A day of rest

After yesterday’s turbulence what we needed was a day of rest for Sunday. That’s what the Doctor ordered so that’s what we did.

Despite the jet lag we forced ourselves out of bed at around 7am. We decided to do a little exploration of our new neighborhood near Independence Square in downtown Kiev.

I found that communicating with the natives wasn’t as difficult as I thought it would be. I will say that relative to other countries there is little English spoken here. Nevertheless communication is possible although it is a skill that must be learned. I am not talking about enrolling in language courses, I am saying that first you must at least learn the basic, simple native words from phrase books. Also be prepared to use body language. Lots of gestures and pointing. If you are going to speak English, you must use SIMPLE English and only one or two words at a time. If you are going to rattle off a paragraph of college-level English then don’t get impatient or arrogant when these people look at you like you’re from Mars. Not only will you look like an idiot but you’ll be giving all of us Americans a bad name.

We found a cafeteria near our apartment and sampled the local cuisine. We had no idea what we were ordering, just pointed to a few different things for the cafeteria people to put onto plates. Most everything that they had laid out for breakfast looked like various strudels. Some were meat-filled, some cheese-filled. Shirley hit the jackpot when she pointed at something that turned out to be a Ukrainian version of apple strudel. Delicious. She also pointed to a tray of what she thought (and hoped) were potatoes. Turned out that was exactly what they were. And they were also good. I saw what looked like eggs being cooked and I love eggs for breakfast but I’d left our Ukrainian Phrase Book back in the room and didn’t have a clue how to say the word “egg”. So I had to do without. The coffee resembled Turkish coffee. You know - the kind where the coffee grinds are cooked right into the coffee and all of it is consumed together. Strong stuff – anyone whose eyes weren’t opened after a mug of Ukrainian java is either comatose or dead. Overall it was a good meal.

Kiev is a major city and with that comes many thousands of international visitors (like us) into the city every year. I will say that compared to other cities in the world, Kiev is very friendly towards it’s foreign visitors. Of course those airport post office types can be found anywhere in the world. But in general I found the people here to be welcoming and always trying to help. Any American that complains about Ukrainians as overall rude people has never been to a place like Paris or Athens? You want rude? Look no further!!

Traffic-wise, Kiev is the same as most any other major city. What would I compare Kiev traffic to? I’d say that the traffic here is like a cross between Philadelphia and Athens Greece. The speed and aggression definitely reminds me of my Alma Mater - that dear old City of Brotherly Love. Multi lane traffic converging at warp speed from several directions into two lanes without anyone either slowing down or getting killed is definitely Philly-like. But having thousands of cars thrown into a giant mixing bowl of chaos reminds me of Athens. If a driver can’t find a way there, he simply makes a way there. Drivers who cannot find parking places simply make one of their own. Cars are often parked with one side of it’s wheels up over the curve. These cars are sitting at 10-15 degree angles. When Shirley asked our facilitator if that damages the cars’ tires or suspension he just shrugged and said “who cares”. Another time during heavy traffic Shirley was walking back to our apartment and nearly jumped out of her skin when a car whipped by her on the walkway. Usually the traffic at Independence Square is pretty thick and this one particular NASCAR-like daredevil decided to do an end run around the traffic by driving ONTO THE SIDEWALK.

I did have an incident here in our apartment when I went to take a shower this morning. Just like most of us in The States, anytime I go to take a shower I’ll run the hot water for several seconds and then adjust both spigots to get a comfy water temp. Here I went to do the same thing; turned the spigot marked HOT and let it run. Thing is, the water wasn’t getting any warmer. In fact it stayed downright freezing. Now on the bathroom wall there is a sign that reads “IF THERE IS NO HOT WATER, DO NOT TURN THE BOILER ON BY YOURSELF BUT CALL THE ADMINISTRATOR – HE WILL HELP YOU”. All I could figure out was that this must happen fairly often. So after a few minutes I go to the guy at the front desk and try to explain that there is no hot water. He follows me into the room where I show him the freezing water. He reaches past me to turn off the spigot marked HOT, then turns on the spigot marked COLD and in no time at all the water is steaming hot. I felt bad about calling the guy into the room just for this but he just smiled, said “OK” and left.

Imagine that – here I am with two college degrees under my belt and I couldn’t even figure out that to get hot water for my shower I needed to turn the knob marked COLD. Sometimes I make a total idiot of myself!!!

Our facilitator met with us for dinner at….you guessed it….TGIFs. It was nice to see a menu in English and to know what our meal was made out of BEFORE taking a bite. Most of all we needed to discuss options and strategies for tomorrow’s court appointment. If all goes well we could be leaving Kiev as early as Monday night or sometime Tuesday for whatever region the orphanage that we select is located. Let’s just hope that all goes well; not that I dislike Kiev – in fact it’s a great city and I’d love to see more of it. But we’re here on a mission and our top priority is to stay focused. Besides we’ll be back for our final 2-3 days of paperwork, hopefully with a little girl in tow.

As for today its been a nice, quiet Sunday. After yesterday's experience we needed the down time. More important - tomorrow is going to be a big day and we need to be fresh.

Some of you have emailed me with suggestions on writing a book. I say – why reinvent the wheel? By the end of this whole ordeal I’ll have a HUGE book right here!! ;-)

Talk soon. Bye for now……SCZ