Eyes, Smiles, and Candles

The picture above shows Kharkiv National University, where I'll be teaching three classes (the first in a couple of hours).

Some details from my journey so far.

While boarding my flight to Kyiv in Chicago, an airport employee – the type of guy who waves the plane home with those neon orange paddles – slipped in front of me on the gangway and into the cockpit. When he emerged, he was holding a cardboard box with a bright orange sticker: Human eyes for transplant.

In Kharkiv, while posing for a passport photo I needed for a university pass, the camera person told my interpreter to have me stop smiling, which only made me – and them – smile all the more. “In our country,” my translator said, “we look very serious for such photos.”

I have already been ill (a good thing, I think; the quicker Ukraine gets into my system the better) and so I was lucky enough to see a doctor and have this exchange with my interpreter as the doctor sat slumped behind his desk:

“And he will give you something for the pain, a powder,” G. said, “and some candles.”
“Candles?”
He nodded. “For the anus.”
A look of sheer terror. “Candles for the anus?” I’d been told of the three medical traditions: oral, injection, and suppository. But what was this, a fourth? I pictured something like ear candles used to melt the wax, but they weren’t stuck in the ear and I didn’t know what they were doing there.
“You stick them up and”—my interpreter must have finally seen my expression—“how do you call them?” he said.
I call them not in my ass. “Suppository?” I said.
The doctor eyes lit up. He nodded. “Suh-pah-zuh-toe-rhee,” he said.
G. smiled. He shrugged. “We call them candles,” he said.
“Okay, then. Candles.”