American Pupils Spend Holidays in Rivne Region

For the first time since the Chornobyl disaster a large group of American children has arrived in Ukraine. 84 high-school students from the town of Winnechi, Washington and twenty adult guardians will spend eight days in the Elektronyk health resort near the city of Rivne.

The key objective of this initiative, said Norman Carlson, the Ukrainian Medical Team Director and one of  mission organizers, is to help American and Ukrainian teenagers get to know each other better. In the next century some of them will determine their countries' policies, and the better they become acquainted with one another now, the easier it will be for them to communicate in the future.

However, communication between the two cultures is taking place under the watchful eyes of close observation by numerous Ukrainian police officers patrolling the resort area. According to Elektronyk Director Ruslan Dimurov, due to the events in Yugoslavia it was not quite certain up to the very last moment if the Americans would come.

Communication between teens from different countries  acquired an informal nature from the very beginning. After a few days of their joint holidays, it was difficult to tell at first glance Ukrainian youngsters from Americans.

Still, there is a basic difference between Ukrainian  and overseas teenagers. The Winnechi children paid part of the cost of their journey to distant Ukraine themselves, by harvesting citrus fruit crops. To their new friends in Ukraine such a means of providing for a trip abroad is unfamiliar.

According to the organizers, the first experience of joint Ukrainian-American holidays has turned out more than successful, and before the end of this summer it is planned to send several groups of pupils to Rivne oblast from abroad. A total of 600 American teenagers showed an interest in visiting Ukraine this year.