Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Exploring Kyiv

We spent the day exploring St. Andrew's Street and Old Town. I made a list in the morning of places to see in Old Town and then left my guide book at home. We found several churches and took many pictures. Unfortunately none of the churches we found were the churches in the tourbook. Nonetheless the day was not a waste. Old Town is quite charming (I seem to say that a lot) and we will take the Funacular down to Podil and pickup where we left off. I recommend picking up a couple of the travel guides while in the States. The two lent to us are quite different and together make for some good reference information.

Our translator is weaving her magic. There is nothing transparent here. You have to trust your translator and we do. We are still here and have not been sent home and we are still hoping and chosing to be optimistic that the SDA will looking kindly upon us and give us a second appointment.

The bread here is devine. Several of the loaves we have purchased have had seeds on top of them with such a distinctive taste. I cannot place them and may not have had them before. Please leave a comment if you know what they are.

It began to snow quite heavily this afternoon on our return home. We found a back way to our apartment along the hilltop overlooking Old Town and we then cut through the walkway at Pocrofvski Church and the woman's monestary. I hope I am spelling that correctly as I have not seen the church noted in any reference material and it is just a delightful place to stroll. It must be beautiful in the Spring and Summer when the rose gardens and vegetable gardens are in their glory. Aiden was a real trooper on our 3-4 hour walk today. He became whiny toward the end, but we found some baby stroller tracks, and tracks are the end all for Aiden. He walked the tracks to see where they led us, which was right back to our apartment.

2 comments:

Christie M said...

Have you tried the underground train?
(metro) There is alot to see underground.


The seeds to talk about, could they be anise? (licorice flavor)

We LOVED being in Kharkiv and Kiev.
I'm glad you are making the best of seeing the city. There is so much rich history there.

There is also a great place to eat.
Ukrainian Country Buffet. It is located just behind the main street
in down town. (the one where there is a McDonalds and next to the McDonalds is 3 arches with steps.
go up the steps and there is a restaurant. They serve everything
Ukrainian and even bake pizza.
We ate until we were stuffed for the equilavent of 8 us dollars.

rachel said...

hi,
i just read your last 2 posts.
hang in there!!!
i am wishing the very best referral for your family.

best regards,
rachel