I Wanna Be a Cosmonaut

I wont focus too much on Tuesday as i mainly slept all day due to the Alcohol running though my system…. so i will call that a write off as far as my adventure goes

Today is Wednesday the 9th and it is another great day in the city of Kiev!

I seem to be slipping into the realm of holiday mode and I’m getting up later and later.

I started my new book last night by Michale Connelly – Two Kinds of Truth. I made the mistake of starting the first chapter in the common room at about 10PM…i swear i only read one chapter but i some how managed to get lost in pages of a captivating story and by the time i looked at my watch it was 2.33AM and i was on chapter 15….. this is not going to be ideal for waking up tomorrow

It’s 10.30AM and i have put a load of washing on and made my way to the courtyard, Rory was sitting in the corner looking rather guilty so i asked him whats up and he has had some inter dorm room politics take place with some residents that are staying here and he didn’t realise they were friends… and you can probably guess what has happened…. i laughed and said the only thing that will fix the guilt is a good honest breakfast.

Rory knows a place round the corner called Puzata Hata, it is a chain of fast food restaurants that are throughout Ukraine, its not burgers or fries , its an eastern style block canteen where you grab a tray and walk along the rows of food and the chefs dish up for you what you want

The food is of local cuisine and exceptionally cheap, you could get 7-8 dishes of food and it would not only feed an army but cost you about 10NZD… CHEAP!

We sat there and ate, talking about the city around us having a laugh at the occasional thing, however Rory seemed to be genuinely upset about his debacle. We finished the meal and made our way back to the square and then up-to the hostel.

I sat back down in the courtyard and got talking to a Dutch guy who was here for 2 weeks on summer brake, he was off to the cosmonaut Museum, i asked if i could tag along as the USSR had one of the most advanced space programs during the 1950s-60s during that time there technology was actually more advanced than the USA in the space race

It was about a 55 minute walk to the Museum/planetarium…. it was only a 3 stop ride on the Local underground, I hadn’t taken a Subway yet in Kiev so we opted for that its a very primitive system… you buy a token which costs about 10 Hryvnia….about 20 Cents NZ an that gives you one ride… in that ride you can use as many lines and as many trains as you want… at soon as you leave the station you have to buy another token to get back into the subway… quite good really… makes it cost effective, the trains are old Russia trains and are very overcrowded, noisy and muggy… Lucky for us it was only 3 stops so it was all over within about 5 minutes… achievement unlocked!

When we arrived at the planetarium and got inside we suddenly realised that Lena at the front Counter might have miss interpreted what we were actually looking for ….. turns out our Museum was 134Km West at a completely different town!…. good one Lena!

No harm done so we decided to take a walk back to the hostel in the peak sun , we walked past the main centre and as we got to the old part of the city we walked into the local gardens and decided to go to the National History Museum …..its not a big museum however the soviets tended to split up there archives so you will have a Museum for Technology, art, genetics …. and so on.. you get the picture.

The Museum had an amazing selection of old bank notes dating back to the early 1900s, one display that was quite Captivating to look at, it was suspended in the staircase linking the floors and it was a whole bunch of suspended Mortar shells ripped apart and re constructed, as you looked at it you tried to imagine what the original product would have looked like… before it had destroyed a city building.

The top floor was based around the Ukrainian uprising against the USSR and the was photo of the civil war that took place in the early 90’s the main town square was a stomping ground of Angry Ukrainians at war with the local government bodies displaying the disgust towards ever being part of the Soviet Union… empowering imagery

I had to leave Gerald at the desk with the nice lady in the Cloke room, they are very nervous about back packs in Museums over here for some reason… anyways I was fine with this, i put my deadlock on my zips and handed it over willingly.

We finished wandering around the Museum trying to decipher the Russia and Ukrainian descriptions with not much luck… i felt like 3 year old trying to read…. so i just looked at the pictures and was happy with that.

We wandered back down the the hostel as it was time for lunch, i had a traditional Soup called Borscht, this is a soup made from Beets, Cabbage, Potato’s, Carrots, Onions, Garlic and Dill.

It has an amazing sweet, sour tangy flavour and was demolished rather quickly i washed this all down with the $1 Beer

After my late lunch of 3 PM i sat back down and got chatting to Luke from England , he is mid 30’s and lived in the area as a tour guide for 14 months about a year ago, he was back just to reacquaint him self with the area and to keep his language skills up, he has the identical laugh to Ricky Gervais so when you sit there and have a conversation, every time he laughs you feel like talking directly to the comedy legend himself

About 45 minutes later a few of the other residents came over and we laughed and talked about all the things boys talk about when alone with alcohol…Ukrainian genetics came up a few times as we still cant understand how the women here look how they do… it mathematically does not make sense at all.

The sun was beginning to set and we decided that this was appropriate to wander off and find some food, everyone opted for Puzata Hata as it was close, cheap and never fails to disappoint in food quality, some how dinner conversation changed from women to Brexit and Luke gave us the full Londoner’s inside guide to why, how, when and the motivating factors behind the exit of Britain from the EU… it wont directly effect New Zealand travellers but it will for EU countries.

Luke then took us for a quick walking tour of the area and showed us a few bars that he used to go to and also where he used to live his monthly income was 12000 Hryvnia … about 380 euros a month to live and his rent was abut 2500 Hryvnia… so living costs are here in relevance to income within reason… but he said the flat was one step above a Chernobyl flat ….

It’s coming to the end of the day and tomorrow we ship out to Odessa which is a seaside town… apparently full of fat Russians and party Goers, so should be good!

“I never wanted to be Famous, I only wanted to be great” – Ray Charles

Kiev City in about 500AD