Odessa

High tech bus right here!

I have to say my first impression of Odessa was not what I pictured in my mind when Auntie Linda said it was her favorite city... The train station itself was very nice. Get past that though, and it looked like we stepped into the ghettos of Detroit. While you could tell that the buildings at one point were very attractive and architecturally pleasing, the result of communism is very evident. (Soviets don't believe in maintenance unless absolutely necessary.) Everything I saw was literally falling apart. As we are driving to A's apartment, we pass through some of the sketchiest places I have seen. The contrast between poor and rich in this city is ridiculous. From the bus I saw a Porsche dealership, and literally the building attached to it was missing chunks and there was graffiti all over it.
The bus comes and I find out that you pay the bus driver when you get off, rather than when you get on. This means that the driver is talking on his cell phone and counting your money as he drives the bus, which happens to be a stick shift. This is all in crazy European traffic where no one follows any rules.

I did want this... 

After breakfast at A's, we head off to this famous 7 km bazaar. It is the strangest market I have ever seen or heard of! Since Odessa is a port city, what basically happens is containers come in off ships from Turkey, Italy, even China, and these containers get moved to this massive outdoor space and "organized" into rows. they then turn the inside of these containers into stores and you walk down huge massive long aisles that are kind of sort of covered with tarp to provide some shade. I saw some gorgeous Italian leather jackets for $250-350, which you would pay at least $700 in a normal store. I could have also bought a real fur bathrobe/winter coat if I so desired... However the main interest is the rows of clothing where they are selling absolutely gorgeous boutique clothing for ridiculously low prices. Most shirts and things were under $20. Pictures can't really show anything because everything is jammed together. I took a video which I may upload later. Definitely one of the most crazy places I have ever been!

Sandals vs boots
Canadian vs Ukrainian
(it was 20C that day)

When our feet were about ready to give out, we took the bus to the beach on the Black Sea. We walked for a minute and watched some wind surfers, but it was much too windy to hang out on the beach so we had sandwiches in this little restaurant on the boardwalk, and we accidentally semi-crashed a wedding. Dinner commenced with another two guests at an Italian restaurant. There I blew said guests' minds that I had bare legs and sandals when they were wearing boots... "Canadians!"

Day two of Odessa began with another delicious breakfast, another brief trip to the 7 km bazaar. We didn't stay long however, as Sunday is the craziest day there, and the amount of traffic was insane. We jumped on a bus heading downtown where I wandered through a mini handcrafted market located next to a Ukrainian Orthodox church. With their celebration of Easter this week (which is a huge deal, like Christmas is for us), there were pussy willows for sale everywhere. I'm not really sure what the deal is with that though. We then stopped in at a very nice (and pricey!) mall and had lunch (which came to $10 for 3 people... so awesome). A became a great tour guide and we wandered around the touristy area of Odessa. Here, there is no sketchiness! It was absolutely gorgeous. It makes me even more excited for the rest of Europe! The opera theatre is so so pretty, one of the highlights for sure!

Opera Theatre

We made our way down the famous steps into the Odessa port - the same steps my great grandparents walked down as they fled Ukraine for Canada. The port is very nice, and extremely busy! A spotted dolphins right beside the dock and said she has never in all her life seen them so close to land. On the way back I had to pay 20 cents for the privilege of using a squat toilet. My least favorite thing about this country!

Fancy fancy! 

Kiev Part I

Famine museum is underneath this
monument - a massive candle
remembering those that died.

How do I summarize Kiev? The first thing I thought when I landed was "Yep, this is Ukraine, looks like we just stepped into the USSR". And then waiting and waiting for my bag - which never showed up. Typical, right? And then I had to go into this little office and fill out tons of paperwork, which they then processed on this machine from the early industrial age...

Anyways, I eventually made it into the main airport area and met Auntie Linda - good thing she caught a glimpse of me though the doors about 30 minutes before or else she probably would have assumed I had been kidnapped or something.

One thing about Kiev is we walked a LOT. We took the metro there, which has 4 lines. In order to get to the metro though, you walk and walk and walk. And after you get off you walk a lot more! The sidewalks are lined with people selling anything from underwear to lettuce. My first ride on the metro conveniently coincided with rush hour... that was fun. One of the stops has the longest elevator - just under 4 minutes long. I took a video in case you don't believe me.

Men playing chess - not really trying too hard to sell that
pork fat. It must sell well enough on its own.

Auntie Linda took me to see the WW2 memorial, and right next to that is the famine museum. Ukraine had 3 periods of government-planned famine during the periods of Lenin and Stalin. We then continued to the downtown touristy area of Kiev, where we saw the square where the Orange Revolution took place, and went to this little food market that has been there for 100 years. All the fruits and things were displayed very nicely, and so was the raw meat laying out on counters with no ice or anything. The most delicious thing I saw there was the slabs of pork fat, which tastes even better than a roast! 

Where the Orange Revolution happened - now there's a
huge monument and a clock on the grass.

I then took my first taxi (scoff) ride to the train station for my first ever night train. First of all, it wasn't even really a taxi. Just some guy commissioned probably to drive us. Then my seat did not have a seat belt, so I was fearing for my life before we even started driving. THEN I got my first taste of European driving - no rules, no lanes, no problems.

View from the Kiev apartment.

Needless to say - my first night train (and my first train period) resulted in no sleep. At least we arrived without derailing!

I will try to take more photos of real life Kiev when I go back this week.