Things I love about Ukraine.... and things I love less

1.       The appreciation shown for extremely random and therefore excellent music. I’m not even talking just about my beloved Eastern European pop (exhibit one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBdCSFm-G0E) but also stuff from much further afield! Today I was delighted to hear my favourite French Canadian singer Coeur de Pirate on the radio: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tL_EdIfr24U 

2.       The abundance of Georgian food. Khachapuri is perhaps my favourite thing in life. Definitely did not eat a whole one after church on Sunday.   

Amazing cheesy goodness.

3.       The general cheapness of living. I shocked my class today when I said that one journey in Zone 1 on the Tube costs £2.10 (26,4 Ukrainian Hryvna) when one tram journey here in Odessa costs 1,5 Hryvna. Sometimes I go crazy and take a bus AND a tram. 

      

      Food is super cheap, and also very tasty. It would be rude (or indeed churlish, as my father would say) not to take advantage of this fact.  Plus, who can say no to cheap Moldovan wine...

4.       Crazy but awesome students. Some of them are too cute for words, some make entirely unintentional hilarious comments, some bring champagne to class (win) and SOME of them even seem to be genuinely interested in English! Shock horror. They give me the confidence to look ridiculous (dance moves should always form part of an English lesson surely) and not give a damn.... for this I will be forever grateful. 

5.       The people I have been blessed enough to meet. At school, at church, on the tram, in cafés, on the street- people are great! Particular mention must go to Erinn who is my companion on the foodie tour of Odessa. You are insane.  

      When I left church on Sunday I felt about as joyful as I can remember feeling in a long time. Before I started going to church I used to think this whole idea of a ‘Church family’ was a ridiculous lie. How wrong can you get? I literally wanted to dance down the street.

Coming from a church as big as Hillsong Paris, I was a little apprehensive about what a much smaller church would be like. Oh my. So much love for the people there. And adorable letters.  

And awesome worship in 3 languages (English, Russian and Ukrainian)- what’s not to love?

6.       Snatches of beauty 

7.       Not being presumed foreign. I like the fact that people ask me for directions etc on the street. Of course their illusion is soon shattered when I respond with what could be translated as “I so sorry, I no speak good Russian”, but I like the idea nonetheless.

Things I like less:

1.       Pavement/ lack of it. Never again will I complain about potholes or the state of the pavement in the UK. When we had rain here there was just mud... everywhere. Where did it even come from?

2.       People who check receipts at the exits of supermarkets. Why? This would possibly be okay, except sometimes they don’t want to see your receipt and get annoyed if you show it to them. How are we supposed to know?!

3.       People spitting on the street. Ewww.

However, you can be made to feel better about almost any problem with the help of a (very reasonably priced) beer.

All in all, life is good.

We're not in Kansas anymore...

One weekend when I was sitting at Heathrow to fly back to Paris, I received a phone call from my Dad. He offered to come with me to Ukraine so that I could “have some company” on the journey to my new home. Any desire that I may have had to come across as brave and independent gave way to massive relief.

Last Tuesday, having met at Heathrow at 6am, we flew in over snowy fields to Kiev in the north of Ukraine. The excessive politeness of the British Airways stewards and freely flowing cups of tea were our last tastes of the UK before being met with swarms of aggressive taxi drivers in the arrivals hall. I was very keen for my Dad to get a good impression of the place, and to understand why I had chosen to come back to Ukraine, which was not particularly helped by the thick layer of grey snow which covered the run-down apartment blocks and the grey fog (you can see that grey is a theme) that hung in the sky on our drive into the centre of the city. Once we had navigated our way through a maze of underground tunnels at the train station to the left luggage, we set off for Майдан Незалежності (wooo get me and my Ukrainian) or Independence Square. The last time I was here we were able to watch the recording of a TV show consisting of huge group dances by teams from various Ukrainian cities. 

Unfortunately this time there were no dancers, but instead a huge Christmas tree and some beautiful lights. 

Even if we did come dangerously close to falling flat on our faces, braving the icy pavements was worth it. Whilst we were in town we also paid a visit to St Michael’s Monastery and the Saint Sophia Cathedral, which Jamie, Mollie, Rhiannon, Penelope and I had loved when we spent a short time in Kiev nearly two years ago. 

Then:

Now: slightly less hyper.

Here is my Dad looking generally cold and somewhat mysterious.

After a great dinner (one of the many plus points to having a parent around) we went back to the station for the overnight train to Odessa on the Black Sea. The cabin was really cute but SO HOT. Like Greece in August has nothing on that cabin. 

But we eventually arrived and met my boss and landlady at my flat which was a welcome surprise; despite being in a, shall we say, ‘aesthetically-challenged’ tower block, it is clean and warm and certainly bigger than the flat I shared in Paris, not to mention less than half the price.

What a view!

Bedroom. I make use of the space by dancing to the very high quality Russian music channels.

I started teaching English on Thursday, which seems to be going okay (touch wood), but my Dad and I had some time to have a wander about until he left on Thursday to go back to Kiev. It was so lovely to share this exciting but frankly bloody terrifying time with him. Big love to Papa. Since then I have enjoyed various drinks outings, a shocking amount of dumpling-based meals and a wonderful church service in a disused factory! Here are some photos and anecdotes from over the last few days:

Here is my church! Seriously :)  it's a disused factory with loads of big rooms that get rented out by different groups, one of which happens to be"Живая Надежда" (Living Hope) Church. It's a bilingual church with some lovely people! This said, perhaps my favourite part of going to church this Sunday was getting shouted at by the fairly drunk security guard (this wasn't the good bit) who was then told to shut up by a passing old lady wearing a magnificent fur hat. Respect. 

For some unknown reason there are no switches for the lights in my corridor, which makes opening the door with multiple keys a slight issue. But no fear, for I am equipped with a torch, and not just any torch, but what appears to be some kind of wind-up vampire penguin.

I don’t have any photos of my students, but they have all been lovely so far. There were lots of questions about whether I have met the Queen (expected) and twice I have been told that I "no look like British woman". Apparently I look like I could be "native American" "Indian" or "Asian" (less expected). Take your pick.

To finish off, here is an enormous crisp.

What left can there be to see, I hear you say.