The Road Less Traveled

After I had breakfast and got ready, I headed out again towards Maidan. Knowing where I was going this time, I crossed the street in a crosswalk and was stunned when cars actually STOPPED to let me pass. This experience was unimaginable in Ukraine a few years ago.

I got on a bus that was only 2 gryvnias instead of 2.50; it seemed older, made more stops, and went down a different street. But I got there just the same. As I walked to the Post Office, I saw tables with gifts and souvenirs on display. I saw multiple copies of Ukrainian poet Taras Shevchenko’s “Kobzar”, something I probably wouldn’t have noticed if I hadn’t had that class on Ukrainian literature at Penn. I also saw souvenirs similar to ones I had seen in Philadelphia that I thought somehow had been “American”, like t-shirts and car stickers that said “Ukraine” on them. I also saw some anti-Russian sentiment: Several shirts and mugs said “Thank God I’m not Russian” (….тобі боже, я не москаль).

One stand was run by a man selling stamps. Two of my very good friends in Pennsylvania are stamp collectors and sellers so I started looking for things to buy. I asked if he had anything particular to the post office or stamp collecting. He covered up his table with plastic sheeting and walked with me inside the post office and sat me down with a book of stamps. He recommended one which I ended up choosing, but I decided to flip through the book anyway to see if there were other options. In that moment of looking through those books, I felt transported to my friend’s house; it was as though I had met their Ukrainian alter ego. I was so happy that it didn’t even bother me when, after I handed him a big bill, he said he didn’t have enough change and asked if I would by something more. (I added a stamped envelope to my collection).

I went upstairs to the internet cafe of the post office. The price had gone up since I remember to 12 gryvnias for one hour (about $1.50), but it worked fantastically. In fact, I think I uploaded my pictures to Facebook faster here than at home!

After emailing I was hungry, so I walked back to Krim (Crimea), a semi-outdoor cafe (it was covered on the top but not the sides). The manti (Turkish dumplings) were extremely tempting, but instead I was a good girl and ordered shopa, which turned out to be chicken soup with potato, carrots, dill, and a cube of meat. I also had a cappuccino that was smaller than an American cappuccino but still very good. The best part I think were the two pieces of black bread (Ukrainian rye bread).

St. Sophia Cathedral

I walked up the hill and paid the 2 gryvnias (25 U.S. cents) to enter the cathedral. I was stunned when the clerk handed me a computer printout with a barcode, which a guard scanned so I could enter the turnstile. That seemed fairly cheap, and I soon learned why—each building inside the cathedral has its own admission. I decided skip a few of the buildings, but something about the “khlibnja” (bakery) caught my eye. No, it wasn’t the donuts; it is a former bakery for the monastery that is now an art museum. There was an exhibit on the 75th anniversary of the restoration of the cathedral, paintings of the cathedral, and an exhibit in honor of Mother’s Day of a woman’s paintings of flowers.

I left the khlibnja and walked around the grounds. As I neared the other end of the complex, I saw through the trees a HYATT hotel! I had heard that Radisson had a hotel somewhere, but I couldn’t imagine that an ancient site as St. Sophia would now look out on such a modern building.

I left the cathedral, crossed the street, and browsed the hotel. It was so luxurious there, I even contemplated getting a massage at the spa. But I looked at the price list and realized I wasn’t willing to spend hundreds or thousands of gryvnias on that. Even a simple manicure was around $30.

I gently exited the hotel and stopped at a cafe between St. Andrews and St. Michael’s. I was staring at the buterbrod (butterbread, meat or cheese on a single piece of bread) contemplating what to order. The waitress asked what I wanted. I suddenly got tongue tied trying to explain that I was trying to decide which buterbrod I wanted. This waitress suddenly started speaking in English! “We have hot dishes, meat, potatoes”. I couldn’t cope with it and started speaking in Russian again. The second staff worker also said something in English, though I can’t remember what she said. Once I ordered, I said in Russian, “I’m sorry, you speak English well, I’m just not used to hearing English in Kyiv” (извините, вы говорите хорошо по-англиский, просто я не привикла слухать англиский язык в киеве.) She responded (in Russian), “I don’t speak English!”

After eating one buterbrod with salmon and lemon and another one with cheese, cucumber, and tomato, and drinking a rather sweet tasting green tea (probably the cup was pre-filled with sugar), I walked on to what I thought was St. Andrews and St. Michael’s cathedral together. I soon learned that the light blue building was the bell tower of St. Michael’s and the periwinkle building is the actual cathedral. I walked through the arch of the bell tower, and to the left there was a museum. At first I wasn’t interested and even the 8 gryvnia (1 dollar) price didn’t entice me. But I caught a glimpse of exposed brick and a diorama and got curious.

At the cashier’s desk, I met a man from Kingston, Ontario whose mother was Ukrainian; he was visiting the country for the first time and didn’t speak the language. He decided to skip the museum even though the cashier said (in English) there was English “explication”. He only had a week to spend in the country so I can’t really blame him.

The museum got really interesting on the second floor. In an area with walls painted red as part of the exhibit on the communist era, I saw a quote from Lenin only in Russian. I could understand he was talking about the church, but I couldn’t tell if he was supporting or condemning the churches. I knew the Soviet Union was pretty much atheist, but I wasn’t sure if that began with Lenin or Stalin. In Russian, I told the woman who was sitting guard duty that my Russian isn’t very good, and wondered if Lenin was for or against the church.

Suddenly, the guard was transformed before my eyes from a mindless drone to a history professor. She not only answered my question, she pointed out the key words in the passage that indicate Lenin wanted to get rid of the church. She then led me and another visitor into the next room and explained the pictures on the walls. Until now, I had thought the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was an impressive if austere building. Once I learned through her description that it had been built over the original monastery which was destroyed by the Soviets, it became hideous to me.

The guard continued, pointing out the photos of the rebuilding of the cathedral and bell tower, and pictures of the reopening ceremony in 1997 with then-president Kuchma and famous Ukrainian boxer Valeriy Klitschko. Last, she described the bell tower. I understood there were 50 bells and a carillion, then it got fuzzy for me. It seemed the bells were out of service. She also said something about computer controls of the bells (or that a computerized version was being played)? Whatever she said it sounded fascinating.

I thanked her and walked up the steep, attic-like steps to the bell tower and admired the view of the city below and the bells above. I came back down the steep steps and finished my tour of the grounds. 8 gryvnias well spent indeed.

I was about ready for a nap, so I started walking back to the apartment. On Artema I saw a cafe named after Pink Floyd’s “The Wall”, complete with a picture of a pupil. Next to the cafe was the Pink Floyd the Wall grocery store (produkti), so I went in and found a modest selection of prepared foods. The mayonnaise-based salads looked old, but the chicken thigh and cabbage salad looked safe. I took them and some provisions for the road to Dnipropetrovsk. I took a short nap, ate dinner, took another short nap, and packed while watching “House” overdubbed in Ukrainian.

Olena, the landlady, came at 9 p.m. as we agreed and she called a taxi to the train station for me. While waiting for the taxi, we chatted in Russian. I found out she has been living in Kyiv for 30 years (moved there from a small town/village outside of Kyiv), has two grown sons, and grandchildren (2 grandkids, or a kid who is 2 years old, I’m not sure).

At one point, Olena asked if I spoke Ukrainian. I said unfortunately no, and then told my story about living first in Kharkiv and being told to study Russian there. She said not to worry, she only speaks a few words of English. I said I’m a student of linguistics and language policy, so I know how important language is. I then asked if she spoke Ukrainian at home (something I suspected given her childhood home and question). She said it depends on who she speaks with. If they “advertise” (?) Russian, she speaks Russian; if they advertise Ukrainian, she speaks Ukrainian. I had to probe further—what about her family? She said Ukrainian. I said, only Ukrainian? She said yes. It fascinates me that even at home, language use is fluid and negotiated, and that in this case home (в дома) didn’t immediately refer to family.

When the taxi came, Olena helped me get my bags down the stairs. I got in the front seat and PUT ON MY SEATBELT. Not only was it there and working, it had a little pad on it, and the driver didn’t wave his arm at me and say, “you don’t need that.” Another point in the huge change column for Ukraine. (I heard later from a student and teachers in Dnipropetrovsk that fines for not wearing seat belts are very high these days, but still many Ukrainians don’t like to wear seat belts. In fact, the Honda Civic this student drives came with a plastic insert to block the seat belt lock! On the other hand, when she said her father still hates seat belts, I had to admit my father hates them too.)

At the train station I decided to get some ice cream and sit for a while. But then I found a new Ukrainian restaurant below the pizzeria Celentano called Drova. They had blini with cheese (tvorog) and sour cream (Smetana). That was better than ice cream!

I got on the train, which seemed like it had had a fresh coat of paint inside (and not in a bad, smelly way but in a freshened up way). I walked in the cupe compartment (4-bed sleeper), and there were already sheets and a towel. I asked the girl sharing the compartment if I still had to rent the sheets; she looked at my ticket and said it was included! Looking back on this moment, I think it is one of many examples of Ukraine’s efforts to be tourist-friendly for the Euro Cup coming to Ukraine in 2012. I curled up under these pre-paid sheets and hoped the rhythm of the train would rock me to sleep.