Sunday 29 April 2012

Money down Reg's trousers!

Sunday 29 April


After breakfast we go off in search of a market, which we spotted yesterday, when we were on the way back to the hotel.  It's been raining hard, but soon dries off, and the temperature is pleasantly warm enough to wander around in short sleeves.  
We have a specific mission this morning - to find somewhere that sells cheap reading glasses; Reg has already lost the 2 pairs he bought at a market stall in Moscow, to replace the 2 pairs he brought from home, and can't see to use his smartphone and computer without them.  His 2 favourite sayings this holiday have to be,

"I've lost my glasses ... again!  I think I left them in that cafe place!  
and

"These boots are superb!" (referring to his new walking boots).

At least he doesn't make dumb statements like I did, while lying in bed this morning.

"That bird's making a funny noise.  It sounds like someone scraping mud off their boots."
Reg:  " That's no bird.  That's me using the computer mouse."
.
After quite a long walk and asking a couple of people, we find the market.  It's a huge covered fruit and vegetable bazaar, selling everything from huge spring onions to spices, grains, and flour.  Around the outside are several stalls selling other goods - domestic wares, cheap toys, and sunglasses.  I spot  a couple of pairs of reading glasses at the bottom of the stand, and quick as a flash the woman assistant  has a whole box of reading glasses out for Reg to choose from. At this point I should say that Reg has his money in a money belt around his waist, which he wears inside his trousers (for absolute safety!)  As usual we count out out oodles of notes to pay for the glasses - 31,000  Uzbekistan soms.

Afterwards Reg puts his remaining wad of money back in his money belt and we start to wander away.  As we do so, notes pour from the bottom of Reg's trouser leg!  He gathers them up and more pour out! And more!  Reg, the lady who runs the stall, and I are creased up with laughter.  It takes Reg a few minutes to shake all the  notes out of  his trousers.  He must have accidentally missed the money bag!  The stall lady hands Reg a couple of elastic bands.  Eeenglish! What are we like!!

I can't stop giggling all the way to a little cafe we go into, near the market.  It's truly Uzbekistani as in additon to cafe tables and seats there are very low tables with cushions around them on the floor; some people sit at these tables, cross-legged, eating their food.  Reg and I so far haven't really enjoyed what we've tasted of food in Tashkent.  The food here doesn't look very appetizing either.  We order a cup  of tea - it's lukewarm - we should send it back but we drink it anyway.  At this roadside cafe it's a really cheap cuppa - the equivalent of 25p.

On our way back to our hotel, we look for somewhere to eat.  It's Sunday though and many places are closed.  We find a little fast-food cafe, and have an orange Fanta and mediocre burger each.  Not sensible but the only place we can find open.  Reg has to ask for his to be warmed up in the microwave.  I  hope the Paraclens (herbal protection against tummy upsets) do their job.

We return to the hotel for a rest.  As Reg gets changed still more notes fell out of his underpants!  Did you really need that information?!  We prepare for our overnight train journey to Bukhara. The lovely young girl on reception willingly takes our thermos flask yet again to fill it with boiling water.  We've been doing this  regularly while here, to enable us to make tea in our room - there are no tea and coffee making facilities here, as in British and European hotels.  All the hostels have this facility, but there are no hostels in Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan, so we are staying in 2 star hotels.

We paid extra to stay in our room until 6 pm.  It's now 7 pm, and we're sitting in the hotel lobby, waiting for our taxi to take us to the station.  I'm writing this, and Reg is listening to his favourite tracks on Spotify through his smartphone.

























Saturday 28 April 2012

An unexpected extra day in Tashkent

We are in our hotel in Tashkent.  Breakfast is 7 till 11.  We go down at 10.30,  to find that it's a buffet style breakfast - eggs, meat, cheese, bread, pancakes, jam, but no butter.  Also black or green tea (we have black) and a pinky brown fruit juice - not sure what it is but the smell puts me off.  The woman who is overseeing things asks us if we'd like porridge.  Reg declines but I readily say, yes, please!  The porridge is actually more like semolina, but its very nice, especially when I've stirred in a couple of spoonfuls of runny jam.

We go to reception to see how we go about getting our train tickets to Bukhara tomorrow (Sunday) morning;  also to see if they can advise us about changing up some dollars into local money.  We are able to change up some of our money at the hotel.  $1 = 2000 Uzbekistan som (give or take 150 som).  Thus changing up $150 means you will receive about 300,000 som!  The largest note is 1,000 som - so you will receive at least 300 notes - quite a wad to carry around.  Reg jokes that he is a quarter of a millionaire - in soms!

A man who seems to be something to do with the hotel will go to the train station and get our tickets for us, if we pay him $20.  Everything has a price here, and if we went ourselves to the station, they wouldn't understand us, and in any case we'd have to get a taxi.  Off he goes, with copies of our passports.  He's soon back - they need our original passports, and by the way, they only have 1st class tickets left for tomorrow morning's train.  We say fine.  However, by the time he gets back to the station, there are no tickets at all left for that train, and only1st class tickets left for the overnight train on Sunday evening.  Off he goes again to get us tickets for the Sunday evening train to Bukhara.  This man is useful because he can also sort out a Uzbekistan simcard for Reg's phone, that will cost us a bit too, but never mind!  We need a simcard, and from our experience of trying to get one in Russia, it's not that easy ( you need passports, you need to register the simcard, and you need to understand the language to do this).

So instead of leaving Tashkent tomorrow morning, we'll go tomorrow evening - an unexpected extra day in Tashkent (or, Toshkent, in the local language).  We've learned therefore that we need to buy train tickets at least a few days in advance in future.   Reg  had thought there would be plenty of room on the train.  Reg has bought most of long journey tickets, it's only one or two shorter journeys where we still need tickets.


Our hotel in Bukhara is booked for tomorrow (Sunday) night, so we'll have to phone them and say we won't be there until early Monday morning.  We'll still want our room straight away as we've paid for it, also we'll be able to have breakfast.


Now that the helpful man has come back with our passports we can go out.  You need your passports and registration tickets (which the hotel give you) with you at all times, again, as in Russia, in case you get stopped by the police.  It's about 4pm and we haven't eaten since breakfast so we're a bit  peckish.  We order a taxi and ask the hotel receptionist if she can recommend somewhere to eat.  She consults with the taxi driver and together they come up with "The Bukhara Cafe".

The cafe staff speak practically no English and the menu is only in Uzbekistani.  The waitress mentions "soup" and "fish" and "salad" so we agree to all this, plus we ask for black tea.  The soup is tasty, a type of broth, slightly greasy, and the bread is lovely and fresh.  The salad is cucumber and tomatoes with a sort of sourcream sauce which we saw a lot of in Poland and Russia - it's delicious.  When the fish comes it's like battered goujons, and there's quite a lot of it.  Too much for us to manage as it turns out.  There's a red savoury sauce for dipping the goujons of fish, but Reg and I both don't like the sauce much.

The most  unusual  aspect of this meal for us is that although we are given spoons to eat the soup, when it comes to the fish goujons we each only have a fork - and we notice that the surrounding tables only have forks too.  So at that restaurant anyway, knives aren't part of the cutlery.

Taking a walk after our meal, we come across an outdoor steam and diesel train museum.  You'd have thought we'd have had our fill of trains, having just spent 3 days and 3 nights on one, but no - we decide to have a look around.  We get talking to 2 teenage boys, have a train ride, and take pictures of a bride and groom who are there having photos taken (as you do)

We are able to pick up a taxi at the nearby train station; this driver has difficulty finding our hotel, as did yesterday's taxi.  He finds it eventually, and we return to our room to relax.  Reg gets our thermos filled up so that we can havea cup of tea, and I collect our laundry, which I'd left to be washed earlier in the day.


The Kazakhstan border guard asks for $3000!



Thursday night, 26 April, Friday 27 April


Kazakhstan is a huge country.  After the incident yesterday (Thursday) morning when the Swiss couple had to leave the train because they didn't have the right visas, it takes us all of Thursday, right through to Friday,afternoon, to travel through  Kazakhstan.  The train churtles on, through increasingly flat, dusty desert country, interspersed with some greener village areas where cows and horses are wandering about as children walk past, going home from school, the girls in pretty dresses with large flowers in their hair.  We notice how the features of the type of people have changed as we travel across this vast country.  Many of the houses are in good repair, all with corrugated roofs. The village communities are however few and far between.

At about 3pm the carriage guard knocks on our door to let us know that the border guards for "leaving Kazakhstan" are on the train. (This is to make sure we leave Kazakhstan when we said we would).

A young guard comes into our carriage.
"You British?"
"Yes."
"You have dollars?"
"Yes, why?"
Something in Russian we don't understand.  Then the guard indicates the pen and paper I have nearby and writes on it "$3,000".  I say.
"What are you talking about?"
"It cost you $3000 for visa"
"We have our visas," says Reg.
"Uummp ....."says the young guard, and walks away, down the corridor, to check our passports, which had already been taken by his colleague.

A young woman border official comes back a few minutes later, our passports in her hand,
"This passport ok" (pointing to mine)."This one... out of date" (flourishing Reg's passport).
Reg points out that she's looking at the start date of the passport, and points to the expiry date.
The young woman border guard walks off down the corridor with our passports.  Reg stands in our cabin doorway keeping an eye on the situation from a distance.

Now the train carriage guards ( a man and a woman) have been with us all the way from Moscow.  They are absolutely excellent, and not corrupt thank goodness.  They also have a few years on the young border guards,and can see through their game - no doubt they've seen it all before.  The male train guard tells us
"Don't worry. Do nothing. Everything ok."


Finally, yet another border guard returns our passports, and the border guards for" leaving Kazakhstan", disembark from the train.  I'm a bit spooked by all that has happened.  It was obvious that the young border guard was after what he thought would be "easy  money", and I'm glad to breathe easily again.  Incidentally, the young Russian passenger had told us earlier that if Monica and her husband had quietly offered a bribe to the Kazakhstan border guards when ordered to leave the train, they would almost certainly have been allowed to stay on.

The train moves on, only to stop again shortly afterwards as we enter Uzbekistan.  It's about 4 pm.  The Uzbekistan border guards and customs officials board the train.  Our train guards are themselves from Uzbekistan (they must work "one week on, one week off", as we're sure they've travelled with this train all the way to Moscow and back to Uzbekistan, a journey of 6 days and 6 nights) and the atmosphere when the Uzbekistan border guards and customs officials come onto the train is much more cordial.  The border officials are polite and friendly, and one can speak some English and asks us why we want to tour Uzbekistan? When we explain that we're going all the way to Singapore by train, through China, Vietnam etc, he is really interested.

The female train guard fills out our immigration forms in Uzbekistan language for us, and we sign them.  We are asked how much money we are taking into the country.  We also explain we have a visa card.  I think they need to check that you can support yourself while in the country.

We've met some great people on the train - the mother and daughter from Tashkent - who gave us the profiteroles on the first day.  The daughter later came to our compartment to give me a mini lipstick.  I gave her a pen, as I felt I wanted to return her kindness.  We exchanged email addresses as she can write in English.  The young Russians who were making the film at the Aral river left the train a couple of stops ago; Reg gets talking to another Russian who lives in St Petersburg, and is travelling to Tashkent with his mother who lives in Bellarusse, where Reg's Mum was born - part of Bellarusse was in Poland before the 2nd world war.  The Russian lady gave us a magnet with Russia on it, and a lovely teatowel.

Finally we say our goodyes and leave the train, clickety-clicking along the interminable platform with our luggage, and crossing at a sort of mini level crossing at the end of the platform, to the opposite platform and way out  (over four railway lines, with no warning signs or barriers).  I keep a look out as we cross!  Taxi drivers aren't allowed onto the platforms here, so once we pass through the exit, we are quickly approached by several drivers.  Reg thought we were going to be met by our tour operator, but no sign of him, so Reg shows our hotel address to the taxi driver.  It's in English not Cyrillics, but after consultation with other taxi drivers, this driver agrees to take us.  I ask how much - he would prefer payment in local currency, but I only have dollars.  We agree $5.  I worry that we don't know this man from Adam and he could be kidnapping us, but Reg has a good feeling about him.  After having to stop to ask a couple of times, the driver locates our hotel and I breathe a sigh of relief,  I tip him well.

We check in, then have a small meal of ravioli and a cup of tea in the hotel.  This is prepared especially for us as they've finished serving meals for today - though it's only 7pm.

It's about 25 deg c here.  We put the air conditioning on for a while.  After our meal I revel in a lovely strong hot shower  and wash my hair!  This is absolute bliss after 3 days and 3 nights on the train! Reg is soon fast asleep.   I send an email to Elaine as can't contact her by mobile at the moment - no signal.  Tomorrow Reg will get credit on his phone (which has a simcard which can be used in Uzbekistan).




































Friday 27 April 2012

Drama at the Russian/Kazakhstan border


Wednesday night 25 April/ Thursday 26 April 

We have a good night's sleep, but are awoken by a knock on our cabin door from the carriage guard at 5.30 am, as the Russian border officials have just boarded the train. This happens just before we enter Kazakhstan, so we can only assume the Russian officials come on to make sure we leave the country when we said we would, as stated on our visa. The officer is a pleasant young man actually, and when he sees our British passports, he jokes with Reg about Chelsea drawing with Barcelona at football on Tuesday evening, ensuring Chelsea of a place in the European cup.

An hour later, we cross the border with Kazakhstan, and their officials get on the train to inspect our passports. The young official who looks at ours shouts out to his colleague along the corridor,|”English! English!” and hurries away with our passports. This seems ominous to me and Reg follows the border guard down the corridor in hot pursuit.

We quickly learn that the Swiss couple I mentioned in yesterday's blog have been ordered to leave the train! It's because they don't have a double-entry Kazakhstan visa – the visa they do have for entering Kazakhstan was for a later date. They are distraught, but there is nothing they can do. Their visas were arranged by a tour company, so they trusted to their so-called expertise. We are shocked. Monica and her husband have travelled 2 nights and a day for nothing. The young Russian man in the next carriage to ours, who speaks English, helps the Swiss couple by finding out the time of the next train back to Moscow, and gives them his mobile number in case they need translating help.

Fortunately, the border official hands back our passports – they are ok. I praise Reg for his astuteness and thorough research of the visa situation. Thank goodness he was so meticulous, not only about getting the double-entry visa, but getting the dates right too.

You need a double-entry visa because although we are not getting off the train before we enter Uzbekistan, we are travelling through Kazakhstan; our second entry visa is for when we do disembark in Kazakhstan later in our travels.

The train has been stopped for about 3 hours at the border. The customs officials had a brief look around and left. Eventually, at 9.30 am, the train pulls away and Monica and her husband, a forlorn sight alone on the platform, give a brief wave to the helpful young Russian. Apparently they may be able to fly to Uzbekistan from Moscow (thus not having to go through Kazakhstan territory) to continue their Silk Road journey. What a lot of wasted time, money and effort.

This incident shakes us up a bit and we are subdued for a while. We have breakfast, Reg eating bread and butter, ham, and one of the boiled eggs he bought at the station yesterday, He said it was just like having egg and bacon! I had 2 ginger biscuits and a banana.

How to have a wash? I have a brilliant idea. Cup-a-wash! I fill one of our trusty plastic cups (which we take everywhere with us), half with the trickle of cold water from the washbasin in the toilet cubicle, and half with boiling water. I lock our compartment door and have a strip wash, using 2 flannels squeezed out in the water in the mug, which is placed on one of our plastic plates, to catch the overflow. I feel a lot better – I can highly recommend this method when needs must. Reg washes later in the same way. Can't do much about the hair though – may try the dry shampoo tomorrow but I'm almost past caring about how I look – as long as I feel fresh!

I finish The Sealed Letter on my kindle – I thorough enjoyed it. I've started another of my kindle books, The Help. Rose thought I'd enjoy this book. It's good so far. I've also started on my Unit 13 assignment for my local preacher's course. I'm at the stage where there's lots in my head, a brief outline on paper, but it's all a bit muddled. I'll do some more tomorrow.

Keeping the computer and phones charged up is a bit difficult, as there's only one socket in the corridor fairly near but not within watching distance of our compartment door, and other people (mainly the Russians next door) need it for their computer and phones too. However, disappointingly, I haven't had a mobile signal all day, nor has Reg. We're in remote country, with trees giving way to “the steppes”, which is green scrubland, gradually turning into more desert country. There are village communities now and again with white, and a few blue, single story houses. Not much sign of arable agriculture – mostly cattle, horses, and quite a few camels.

As dusk falls we see electric lights twinkling from the houses, and children playing outside. There are landline telephone cables, but seemingly no mobile phone masts. Reg and I have our evening meal of bread and butter and cup-a-soup (having had sandwiches for lunch – the ham and cheese stayed fairly cool in the draught of air in the floor). All this has been interspersed with mini Mars and Snickers and numerous cups of tea throughout the day.

We're near the Aral sea, and at the next station the 2 young Russians disembark. Reg is enjoying himself following our journey on a sat-nav app he's previously downloaded onto his mobile phone.

After the alarming start to the day, the rest of the time has passed quickly and pleasantly. I'm enjoying recording our experiences in the blog, even though I can't publish it until we get the internet again.

Soon be time for bed - our 3rd night on the train.. One more night and day to go – we arrive in Tashkent tomorrow evening – it's supposed to be at 6.25 pm, but Reg thinks in view of the delay this morning, it'll be later. So far I'm still on the edge of my comfort zone …...! Reg says he thinks I'm well within my comfort zone as I look really happy!

A smelly toilet, but a good night's sleep


Wednesday 25 April

Reg wheels my suitcase along the corridor of the train, then returns for his rucksack. I follow him with the small backpacks and huge carrier bag of food. My new purple Berghaus rucksack is the most comfortable in the world (thanks again Elaine and your friend Kate and Reg of course).

Our private compartment is basic, but comfortable. We're travelling 1st class, but I'd say 2nd class on the Polish trains is superior to this – on that train we had our own washing facilities in the cabin, (even though they were hidden under a table and we didn't find them until we were leaving the train, but that's by the by). On this train there are 2 beds, which double as seats, already spread with a blanket each. No sign of any sheets or pillowcases, so we take our own small pillows and single duvet covers (to use as sheet sleeping bags) out of our luggage, and have just laid them on the beds when the female guard (there's a guard for each train carriage) arrives with crisp white sheets and pillowcases. We're impressed. Also there's plenty of storage for our luggage above the beds, and room for my large suitcase under the seats. There's a small table between the beds; and as soon as we leave the station, the pleasant guard brings us 2 glasses in the familiar silver holders. They are empty, but there's boiling water on tap as promised by the young woman traveller I met in the laundry room at the Godzilla hostel.

It's cool but not cold; the window is openable at the top, which is nice. Now a trip to the end of the corridor to perform the usual acid test, ie inspect the state of the toilet and availability of water for having a wash (we already knew we had to bring our own bottled water for drinking).

The toilet nearest to our end of the corridor is out of order.. The one at the other end is small, has the usual “long drop” as George describes it, ie the toilet flushes onto the railway track – and is fairly clean, if somewhat smelly. A trickle of water, enough to wash hands or wet a flannel, emerges from the one cold tap when it's pumped. Was it to prepare me for this non-washing train journey that I went, a good few years ago now, as youth worker on all those MAYC (Methodist Association Of Youth Clubs) weekends away,, sleeping on hall floors surrounded by young people, and having the merest lick and promise of a wash in the washbasins of church premises? I guess that was marginally easier as there was at least hot water on tap. Well, I knew I wouldn't be able to wash my hair on this trip! I'm glad I had a shower and hair wash at the hostel before we left.

Our compartment door is lockable. Reg and I soon settle down within our crisp white sheets; I change into my nightclothes for comfort. Both of us have a really good night's sleep, surprisingly (perhaps it's the gentle rocking movement of the train). By morning, we're aware that the weather's definitely getting warmer. I get dressed, and we have a welcome cuppa. Soon a man comes around selling doughnuts (of a sort). They're a bit greasy, but swallowed down with a cup of tea and a banana to follow, they're an adequate breakfast.

On my way to the loo I get talking to a woman called Monica, about my age, from Switzerland. She and her husband are also following the “Silk Road” railway. She speaks French, German, Italian and English. She seems really nice.

Reg gets talking to 2 young Russian men in the next compartment to us, both of whom speak good English. They are going to Tashkent to inspect the Aral Sea, near Khiva, with a view to making a film there! You meet fascinating people on trains.

We have cup-a-soups for lunch, with bread and butter (had to buy a knife, fork and spoon set from a department store in Moscow yesterday, as I omitted to bring these on our trip). I really like my mushroom soup, but Reg isn't so sure about his noodle variety.

During the late afternoon, the train stops for an hour at a station, and locals are peddling their wares, including foodstuffs. Reg is pleased to buy 2 hard-boiled eggs, which he's going to have for breakfast tomorrow. The temperature is rising all the time and it's a real relief to have a walk around on the platform, where the air is cooler. I've already changed from my long-sleeved top into a t-shirt. While strolling on the platform I get talking to a mother and her grown-up daughter from Tashkent. The daughter speaks enough English to tell me that the temperature in Tashkent is 35 deg c. Wow! Hotter than we thought. Thanks Sylvia for your thoughtfulness in giving me an emergency travel sized “things you might need” kit, including factor 50 suncream.

We've so far managed to keep our food cool in an air draught, and have our sandwiches, with crisps, for tea. The daughter from Tashkent brings us some little cakes, which turn out to be mini profiteroles. It's a lovely gesture. We could offer them a couple of Aldi gingernuts tomorrow, though there aren't many left.

Surprisingly, the day has passed really quickly. I've nearly finished my kindle book, The Sealed Letter (it's brilliant). I've done some studying, and written this in Open Office, to cut and paste into my blog later.

Being on a train for an extended period of time has its advantages – no meetings to attend, no clock watching, no stress. It's relaxing in that you're in your own little bubble, away from the real world in a way. You're able to send and receive the odd text, when there's a signal, to keep in touch with the outside world – but you're not somehow part of it.

And now it's dark and will soon be time to bed down for the night again.. The scenery today has been lots of forest, interspersed with country villages, with some of the houses in dire need of repair. Nearly all properties, apart from concrete blocks of flats in the town areas, have corrugated iron roofs. There's much evidence of agriculture being a way of life in the greater part of the region we've passed through. In some areas, there's lots of litter everywhere. As darkness falls there are large areas of scrubland – we're starting to pass through regions with higher temperatures and drier weather.


Last day in Moscow (continued)


Tuesday 24 April (cont'd)

After gathering food supplies for the train, as detailed in my last blog post, we go off in search of the Russian Gulag Museum. It takes us a while wandering the streets to find it, even though we had (sort-of) been given directions. It is an unpretentious building with a small entrance.

What were the Russian Gulags? They were the notorious camps (often called Russian or Siberian labour camps – though most were not actually in Siberia but other parts of Russia, the coldest, bleakest, and most inhospitable parts, with the thickest snow and longest winters ), where anyone who Stalin's government thought could cause a problem to the state were sent, including political dissident. Thousands of ordinary innocent Russians and Poles were sent there – and Reg's Mum was one of them. This museum therefore has special significance for Reg, and for me too, as Reg's Mum Kazia would occasionally when pressed tell us the horrific, fascinating story of her time in the camp near Archangle. She also told us of her long journey to Iran and then East Africa, when the camps were finally liberated. Kazia's story had a happy ending. When in East Africa she met Reg's Dad, who was in the British Army. When he got back to England, he sent his demob money to her, to bring her to England to be his bride. He couldn't speak Polish, she couldn't speak English, so they communicated in the African language Swahili! Once in England, Kazia had to be taught to say “I do” for the wedding ceremony. Bob and Kazia were married for 47 years until Bob died in 1995 and they were devoted to each other.

A few years ago, using the internet to discover more about the Russian labour camps , amazingly Reg was able trace Kazia's name, the actual train that took her to the labour camp near Archangle, the date she was taken, and who was in charge of the train.

Many, many people died in those camps. Some died due to starvation, the harsh conditions and bitter temperatures, some were shot on the slightest pretext. The inmates were forced to do hard labour. Kazia was only a teenager when she entered the camp, and had to chop down trees. In the Gulag museum, we viewed a saw that was used for tree felling. It was a vicious circle, because the prisoners were only given their daily ration of watery soup if they felled their quota of trees; of course, if you didn't have any food you had no energy to fell trees. At one point Kazia had to eat grass to survive; she was so starved that her periods stopped. To the day she died. Kazia was never able to throw away a morsel of food.

The Russian Gulag Museum told us much about life in the camps from letters, artifacts, and personal testimonies; most of the information, letters etc were in Russian but there was an overview of the situation in English. Also Reg bought a book (translated into English) detailing one inmate's experience of the camp. We saw one of the original “beds' the prisoners slept on – just a wooden board. The museum stewards were Russian, but a young Russian woman, who was visiting, spoke excellent English. She was fascinated by Kazia's story and spent a lot of time translating the curator's words for us.

Stalin was portrayed in the museum as the evil murderer he was. There was a fascinating exhibition of original and “touched up” photographs, side by side. Most of the originals had Stalin in them, together with other politicians or people who were part of Stalin's entourage. In the second set of photos, those of Stalin's “friends” or “cronies” who'd lost favour with him, had either been removed from the original photograph completely, or had their faces blacked out. The museum records informed us that most of these “out of favour' people were either subsequently shot, or occasionally they mysteriously disappeared.

It seems to us that Russia is still trying to shake off it's secret police image – not helped by the fact that tourists have to complete registration forms when they arrive in Moscow and are warned to carry these with them at all times, with their passports. But, we are told, show your passports if asked – but never hand them over!

In the afternoon we decide to visit the famous TV tower on the outskirts of Moscow, by far the tallest building in Moscow. We are really pleased with ourselves for navigating the Metro without too much difficulty, and alighting at the right Metro station to get the monorail connection to the TV tower. After a bit of a walk we finally get there to find it closed for a meeting (!! - Russians have these as well as Methodists!) and the next tour isn't until 7 pm. That's too late for us as we want to have time for a rest (we are OAP's after all), a meal, a shower, and to sort ourselves out in time for our taxi arriving at 10.45 pm to take us to the train station– for our marathon 3 day, 3 night journey to Tashkent in Uzbekistan.

I'm bitterly disappointed after all that effort to get to the TV tower, not to go up it and see the magnificent view, but c'est la vie; so we do the next best thing. We go into the adjoining cafe and have a cuppa.

We leave behind the Godzilla hostel, an absolutely brilliant place to stay, and our lovely taxi driver who brought us to the hostel on Sunday takes us to the station, booming out English pop and rock on his radio, tapping his steering wheel to the music as he manoeuvres his trusty vehicle through the 5-lane wide major routeway towards the station.

Our driver gives us a fridge magnet of Moscow as a memento, we tip him well because we like him, and he hands us a sheet of paper which he extracts from a huge wad of papers in his pocket, each sheet appearing to contain the same information – the taxi driver's name and address. He must have friends everywhere.

We have our usual trundle along the the platform with our mountain of luggage (including the two carrier bags of food for the journey) and climb into the train, ready to embark on the next stage of our epic journey.

Tuesday 24 April 2012

My blog will resume on Saturday - hopefully!



Tuesday 24 April - Last day in Moscow

We've been out all day today, so no time to write the blog.  For the next 3 days and 3 nights we'll be on the train to Tashkent, Uzbekistan, arriving on Friday evening, 27 April, when we'll be 4 hours ahead of the UK.

I'll write about our last day in Moscow when I'm on the train, but won't be able to post the blog until Saturday (all being well).  We will have internet access in Tashkent but it could be in the form of fixed computers rather than wifi for our own computer.  We really don't know yet. 

Just to say briefly that the temperature high in Moscow today was a pleasant 21 degrees c - a precursor to   Tashkent where it'll probably be 28 - 30 degrees c.  Our fleeces will be packed away!

We've stocked up on food from the local supermarket - filled rolls, loaves of bread, butter, cooked meats, cheese, crisps, biscuits, Mars, Snickers, cup-a-soups, pot noodles, and fruit.  Anyone would think we were preparing for a siege!  However we took the advice of a fellow traveller (see yesterday's blog) not to rely on the food on the train - also it will be expensive.

Reg and I are booked first class for this journey, so we'll have a compartment to ourselves.  I think this will be my first real test of being out of my comfort zone!  Hurray for my kindle (and I might even do some studying).

The Kremlin Museums and Red Square

Monday 23 April


We both have a brilliant night's sleep in the comfy bed, and go for breakfast to the same self serve restaurant.  Eating out is expensive in Moscow (everything is expensive in Moscow!) so it's good to find a restaurant that's reasonably priced.  I spot croissants - bliss!  I warm them up in the microwave which is there for customers' use, and ask for jam. The lady behind the counter scoops out a ladle full of jam from a bowl and pours it over my warm croissants!  Lovely.  Reg manages to make the counter assistant understand that he'd like a couple of fried eggs.  There's no bacon or sausages so he has his eggs with bread. We've both got used to black tea now.

i keep forgetting to mention that it's getting warmer.  It was 6 degrees c in Wrocslaw in Poland, and today is a pleasant 18 degrees c in Moscow.  We should make the most of this mild weather - it's going to be very hot in Tashkent in 3 days time - about 28 degrees c.

We take the Metro to the Kremlin.  It's two long escalators down into the depths of the station.  Good job it's only a couple of stops, otherwise it would be difficult to know where to get off - there are no English signs or place names on the Metro - everything is not only in Russian, but in their Cyrillic Alphabet (some of the letters are the wrong way round!)  Well, the right way round for Russians!

Our impression is that everything in Russia is money, money, money.  When we arrived at the hostel we had to buy registration forms which you have to carry around with you, in case you get stopped by the Russian police (you don't walk very far without seeing them in their familiar Russian caps). We pay the equivalent of about £25 each for tickets into the Kremlin Museums - this includes the Armoury and the Kremlin Cathedrals (2 of which were shut).  Actually the expenditure is well worth it - but then you aren't allowed to take rucksacks in and have to pay to put them in a left luggage store.

The building of the Kremlin is like a red brick fortress, with a tower and a wall surrounding it, which varies in height from about 16ft to 50 ft.  They've even got changing of the guard -  or something similar with a posse of Kremlin soldiers with their rifles marching along a parade ground then back again.

We can only liken the Kremlin Armoury Museum to the Crown Jewels in The Tower of London.  If you have the chance to go to Moscow, don't miss this exquisite treasure trove of Russian history - many of the items having been presented to the Russian Czars as royal gifts. There's much more than Armoury there - in fact, though interesting, the Armoury exhibits are tame compared to the rest of the displays - although of course it all depends on where your interests lie.

Of particular interest to me are the many 16th and 17th century editions of the Four Gospels; these were altar bibles in churches.  They are all about 1ft x2ft, encased in jewelled covers, all set in beautifully worked silver or gold.  They were made by master craftsmen and are magnificent.  A far cry from the dog eared bible in my suitcase!

There are hundreds of 16th - 19th century silver and gold items - some were religious artefacts, some belonged to the royal household - a whole case contains Engish silverware given as gifts to the various members of the Russian royal family.  There are Faberge eggs with surprises  inside (one of the surprises was a tiny working replica of the Trans-Siberian railway train at that time) and a huge porcelain tea service, each plate with a different picture on it, painted by a master artist, telling stories of the Greek fables - this is called the Olympic tea service, and was a gift from France.

There are 17th and 18th century costumes, including embroidered silk dresses with bustle cages and enormous flowing trains, which various queens wore at their coronation and on their wedding day. There are carriages, finished in gold and artwork,  including an English carriage given by King James 1, and a carriage on skis which transported Catherine the Great on a 3 day journey during the Russian winter.

Everything, from snuff boxes to Limoges boxes to the thrones of the Zsars, appears to be in pristine condition - whether they were preserved in this condition, or have been restored, I don't know.

We are flagging by the time we finish in the Armoury Museum - and could do with a cuppa. Surprisingly, there are no cafes nearby - I'm surprised Russia has missed this opportunity to make a lot of money! - so we buy a Fanta, a Snickers and a Mars from a kiosk, and sit on a bench in the gardens outside the walls of the Kremin to relax for a while,

After lunch we continue our tour by visiting some of the Kremlin cathedrals.  These are stunning, but we are tired, and after our visits to Lvov and Kiev in the Ukraine, where we also saw spectaclular church exteriors and interiors, we are ashamed to say we're a bit "churched out".

We walk to Red Square.  On this huge expanse of cobbles, Reg pictures in his mind the colourful May Day parades that take place there every year, and reflects on the historic use of the square.

We are extremely brave and decide to try getting the Metro back to our hostel from Red Square, which involves taking a different metro line from the one we came on, and then changing to our original line.  Bearing in mind that it's really difficult to read the station names,  I attempt to copy onto a piece of paper the Cyrillic letters of the station where we change lines, and of the Metro station near our hostel.  Even having done this, we still have difficulty.  A young woman who speaks English approaches us and asks if she can help - she must have noticed our puzzled expressions as we tried to recognise the station names.

We alight at the right station, congratualate ourselves (we're relieved actually),  have a meal at the self-service cafe, and return to the hostel.  I sleep for an hour, then, having booked to do our washing at 9.30 pm, put the washing on.

In the laundry room I get talking to a young Australian girl who tells us they spent 5 days and 5 nights travelling on a Russian train - and it was a bit tortuous!  (Our journey tomorrow evening to Tashkent in Uzbekistan  will be 3 days and 3 nights.)  The young woman advises us to take a thermos flask (which we have), as there is free boiling water on the trains.  She also recommends taking plenty of bottled drinking water and plenty of food - the meals on the Russian trains are expensive and not big enough to feed a sparrow!

Reg has already gone to bed; I'll follow once the washing is dry.























































Sunday 22 April 2012

The night train to Moscow

Saturday night and Sunday morning - 21/22 April

We've just left Kiev on time, at 7.15 pm.  We're due to arrive in Moscow at 9.01am tomorrow.  This is our first experience of a night/sleeper train outside of Europe.

We're impressed with our comfortable train compartment - the door can be closed and locked from the inside if necessary.  The beds in the top bunks ( which have been allocated to the 2 Russian girls thank goodness! ) are already made up with crisp white sheets and pillowcases and a blanket each. The bedding for the bottom bunks is up on a high shelf - they cannot be made up yet as the lower bunks double as seats during the day.  There's a table, and apart from the bedlinen, a small towel each.   There's no complimentary drinking water, as there was on the train from Wrocsaw to Lvov.  Each train carriage has it's own "guard".  It isn't long before ours pops her head into our compartment and asks if we'd like a cup of tea.  The Russian girls decline but no prizes for guessing our answer!

The toilet is a bit smelly but fairly clean, and a bit more roomy than normal - you could get changed into your nightclothes in there if necessary. There's a little water available (definitely not for drinking though) if you pump the tap.

The girls have had a hectic time at an international conference on diabetes, held  in Kiev, so they soon climb into their top bunks.  I read on my kindle for a while.  Reg and I don't get changed.  We make up our lower bunks, and I take off my jeans and snuggle into my bunk at about 9.30pm.
Soon we are awoken by border officials.  Reg and I have had to fill out immigration slips.  These customs officials are the Ukrainian ones. making sure we leave Ukraine when we said we would.

We are all fast asleep at midnight when we hear all the compartment doors being flung open and the Russian border officials come in and check our passports.  Then a very severe looking official comes in and speaks in Russian to the 2 girls, presumably asking them if they have anything to declare.  He doesn't speak to us at all - presumably the train guard has told him we're English.  I'm sitting up in bed and the official suddenly lifts up my pillow.  My handbag is underneath but no illicit substances.  The customs man makes a quick, sharp, exit.

It's Sunday morning and it's our 34th wedding anniversary!  We should remember this one!  We arrive in Moscow on time and are glad to be met by a taxi driver sent by the Godzilla Hostel.  He's friendly and genuine and we like him immediately.  His car is old and rusty, and small, but he packs in our luggage, with my large suitcase on the back seat, next to me.  He makes an effort to talk to us in limited English. He likes the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, Police and Sting.

The hostel is lovely - bright, clean and welcoming.  The receptionist, Ryan,  can't do enough for us.  It's not yet 10.00 am, and we can't check in till 2, but we can take a shower if we want, and sit in the comfortable lounge.  We're really tired, but the shower is bliss!

Ryan makes us a welcome cup of tea and I write this, in between chatting to the young people who come into the lounge at various intervals - a young woman from Perth, Australia, who was a teacher but is going to work as a truck driver in the mines near Perth when she's finished her travels - which will include a trip down through Africa, ending up in Capetown;  a  young Glasweigian who has his own taxi business; a young Frenchman who's worked in Vietnam; and a young woman from South Korea, who's an Art teacher but is taking 2 years out to travel the world (and is feeling the worse for wear after a great night out last night). Oh, the joys (and hangovers) of being young!

All had fascinating stories to tell.  That's one of the best things about staying in hostels - the different people you meet.

Our room's ready and it's lovely.  We both need a sleep before we venture out into the streets of Moscow.

In the evening we take a short stroll, Reg buys a Russian simcard for his phone, and Elaine texts us to wish us Happy Anniversary.  We eat our anniversary meal in a self-service restaurant, and return to our hostel to relax.

The treasures of Moscow's sights and sounds will open up to us tomorrow when we've (hopefully) had a refreshing night's sleep.  In all hostels we've booked our own double room; this one seems to have a really comfortable bed - not two singles pushed together, and not a lumpy converted put-u-up - and it actually has a double quilt instead of two singles! Yey!  It's amazing how the little things mean so much!!




























Goodbye, Kiev!



Saturday 21 April

We find that the lovely cafe where we've had breakfast for the past 2 days doesn't doesn't serve breakfast on Saturdays.  We have breakfast in the fast food hall in the huge underground shopping centre, underneath Independence Square.  We have kilbasa and brown bread (which is stiff and dry) plus black tea.  We don't enjoy our meal.

There's some sort of "pre-Olympic" event going on for young people in Independence Square, sponsored by McDonalds, who are literally everywhere in Kiev.  I want to go to the market that we saw on our tour of Kiev on Thursday.  It starts to rain quite heavily (this continues on and off throughout the day).  As we pass by another open area in Kiev centre we see a demonstration.  People, young and not so young, are handing out leaflets, and a band is getting together on a podium to sing, (in protest?)  We manage to find a young man who speaks English.  He says they are protesting  against the destruction of the beauty of Kiev; bland new buildings are being constructed next to beautiful old churches, and, the young continues, they are ruining the look of the city.  The young man goes on to talk about the fact that often no one knows who these eyesore buildings belong to.  He says there is corruption and a lack of transparency in government.  We get the feeling that the underlying protest is really about this.

We find the market and Reg wanders off while I look at all the stalls - skillfully painted paper-mache boxes with little scenes depicting Ukrainian peasant life on the lids, more expensive Russian boxes and of course, Russian dolls, and lavishly embroidered blouses and tablecloths.  I can't resist buying a little box.  I haggle and pay half the asking price.  I tell myself it's very small and will only take up a tiny corner of my already very heavy suitcase.

We walk down a street where the pavements are lined with oil paintings.  We consider buying a painting of a tram, but decide we really haven't got room, and it would need specialist packaging to send it home.  Oil paintings are, in the words of the postmistress in the TV series Larkrise to Candleford, "our one weakness."

As we meander back towards our hostel to prepare to catch the night train, leaving at 18.15, for Moscow, we notice, in separate places, 2 newly-wedded couples having photos taken in the centre of Kiev.

We eat again in our "Eric Clapton" pub restaurant,  because the food is good, and the service is fast.

Our taxi arrives to take us to the railway station - we arrive there ant hour and a quarter early.  We always need to allow plenty of time as we have a lot of luggage and need to find the right platform.  Reg looks at the departures board and we realise we have even more time than we thought.  Our rail tickets state our departure time as 18.15 - whereas the actual time of leaving is 19.15 Ukrainian time.  We're glad it's an hour later not an hour earlier!  We can't get our heads around why the train ticket should record our departure time as an hour earlier than the actual time of leaving, as  Moscow is an hour ahead of the Ukraine, so we'd have thought it would be the other way around!

We find a waiting room - it costs us about 30p each to go in - but it's craftily the only place in the station to sit down, unless you're disabled.  The waiting room is huge and extremely ornate, with carved and painted ceilings and chandeliers, and an electronic timetable which flashes in English every so often.

Our train is in!  I rattle along with my heavy suitcase behind Reg.  The train is really high above the platform, and we have to hoist up our luggage, then I wheel my case along the corridor of the train to our compartment.  Its a 4 berth, and we are soon joined by 2 young Russian women, who turn out to be doctors.  We settle ourselves down and soon the train cranks and grinds into action.  Goodbye, Kiev!


























xxx

Saturday 21 April 2012

Kiev's underground monastery

Friday 20 April

 I have had stomach cramps all night and have an iffy tummy.  I forgot to bring Immodium tablets with me.  I haven't started taking the Paraclens tablets yet (they are herbal tablets which my friend Anne recommended to me to prevent iffy tummies), but obviously the time has come to start taking them.  So I'm not on full form today, but we are looking forward to Galina, our guide of yesterday's tour, taking us on a private tour of the Kiev monastery of Lavra today,

After a leisurely breakfast ( I avoid spicy foods and salami) we meet Galina outside McDonalds.  We take the metro to the Lavra monastery.  The metro was built by the Ukrainian army deep underground; it doubles as bomb shelter.  In emergency, there are doors which will hermetically seal the shelter off.  Ventilation has been built into the system.

The escalators leading down to the Metro are extremely fast compared to those on the London underground, and they are the longest escalators in Europe.  They seem to go on forever. We take the tube and alight near the Lavra monastery.  This is supposed to be a two and a half hour tour.  (It lasts 5 and a half hours, and we don't even stop for coffee!)

We spend at least half an hour standing outside the metro station while Reg questions Galina on the timeline of Ukrainian history, as he is really interested in it.  Galina obviously loves being questioned, and is an expert on this subject, and doesn't seem at all concerned about all the extra time this is taking.  I stand listening to their discussion; it really is very interesting to hear how the Ukraine has battled for independence, and what the country has been through to get there.

On the way to the monastery, we learn that the founder of Moscow Yuri Dolgoruki , came from Kiev, and is buried underneath a nearby church.  However, the Russians want him to be buried in Moscow, so have negotiated for his body to be returned to them.  Russia and Ukraine have their differences:  Galina says the only way to deal with the Russians is to meet "force with force".   The Russians supply the Ukrainians with gas and oil, so could be said to have the Ukrainians "over a barrel" (excuse the pun).  On the other hand, the Russians' gas pipeline to Europe runs through the Ukraine - so the Ukrainians have a bargaining point here.

We go past the tomb of the unknown soldier, commemorating all those soldiers lost in World War 2, which for the Ukrainians was 1941 -1945.

There is another monument, to commemorate the fact that Stalin deliberately starved 10 million - yes, 10 million - Ukranians during 1921-1922 and 1932-1933.  Stalin wanted to get rid of the power held by individual farmers who farmed their own lands. (Galina tells us that Ukraine has the most fertile soil in Europe - it grows an enormous harvest of wheat, and is known as the "breadbasket of Europe"). So Stalin surrounded each village with troops, took all the food, and starved all the villagers to death.  He did this all over Ukraine, and he did it in winter, so that the people could not find any alternative food eg garden worms, grass. Shockingly, we learn that some people were driven by hunger to eat their own children.  Galina said, the persecution of 6 million Jews in the Holocaust was an evil thing - but so was Stalin's murder of these 10 million Ukranians.

We look inside all the beautiful golden-domed churches on the monastery site, including the Lavre Cathedral.  Galina tells us that the Cathedral was built by 12 Byzantian builders, who all independently were told in a dream by the Virgin Mary to leave their homeland and build this cathedral on the Lavre site. Pilgrims come from all over the world to this site, to pray, receive forgiveness for their sins, and be healed - Galina tells us that the Lavre monastery is for Orthodox Christians the equivalent of Lourdes in France. Whether or not one agrees with the Orthodox response to Christianity - lots of ritual and splendid icons, wall and ceiling paintings, gold and splendour - I don't think one can fail to be in awe of the architects, craftsmen and artists who designed the churches and cathedrals, and who adorned the magnificent church interiors with such breathtaking skill.  I paarticularly loved 2 wall paintings depicting when Jesus calmed the storm and when the Emmaus road travellers recognised Jesus as he broke bread at supper.


We are about 4 hours into the tour and I am  definitely flagging, and we haven't even been into the underground "cave monastery" yet.  I use the toilet (one of those stand-up "put-one-foot-either-side" types, and ask if we can sit down for 5 minutes.  We share the one bottle of water I brought with me.

We hold a candle each as we negotiate the labyrinth of tunnels in the underground monastery,  Galina is still explaining what everything is, and who the saints are whose bodies are encased in various alcoves amongst the tunnels.  The bodies(including those of the 12 Byzantian builders) apparently by "a miracle of God" have never decomposed, and have been in situ for hundreds of years.  The bodies in the glass protective cases are covered, apart from one or two hands showing.   The hands are black, and look dried up as if they were made of wood.

Galina is telling us the names of all the saints as we reach each body, but by this time I am absolutely exhausted and can't take any more information in.  I can't wait to get out!

We all catch the bus back to Independence Square, and walk with Galina as far as the end of our road, where we kiss, and I give her my email address, and we part company.  Galina's tour was absolutely excellent, but too long for the average tourist.  Reg says he was partly to blame for this, because of all his questions; I resolve to say nothing that could inflame the situation at this point as we are both very tired!  Besides, the history of the Ukraine is fascinating.

Reg and I walk ever so slowly back to our hostel.  I joke with Natasha the hostel receptionist, that, oh dear, I'm feeling my age and need to rest.

After a 2 hour sleep Reg and I are refreshed.  We find the perfect place for dinner, a bustling, pub-like bar/restaurant,  where a band in the cellar are playing live music, old stuff, including Eric Clapton, Roy Orbison and The Beatles .  My tummy is still unsettled so I have grilled salmon which is delicious,and Reg has Chicken Caesar salad and chips.  Afterwards Reg has apple pie (which looks similar to the delicious apple strudel-type cake that our Ukrainian friend Valentyna makes) and I have cheesecake.  Reg has tea and I have Americano.  The meal is expensive by Ukrainian standards, about £30 inclusive of a beer and orange juice. This is our last night though and during our 5 and a half hour tour we didn't have any lunch!!  Tomorrow we catch the 6.15 pm overnight train for Moscow.




















































Thursday 19 April 2012

Reg slides down on his bottom.... into a puddle!

Thursday 19 April

In the cafe down the road, we have a late breakfast of black tea, 2 hardboiled eggs, slices of yellow pepper and cucumber, Ukrainian meats, roll and butter.  While we eat I look out onto the street.  Suddenly there is much blasting and beeping of car horns as an entourage of cars adorned with flags joins our street from a side road.  We have no idea why the cars were waving flags.  The streets are strangled with traffic - mainly, as mentioned yesterday, black Mercedes, or Toyota, 4 X4's, or some sleek Mercedes or BMW saloons, all with blacked out windows.  Is that for privacy or because of the hot weather in summer?  Cars park where they like on the pavements.

We notice that there is a proliferation of shops with designer label titles - Adidas, Nike, United Colours of Benneton.  This (and the posh cars, including the unusual number of 4x4's on the road), indicates that image seems to be important to some people here.

Our tour of "old Kiev" starts at 12 noon in Independence Square, and so does the rain, which buckets down for the whole 3 hours, leaving us all drenched.  Reg and I are glad of our waterproof walking boots.   Our tour guide is Galina, a young Ukrainian woman who it turns out really knows her stuff.  We tourists in the group are a motley crew - 2 from UK (us!), a young Russian woman, a young Romanian man who is of Hungarian stock and speaks perfect English (and about 7 other languages),2 older people from Boston, America who are currently missionaries in Russia, A Turkish man, and a Methodist minister from Ireland.  (what are the chances of a trainee Methodist local preacher (me) meeting a Methodist minister on a tour of Kiev?)

The tour whizzes by.  Galina has a natural talent for making Kiev history really alive.  We learn that Ukraine is fiercely proud of its 21 years of independence, having been crushed by various countries throughout its history, especially it would seem, by the Russians.  Many of Ukraine's beautiful churches and national heritage buildings were razed to the ground by the Russians;  Christianity was outlawed by the Soviets when they took over Ukraine  in 1918.  Some churches have been rebuilt as exact replicas of the originals.  The churches are stunning, especially the insides, bedecked with gold, icons, paintings and beautiful ceilings.  Orthodox Christianity is the national religion. Galina estimates that 80% of people in Kiev are Christians.

 I remark to Steve, the Methodist minister, that all the opulence and finery seen in the Orthodox churches here couldn't be more in contrast to the plain, down-to-earth Methodist chapels and churches.  Steve and I have a really good discussion about his ministry in Ireland, and how my church in Bristol is involved with Messy Church.

It's still teeming down with rain.  We are shown some interesting outdoor modern art, mainly unusual sculpture; also a picture by Banksy on the side of a building, depicting the Ukrainian woman prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko who's been imprisoned by the president of Ukraine as his way of getting rid of the opposition party. The Ukrainians believe that the charges against Yulia are "trumped up".  We explain to Galina the significance of the world famous Banksy to Bristolians, as he heralds from our home town.

Towards the end of the tour there's a children's (and I guess adults) play area sculpted in concrete, telling the story of Alice in Wonderland.  The sculpture includes a lovely slide which a couple of our party persuade Reg to go down.  It's still raining hard, and at the bottom of the slide, unseen by Reg, and the rest of us actually, is an exceptionally deep puddle. Reg lands squarely in the puddle, bottom first, with a big splash.  Men will be boys, and as Reg's trousers are already sodden, the wet behind doesn't make much difference.

Reg and I arrange a tour around the Kiev underground monastery for tomorrow, with Galina as our guide.

We find a really good, cheap, self service place for lunch, where we can try a great variety of Ukrainian food.   We are so impressed, we return there for our evening meal.

We finish off the day by buying a bottle of shower gel in a local supermarket.  The assistant refuses to take our Ukrainian 10 hryvnias note and starts to smile.  I'd mistakenly left a Polish 10 zloty note in my purse and am trying to give her that.  It takes the assistant, with the help of a male colleague, a few minutes to make us understand our mistake.

What are we like? Such is life with the Parkers.
















Wednesday 18 April 2012

The fast train from Lvov to Kiev

I get up at 4.30 am to get ready to catch the 6.35 am train.  Reg stays in bed as long as possible!  The train is crowded, but luckily we have reserved seats.  When the train gets going, the guard brings round tea, in a glass in a fancy chrome holder, with a delicately fashioned teaspoon inside.  We're impressed.  We haven't had breakfast, so eat a banana and a chocolate bar each.

The train journey passes uneventfully, though it's difficult  to look out of the window from these particular seats, also the window is quite misted up.  I do notice when I strain my head, lots of women working in fields, then forest scrub, some posh houses,  and many houses and other buildings with corrugated irons roofs, some well-maintained, many delapidated. I see untarmaced roads in some areas - there's the impression of much poverty, and as before, pockets of wealth.

The train gets in to Kiev three quarters of an hour late.  As we alight from the train a man on the platform approaches and asks us with some persistence if we want a taxi.  We've been warned not to bite and to take a metered taxi - a similar thing happened to us when we arrived at Brussels. (We later learn that it's apparently impossible to get a metered taxi in Kiev), We decline, and as we leave the station another man approaches us and asks where we are going.  The proper taxis appear to be across the road.  Reg decides we should go with this driver as he seems cosha and knows where the hostel is.  The man leads us to a battered Skoda and I am less than happy to get in this car.  It has no rear seat belts.  As Reg has made his decision I ask "How much?"  The driver replies, the equivalent of £8, which isn't extortionate even if we're not going far (We later learn a reasonable charge would have been half that).

The man speaks a little English, and points out 1 or 2 landmarks as he drives like a maniac through the city of Kiev, which is completely snarled up with traffic.  There are lots of Mercedes and Toyota 4x4's with blacked out windows.  Our driver isn't fazed by any of them - after all, they are no  doubt more concerned about damaging their vehicles than he is about his rusty Skoda.  Our driver forces his way into a stream of cars 2 cars wide at one point, causing a black 4x4 to clip the side of another car in the ajacent stream of traffic.  Our driver's car is undamaged so he keeps going, seemingly oblivious to the havoc he is causing.  When we arrive at our destination he gives us a piece of paper with his mobile number on it, should we be in need of a taxi again(!!)

I'm suspicious as to whether this really is our destination, as there's no obvious sign indicating a hostel, only a few graffitied letters on a wall saying "One Step Hostel" with an arrow.  We follow the graffitied arrows, and then ask someone who happens to be passing - yes, this is the  hostel! It's on the 4th floor of a rather shabby building, but the hostel has a high rating on Hostelworld.com so we aren't too worried.  We're relieved when a friendly voice answers the intercom, and soon we're in a very welcoming, brightly decorated hostel, and the English-speaking receptionist is making us feel at home.  We have a lovely big room with a huge double bed (2 singles pushed together).

Natasha the receptionist will do all our washing for £8 which is great.  We sleep for over an hour, then go out to draw out some cash from one of the numerous ATM's, as Natasha  would prefer payment in cash for our stay.  It's our experience that this is the payment preference of most hostels.

We call  in at the Tourist Information Office and book a tour of the old town for 12 noon tomorrow.  Then we go for a meal in a restaurant near the hostel.  The place is done out in Ukrainian country style, with the waitresses in peasant costume with flowers in their hair,  The meal is mediocre though and the giggly barn dance music would drive me potty if I worked there.

When we get back to the hostel, Natasha returns our washing beautifully clean and tumble dried.  I knew I shouldn't have put in my merino wool jumpers though, as they've shrunk.

We make a couple of phone calls home, then  Reg goes to bed while I finish writing this blog.








Out and about in Lvov on “The Second Day of Easter”


Tuesday 17 April

In view of our lack of sleep the previous night, I sleep in the 4 foot bed and Reg sleeps in the bottom bunk in the dormitory next door. We both have a really good night. Reg is still dead to the world when I wake at 7 am. I decide to go downstairs and make a cuppa. I switch on the kitchen light and wake up Ola who is, unbeknown to me, asleep on the kitchen couch. Surely with all these empty hostel beds (remembering the large room off the kitchen which also has several bunk beds) Ola could have slept in a bed? Poor Ola.

I need to do some studying for my course back home. I do an hour and am pleased with myself, so read a bit more of The Sealed Letter on my kindle.

Finally Reg wakes up and we go for breakfast to a cafe we noticed yesterday. Like all the restaurants and cafes we've been to in Lvov, it's spotlessly clean. I order warm croissants with butter and jam and Reg asks for an egg and bacon sandwich. This comes as a bacon salad sandwich with two fried eggs on top. We both have tea with lemon, which I'm getting quite used to. The young waiter speaks a little English and is very friendly. He tells us its the 2nd day of Easter.

Out of the cafe window I have a good view of the huge crucifix in the centre of the square.   Several older people stop in front of the crucifix and do the sign of cross and appear to murmer a few words. A man of about 40 on his mobile hesitates and hastily does the sign of the cross as he passes the statue, without stopping. Younger people walk by the statue without even looking at it. Is Christianity lost to the young in this country with its entrenched religious practices and customs? I decide probably not, when we later go into St Andrew's church and find it is packed with people praying and some sort of a religious ceremony is happening, though not a service, as people are still wondering about and coming and going as they please. There's lots more kissing the icon and wiping away with the white cloth. A man comes in with his 2 sons, in their early twenties, and several women have young children with them.

We come across the Lvov art gallery/museum, which apparently has the finest collection of 17th and 18th century Ukrainian art in the whole of the Ukraine and possibly in the world. Reg gets talking to the young commissionaire/security guard who is wearing a very smart Army style uniform with classic peaked hat. He speaks a little English, and tells Reg he works a 24 hour shift twice a week. We wonder why he would need to work 24 hours, but perhaps it's because the paintings are so valuable, someone needs to be there overnight.

There are many religious paintings which were originally housed in churches, depicting various biblical events, such as the passion of Christ, and Judgment Day. There are also oil paintings of everyday Ukrainian life in the 17th and 18th centuries. The quality of the art is superb.

Lunch is in a little cafe where one of the young assistants behind the self-service counter speaks good English with a USA accent. She's been to the USA, but can't get a visa to visit the UK. We pick out a cheese& ham salad baguette (me) which also turns out to have mushrooms in it, and a salmon salad baguette (Reg), and order tea. Our lunch comes in a few minutes. We find that the baguettes and fillings are served warm, like paninis.
After lunch we go to have a look at a local park. On the way we pass a huge building – “The Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine”. I ask Reg why there are loundspeakers all around the outside of the building. He explains patiently that that's the air conditioning.

I take photos of a very prestigious building, the University of Lvov. We are in the park now, lots of trees, paths, a children's play area, and scrubby lawns, half mud and half grass. About a dozen older men, senior citizens, are gathered around a couple of park benches, playing cards. Reg asks if he can take a photo – they don't seem to mind.

We spot a trolley bus, and Reg wants a photo. It drives by too quickly. So we wait for 15 minutes in the cold (it's 5 degrees c) for another trolley bus to come by.

We're quite tired now and chilly, so we return to the hostel, where Reg tries to explain to Ola that we need a taxi for 5.30 am tomorrow morning. She doesn't understand. She phones the hostel owner, who speaks to Reg in English. The hostel owner explains the taxi request to Ola, who then orders the taxi. Simple really.

Reg sleeps and I write my blog. For dinner we return to the restaurant where we had lunch yesterday, as it was so good. It's different this evening – very busy and paper not cloth serviettes. |We sit down in the no smoking area. Near us are 4 Ukranian men who are just finishing their meal. There are empty beer and vodka glasses on the table and they've obviously had a good time, as they are finding it difficult to get up from the table, and one of them remains seated, dropping his head on his forearms.

There's an English couple sitting at the table next to us – our first encounter with English fellow-travellers since leaving the UK. They've just arrived for a couple of days in Lvov, having been staying in Kiev (where we're going tomorrow) with their daughter, who's a lawyer married to a British diplomat, who has a 3 year posting in Kiev. They recommend that we visit the underground monastery in Kiev, and say we'll need a guided tour.

The English couple have left, and the non-smoking part of the restaurant is now empty apart from us. While waiting for our coffee we phone George and Marianne. Phone calls are cheap with the Ukrainian sim card.

Back at the hostel we pack up our belongings, ready to leave at 5.30 am, to catch the 6.35am fast train to Kiev. The train is due to arrive in Kiev about 1.00pm.

Tuesday 17 April 2012

It's Easter in Lvov!

Monday 16 April

It's Easter in Lvov - a week later than in England.  The lady we chatted to on the train (the one with the on line clothing business who once worked in Park Street) told us this - although she said that for Catholics Easter was last week - very confusing!  Anyway, that means that today is a Bank Holiday in the Ukraine and people are out and about in families.

Despite being exhausted Reg and I both sleep badly in our lumpy 4 foot wide bed.  Reg is going to sleep in one of the lower bunk beds in the main hostel room tonight,  so that hopefully we'll both get a good night's sleep.  Ola our host arrives at 9am.  She's young (about 20), very friendly and smiley, and doesn't speak a single word of English.  Reg uses the language translation application on his smart  phone (where you speak in one language and it translates to the language of your choice) to try to communicate with Ola, but it doesn't work that efficiently. Reg tries to ask Ola to order a taxi for 5.30 am on Wednesday, when we have to catch the 6.30 am train from Lvov to Kiev.  We're not sure if she's understood or  not, though she's smiling a lot.  Whenever we see her she's on  her mobile, and who can blame her?  She must be really bored, with us as the only guests, and she can't communicate with us.

The shower's quite good, and the water's hot, so that starts the day off right.  We plan that when we get to Kiev we'll see if we can do some washing -there don't appear to be any facilities here.  Our underwear (excluding socks) is the only clothing we are changing daily!  It's boring but practical to wear clothes until they seem to have reached their "wearing" sell-by date.  I may post my winter clothes home after Tibet.  Have bought a couple more gifts which will need to be posted home when I have a few more things to send.

We venture out. It's 10.00 am and not too cold.  We spot a McCafe, which is a sort of side-cafe to McDonalds and I notice they sell croissants, which I love but Reg is not so keen on.  Still, we go in and Reg is pacified by fact that they have free wifi so he can fiddle around with his phone while we wait for our breakfast order.  We notice that all the cafes and restaurants here seem to have free wifi access.

The tea's lovely (you have to ask for Ceylon black tea here).  You get a large teapot and they'll refil it with boiling water for free. The tea is loose but in a sort of silk pouch, which drapes over the outside of the teapot.

The young girl who serves us in  the McCafe is  really friendly and speaks good English.  She's been to the USA but not to England.  She tells us that it's extremely hard to get a visa to go to England - other young people reiterate this.  One young waiter said the only way to get a visa for the UK is to go to Poland and then apply from there.

We wander around Lvov (which was part of the Soviet Union about 20 years ago). We find a phone shop and the assistant is extremely helpful in helping us choose the right sim card, even though he speaks little English. There aren't many cars about - is that because it's a Bank Holiday or are there simply not many cars in Lvov? (Note:  Many more cars the following day - so the Bank Holiday must have been the reason.)   The overall feeling is one of lots of space - a huge square and wide roads seem to dominate the centre of Lvov.  There are a couple of tarmac roads, but most are square cobblestone,  The cars make a shooshing noise as they travel over the cobbles.

We have lunch in what turns out to be quite a posh restaurant, though from the outside it's like any other, with tables outside.  We go inside because it's fairly cold.  There are 3 waiters with dicky bows. They fall over themselves to show us to a table, which is laid with a white tablecloth, loads of silver cutlery and cloth serviettes.  This is going to be expensive!  The room  is beautiful, with carvings of couples dressed in clothes of the Dickensian era, in romantic mode.  I take photos.

While we wait for our food the 3 waiters are folding serviettes.  The meal is delicious (my friend Carol, please note!!). I have pork fillet rolls, stuffed with mushrooms in a cheesy sauce, with "peasant potatoes", which turn out to be potato wedges.  Reg has pork in a mustard dressing, with chips, and salad.  For dessert I have ice cream with chocolate flakes topped with one of those paper umbrellas.  We have coffee and tea afterwards and the whole meal (including an earlier beer and fresh orange juice) comes to £17 for the 2 of us.

Reg gets told off for taking a flash photo in a church, by a lady who's praying on her knees.  Several  people are on their knees praying - mainly older people.  Perhaps it's because it's Easter, or perhaps this happens all the time, we are aware that people seem more observant of Catholic religious practices here.  In the churches, people kiss an icon at the foot of a crucifix statue or statue of the Virgin Mary.  On the glass top of this kissing area there's a white lace edged cloth.  Each person kisses the glass, then wipes their kiss away with the white cloth. Everyone uses the same white cloth to wipe where their lips have touched the glass.  Don't even think about the hygiene aspect.

Regs wants to climb a tower that has 306 steps, so we do.  I'm puffed out by time we reach the top, but there's a beautiful all-round view of central Lvov.  My knees will suffer tomorrow!

We visit the  Lvov museum.  The most interesting aspect is the attitude of the stewards.  On the first floor we are met by a dour-looking woman who silently takes our tickets and is extremely unwelcoming.  On the second floor, the steward, a woman, is all smiles, and points out where we can read about Lvov's history in English.  She is pleased to see us.

What I glean from the museum is that the Ukraine has had a difficult time establishing itself as a separate country, having been fought over many times by various countries.

For dinner we go to a modern cafe type place, but our evening is ruined by the surly young waitress.  We smile pleasantly as we order but her face is deadpan. (Perhaps she's just having a bad day).  I order pizza which comes before Reg's meal, which is chicken and chips.  Reg had ordered by pointing to the photo on the menu.  Finally when I've had to start my meal so that it won't get cold, Reg's chicken arrives without chips.  We manage to make the waitress understand and she reluctantly orders chips.

For the first time on our travels, we don't leave a tip, not because of the misunderstanding over what we'd ordered, but because it doesn't cost anything to smile.

We go home and phone Elaine using Reg's phone with the Ukrainian sim card in it.  The phone company are of course sending him lots of text messages in Ukrainian which we don't understand!

We try to watch Waterloo road on BBC I player, which Reg has managed to put on his computer.  But the intermittent "buffering" (picture stalling) makes it impossible to watch.  Oh well, we'll  have that to look forward to when we get back to the UK - Reg is recording it on "series link" at home.

Time for bed!










































Monday 16 April 2012

Customs officials and sniffer dogs


Sunday 15 April (continued)

We are stuck at the Ukranian border for 3 and a half hours. But we later arrive in Lvov on time so the train must be at the border for that long every time it makes this journey. After our passports have been checked twice at the border, a woman customs official briefly looks in my suitcase, then looks at Reg's huge backpack and smiles. “Just clothes?” she asks, in a thick Eastern European accent, and Reg nods. She disappears and another customs official with a black spaniel appears in the doorway. Drugs! The man asks us a question in what seemed to be Polish.
Sorry, we don't understand,”we reply lamely, “We're English”, as if that explained everything.
Do you have any drugs or dangerous weapons?”the official asks, extremely politely.
No” I reply, thinking of the mountain of herbal tablets we have with us – glucosamine sulphate, ginko bibloba, EPA high strength fish oil, 6 bottles of Paraclens to ward off dodgy tummies, not to mention malaria tablets. I smile benignly at the sniffer spaniel and say “Hello, there!” in the kind of voice we reserve for children and dogs. The spaniel luckily isn't interested in my herbal pharmacy and waddles out of the cabin, followed by the very polite customs officer.

We are tired and drained and can't wait to get to Lvov. Finally the whistle blows and the train jerks itself into action. We are soon speeding towards our destination. As we pack up our bits and pieces, we discover that if you lift up the cabinet/tabletop opposite the bunks, there's a washbasin concealed below, with hey presto! running water. So there had been a use for the soap and towel after all.

As we are nearing Lvov, we wait by the train exit door with our luggage and get talking to a Ukranian lady who is married to an Englishman, whom she met while working in Park Street! Finally, we've met someone who's been to Bristol!  She has an online clothing business, and made us laugh with her tales of doing business with the Chinese, and her difficulty in using chopsticks.

We are met at the station by the owner of our hostel, thank goodness! The owner tells us as we arrive at the hostel that we will be "home alone" overnight, as he's going back to his house, and there's no other guests staying here at the moment (well the hostel is as yet unrated as it only opened in March this year). Reg knew he took a risk booking it up, but the fact that it's right in the centre of Lvov swayed him to book.

The owner points out the kitchen where there's free tea and coffee but we have to go out for breakfast or make our own. After walking up a wide stone staircase, we reach a huge room with four sets of bunk beds in  it, and we walk through this to our double room.  The bed was described as a “deluxe double bed” in the information on line; we discover that  the bed is only 4 foot wide so we know we'll have trouble as I'm a very restless sleeper.  We also find out it's not very comfortable, appearing to be a converted couch/"put-u-up",  However, the room, though small, appears clean and has a shower-room toilet cum toilet right next to it, opening out into the large bunk-bedded room.  We're grateful really that there are no other guests, because it means we actually do have an on-suite bathroom as described on line; had the bunk  beds been fully occupied there would have been 10 of us using the tiny shower room cum toilet.
   
We're both asleep as soon as our heads touch the pillows.