Thanksgiving

We were invited to Butch and Dawn's for Thanksgiving and were surrounded by warmth and welcome. It was definitely a home away from home!

Dawn converted her living room into a restaurant-style sestting. She has incredible attention to detail and had gorgeous place settings and Apple-Turkey center pieces.

The food was AMAZING! It was quite the spread! There was amazing home-made cranberry sauce, home-whipped mashed potatos, some of the best corn-bread I've ever had, and a dessert table that made go back for thirds and fourths!
The kids were adorable. They dressed up as Indian Princesses and played pin-the-tail on the turkey.
The best part of the evening were when we split out to play games. We decided on Junior Pictionary and I don't think I've ever laughed so hard in my life. Bob and Andrea are definitely one of my favorite couples. They have this amazing witty, sarcastic banter that just kept me cracking up.

One of the highlights was when Arun tried to draw 'iceberg.'
He decided to draw an ice bucket... then a shovel.... then what looked like little puddles.
[yeah, you had to be there...]


Nonetheless, we have been incredibly lucky to have had such wonderful people take us into their fold. We're definitely thankful for this community out here in Ukraine!

Just got a Flickr link for some more pictures

(Taken by the Burnhams): http://www.flickr.com/photos/bobburnham/3064045669/in/set-72157610273752119/

New Coats...No Snow

So we're still awaiting snow in Odessa. In case you're wondering, we only have about 4-5 actual "snow-days" here because the temperature generally doesn't drop into the 30's. Currently, we're averaging about 45 degrees F (7 C).... which is COLD... but not freezing. It WILL get colder in January and February, but for now, it's really not too bad.

I've also realized, yes, it is warmer in Odessa, Ukraine than Ann Arbor, Michigan.

Who woulda thunk it?

Nonetheless, Arun and I decided not to brave the weather any longer and we decided to buy some winter coats. I decided on a trench-style, off-white, wool coat. I researched it, I dreamed it, and let's just say that it took me about 20 minutes to walk in and purchase my coat.

Arun saw my purchase and decided that he wanted to get a long trench as well! Unfortunately we walked into store after store and we couldn't get it right. Wrong style... wrong size....too expensive.... and he became increasingly disconcerted and irate.

We stopped for lunch and had some Korean food, which Arun was ecstatic to find. He was in a much better mood after some bulgogi and so we were off again for the search of the perfect coat.

Finally, I convinced him how awesome this sporty black jacket was and we were BOTH happy. His co-worker liked it so much, he asked Arun if he wouldn't mind if he got the same one!

Alls' well that ends well!

How we spend our weekends...

So without Angelika Film Center and Fun Asia for movies... how do we spend our time on weekends?

Well, this past weekend, we took in a few more museums. The Pushkin Museum was marked with this Pushkin statue on the left. He was quite the interesting character. He was part of the Moscow 'court society' and he grew increasingly jealous upon hearing stories of his wife conducting a scandalous affair. He challenged her alleged lover to a duel and died an untimely death when he was mortally wounded. He was known as a social reformist, and under the increasing scrutiny of the Russian government, he was exiled to Southern Russia. He spent 13 months in Odessa during that time. Who needs movies when you can hear about epics like this?

I guess the interesting thing that came out of the little museum trip was my Russian practice with the curator. I've become quite adept at steering conversations towards topics in which my vocabulary is strong. I'm particularly fond of families, for example. I also frequently talk about the weather. So I had a good time asking ALL kinds of questions about Pushkin's family:

"Eta ego Xena?" and I point to a portrait of a young woman.

[Is this his wife?]

That's actually what prompted the whole barrage of Russian about the lover etc.

I had a solo trip out to the Odessa Fine Arts Museum. It was really a rather nice collection of Ukrainian and Soviet art from the 15th century through contemporary works.


Finally, we went to an Odessa version of Sea World.
It was pretty fun, but of course we couldn't laugh along with all the Russian jokes and commentary throughout the show. Oh well!

The Strays...

So remember awhile back I mentioned that stray cats and dogs were a real issue here in Ukraine?
Well, it's really starting to get to Arun.

A few nights ago, Arun suddenly shouted [it was around 2 or 3am]
"Hey!! Hey!!"
I was startled awake, and got up to ask him, "What? What is it? What happened?"

"What IS THIS?"

I look around to determine what he's talking about....

"Why are there all these CATS in the house?" he grumbled... and then turned over and went back to sleep.

Yes- he was having nightmares about me bringing strays into the apartment.

Then we had an incident last night. We went downtown to one of our favorite little restaurants here: Top Sandwich. As we were walking into our apartment complex there was limping, mangy dog snarling at us at the entrance. This time, we were BOTH scared.

I started walking VERY slowly but edging my way towards the gate. Finally, I catch the attention of one of the security guards and point anxiously to the dog and say, "Sabaka...."

He got the message and stood between me and the dog and let me walk in safely. I turn around and discover that Arun has somehow disappeared!

He was standing about 20 feet away [presumably hoping whatever altercation I had with the dog would pave the way for him to run in unnoticed]. The guard laughed at him as he sheepishly walked in, "What will he do?"

Arun muttered back, "I don't want to find out..."

Another night in Odessa.

Roses

So Arun surprised me with a bouquet of roses.

Yes, he still does that. Awww... I know.

But of course, it's the backstory that makes it interesting.

Arun stopped at a street shop and pointed to some red roses and asked, "skolke?"

She answered, and he didn't comprehend. (They speak lightening-fast here.) He put up six fingers saying he wanted half a dozen roses. She shook her head and said, "Nyet, dicich."

This time he understood- 10. He thought- WOW, who would have thought that six roses would only be $1.50? How could they be cheaper HERE than in America? Where do they grow these? It's cold half the year....

So he tells her he wants a dozen.

Ok- so you're seeing the punchline right? Yup, they were $1.50 each. So the grand total was $18 or 108 Hr. Which makes a LOT more sense.

And best of all? Arun's always thought red roses were worth it :)

Newspapers

Living in the States, I'd never really miss newspapers. (But unlike Palin, I could NAME a couple if asked.) I get all my news online; and I don't really need the tactile nuisance of fumbling with large sheets of newsprint. Still, HERE- I kind of miss not having anything English to read outside of the internet. I went to the hair salon a couple of days ago and I couldn't just pick up a Cosmopolitan or Vogue to pass my time. It was ALL in Russian. So I flipped through them, looking at the pictures and feeling like a preschooler.

However, when we were in Kiev, I was very excited to discover that they do have an English Newspaper: the Kiev Post

It's like a bawdy British Tabloid. Here are some of my favorite articles:

-Marharyta Chervonenko's divorce headaches from Yevhen (millionaire businessman/former racecar driver)

-A lively discussion in the Opinion page of the metro fares increasing from 50 kopecks to 2 Hr

-An article encouraging Ukrainians to have prenups (VERY high rate of divorce here.)

-An IFES poll finding that 76% of citizens believe Ukraine is moving into chaos. 84% don't trust Yushchenko. 72% don't trust the government.

-A restaurant review of Comunalka- a communal flat-style restaurant harkening back to the Soviet regime of utilizing large-scale apartments of rich citizens and dividing them to fit 4-5 working families. They would share a bathroom and kitchen and dining area; so this restaurant was decorated as a communal dining room. The review recommends the Lenin Diet mushroom soup and Genplan veal tongue with cheese.

Then there was the section that just made me laugh out loud.

an entire section dedicated to : Introduction/Massage.

I'm not kidding.

The whole "Russian mailorder bride" thing.... it applies to Ukraine as well.

ANYWAY.

The one thing I was a TINY bit jealous of ? The much-larger ex-pat community in Kiev. There were numerous English Speaking clubs and organizations, including an English AA, an amateur English Theater club and Latin Dance clubs. My favorite? Democrats Abroad Ukraine. I would SO join.

Kiev: Photography

It all started on Saturday as we headed out from our hotel.

Arun turns to me and says, "Now remember, we're here to take pictures..."

I give him a look... "next to stuff," he adds.

For any of you who has perused our plethora of travel-albums; you may have noticed the abundance of pictures of Arun in them. There's usually very few of me.

Let me tell you why:

• Arun LOVES to pose.
• Arun, as highlighed above, thinks that a #1 priority in travel is to take pictures... next to stuff.
• Arun's a HUGE ham.
• And finally- Arun can't photograph.

Ok- Arun can't photograph WELL.

Let me demonstrate:

Blurry................Blurry.................Blurry/dark.................

So you see- usually by the third or fourth frame, I'm totally tired of waiting...and posing, and it's a chore to try to find ONE picture that's salvagable!

Now compare Arun's joy of posing:

(admittedly, much better lighting conditions)

Yeah, I know....

A final thing you should all know about is that Arun on this trip- it was FREEZING cold. YET, Arun would dutifully put down the umbrella, take off his coat and brave the temperature in the name of a good photograph.

Kiev

Let's be honest, here. Our trip to Kiev was ALL about the eating.

And on that count- it was a VERY successful trip. We had a fabulous lunch at Mandarin (in fact, we were standing outside of the doors at noon when their doors were still locked.)

We also had some FANTASTIC Indian food. (We walked almost 2 miles from the metro stop to eat at New Bombay Palace.)
And we had some great Indian-Chinese at Himalaya.

On the sight-seeing end of things; however, it was pretty miserable. Not the sights, but because Kiev is SO much colder than Odessa. It was in the mid to low 40's and raining the entire day Saturday. It all proved to be very frustrating for photography; and I abhor the rain. Ugh!

So here are the take-aways:

• Kiev is a 'real' city. A great, lively downtown.
• Kiev is MUCH more cosmopolitan- a lot more people spoke SOME English.
• Kiev has much more diversity, in terms of restaurants, people, shops.
• Kiev's location on the banks of the Dnipro makes it quite charming
• The metro is something I REALLY wish we had in Odessa.
• It would be MUCH harder to actually live in Kiev day-to-day (larger, more populated, expensive)

As for some of the sights we took in. My favorite was the Pechersk Lavra Monastery. Even though it was bone-chillingly cold there was such an indescribable feeling when the bells started chiming at dusk and monks started coming out from every direction in the purple-twilight. It suddenly gave me the feeling of being in Jerusalem. Very neat- and something you can't capture on film. It's an enormous site- almost 70 acres on the banks of the Dnipro.

The other sight that was impressive was the St. Sophia Cathedral. It's a great complex with some wonderful frescoes and mosaics.

I'll be writing more about our trip- stay tuned. (Photography in Kiev will be my next topic!)

You Get What You Pay For....

So what is the cost of living like in Ukraine?

Well, there's no short-answer to that.
This is definitely the land of you-get-what-you-pay-for.

Allow me to provide a metaphor.

Life here, is like.... toilet paper.

You can get the incredibly cheap, non-perforated, non-bleached, singly-ply almost-cardboard variety at a very affordable price (about 50 cents for 4 rolls). [far left]

You can get perforated, singly-ply, decorative, feels-like-newspaper kinds for about a dollar for 4 rolls. [middle]

You can get the nice, 2-ply, soft-cushiony variety most of us Americans are used to for about $1.75 for 4 rolls. [far right]

The same goes for just about anything here.

Our apartment, is not really as affordable as you'd imagine. A one-bedroom in our complex would run you between $1400-$1700.

Now, you could live in one of the 'Soviet-Style' apartments that is right behind our complex, but as I said... you get what you pay for.

I would say, on average:

• Eating out here is more expensive than eating out in America.
• Clothes here are more expensive than clothing in America.
• Utilites and Transportation are heavily subsidized and therefore cheaper than America
• Cellphone contracts are cheaper than America.
• Groceries are more expensive than in America.
• Fine arts/performing arts are cheaper here than in America.
• Cars here are incredibly expensive; much more so than in America.

Other than that, you get what you pay for.

There are cheap hotels and expensive ones... there is affordable housing, and surprisingly expensive housing...

Any guesses as to which building we live in?

I LOVE juice!

I guess this is going to be a random one.

A 'filler' until I get more fodder for my blog from our weekend trip to Kiev :)

The juices here... are AMAZING. I'm a bit addicted. I keep going out and buying the stuff, and Arun thinks I'm nuts. The last time I went, I stocked up on pomegranate juice, peach, grapefruit juice and a mixed berry juice... as well as the usual orange juice. I think it's because they're affordable, freshly-squeezed, and soooo good. Also- you can't drink tap water here (NOT-potable), and lugging huge jugs of water to the house is a pain.

Ok, that's it!

Yes, Ukraine has beaches!

When you think of Ukraine, the first thing that would pop into your head is beaches, right? Yeah, I didn't think so. But yes, Odessa does have beaches.

This past Saturday afternoon, Arun asked me what I wanted to do.

"I haven't been to the beach yet!!" was my response, and so we set out; all bundled in scarves and jackets. Now, the middle of November is really not the most ideal time to visit the beach; but that's when I haven't had the chance to go yet, and Arun had already gone when the weather was more pleasant. It's in the high-50's here now, and so yes, it is finally getting cold; but certainly not freezing, and when the sun is out, it's 'brisk' but not unpleasant.

Arkadia beach is flanked by clubs and restaurants and great stores. Only, the season is from May to October, and off-season it's practically a ghost-town. It's only about a mile from our apartment, so we decided to walk it. There were quite a few people walking along the boardwalk. There were dogs running along the beach. And it was really quite nice. And here we are:

You can see why I'm the photographer on our trips; I don't know how Arun managed to capture a huge shadow across my face!

7 Km: the Container Market

This past weekend, Arun and I decided to go to the famous 7 KM Container Market. As the name would indicate- the market is located 7 km from the city of Odessa; a distance most locals consider way in the outskirts. Apparently, you can find ANYTHING in this marketplace- from hangers to leather coats to tweezers. Now, the reason it is called 'Container' market is because they literally take items out of shipping containers (see image below pulled from google images)

and then they sell them directly OUT of the shipping containers themselves. See image below from google (Sergei Leshchinsky)

On weekdays, the market is only for wholesalers. I imagine, people paying rent for actual stores in the city come out to the container market on these days, buy up goods and then quadruple the prices to offset the price of rent.

On weekends, however, the aisles teem with people. There are individuals with little carts selling hot tea and baked goods. And shoppers abound! (Now I know where they buy all that pleather!)

Here's some answers to questions I'd imagine you may have:

• Yes- there are a TON of knock-offs. And not nearly the cut-rate prices we saw in China
• It's mostly new items. But yes, there are also second-hand goods sold.
• No, there's really not too much haggling.
• Most of the containers are staffed by Ukrainians and Moldovans. Off to the sides we saw people from Arabic countries and Central Asia. They were more likely to haggle. They probably didn't have connections to actually get a container. And local Ukrainians tended to avoid them.
  

What was funny was that when I was hanging out with Mascha (from Arun's work); she couldn't believe we would venture out to 7km alone (and without knowing much Russian). She insisted on accompanying us since she had to buy a few items herself. She warned us of pickpockets, and looked genuinely worried for our well-being. Well, once we got there, Arun and I realized that it was a very familiar scene: much like Namdaemun in Korea, or the Silk Market in Beijing, or any alley in Benaras. As for communicating- well, that's where writing and punching buttons on calculators come in! So we really wouldn't have had trouble at all. Still it was a nice outing with our Ukrainian friends.

Oh, and we did buy a lot of great stuff :)

Crimea: Our last day

Our last day in Crimea comprised the Lavidia Palace; the aforementioned location of the famous Yalta Conference. This was where FDR and the American delegates stayed. We were able to tour all the important rooms: the room converted into FDR's bedroom, his room for entertaining visitors, and the famous rooms where he held discourse with Stalin. For all you history buffs, a quick recap: The "Big Three" met in February of 1945. The US was asking for Soviet support against Japan, and Stalin wanted a sphere of influence in Eastern Europe.

Our final stop was a trip to Sebastopol. It’s an important military location and still houses Russian naval fleet (they are leasing until 2017). It’s also a scientific site with marine biology research (dolphins were going to be used for undersea operations by the USSR). The city is still very Russian and it is an autonomous municipality separate from the rest of Crimea. We toured the Panorama Museum and the Diorama Museum. This stuff was REALLY not my thing, but Arun ran around giddily taking pictures with anything Soviet.

We then went to the neighboring city Balaklava which is famous for its champagne. We were able to see the old submarine-repair areas and Arun seemed thrilled. And that pretty much sums up our tour of the Crimea!
Back to Odessa! Leave me suggestions for topics (in the comments)!

Crimea Continued...

Our second day in Crimea comprised our day-trip to Bakhchisaray; the center of the Crimean Tatars. Arun was mostly interested in seeing the Old Fort; and we realized the most affordable way of going would be to join a Russian Tour Group. Only problem, of course, was that our lovely tour guide prattled for an hour and half in Russian while we sat uncomprehendingly. We were relieved to finally get out of the van until Arun realized, much to his dismay that we were let off at the foot of the mountains! In order to see the remants of the Old Turkish Fort we had to hike for about an hour and half to the pinnacle!

It was easy to get over it, because it was a gorgeous day, and of course incredibly scenic.
Here I am at the top!

On the route back down the mountains we ran into this amazing monastery, carved into the cliffs. It's called the Uspensky Cave Monastery and was founded by Byzantine Monks from 7th-9th centuries.

We were then taken to the 16th Century Khan Palace: The property is maintained by Turkey in conjunction with Ukraine. The king fell in love with one of the Polish girls from his harem and married her. When she died, he was so distraught that he commissioned a fountain that would forever 'weep' as he had. (And yes, Arun bought a Turkish hat)

So that's the end of the second day! One last installment of our Crimea trip!

November 3, 2008: Crimea

We’re back from our trip to Crimea, and I can’t wait to show this side of Ukraine, because so few people would realize how scenic and temperate and gorgeous it is (I didn’t know either.) We took an overnight train into Simferapol and then went to Yalta; which is a great ‘base camp’ for a lot of sight-seeing. There are amazing palaces, old Turkish forts, monasteries built into the mountains and scenic beaches. We could not have chosen a better season to go because the fall colors reminded me of Tuscany. Oh, and there are vineyards galore!

Our drive to Yalta was incredibly scenic. It's about an hour and half from Simferapol through the mountains and the city of Yalta is nestled along the coast of the Black Sea and the Crimean Mountains.

Yalta used to be an exclusive resort city of the Tsars and aristocrats. Lenin, turned the city into a retreat for the proletariats which is why there are 'sanatoria' in the city. However, the high prices has generally kept the city as a place for the 'nouveau riche' to frolic.

Tolstoy and Chekhov had residencies in Yalta.

Of course, Yalta is also known for the Yalta Conference when the "Big Three" came together in 1945 setting an agenda for governing Post-War Germany (and other issues/agenda for the UK, US and USSR)

The history of the Crimean region is fascinating because it has gone through so many hands: Greeks, Mongols, Ottomans and then Russians. Arun's favorite word during our trip was "Tatar" because he thought it was funny. Tatars are an ethnic minority that was expelled from the region by Stalin. They still make up about 13% of the population.

Our three day weekend was jam-packed (of course!). I'll cover our first day on this post. We spent it enjoying Yalta, and we took a trip out to the Swallow's Next castle and Vorontsov Palace.

This is the boardwalk/ seaside promenade in Yalta: (yes, that is Arun with a statue of Lenin)

We then took in some of the sights of Yalta. There is a famous church: the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral.

We then took a cable car with Arun freaking out about Russian engineering the whole time. He insisted that the cable cars had probably not been maintained since the 1980's and that it was a huge mistake to get on them. These are from that little adventure (you can see his forced smile.)

After our adventures, we headed off to the Swallow's Nest castle. It was built by a German baron who made his money drilling oil in Baku. A Russian architect built it in this neo-Gothic style. It is built on top of the Aurora Cliff and is pretty spectacular. You can see why it's called the "Swallow's Nest" because of the way it is perched on top of the cliff (40 m above sea level).

Finally, our last stop for the day was the Vorontsov Palace, also known as the Alupka Palace. The whole thing is an extravagant mixture of Scottish and neo-Moorish styles; with Islamic- style minarets and mosaic tiles on one of its entrances. It's also surrounded by an incredible park with trees flown in from all over the world.