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We arrived in Ukraine safely, with the strikes not affectting us at all. Indeed, the passage through Gatwick was surprisingly smooth and a testament to the excellent system they have there. Aside from Gatwick Airport Taxis cancelling my cab to get us to the airport without telling me, all went well.
We found our apartment in Kyiv easily enough, as well as a free wifi connection. It's basic but excellent value for money. The key code system is rather bizarre though as you have to press all buttons at once rather than methodically. The flat is in a typical three story Soviet building which is common out here.
Today we had planned to go to Chernobyl but sadly the trip had to be cancelled on police advice. Consequently we spent most of today trying to find the offices of the travel agency to get our money back. The Ukrainians don't seem to do street signs so it was a struggle. We have also hit some sort of monsoon as it has been raining all day. We got absolutely soaked traipsing about. Anyway, we eventually found the company in a Soviet warehouse in the outskirts of town. We got there on the antequated metro - again typical of anywhere in Eastern Europe - and had a nice chat with the company owner on this flooded testament to Soviet design. Nice! We got soaked to the bone though and had stray dogs barking at us on the way back to our apartment. I was scared and walked around them but Wolfie walked straight through. We have also seen a lot of poor old women selling berries on street corners.
Last night the taxi from the airport deposited us outside the local Marks & Spencer whilst the first two things insae upon arriving in Kyiv were a Vodafone advert and a McDonald's sign proclaiming "Welcome to Ukraine". Sometimes globalisation sucks. There is a lot of poor pop music too but some of the local stuff is quite good - and as the music channels display lyrics at the bottom of the screen, it's helping me with my Ukrainian pronunciation too!
Learning Ukrainian and particularly the Cyrillic alphabet, had proven to be a positive despite my inability to say much. Still we have gotten by without flailing and even managed to buy bread, cheese and meat from a local delicatessen. The meat translated as "sturdy hospital sausage" but it was tasty nonetheless. Excellent indeed. Aside from this, we have tried borshch (beetroot soup), Hirov pork (pork cooked in sour cream with tomatoes), meat dumplings with sour cream and a chicken Kiev in Kiev. They are like Zeppelins with fresh garlic and parsley here rather than the cowpats in the UK. We also tried the saltiest bar snacks ever - deep fried toast soldiers coated in paprika. Our other bar snack was like eggs benedict but the egg was in the middle of the plate surrounded by toast. As well as this, we have also tried a lot of beer, which I will detail in a special Ukrainian themed beer tasting notes shortly.
We found our apartment in Kyiv easily enough, as well as a free wifi connection. It's basic but excellent value for money. The key code system is rather bizarre though as you have to press all buttons at once rather than methodically. The flat is in a typical three story Soviet building which is common out here.
Today we had planned to go to Chernobyl but sadly the trip had to be cancelled on police advice. Consequently we spent most of today trying to find the offices of the travel agency to get our money back. The Ukrainians don't seem to do street signs so it was a struggle. We have also hit some sort of monsoon as it has been raining all day. We got absolutely soaked traipsing about. Anyway, we eventually found the company in a Soviet warehouse in the outskirts of town. We got there on the antequated metro - again typical of anywhere in Eastern Europe - and had a nice chat with the company owner on this flooded testament to Soviet design. Nice! We got soaked to the bone though and had stray dogs barking at us on the way back to our apartment. I was scared and walked around them but Wolfie walked straight through. We have also seen a lot of poor old women selling berries on street corners.
Last night the taxi from the airport deposited us outside the local Marks & Spencer whilst the first two things insae upon arriving in Kyiv were a Vodafone advert and a McDonald's sign proclaiming "Welcome to Ukraine". Sometimes globalisation sucks. There is a lot of poor pop music too but some of the local stuff is quite good - and as the music channels display lyrics at the bottom of the screen, it's helping me with my Ukrainian pronunciation too!
Learning Ukrainian and particularly the Cyrillic alphabet, had proven to be a positive despite my inability to say much. Still we have gotten by without flailing and even managed to buy bread, cheese and meat from a local delicatessen. The meat translated as "sturdy hospital sausage" but it was tasty nonetheless. Excellent indeed. Aside from this, we have tried borshch (beetroot soup), Hirov pork (pork cooked in sour cream with tomatoes), meat dumplings with sour cream and a chicken Kiev in Kiev. They are like Zeppelins with fresh garlic and parsley here rather than the cowpats in the UK. We also tried the saltiest bar snacks ever - deep fried toast soldiers coated in paprika. Our other bar snack was like eggs benedict but the egg was in the middle of the plate surrounded by toast. As well as this, we have also tried a lot of beer, which I will detail in a special Ukrainian themed beer tasting notes shortly.
