by Judy Berdy

Roosevelt Islander Carole Kennedy is now a Peace Corps volunteer in Poltava, Ukraine. She's working for an agency that teaches computer and management skills, and helps women start their own businesses. I recently spent a week with her.

Her new home is a lovely city of 300,000 people, in an agricultural region about 200 miles east of Kiev. Coincidentally, a former inmate in the Blackwell's Island Penitentiary, Emma Goldman, visited Poltava in 1923. In her book, My Disillusionment With Russia, Goldman described Poltava as a famous "manufacturing centre of peasant handicrafts" including "beautiful linen, embroidery, laces, and basket work," but she noted that, under the Bolsheviks, those industries were virtually suspended. Goldman quoted a woman in charge of promoting the crafts as saying, "The peasants have lost their art impulse, they have become brutalized and corrupted." (On-line, see marxists.org/reference/archive/goldman/works/1920s/disillusionment/ch20.htm.)

Carole was staying with a family when I visited. There were four generations of women: daughter (age 20), mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother (in her 80's).

Grandmother was constantly trying to feed Carole, who had never eaten so much soup in her life. The apartment, though not luxurious, was comfortable for the family and Carole. But Carole had not yet mastered the hot-water heater. Running hot water is not automatic in Poltava apartments. To shower, you must think ahead, and turn on a temperamental gas appliance that looks fearsome.

That five-story apartment house, where Carole was on the third floor, had no elevators. She is now lean and trim, thanks to lots of walking, and jokes that she has no need for a gym.

Carole and I had a great time together exploring Kiev and Poltava. We were constantly amazed that there is apparently a fear of fresh air. No matter how hot the weather, every window is closed in stores, on buses, and in public buildings. Luckily, the hotel rooms are air-conditioned - a real treat. Carole promises to report on the temperatures when the notorious winter strikes and lasts for six long months.

"The people here can't get over that I come from a little Island in the middle of the East River and use a Tram for transportation," Carol says. She notes that the Americans and Russians had an air base here during World War II, and there is a very nice section of the small space museum devoted to our efforts in the war. "They have a big American Flag and other memorabilia beautifully displayed. It made me feel very good to see that our efforts have been remembered."

Carole is living on her own, starting this month, in the same neighborhood where she's been a boarder. She's looking forward to the change. She sends her regards to all her Roosevelt Island friends and misses the neighborliness of the Island. Her e-mail address is carolek5312000@yahoo.com.