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!)