I'm sure he makes a bazillion dollars). On the show he said there are three important questions to ask in the beginning.

1. What comes easily to me and difficult to others?
2. What could I do for free and still feel fulfilled?
3. How can I use that to serve others?

I feel so fortunate that the answers to these questions yell out loud and clear to me ("LEARN LANGUAGES"), and that I was already able to act on them in Ukraine. However, I still am not seeing my bazillions. Maybe I need the book . . .