ukraine: kyiv with a visitor

I love playing tour guide, I wish I could do it more often. (Maybe I ought to look into this as future employment? Anyone reading this know anyone in tourism or that sort of field?) Unfortunately, Ukraine isn't on most peoples' list of places to go, and is in fact a destination a number of my military friends are not allowed to visit for the time being. My friend amanda came to visit for a few days, yahoo. We met in Seoul, through rugby, she now lives in Istanbul.
Amanda was supposed to arrive at 0815 Saturday morning, but when she got to the airport in Istanbul she was told her flight was full so she was  put on another flight a couple hours later. Does it make me sound awful if I say I was glad for the delay? I was able to sleep an extra hour and clean my flat a little more.

I met amanda at the airport, we used public transport to get back to my flat. (shuttle bus then metro then bus). It's an easy trip, but not terribly fast, argh.
After relaxing for a few hours we went back into the city using the metro and bus. After exiting Arsenalna station, we walked along the street going toward Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra. It's one of two UNESCO sights in the city. Along the way, we stopped at a place that shows a nice view of the left bank of the city. It's lovely.
This viewpoint is right next to the Holodomor memorial, which always gets me. It's hard to believe someone (or a government) would do that deliberately. Too many people starved, and it didn't need to be as bad as it was.

The Soviet Union never accepted responsibility for it, they always said it was poor farming, and a year of bad weather. Russia says the same thing now. Most of the rest of the world says it was done on purpose, while Stalin was trying to get everyone into collective farms. Nearly all the grain that was grown was exported, or put into locked silos to which the people did not have access. As people starved, the borders were closed, people were not able to escape. Millions died, though the official number of dead is debated. What always gets me at this memorial is the statue of the little girl who is sad and starving. (She looks particularly pathetic during winter, when she is covered in snow, as someone almost always puts a flower in her arms then as well.)

Further down the road we came to one of the entrances to the Lavra. It's the holiest complex in Ukraine, and one of the top 5 in the orthodox world. The entrance used by most people has frescoes on the walls. They're beautiful, but fading. We arrived pretty close to closing time, so we didn't have to pay the entry fee, yippee!!
I think this was the first time I've visited when trees were blooming. So pretty. I took one photo with a cherry blossom tree (it could be anything else, I don't know tree names; the blooms were pink) which I love.
As we approached the main church, I saw an open door. I know from past experience that this door leads to stairs which go to an upper level, and this door is not always open. We went up the stairs only to find that the second level was being renovated. Sheets hanging everywhere, both plastic and cloth. Boooo.

We could hear the music of the service, but could only see glimpses of the intense beauty of this church.
Back down the stairs and through a different door into a small chapel. This chapel has a side door/entrance into the main church. It's only open during worship services, I was happy amanda was able to look in. This church is brightly colored, with gold and new paint everywhere.
I also showed amanda a view over the lower part of this complex. Amanda was more fascinated by what she could see of the statue Rodina Mat, as part of the WW2 memorial. The statue is 62m tall, it's hard to miss.
We followed a path back out to the big street, and walked back to the metro station.

That was all the sightseeing we did that day, but it was still nice. We took the metro back to Khreshchatyk, and ate dinner at a steak place (a branch of an American chain, I always laugh at seeing the name written in the Cyrillic alphabet.) it was good but not wonderful; the dessert was big. Yum.
As we got back to my flat, we went through the supermarket nearby. Amanda loves walking through those as much as I do!
Since Amanda hadn't slept well the night before, then traveled and been out during the day, she was exhausted. It didn't take long for either of us to fall asleep.

The next day we got up slowly, she with coffee and me with chai. I love weekend mornings when I stay in Kyiv, I love starting my day this way.
I had a farewell party to go to, so Amanda and I figured out where to meet in the afternoon. We met up, then walked up a street starting from Maidan. This particular street hasn't really been open to traffic since the protests of last year, I don't know when it will be, if ever. It has been a memorial street, with flowers, pictures, candles, etc. I want every visitor to the city to walk this street, to get a little bit of feeling of what happened here last year.
We made it to the National Art Museum of Ukraine, this was my first visit despite living here almost four years! It's not big, which is perfect for me, as I'm not hugely into art.

This museum is two floors, with four-ish rooms with displays in each floor. The first floor hosts temporary exhibits, if I understand correctly. One of the current temporary exhibits is about heroes. The exhibit recognizes that there is no specific definition of a hero. It can be a regular worker, a soldier, a miracle maker, etc... As part of this exhibit we saw a bunch of paintings of Lenin, which really surprised me. Ukrainians haven't ever been fans of his, and with the recent passage of a law forbidding communist and nazi propaganda, it's expected that pictures and statues of the guy will be removed in most or all places around the country.

There was also a large painting depicting a dinner of some sort, I think Stalin is leading a toast. In the painting are also heaps of others who at various points held political power in the Russian empire. It's neat.
In three different places on the second floor there were young painters making copies of displayed paintings.
Then it was time for tea at a cafe.
We walked from Maidan up a street in the direction of St Sophia. At the top of the street we turned right, and walked to the entrance of St Michael. I've been told this isn't the original church, it was actually only built in 1994; it's a copy of the St Michaels that was destroyed by the soviets back in the day. (In 1938 think.)  even so, I find it beautiful.

As we entered the church, we realized there was a service happening. I've stepped into quite a few orthodox services in the past years of living here, but this service wasn't the normal. There were a number of priests standing on the middle, all of them in fancy dress. (Not just their normal black robes, they had extra gold/red garments on top, and the lead priest was wearing what to me looked like a crown of sorts. I need to ask someone what was happening.)
From St Michaels we walked to Andreiivsky uzviz, (another language calls it Andreiivsky spusk) or Andreiivsky descent. It starts next to St Andrews, and goes down a hill. Amanda and I entered the church, which is different from the other churches we'd seen during the day. From the railings around the church you can see over quite a bit of the city.

St Andrews is close to my favourite park in the city, called Mosaic park. We strolled through, watching people.
At one point we sat down to use an app on Amanda's iPad to figure out where to go for dinner.
We chose a vegetarian place, which was good but expensive considering the portion sizes. The smoothies were healthy and good.
Again, it was easy to fall asleep.
Monday I had to work all day, there is nothing to say.
Tuesday we met up early afternoon, after I finished my morning class. The weather was amazing, almost too hot! (Or maybe it just felt that way because everyone is still used to the idea of winter weather.)

I showed amanda my school, and the hedgehog statue not too far away. Then we made our way over to a bakery that has my favorite cinnamon rolls...there is just a slight glaze on them, they're perfect. Most cinnamon rolls in this country are too dry.
That was just a snack. (Snacks are wonderful, and definitely a weakness for me.)
We took the metro next, then walked to one of my favorite (if not very favourite) restaurants. Both of us wanted a meal, not just a series of snacks.
Revolution Grill is awesome. The menu is somewhat eclectic, it's not at all Ukrainian. Some Asian food, a few middle eastern items too. I had pho, plus a caramel flavored milkshake (they make their own caramel flavoring!) and pumpkin creme brûlée. It was too much, but sooo worth it.

The head chef/owner came over to talk to us, even bringing us a free dessert at one point! The restaurant has been open less than a year, so the menu is still expanding, and the chef is always curious about the opinions of his customers. The food is healthy, and the ingredients are seasonal as much as possible. I try to eat here at least once a month, just because.
The evening was very relaxed, just the way I like it :)
I had to work all day Wednesday, booo. Even worse, I had to wait a fter school to be available in case parents wanted to talk to me about student evaluations we recently completed. No parents showed up, I spent the extra hour and a half really annoyed.
Amanda and I met up for dinner, we went to a place geared toward tourists not far from Khreshchatyk st. I don't always like to do this (go to touristy restaurants) when I'm traveling, but this place has a menu full of traditional Ukrainian food. I figure every visitor has to try salo, even though we don't usually finish all that is served, hee hee.
After dinner we went to the chocolate store not too far away, and picked up some dessert. YUM!
Thursday morning amanda took a taxi to the airport and flew back to Istanbul. Thursday night I flew to Helsinki, a new city for me to explore.