Shady Deals

My cousin Dave works with a Ukrainian woman who taught him a common Ukrainian expression: "Have to borrow the dog's eyes to look you in the eyes".  The meaning wasn't obvious at first (being shady), but has plenty of application with a little context....

Under soviet rule, all property and assets were state assets.  Since its collapse, Ukraine has undergone - and continues to undergo - privatization (selling government assets to private companies....kind of like Chicago selling its parking meters). 

After decades of living under "we are all equal socialism", the transition to a free market seems to have swung the pendulum to the opposite extreme.  Those in top government positions and their friends get the best deals – buying utilities, land and other assets at fire sale prices. 

One of the richest men in the country (~$2B estimated worth) snapped up major state assets for cut-rate prices in 1996-2005 when his father-in-law was president!  Conflict of interest?  Nah!

One of the biggest deals took place last year when the national phone company (Ukrtelecom) was sold for over 10B UAH (~$1.3B).  The shady part being that it was sold when the stock was at record lows AND there was no competition for the deal (only 1 bidder – who by the way is somehow related to the president).

And rumor has it, our neighborhood is thanks to one of those shady land deals.  Our house is ~2-3 lots away from the State Botanic Garden.  Apparently, the Botanic Garden used to be even bigger– but the people running the joint decided they could pull the fence in a bit, sell off some plots and line their pockets.

So you could say, the people involved in the aforementioned deals would “need to borrow the dog’s eyes to look taxpayers in the eye.”

Here's to funny expressions and 'keeping your nose clean' so you don't have to 'borrow the dog's eyes'.

Prague & airport sightseeing

I was in Prague this week for another GfK project.  While the timing was not perfect (straight from vacation), the project sounded fun and I was excited about getting to Prague……

I had visions of this side of Prague…

Unfortunately, was in this side of Prague….

...proving that ‘vanilla outskirts’ with corporate hotels & generic office parks are pretty much the same wherever you go. 

The long days kept me from seeing the city center, but using the airport as my guide, we need to go back:

Most importantly – Fountain DIET soda!!  (no diet 'on tap' in Kyiv)

But seriously, there are enough amenities at the airport, you could make a weekend of it alone:

Free Movie theater

Free Xbox station

Kiddie rides

A grocery store – with produce and fresh baked goods to rival our nicest stores in Kyiv

Real large drinks – while I don’t like coffee, I do believe in the power of ultra large caffeinated beverages (a serious ‘outage’ in Europe with their tiny drinks)……but, thanks to Starbuck’s in the Prague airport, serious volume can be had! 

Amen to that!

While I briefly fantasized about moving there, I noticed the headline on their paper and was comforted that even within the politics, we would feel right at home….

(a Parliament political boss convicted of bribery)

Happy Friday & here’s to enjoying what you can from the car window.

Spring Break Part II: Corn Maze Venice

For the second half of spring break we rode the train from Rome to Venice and found a city super fun to just amble through….

Corn Maze Streets: And we thought Rome had small streets!  Here they are so small there are NO CARS on the island at all – so small you aren’t even allowed to ride a bike!!!

 It really was like navigating through a water-front corn maze.

Colorful past and Artsy Present: Venice has quite the history.  In the 16^th-18^th centuries it was the wild joint – big red light district, nunneries known for raucous parties….  and with many of their men off to sea, it became a norm for the ‘white widows’ (wives of sea men) to take in boy toys to fill their needs.  Orphanages blossomed and helped create Venice’s renowned music scene as orphans were trained as musicians from an early age.   Today it has a reputation of being an ‘art, music & architecture’ scene.

Boats galore: boats are the taxis, the buses, the everything!  But hot damn, they are clearly passing along the high gas prices.  A 1 day boat-bus pass cost ~$20 / person! 

Price aside, it was super fun to take a boat ride to the airport!  (Don't let Zoe's face above fool you - they had fun - just had to get up at 5am that day!)

Touristy – but local life nearby: While the Grand Canal area is serious tourist central, and the local population is dwindling (dropped in ½ over the past 100 years to ~60,000 locals), we enjoyed staying in an apartment in one of the nearby local neighborhoods.  It was peppered with cute little stores, restaurants & more commonly bars serving cicheti (appetizers like tapas), generally consumed with a drink standing up at the bar.

Murano glass madness: we thought the kids would like seeing the glass blowing process, so headed over to Murano island.  The kids enjoyed the demonstration – but even more – spending their allowances (this week’s and next’s) on glass animals.

What we did not realize is that it is a gold mine of glass costume jewelry!!  The ‘let’s go for the kids’ excursion turned into a Merilee glass ring seeking bonanza!

Quincy at one point (bored with the waiting) reported “you DON’T NEED ANY MORE rings!  You have more jewelry than anyone I know!”

 So I did what I had to – and continued to hone my well-developed speed shopping skills.  

That said, I’d go back in a heartbeat if you’re interested……(mom!?)

Roman Spring Break

Before moving we each identified places we'd like to visit in Europe.  Zoe picked Italy – and given the chance to go somewhere we knew the kids would not complain about the food, we jumped...

Rome – a short 3 hour flight away – WOW – yet another fabulous city (I’m starting to wonder if I was harder to impress in my 20s or if my bar has gotten lower……)  The things that really struck us:

Good First Impressions: In the taxi from the airport, the kids shared their initial POVs:

• ·      Zoe: “It’s more pretty-er than Kyiv”
• ·      Xavier: “More green”
• ·      Quincy: “I think the food will be yummy’ier”

Ancient buildings galore: in addition to the explicit sites we headed to – like the Coliseum…..

(I guess no one is exempt from modernization - the ancient Coliseum rented iPods as video / audio guides!)

….cool, old buildings were around almost every corner.

(Zoe was particularly impressed with the angel carvings in this church - giving it her highest ranking of a double thumbs up)

Tiny streets, tiny cars: I’ve never seen so many micro cars.  Tiny Smart cars and motorcycles are the norm (apparently given all of the taxes gas is ~$10/gallon!).

And even tho you aren’t even allowed to drive in the city center unless you are a resident, it’s still jam packed! 

Crazy full of tourists: Even after working in San Francisco’s Ghiradelli Square, I’ve never seen so many tourists.  Walking around with a map out may make you feel like an asshole in most cities, but in Rome, you fit right in..

And if you can't beat 'em, join 'em we said - and hopped on the double decker tourist bus!  

(We thought what a smart way to avoid dragging tired, whining kids all over Rome.  Turns out, the kids cried they wanted to walk that day!)

Silly Pizza & Gelato: I guess predictable, but the abundance of gelato and pizza places was fantastic insanity.  It was no effort at all to live up to our objectives of pizza and gelato everyday

And I’m happy to report that even the mediocre restaurants did not elicit a single kid complaint!

Salud to adventure with the insurance of 'sure bet' dining!  

A Fresh look

Our dear friends – the Scheidelmans – came to visit last week.  We had a fantastic time, so appreciate them coming AND got to see Kyiv through 3 fresh sets of eyes.  


The things that struck them as ‘culturally significant’…….

Congestion & Crazy Driving: traffic is fairly common and can be brutal – exasperated by lack of concern for ‘blocking the box’ & rules requiring that you do not move your vehicle after an accident (2 squished cars in the middle of the road is a common sight). 

Just today en route to the airport 2 big fancy cars started driving down the blocked off lane under construction and proceeded to honk at the road construction vehicle in attempt to get by!

Cool Metro Stations: While the Metro rides do subject you to a protocol of serious shoving (Carol & John missed a stop not being pushy enough to get out), you are rewarded with super deep stations with cool architectural elements AND abundant in-station shopping!

Haves & ‘Have Nots’: The 2 tier society is omni-present.  Housing is a visible example….on the same street you have enormous, elaborate houses finished with ultra-high end materials (this one, under construction must be ~8,000 sq. ft)

 AND shack like homes or big Soviet style apartment complexes

Stiletto Skills: Little attention appears to be paid to common areas – as evidenced by the abysmal quality of the sidewalks.  Additionally, no 2 stairs in a staircase are the same height or depth….combined these add up to a need to proceed with awareness and caution. 

But somehow, these circumstances do not drive the ladies into Ecco and Rockports....

...ultra-high heels still prevail and do not appear to pose any problem for Ukrainian women

Variable Prices: Like in many developing countries, most prices are grey and negotiable, and – of course – significantly higher for foreigners.  We took a cab ½ way across town for 60uah after some serious negotiations (in my broken Russian).  The return trip home was about 2x the distance – but given the taxi was arranged by a local, cost only 48uah. 

Abundant Beer Availability: Beer at the mall food court is novel for sure (below).  

But here you are hard pressed to find a place where beer is not available.  

Museum snack stands (above), bus stop kiosks, and metro stops…..while it’s not always all that cold, you are never more than a few steps from a brew.

So here’s to adventuresome friends & appreciating the novelty through fresh eyes.

THANKS FOR COMING SCHEIDELMANS!!!!!

Happy (Western) Easter

While Ukrainians are not celebrating today (Orthodox Easter is next Sunday), Easter is fairly visible in stores & is taken pretty seriously as a time to celebrate.

Hooray for Ukrainian Egg Decorating

The good news – no need to import egg decorating kits……they have them here too.

And since we had packed ‘US egg kits’, we tried both side by side…..and I’m happy to report the Ukrainian kits trumped....


A) Brighter colors:

(I suspect the brightness is due to reduced restrictions on food dyes or something – but try not to think about that)

b)   More festive ‘stickers’: 

They sell these little sleeves you put around your egg,...

drop in hot water for 3 seconds...

Presto - you have a fancy egg!

Only problem was Zoe growing attached to hers – not wanting to give it up for consumption

Boo for the Ukrainian Easter bunny

While in hindsight it was a total lapse in judgment, the Easter bunny decided to simplify this year and just deliver Easter baskets.  He did not hide the colored eggs NOR zillions of plastic ones like the US bunny.  This was not deemed acceptable - especially by Quincy - with his 9 years of growing accustomed to the tradition…..

We speculated that maybe the Ukrainian bunny was saving the eggs to hide on Orthodox Easter.  But that was also not welcome news.  So we instead agreed to create our own egg hunt 

While this solved the initial disappointment, it also sparked questions.  Quincy found the penmanship from the bunny suspiciously familiar.... 

...and demanded I write something to compare

My cursive, block letters and right-handed writing did not entirely dispel his doubts.  Net, net, we learned while we preach the merits of trying new things – some (traditions) are best left as is.

Happy Easter – here's to believing in the spirit of the occasion and hoping you are enjoying some old or new (but acceptable) holiday traditions!