My Parents' Visit

After a brief hiatus I am back again. My apologies for the long delay, I was running around for a bit of the time, lying down for part of it, and reading books throughout the remainder; oh, what a learned man I’ve become. So, today is the 26^th of July, I’m not sure when I’ll post this, probably within the next day or two, but I’ll date it just in case it is longer. I’ll break the past month into a couple of posts; today will focus on my trip around Ukraine with my parents, and Celia (my sister).

About three weeks ago, I saw my parents off from Boryspil International Airport. That means we all made it through in one piece, physically and emotionally. Ukraine is not the most tourist friendly place in the world, so I will admit that having my family here was a bit stressful. This is something I blame on Ukraine, and not on my family, to be clear. I say this because it is virtually impossible, to find any sort of English in the country, other than on menus in some of the restaurants.

Before I go further, I should give a few thank yous. Of course, to my parents, I packed them down with an entire suitcase’s worth of things I had requested from books, to chili powder, and appreciate them lugging it over here for me. Also, to Mark at Updike’s Newtowne, a tremendous amount of good coffee came my way, which I cannot say how much I appreciate. I just finished the Papua New Guinea, and opened the Newtowne’s House bag this morning. Coffee is one of the best ways to bring myself home for a few minutes. On that note, thank you, also, to Mr. Eastman for making your coffee contribution – my morning’s give their regards. Also thank you to Diane Schaeffer, again your kindness is appreciating, and humbling. It is always nice to have a pair of flip-flops especially when the summer is as hot as it is here. Thank you to Auntie Sue for giving me a gummy-bear/various American candies fix, and to anyone I have forgotten it is not intentional, and my apologies.

We started the trip in Kyiv (Kyiv is the same as Kiev, but it is the Ukrainian spelling, appropriate for a Ukrainian city, no?) and spent a few days in the city that begat the Kyivan Rus, the civilization that fathered modern Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine. We saw almost the entire city, and perhaps the total touristy area. While we were in Kyiv, our first day was low key – I did not want to push my jet-lagged family too far, too fast. However, we did get a nice tour of the city from our cab driver Ivan. He gave us a pretty decent rate, the only problem was that he refused to speak in Ukrainian to me. He answered every question I asked in Russian, which is a bit draining, because I don’t know Russian.

This first night we ate at a river boat on the Dnipro. The restaurant was good, but it was a pain to get to. We had to walk about a mile from the metro stop, past countless other restaurants, to a place where there was no commerce, through a road-work zone, and then finally at the end of the road work zone we reached the restaurant. It served traditional Ukrainian dishes, they gave us a shot of horilka (Ukrainian word for vodka), and a piece of salo on bread. Salo is pig fat, and Ukrainians love it! But, we also had real meal food as well. I had some pork shashyk, which is pork cooked over an open fire on skewers, it is a great way to prepare pork, we had holuptsi, ground beef and rice rolled in a boiled cabbage leaf served usually in a tomato sauce. I’m sure Mom or Dad had some borsch, with a dollop of sour cream. We had pelmeni, little meat dumplings, and for dessert there was cherry-filled dumplings which were pretty enjoyable.

Our second day we spent most of our time at the cave monastery, the Pecherska Lavra. Before getting to the monastery though, I managed to get us pretty lost, which was great fun, and not embarrassing at all. The Pecherska Lavra is a very holy site for the Russian Orthodox Church, it is linked to the Moscow patriarchate, not the Ukrainian patriachate. It is the traditional golden-domed cathedral, but on a much larger scale. It was taken over by the Soviets, and very little was destroyed during the Second World War, or by the Soviet atheism which has made a portion of the monastery a secular museum – museums, according to John Steinbeck in A Russian Journal were the churches of the Soviet Union. But, I digress. Our tour guide was very knowledgeable about the Lavra, and gave a nice tour. But, if I am being honest, I will say that it went a bit long for me. The big highlight of the cave monastery is the caves. In the caves many of the monks who have lived at the monastery are buried, and some have been naturally mummified. This was what I was very interested in, but it took us about 2 and a half hour to finally get through the tour and down to the caves. When we finally got to the caves it was a bit lackluster. Honest as we are we chose to do the “Excursion Route,” and not the “Prayer Route.” The Excursion Route was really quite short, we were in and out of the caves in about 10 minutes. This was a lesson I learned (with the help of a more knowledgeable friend, for the visit of Pat and Dan a week later).

The second evening was a Saturday evening, and if you remember it was the Saturday evening in which our dear country’s national soccer team was beat by Ghana. Watching the game was very important to me. So, while the family enjoyed a truly culturally evening taking in a Tchaikovsky ballet at the National Opera, I went to an Irish Pub full of Americans to watch the game. About half time the ballet finished, and luckily it was only about a five minute walk from the pub I watched the game at. I collected the family and we watched as the American soccer team showed us the worst performance of the World Cup. I was a bit heartbroken by the result. Losing is not something I enjoy (though I am an avid Providence College basketball fan), so when I got back to the hostel I stayed at, I went to the CIA World Factbook and I looked up Ghana’s per capita GDP, and life expectancy, and I realized that ultimately, while Ghana, on Sunday morning would still be in the World Cup, that is about the only victory they have; it made me feel slightly better, even if it does sound bad to admit.

Sunday was our third day together. We had a large part of the day in Kyiv, and then around 5 PM we packed into a train car for the 18 journey to the Autonomous Republic of the Crimea – Simferopol to be exact. But, before we did that we took a bit of a walking tour of the city. We went to St. Volodomyr’s Cathedral and then up to the National Opera House. After the Opera we went down to Saint Sophia’s. Saint Sophia’s is in a square that looks out upon the statue of Bohdan Khmelnitsky and then further down to Saint Michael’s Cathedral. My dad was particularly interested in Saint Sophia’s because it was said to be modeled on the Hagia Sophia in Istanbul (not Constantinople), but we were not able to see that. Saint Sophia’s also is no longer open as a place of worship, it was turned into a museum during Soviet times, and it has not been reconsecrated. Unfortunately, we were not able to see any part of the museum that looked like the Hagia Sophia, but it did have a really nice lawn.

We headed up to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs building, and then down to Kreschatyk, one of the main commercial streets in the country. On the weekends Kreschatyk is closed to motor traffic, so we were able to walk right in the middle of this large thoroughfare and over to Independence Square. Independence Square was the site of the protests during the Orange Revolution of 2004, so may be familiar to those who were interested in international affairs 5 years back (I was more interested in college basketball back then). Independence Square is the home to a statue of Michael the Archangel, protector of Kyiv, and also of a large monument to a woman which was erected to celebrate, shockingly, independence. It was a pretty slow day, and we followed this up with a walk down to the train station. I am disgustingly cheap now, so I did not recommend a cab, or taking the metro, so unfortunately, my poor mother got a couple of blisters on her feet, having done the long walk in sandals.

After our 18 hour train ride we arrived in Simferopol, found an apartment, and headed down to Bakhchisaray. This town is now the center of Crimean Tatar culture. The Tatars were deported from the Crimea to Uzbekistan by Stalin shortly after World War II, and just recently allowed to come back. When they left all of their land was taken, and much of the culture had been destroyed; as well as many of the people killed during transit. However, the Tatar people are making a renewed name for themselves, and this is a great example of their success. Bakhchisaray is the home to a phenomenal palace, the Khan’s Palace. A khan was the leader of a khanate, basically like a king, but more truly, from what I can tell more akin to a prince in a small principality if we are to use western Europe as our frame of reference. Khanates were traditionally in areas dominated by Islam – Crimea, Turkey, the Caucasus, Persia, Central Asia, and the like. The palace itself was great. It was full of fountains, and beautiful carpets, and includes a number of mosques, and a few minarets.

After the Khan’s Palace we ate at a restaurant serving traditional Tatar food. We had beef, and lamb shashlyk, we had plov (which is basically rice pilaf), and the lavash-style bread. It was delicious, and the restaurant was open air and looked right over the palace. There are also some pretty extraordinary rock formations in this area of the country, so it was really a beautiful place to spend the day.

The next day we grabbed a bus to Yalta. Yalta is where the famous peace conference was held at the end of World War II, with the Big Two, and Churchill, who somehow managed to convince Stalin, and Roosevelt he was significant, to the matter. Yalta is a city right on the Black Sea, and is one of the most popular tourist destinations in Ukraine, and in the entirety of the former Soviet Union, for that matter. It is famous for the Swallow’s Nest, a castle that sits on a cliff jutting out over the sea. We caught a cab out to the area of the Swallow’s Nest, and it was definitely a beautiful place to see. We also passed a summer house owned by Medvedev (president of the Russian Federation). It is too bad, but we did not have much time while we were in Yalta, and were unable to go to the beach, or jump into the sea, but it was a beautiful place to be.

This brought us to back to the train station, and towards the west of the country. We made a quick pit-stop in my town, Zhmerynka, and had dinner with some friends in town, which was nice. We did not have much time in my area, so we took a bus to the local city, went to the park, quickly, and then made our way back for dinner. The real reason we went to the city was so I could show the area near me, which is beautiful in the summer.

After this break we went to Lviv. Lviv is now my favorite city in Ukraine. It is in the west of the country, and it is the center of Ukrainian national identity, and patriotism. The other great thing about it is that people speak Ukrainian in Lviv, and they speak clear Ukrainian without using Russian words – it is wonderful. Lviv is much more Central European than Ukrainian in appearance. We spent most of our time in the old town, and I did not see one Soviet-style apartment block. For me the reason to be in Lviv was to relax and be in a nice city, that is beautiful, but we did end up going to a museum while we were there. The museum was in a top secret location on every map, but impossible to find. There were no signs on the street, and we had to go up tree-lined residential streets until we made our way through a forest. It was a really convenient location. One of the highlights for me was the restaurant we went to. I forget the name, but at the restaurant we had to knock on the door and give a password – Slava Ukraini (glory to Ukraine) heroam slava (glory to the heroes). When we entered we were met by a man in fatigues with a Kalishnikov. He wanted to make sure we were not moscals, an epithet for Russians, and Russian-speaking Ukrainians. After he was properly satisfied we were welcomed in and given a shot of cinnamon schnapps to warm us. We enjoyed our meal, including the half-meter sausage ordered by my dad. That was a hell of a lot of sausage.

Our second day in Lviv was much the same as the first (the museum was actually on the second day), but we ended it at a café on the central square. The food was good, the price reasonable, and we were given the added bonus of being within earshot of an American bride-hunter and his newly betrothed. I find bride-hunters despicable in general, but this dude was out of hand. His topic of conversations were his motorcycle, followed by impressive combinations of profanity, complaints about Obama in which a certain n-bomb was dropped, back to his motorcycle. This guy disgusted, and infuriated me, and it is probably good that my mother was there so I kept my mouth shut, and did not cause a scene. It was really embarrassing though, that many people who have never met an American will see/hear this guy and think we are like that – here’s hoping he doesn’t wear his helmet on his next ride.

We made or way back to Kyiv on a high-speed train that went through the night, and was about three hours faster than most trains on that route. This was our last day in Kyiv, as early the next morning the family was shipping out. We put our stuff in the hotel, and made our way out into the city. While getting tokens for the metro (the subway), I gave the woman exact change, and asked for four tokens. She gave me three, and then stared at me. So I told her to give me the fourth. She just stared at me blankly. So I looked at the money she had collected from me, counted it, and told her to give me the third token. She refused to give me the token. It took me yelling at her (don’t worry I addressed her with the formal you), and an increasing line before she would give the fourth token. It was incredibly infuriating, but I felt so much better after I yelled at her. It was really empowering, I should try that more often here. But, once we met up with friends we headed to Independence Square, followed by Marinksy Park, and Palace, where the president of Ukraine lives (usually, but not now because it is undergoing repairs). We then headed down to the museum for the great famines during Soviet times – it was dedicated to famines but focused mostly on the Great Famine – The Holodomor – of 1932-33. It was a pretty well done museum, simple, but very powerful, and it included books for all the oblasts of Ukraine and listed the numbers of people killed in various towns and villages, and names of many of the victims. The museum was built in the shape of a candle, and on the outside has a stork flying upwards in symbolism of the rebirth of the Ukrainian nation. Russian President Medvedev, has even visited, which is noteworthy, because Putin refused to recognize the famine as purposely created which was a source of conflict between former Ukrainian President Yushenko, and his Russian counterparts.

Following the museum we went on to Tequila House, a Mexican restaurant in the Ukrainian capital. I had a big frozen margarita, and a burrito. Friends of mine from Zhmerynka came with us, and they had not had Mexican food in the past, so we decided it would be an appropriate stop. The burritos were good, too. It was too much food for me, which is a bit embarrassing, but it’s true. Afterwards, we made our way back to the hotel. Spain and Paraguay were playing in the World Cup, but we were too exhausted to do anything other than pack up and prepare to leave in the morning.

So, on the Fourth of July, I sent the family home. Luckily they made it through the airport as the final group allowed on their plane before the gates were closed . . . it would have been a bit embarrassing if they had been unsuccessful. But, that is all I know about that trip – perhaps soon I will write about the journey to Krakow and Budapest, with Pat Mulligan, and Dan Moriarty, we shall see.

Be good, and be well.

Pete