House of the Chimeras
Independence Square
St. Andrew's
St. Sophia's
St. Michael's
St. Nicholas Cathedral (where we went to church)
The Lavra
EPIC
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
С Рождеством Христовым и Новым Годом
So last time we talked I was about to embark on a trip to Kiev to pick up my brother and sister. ONWARD!
My 15 hour train ride to Kiev was fine, and I arrived at 7:43 in the morning on the 21st of December. Nick and Jess weren't going to arrive until 4:50 that afternoon so I had some time to kill in the city. I took the metro into the city center where I found a place with wifi to check on airport delays. There were none so I explored the city and got something to eat until it was time to head to the airport. I arrived at the airport just as their flight was coming in, but after an hour of waiting for them to come through the doors I was starting to get nervous. Eventually, Nick found me and said ", what are you doing here?" It turns out that since I arrived in Kiev in September, a new international terminal was constructed across the parking lot. How was I supposed to know about it, Google maps didn't show that it even existed! Anyway we headed into Kiev and caught out train a few hours later to L'viv. We arrived the next morning (22) and walked to the Hostel. Once we arrived we were shown to our room (after waking up the attendant). We immediately showered since we all hadn't for almost three days, and after that we got something to eat. We climbed the city hall tower (again), and walked around the city for a little before we got something else to eat (i think). We did a lot of eating, so if I don't remember what it was that we did, i'll just say that we got something to eat.
On the second day we took a tour that was very informative. Jess took pictures of everything and was generally insufferable, but I made it through. After the tour we ate. Early the next morning we took a cab (their only cab experience, thank God it was a good one...)to the train station, and about 6 1/2 hours later we were in Kiev again. We headed to the Hostel, that we were staying at up town, on the metro. I had gone there once before, but unfortunately this time I went out the wrong exit at the metro station and was lost right away. Nick started to get huffy, mainly because he and Jess over packed. After about 15-20 painless minutes we found the Hostel and were soon out the door again to eat. I really like eating. That night Jess and Nick began feeding their addiction. You see, when we were in L'viv we all tried Ukrainian hot chocolate. It basically tastes like your drinking melted chocolate bars, probably because that's what it is. Their addiction got so bad that we would just randomly stop at Coffee House, the Ukrainian Starbuck's, and get hot chocolate. Anyway, the next day was Christmas. We took a tour of Kiev at 12 in which the guide kept trying to convince me that I was going to find my future wife in Ukraine. I even rubbed a bronze cats tail to make it come true. The tour was really good, which made Jess slightly more bearable. We ate and then went to church where I had a typical Ukrainian public bathroom experience that was saved by a Christmas Miracle! After church we ate Christmas dinner ie pizza.
The next day we went to the Kievo-Pechersky Lavra, or crazy big monastery thingy, and the Great Patriotic War Memorial, or epic Soviet thingy. Jess had to use a squaty-potty that day, which she completely blamed on me for some reason.
On the 27th Nick and Jess left after we did a little souvenir shopping. It was sad, but I had a 15 hour train ride to cheer me up. This is really long, and I didn't even get to talk about new years... New Years: drinking, dancing, eating, laughing, avoiding dancing, falling asleep...
COMMENT!
My 15 hour train ride to Kiev was fine, and I arrived at 7:43 in the morning on the 21st of December. Nick and Jess weren't going to arrive until 4:50 that afternoon so I had some time to kill in the city. I took the metro into the city center where I found a place with wifi to check on airport delays. There were none so I explored the city and got something to eat until it was time to head to the airport. I arrived at the airport just as their flight was coming in, but after an hour of waiting for them to come through the doors I was starting to get nervous. Eventually, Nick found me and said ", what are you doing here?" It turns out that since I arrived in Kiev in September, a new international terminal was constructed across the parking lot. How was I supposed to know about it, Google maps didn't show that it even existed! Anyway we headed into Kiev and caught out train a few hours later to L'viv. We arrived the next morning (22) and walked to the Hostel. Once we arrived we were shown to our room (after waking up the attendant). We immediately showered since we all hadn't for almost three days, and after that we got something to eat. We climbed the city hall tower (again), and walked around the city for a little before we got something else to eat (i think). We did a lot of eating, so if I don't remember what it was that we did, i'll just say that we got something to eat.
On the second day we took a tour that was very informative. Jess took pictures of everything and was generally insufferable, but I made it through. After the tour we ate. Early the next morning we took a cab (their only cab experience, thank God it was a good one...)to the train station, and about 6 1/2 hours later we were in Kiev again. We headed to the Hostel, that we were staying at up town, on the metro. I had gone there once before, but unfortunately this time I went out the wrong exit at the metro station and was lost right away. Nick started to get huffy, mainly because he and Jess over packed. After about 15-20 painless minutes we found the Hostel and were soon out the door again to eat. I really like eating. That night Jess and Nick began feeding their addiction. You see, when we were in L'viv we all tried Ukrainian hot chocolate. It basically tastes like your drinking melted chocolate bars, probably because that's what it is. Their addiction got so bad that we would just randomly stop at Coffee House, the Ukrainian Starbuck's, and get hot chocolate. Anyway, the next day was Christmas. We took a tour of Kiev at 12 in which the guide kept trying to convince me that I was going to find my future wife in Ukraine. I even rubbed a bronze cats tail to make it come true. The tour was really good, which made Jess slightly more bearable. We ate and then went to church where I had a typical Ukrainian public bathroom experience that was saved by a Christmas Miracle! After church we ate Christmas dinner ie pizza.
The next day we went to the Kievo-Pechersky Lavra, or crazy big monastery thingy, and the Great Patriotic War Memorial, or epic Soviet thingy. Jess had to use a squaty-potty that day, which she completely blamed on me for some reason.
On the 27th Nick and Jess left after we did a little souvenir shopping. It was sad, but I had a 15 hour train ride to cheer me up. This is really long, and I didn't even get to talk about new years... New Years: drinking, dancing, eating, laughing, avoiding dancing, falling asleep...
COMMENT!
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