Ballet and Spartacus

Spartacus - Roman revolt, eventual failure and crucifixion, Kirk Douglas.


This was basically all I would have associated with Spartacus before last night.


Last night Alister took me to see a ballet At the National Theater. It was my second ever ballet - the fist also being in Ukraine the November before last when Alister first Came to Ukraine. -
But still, the ballet came as a bit of a surprise.

First of all - I associate ballet with something old - from the time of Mozart and all that - very classical and sweet and innocent. Spartacus did not fall into any of these categories.

It was written in the 60's - had a very energetic score, and, well risqué costuming. Not that I know much about ballet costumes, it would seem that in general that they aren't wearing much anyway - but in this ballet, people were even more scantily clad, (Loincloths - they were wearing loincloths) and as the subject matter dealt with the excesses and abuses of the Roman empire, well despite the artistic vagueness of a wordless art form - the ballet is hardly G rated.

What stood out to me: 1 - that they were able to find so many men (I would say at least 40 men - not to mention at least another 20 women) who were able to dance ballet and were willing to wax everything to dance around on stage. Since this is the Kiev Ballet, I assume that these people are here and are professionally connected to the ballet in some way - but what do they do the rest of the time? Giselle - the ballet we saw last year - had only a handful of men - like 5 - so what do all of these male dancers do when there isn't a huge production of Spartacus going on? Are they part of the circus, or athletic instructors? What does a dancer do when they aren't dancing? What would motivate them to keep practicing to be in shape for the next production of an epic war somewhere down the line?

2: From the last ballet and judging from this one as well - the best dancing never takes place at the start of the ballet. In fact, both ballets were rather dull at the start. This may have something to do with the fact that we have arrived a bit late both times, and so it takes a bit to get into the story as well - but in general I think they save the best dances for later. I don't know why, but I would guess that they do this to help the dancers warm up thoroughly.

3: In this ballet especially - they were doing all sorts of different lifts and falls - there was after all a revolt going on! - The amazing thing was that even in the final act, they were able to jump and lift and spin, and spin, and spin, without missing a step (not that I would know if they missed a step - but they certainly didn't seem to falter, stumble or struggle - ) and without even a grimace of exertion! Their super humanity was, however, checked by the fact that they did break a sweat.

4: From our seats, we could see the orchestra section. It must be very boring to be in the orchestra of a production where you have very little to play. The trombone players were talking amongst themselves for most of the first act.

5: The magnitude of the number of people need for a production astounded me. Not only the army of dancers - but the full orchestra, and then all the people running the lights, and the props, the women taking your coats and the ushers showing you to your seats -And to think that originally this was all for the private entertainment of the king and his court!

6: How did the ballet practice before tape recorders and CDs? Did they have to gather the whole orchestra together and practice while they were practicing?

These are the random thoughts that run through my head in the third act of a 3 hour ballet.

Russian Scrabble

Well - Alister and I have branched out on our scrabble addiction - we are now trying Russian Scrabble - which considering you have 10 extra letters in the alphabet, but only 7 still in your hand, and the small number of tiles overall while needing more letters to make more words - is pretty challenging.

We introduced two Ukrainians to the sport as well - They were really getting into it. I ended up winning - but only because I basically claimed no knowledge of Russian - put all on my tiles on the board and kept asking is this a word? How about this? Or this - which resulted in finding, and learning - Amazing words with high point placements.

Despite my Skeptism - Tymoshenko reported be off to good start

From the Kyiv post

http://www.kyivpost.com/opinion/oped/28334/
Highlights: The new coalition government headed by Yulia Tymoshenko, however, has started ambitiously and auspiciously.
The Ukrainian economy is in good shape with a growth rate of 7.3 percent last year. The stock market surged by no less than 120 percent last year, and it has barely fallen during the January turmoil.
The new government’s biggest achievement is to make Ukraine ready to join the World Trade Organization (WTO) at a February 5 meeting of the WTO General Council. One month after the parliament ratifies the accession, Ukraine will become a full-fledged member of the WTO. This could boost the country’s growth by one percentage point a year.
Ukraine’s WTO accession is a joint accomplishment of the four last governments. The very last obstacle was a European Union complaint about the country’s export tariffs, primarily on steel scrap. It has been relegated to the negotiations about a free-trade agreement with the EU, which are likely to be concluded before the end of 2008.
As elsewhere in the region, the greatest economic concern is the high and rising inflation, as consumer prices rose by 16.6 percent last year. As a consequence, experienced Finance Minister Viktor Pynzenyk immediately tightened the budget by balancing it. Fortunately, no price controls or export controls are being discussed. Tymoshenko says that she has learned not to do so from her tenure in 2005.
Tymoshenko’s most worrisome campaign promise was to compensate Ukrainians who lost their bank savings in the early 1990s because of hyperinflation and to do so in the course of two years. Fortunately, the government has capped this compensation program at $1.2 billion, which is less than one percent of gross domestic product, and it has distributed the money swiftly and equally.

How to Live Well on Nothing a Year

William Thackeray titled the 36th chapter of Vanity Fair "How to Live Well on Nothing a Year". Throughout this and the next few chapters, Thackeray informs his readers how Rebecca manages to live in the most luxuriant fashion on "nothing a year". In short - she is up to no good, swindles and exploits everyone, making quite the profit and building up a secret stash of jewels for herself (unbeknownst to her husband). But doesn't she, after all, have the right to such behavior? Don't other people chase after their own "vanities" at the expense of others? Was not she herself a victim of the world? Why shouldn't she profit when she has a chance?

In Ukraine, one can find luxury around every corner. Fashion, particularly women's fashion is a chief concern. An American nurse in her late 30s was making hospital visits and left her coat in the coatroom. The worker there, dressed in grubs herself, spurned to take the coat, said it was the ugliest thing she had ever seen and that the nurse was much too young to wear such a coat. The Coat was warm. It was practical. It was in fact, like most winter coats you would see in America - especially in the Pacific Northwest, for everyday wear. It wasn't fur lined; it wasn't a smart Pea Coat - just your standard microfiber hooded winter jacket.

Walking the downtown streets of Kiev and riding the metro, you see people dressed to the nines. Smart suits, tailored jackets, the latest mobile phone or Armani Bag. There are no amazing bargains in Kiev (or if there are - no one that I’ve met knows of them). As one man said, Kiev has abandoned the communist dictator for a moneyed tyrant - it is now money - or the appearance of money that accomplishes anything and everything.

And so people try to live as well as they can on nothing a year
$400p/month Avgas Salary in Kiev
$350 - Average price of 1 ram apartment a 40min metro ride from center
$1 - 10 large eggs
$2.50 - 1 lb of ground beef
25 cents - Loaf of white Bread
$1.75 - - 1 Gallon of boxed long-life milk


For the majority of people - they don't succeed in living very well at all.

However, others manage to live very well indeed.
A recent acquaintance of ours makes a living installing heated-flooring. He was apparently - one of the first in Ukraine to begin doing this and has been allover the former soviet Union installing his heating system. Additionally, he does other building and remodeling work. Obviously, his skill and the uniqueness of his work attract some very rich people. It also attracts people who want to appear rich and live very well on nothing a year. Having agreed on a recent job, building a pool house/sauna for a named price, the Down payment of which was a quarter of the agreed upon sum- the Homeowner - upon completion of the work- refused to pay the remaining sum and less than half of the agreed upon price - Wanting to at least receive something for his weeks (and his employees) weeks of work - he decided to accept this sum - but on going to fetch it - was chased off by a man w/ a gun, and he went home without money.

Obviously - we heard only one side of the story. However, Ukraine ranks as the country of highest corruption in Europe - which is understandable considering that 52% of Ukrainians believe that bribes and other forms of corruption are justifiable. Why is it justifiable? Easily, little public trust exists - which means that everyone, in the public sphere, is out to get you - so whatever you can do to get ahead, to get by, is justified. It is important to note that this mentality relates to the PUBLIC Sphere - the walking down the street passing nameless faces sphere - Once you have crossed into the sphere of acquaintance - and then fallen farther into the sphere of friendship - you will find that suddenly you have lots of people looking out for you - making sure you aren’t paying too much to your door keeper, have found the right medicines in the drugstore, don't walk in such-and such a place alone at night - etc. The void of trust - and even amiability in the public sphere is made up for 100 fold in personal friendships. Unfortunately - this doesn't stop the overall rat race nor the exploitation of others.

60 kilos of potatoes later

Some of you may have heard that of the Potatoe drama that ensued earlier this fall when I noticed that everyone was buying potatoes and onions. We proceded to investigate the reason why and were told that you HAD to buy them now or they would be ridicuously expensive later on.
Well, I bought 20 kilos of potatoes (40lbs) and I told Alister to pick up some more. He came back with 40 kilos (80lbs!!!!!) of potatoes. Our balcony was full of potatoes and i have been busy volunteering us for potatoe dishes eversince.

Additionally, we bought 18 kilos of Onions.
Well last week, we finished off the potatoes, or rather, we will have finished them off as soon as we finish eating the potatoe soup I made.

The onions too are down to the last five in the box.

I must admit, I was surprised we went through the potatoes. I was picturing them still sitting on the balcony until NEXT fall.

Not only that, but the price surprising hasn't gone up too much (surprisingly since Milk, eggs, hamburger, and chicken have gone up significantly - not to mention that bird flu is reportedly spreading in Ukriane now and so chicken will either be more expensive and harder to find, or a very much buy-at-your-own-risk sort of thing. We are warned to stay away from buying products on the street as we might be buying Chernoble mushrooms, chernobly fish, and other radioactive products)

I have to admit, not having to carry potatoes and onions from the super market was nice - and it was nice to have them around for last minute dinner ideas - but I'm also glad they're gone - to not feel the pressure - of must use them before they spoil.

Pysanky

My newest hobby here in Ukraine is Pysanky. There are lots of very well laid out and explanatory sites about the art already on the internet – and I suggest you look at them to learn more or go to this article for resources and a quick HOW TO.


Basically – I always knew about Pysanky – always wanted to do it – and once I actually arrived in the country of its inception – of course I had to learn. I’ve done scores by now – but have given most away. We used the rejects – the ones with mistakes on them to decorate our Christmas tree this year. These are some that I did the other week when I had some extra time on my hands. Normally, I listen to Russian Audiobooks on tape – over and over and over again as I do the egg to try to build comprehension. Eventually I read the story in English and a light bulb goes on like – OH, so THAT’S what they were doing and then I listen to it a few more times before I try listening to the text and reading along at the same time in Russian. By that point – I understand the text a bit better and can quote back emphatic parts – Like Gogol’s Nose, in the Church when he looks down his nose at the Major and says “Вы ошибаетесь, милостивый государь. Я сам по себе. Притом между нами не может быть никаких тесных отношений.”

Other Pysanky Links:

Method and History and everything else - http://web.mac.com/lubap/PYSANKY/Pysanka_Home.html

Traditional patterns - http://home.earthlink.net/~okaczmar/egstamps.html

Pictures!

So I realized that the Blog was alittle text heavy - so here are some Pictures of the Botanical Gardens a few weeks ago after the snow - It was a perfect day just cold enough for snow - but warm enough to not freeze - and so bright and sunny!

Rumour has it that April/ May is the best time to go the gardens as then there is a grove of lilac bushes that are in bloom and the scent envelops the whole garden.