Sunday was when daylight savings was scheduled to take effect here in Ukraine. I didn’t know that, but when I woke up Sunday morning, the clock on the computer was an hour behind everything else, and it was fall, so naturally, I concluded daylight savings. And then this thought ran through my head, “What time is it, really?”
The previous week, Doug had said that the government had passed a law that this year Ukraine wasn’t going to implement daylight savings. And then he had heard they reversed that decision. So no one knew if we were going to change our clocks or not.
You have to be a bit of a reactionist here. The country passed new visa laws recently. According to different interpretations of the new laws, our brand new (5 year) visas were 1) completely worthless, 2) good for 6 months, 3) good for 6 months if we had registered 5 weeks ago, 4) perfectly fine, and a few other options that I don’t how to explain. Essentially, no one really knew what was going to happen after the new laws took effect, and so we’ve been sitting back and waiting. We’ve listened anxiously to stories of people who left the country and tried to figure out how to come back into Ukraine.
Every story has been different. We don’t know what to expect. And according to Doug, that’s just life here. It doesn’t make sense, but it does wonders for your prayer life.
And so Sunday, we showed up to church an hour early. Anya asked us if we knew what time it was. I answered, “Not really. I know what my clock says, but I don’t know if there is daylight savings or not.”
“Yeah,” she replied, giving me a knowing nod, “that’s life in Ukraine.”
As long as it "does wonders for your prayer life", it's a good thing! :)
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