Tuesday 5/15/2007

When we posted Tuesday morning, we were planning on being in downtown Kiev for only a short time. We wanted to purchase a Ukrainian cell phone, replace our electricity converter that only lasted halfway through Monday night, and pick up a few groceries. Our short trip ended up being a trip full of sightseeing and speed walking! Our translator, Svetlana (Svieta for short) asked us if we would like to see a few of the sights in Kiev after we left the internet café. We were excited to see a little more of the country so we quickly agreed. Downtown Ukraine is very similar to San Francisco in its topography…lots and lots of steep hills. After an hour of walking, Svetlana called Sasha (our facilitator) to check in with him and found out that he was in downtown Kiev with Mark and Christine so we agreed to meet up with them for lunch. We had lunch in a pizzeria that had a menu in Ukrainian, Russian, and English. The pizzas were similar to pizzas you would order at California Pizza Kitchen although some of the toppings were more unusual (Mark and Christine’s pizza had kidney beans on it!) After lunch, we strolled through the underground mall. It was a very nice mall with some upscale stores. While walking through the mall, we saw a man carrying a monkey dressed like a child. It was quite a sight to behold!!! From the mall, we decided to visit some of the churches. We visited St. Sofia’s Cathedral, the oldest church in Kiev which was built a thousand years ago! It has a large bell tower which until recently had been closed. The reason the bell tower was closed was because from the top of it, you could see into the courtyard of the KGB headquarters in Kiev. They regularly executed people in the courtyard and did not want that to be public knowledge. We thoroughly enjoyed our tour and Sasha and Svetlana were a wealth of information on the history of Ukraine. Although we were gone from our apartment for over 8 hours (instead of the 2 we had planned on), it was a very enjoyable day. The people here are very friendly and the city is rich with history! When we got home, we ate the delicious soup that Sasha had brought to us. It was full of veggies and tasted wonderful! I picked up some crackers on the way home and it was “soup”er!