Elevators

We live on the 14th floor. Whenever we tell people this inevitably we get asked if there is an Elevator.
There are two: one small one and one for moving large objects.
Last year, they normally had the freight elevator turned off, except at the busy periods when people were coming home from work. This year, however, it has been working steady.

This summer, coming home from our travels - we greeted the doorman (Jolly - who was very happy to have us back) and then proceeded to the lift. We pushed the button for the floor - the doors closed but nothing happened - that's not unusual so I pushed the button again. The lights went out and we were STUCK in our freight elevator.
After awhile of banging - Jolly came running - but neither he nor we could get the door to budge - so the repair man was called. We did have some light - from our cell phones (which didn't work though they proclaimed "emergency use only" who are you supposed to call when you get stuck in an Elevator?)
More unusual was that after about 15 minutes the lights went on and the door opened - all by itself and without a repairman. We quickly hustled out and crammed ourselves and our suitcases into the smaller lift.
Since then, I've ridden in the freight elevator a couple of times and it seems to be working.

A new addition

Since spring - well probably at least since the mouse episode, I've been wanting a furry animal. Initially a cat (see mouse) - but then it metamorphosed into a bunny rabbit. I spent hours (okay days) obsessing and searching out bunny information on the internet - how to care for them, the types, etc. I even visited various pet stores to look at bunnies and did a cost/benefit analysis of Rabbit to Cat ownership.



I'm sure I drove Alister insane because every other day I would change my mind - we should get a cat - and then - We should get a bunny. And though I kept my eyes pealed - no homeless kittens appeared on the street so there wasn't a ready excuse. Alister was great, and since a bunny wasn't a dog, was really willing to get either as long as it was okay with the landlord.



After our string of summer adventures - I was in bed sick - a combination of dehydration, exhaustion, and I think food poisoning - but Alister isn't convinced. After laying in bed for 24 hours - I decided a rabbit was just too high maintenance - we were getting a cat (Alister was secretly relieved).



Still no kittens materialized on the streets - but a friend of ours sent us a link to a craigslist type website and we found our cat.



Haggai (pronounced in Sarah colloquial as Haggy-eye (ps - we had picked this name for a future cat ages ago when we were still dating - even then Alister liked to make fun of my (mis)pronunciations) was free, already litter trained, and seems like a good fit for us (playful - but not violent, affectionate - but not needy, independent - but not solitary). In other words - he fits Alister's criteria of being small and cute and mine of being furry and quiet. We are very pleased with our new addition.

Dirt, Manure, Wattle and Daub

So - I didn't really think there were any terrifically interesting pictures of Crimea to post - so we're skipping that and moving on to the Dacha Remont project in pictures. (click to enlarge)

This shows the process - from the state of the wall before -

to the making of the daub - you can see I'm up to my knees in it at one point -

and then the satisfaction of one daubed portion of wall.

Along the way we were helped by Natasha (pink shirt)

Pete - Blue shirt, brown hair

And Iura (blue shirt leaning over Alister at the wall).

We normally had a BBQ each day afterwards and I had promised Pete a Lemon Merengue pie for his Birthday and so it finally materialized during our work as well.

Picture insert - pt 5

Click on the picture to enlarge.
From top left and top to bottom:
Saftey poster from abandond school in Priput
Monument to the firefighters in Chernobyl town
Geiger counters - the difference between the air and the ground
Jeff going through the Radiation level detector - we all passed
Model of the damage inside reactor 4
Reactor four from the outside (one with monument)
Pictures of soviet leaders and heros - left behind in Priput
Ferris wheel at Priput

Picture insert - pt 4

Click on the picture to enlarge it

Picture insert - pt 3

Click on the picture to enlarge it.

Picture insert - pt 2

Click on the photo to enlarge it.

Picture Insert - pt 1

So we have a huge number of pics - and we are still trying to sort them out - but as promised here are a few.

WARSAW

Above - WillaNov



Bottom 2 - Warsaw, old town. Now a world heritage site, Warsaw and its old town was completely destroyed in WWII







Lazy

The Baltic coast

Alister and BJ's Small group - talent night

Singing inside on a rainy day during free time

Sarah with her two "wards" - Wiktor and Bartush (Wiktor apparently started using a few Russian words during the week after the camp - poor kid, I probably totally messed up his linguistic development)

A summer series - pt 9

Last one - and then pictures - really (Alister's been downloading and editing them all day) :-)

After all our hard work at the hut - we needed a break - and where do Ukrainians go for a break? Crimea! - Where? Ok. Black Sea. Think Yalta conference - Stalin, FDR, and Churchill? Subtropical Ukrainian peninsula with semi-autonomy and which is claimed as part of Russia every year by the Moscow Mayor? Oh - that Crimea.

It's not a surprise that you might not have heard of it or thought it to be a booming tourist destination- while it is one of the most popular tourist destinations for Russians and Ukrainians - it would be incredibly hard to get around if you weren't in possession of a fantastic guidebook or if you didn't speak the language. Everything is in Russian. While everyone is very friendly and helpful - without the language I don't know where we would be - we ran into one tourist who was trying to find out where to catch his bus - he seemed to be having a great time but he was totally lost - he had come into the city on one of the last buses in - not knowing how that the buses stop at 10pm and not knowing his address or the way back to house so a taxi and walking were probably also out. We couldn't help.

Finding a place to stay - We stepped off the 1 hour 40 minute trolley bus ride (don't do it - take a marshrutka) and before you could say "I think that woman might have rooms" - we were SWARMED by laterally 17 women all offering us accommodation - needless to say with that type of press - its hard to make a good decision - we picked the wrong babushka - the 10 minute walk to the beach was a 15 minute bus ride on a bus that left every half hour - the warm water was in someone elses room, and the "domik" - little house - was a one room in a 4 roomed wall of shacks that made our mud hut look heavenly (ok - the shack did have electricity - a light and a refrigerator - it wasn't the worst place I've stayed - but it did teach us that we need to come up with a better strategy to deal with swarming babushkas - namely if the price is that much cheaper than people who seem to be offering less - there has to be a reason).

We were there three nights and overall it was a good introductory trip to Crimea - we learned where not to go and what not to do and also spotted some places to go "next time". We did see the White Castle where the "3" met to decide the future of the world and precede the role of the UN, we saw a somewhat overly re-modeled castle - the Swallows' nest perched on a hill above a pristine bay that was unfortunately a private beach for a hotel so we couldn't swim - we explored Yalta - tried some Crimean wines (mostly all sweet), but the best highlight was a one day excursion on a passenger boat to Novi Svet (New World), and Sudok (where there is a castle fort on the hill overlooking the beach). The two hours free time at both of these places was way too short - but the boat ride - on the way there for all of us was also part of the wonderful atmosphere - we saw three pods of dolphins. It was great. There were two that followed the boat for quite a ways - jumping in unison as they rushed to keep up with us. On the way home - the careful observer could also see a few dolphins - but for the most part they were sleeping (thanks Hawaii snorkel guide for telling me about dolphin habits) and so you had to watch for their dorsal fins and the occasional mist of spray as they rested at the surface of the water. I did however get to see one - I had moved to the brow of the boat and just looked down and there was a dolphin - right there! He made a couple of jumps and was quickly left behind - but he was the closest one I got to see - it was fantastic.

A summer Series - pt 8

Chernobyl'
We took a break from our hut work to visit Chernobyl'. Let me tell you - this is not an easy task - though we had made our reservation over a month before - we were told at the last minute that we could no longer go - we then had to hustle - calling multiple tour companies to see if we could get in on one of their tours. Supposedly you need to have 2 weeks notice because the security at Chernobyl' is such that they have to approve everyone who is coming into the zone. Finally we found a tour that was already scheduled for a day we could do and who let us on - even though there were less than 48 hours to tour-time.

We got very little if any history about Chernobyl'. Alister had read the Wikipedia article on the accident and he was giving us blow by blow accounts while telling us we should read wikipedia. But we got to see the site and the guide had his little Geiger counter out to show us the radiation levels. The highest we saw was over 2000 and that was on a patch of moss. In general the ground held more radiation than the air and whether it was actual or imagined - I thought my feet were tingling the whole time we were there.

What we did learn about the new sarcophagus being built. It will actually be built a few hundred feet from the sight and then slid into place onto a teflon foundation. inside everything will be automated and so they can monitor, dispose and all that stuff automatically. Apparently even today there is need to send people in from time to time. Only in 12 minute shifts. Can you imagine accomplishing anything in 12 minutes? I was also aghast to see pictures of the state of the roof of the current sarcophagus - just 3 months before our tour - It looked worse than our hut! The metal plates were full of rust and holes. The tour guide said that they had just completed a repair project that would give them the time they needed to make the sarcophagus. Water and nuclear disaster waste is evidently pretty volatile - so the holes are more alarming for the water they let in rather than the gasses they let out.

We also went to the river - where radioactive catfish have been swimming untouched for 20 years now. Catfish grow to be humongously large. Its no wonder ancient people drew sea monsters that looked like catfish - these things are not something you would want to encounter on a swim or a boat ride.

After the nuclear plant we went to a nearby town - Pripyat - that was evacuated 3 days after the explosion and has since become a haven for photographers staging drama and disaster shots initially (a teddy bear abandoned on a Ferris wheel) and now of desolation and the victory of nature as rust and plants creep in and slowly demolish the buildings and anything left by the looters.

The tour ended with a huge 5 course "quality guaranteed" meal. It was tasty so I guess it lived up to the guarantee even if we didn't get to see some things on the tour.

A Summer Series - pt 7

Kiev
Home sweet home :- ). We flew back to Kiev on the amazing and new Wizzair, (It still had a new plane smell!) One hour and a taxi ride later and we were back in our comfy apartment - well not quite so comfy - apparently we had arrived back just in time for the annual two-week cleaning of the water lines - which meant no hot water.

This was slightly uncomfortable - not only for the embarrassment of having to tell our guest that he would have to wash out of a bucket during his vacation - but also because we had been planning to go out and work on our hut during the next week - and had kind of counted on showers. Building with mud and Manure without a shower? - Not a fun prospect. But forge ahead we did. We rented a car - a small tiny thing - but through multiple trips managed to buy and transport beams, lime, brick, chalk, axes, and innumerable other building supplies to our wee potential cottage.

Remont didn't happen as fast as we would have liked - while Pete learned how to Wattle, Daub, Lime, and Plaster all in a four hour course - it took us four days of work just to be able to daub one side. As feared - a lot of the timbers - including supporting beams had rotten from extended contact with moisture. We had to dig out the house - bringing the outside ground level below the level of the interior floor - lay/ relay a brick foundation, hack out rotten wood, and replace it with new strong wood before we were able to even make a mud mix.

My job was battling ants. They had taken up residences all around the hut and were happily laying eggs and munching on the rotting wood. Armed with a shovel and some unknown chemical which advertised itself as "A treatment for the fight against garden and house ants" I set to work digging up anthills. I have never seen so many varieties of ants in my life - there were big black and red ones, tiny little red ones, and medium sized black ones. All living next to each other in organized colonies all around the rotting foundations of our house.

By the end of the week - we had managed to completely dig out the back wall of the hut and daub one third of it. We still have a ton of work to do and will be thrilled if we finish 2 walls of the hut and repair the gutters to prevent future water damage.

A summer Series Part 6

Lvov
We traveled from Krakow to Lvov by bus. Don't do it. You can get to Lvov faster by foot. We sat 5, yes 5, hours on the border. I have traveled a lot - and crossed multiple borders that should have been difficult - Kosovo/Macedonia, Croatia/Serbia etc - none of them have ever left me anything to complain about in the way of boarder crossings (the longest crossing I had before this point was by bus between Croatia and Bosnia - and it was long because I insisted that the border guard stamp my passport because I needed recent entry validation to do my work documents). At the Polish/ Ukraine border we just sat, and sat, and sat some more - we weren't anywhere near the actual passport control check - but for some reason we just sat and sat and sat. Three and a half hours after our intended arrival - we reached Lv0v. There are numerous other options for getting to Lvov - Train, or a train marshrutka foot combo - all are better than taking the bus.

After the grueling entry - we really enjoyed Lvov - except that the rain followed us. Still we got to see the center - enjoy the cheaper prices (not just compared to Krakow - but even compared to Kiev), and beautiful architecture in a compact city where chances are you would run into someone you knew without trying. It felt like I was back in Zagreb - almost.

Our friend Olya showed us around and we had a great time walking through the city eating in yummy restaurants, climbing up the 271+ steps to the top of city hall, and touring the local Brewery. Unfortunately we couldn't get a proper tour - you need a minimum of seven people and we only had five and they would let us pay the extra ticket price to have a tour. I tried to get people from off the street - Hey do you have Half an hour? We need 2 more people in order to have a tour of the brewery - we'll pay for your ticket and you get to try the beer - but surprisingly there were no takers. Even two College students who were walking by said they couldn't because they had just finished testing at the university and they were tired. If you can't get tired college students to come try free beer then we figured it was a lost cause and we just looked around the museum and had a tasting.

A Summer Series Part 5

We spent another few days in Krakow after being joined by Pete (Alister's friend from university). We tried to make the best of the rainy days by touring the salt mines. The salt mines were a bit overpriced for what you got. But it was great to see the salt statues and even the cathedrals that the miners had carved out of the salt. The salt - a deep black in this mine - looked like polished granite on the statues - and especially in the cathedrals.
Pete had come to visit - not only for a vacation but also to help us work on our mud hut and he had even taken a special class on wattle and daub building during his short sojourn in the UK - we joked with him that now he would have to learn how to build with salt so that we could have "granite" floors in our mud hut.
We left Krakow by bus and headed towards Lvov Ukraine.

A Summer Series pt 4

I was hoping to get some pictures in here somewhere - but our summer adventures just keep going so you will have to wait for a picture "insert" at a later date.

From Lazy - we went to Krakow. We again took a night bus with 6 people in the coupe and arrived at the most wonderful hostel ever: Travelers in Hostel- not only were prices reasonable and the location great (5 min from old town and five minutes from the Jewish district) but the hostel was super clean, super friendly, and super accommodating - allowing us to slip in an extra mattress for our friend Pete for a small fee instead of a big fee for his own room and bed. A sign in the hostel says "60% Fun" but I give it 100% helpful.

Krakow was beautiful - but expensive. A cappuccino - normal ceramic cup size- costs min 9 zloty - or $4.5. Not nice.

The city is full of parks, old and new - and our hostel had free bikes and so we pedaled all over the place.

On a day that was supposed to be rainy - we caught the bus out to Auschwitz. We joined an English tour - which got us through Auschwitz 1 and 2 (AKA Birkenau) in 3 hours. In someways, that could be said to be too little time to spend in such a place - but on the other hand it was probably as much as our brains and feet could endure. Birkenau was the more impressive in sheer size - spreading out in front a whole field full of barracks, or the remains of barracks. We went into one of them - originally built to house 52 horses - each stall was converted into a 3 level bunk averaging 10 people per level 1,500 people per barrack - a place meant to hold 52 horses.

It was a lot to take in.