Weekend Surprises

Sunday was by far the most beautiful day we've had in Ukraine. It was sunny with a breeze, not windy, and temperatures approached 60, I'd bet. After our morning at Coffee Life (Coffee As Lifestyle), we chilled back at the apartment and snacked on rotisserie chicken. Kevin decided to chop up the rest of it and make chicken salad. We had green peppers, onions and plenty of mayo, so he made quite a batch. Then, because it was so nice out, we decided to walk to the river and see what was around.

The walk to the river was strewn by broken glass and trash of all kinds. As we approached the beach, piles of beer and vodka bottles were in every clearing. It looked like a popular party place, for sure. I was impressed by how much waterfront property here is not developed. You'd never see that in the US. We walked along the water and saw 2 very large passenger boats. Since we cannot read the signs, we were unable to discern if they were commercial or private. There were no people around, that we could see.

On the other side of where the boats were was a park of some kind featuring sand soccer courts, tennis courts and a kiddie pool. Everything was dirty and strewn with disbris. Obviously the park had been closed all winter and needed some maintenance before re-opening. There was a guy raking and another guy dragging the tennis court.

Across the street, away from the water, we saw signs for our Comfy store and a huge park/playground area. There were people everywhere enjoying the beautiful day. Most of them were carrying beer bottles, no matter if they were teenagers. By this time we had removed our coats because we were so warm. It was interesting to note, however, that the Ukranians continued to wear their hats, scarves, coats, and boots. Kevin was sweating (big surprise there) and we climbed a gigantic flight of stone stairs toward a big rainbow display. The stairs looked like they had a water fountain that might flow between them, but it was not operating at this time.

We passed a group of boys playing cricket and emerged way past the Comfy. By the time we got home it was just before 4:00. Where did the day go? We had arranged to have a cab take us to the orphanage at 4:00 to meet Jessica and go to the youth church at 5:00. Hopefully, Kai would be back by then and could perhaps go with us.

Leonid came to get us and was pleased to meet my husband. He continued to practice his English with us and then put in an early Beatles CD. There were songs on it that we'd never heard before, obviously released in Europe, but not in the US. They were pretty stupid songs, too. Then he fast-forwarded to "Baby, You Can Drive My Car" and began singing with it. I changed it to Leo, you can drive my car and we had a laugh.

At the orphanage, Kai was outside playing soccer with some other boys. He saw us and came to us. He looked pretty rough, sweaty and dirty. Jessica came outside almost immediately and we found out that Kai's step-dad had gotten drunk and never came for him. He had spent the whole weekend alone at the nearly empty orphanage. He said it was no big deal, but I found it somewhat upsetting.

We then talked about what we'd like to do, now that we were all together. Kai said he'd rather we play soccer with him than go to church, because it was such a nice day. It was about 4:30, though and the sun was going down. So, I pushed for church. He said he had run out of shampoo so we decided to go to the store and then walk to church. Kai had to run and find a teacher to ask permission. I'm sure they didn't care, but I really don't want to get in trouble.

We went to the bigger store that we went to the first time. We got shampoo, deoderant and gum. At church, Jessica spoke with a young man about us saying something during service. He said it would be at the end, if there was time. She explained that we had to leave before 6:45 in order to get Kai back to the orphanage by 7:00.

There were only 4 singers for praise and worship, and I only recognised 1 song. Jessica did her best to translate some of the message for us, and we got the basic gist of it. He was talking about idols, that we all worship something, and that we become like what we worship. He used scriptures from all over the Bible and seemed pretty engaging. Kai said he understood what the man was taking about.

When the youth dude spoke about small groups and their importance, I told Kai that he would be in youth group at home, and that Nicky and Elliot would be in it, too. He continued to ask questions about what it will be like when we get home; i.e. where will he attend school, will Dylan or Nicky or Elliot be in school with him, where will we eat, who will be at the airport to welcome us home...many questions. I had to say I don't know a lot.

We had to leave before being asked to speak, which was okay by us. On the way back, I had Jessica explain to Kai that there will be lots of times when we are in America where we will have to make decisions about what is best for him that we will not have the words to explain. I wanted him to know that his wants and opinions are important to me, but that Kevin and I will always have the final say, and that he will have to trust us that we know best, and have his best interest in mind. I think this will be a hard thing for him, based on the fact that people have consistantly let him down, and have not demonstrated having his interest in mind.

We said good-bye at the door and I promised to return in the afternoon, as usual. I kind of like the routine we have established, and he can play teenager and sleep late while I go to the coffee shop and blog. Then we were off to Jessica's apartment where Gallia was preparing a gourmet dinner for us. Kevin opted to walk despite the fact that it was at least a mile away. On the way we stopped at a small market and picked up a couple of beers, a carton of juice, a big bar of dark chocolate, and 2 ice cream treats for Jessica and Gallia. The salesgirls were genuinely amused at our attempts at Russian and Jessica said they laughed at me because I was "dancing". I was most certainly not dancing, but perhaps I was. I don't know. We were having fun.

Jessica's apartment building makes our apartment look like Ford's Colony in comparison. It was dark, dirty, and spooky. The elevator was very dubious. She was on the 7th floor so we used it, however. Gallia greeted us and we were met by a lovely aroma of food. We were all starving.

The apartment was about 1/3 the size of ours with a small kitchen, a small toilet room, a small bathtub room and a combo living room/ Jessica's bedroom. We set up the table in the big room and were served an awesome casserole of chicken, potatoes, and onions in mayonaise and olive oil. In addition, there was a cole slaw of 2 kinds of cabbage, walnuts (from the village), in sesame oil and vinegar. Everything was absolutely delicious. Afterwards, despite being totally stuffed, we ate homemade banana bread and chocolate. Dinner conversation was animated and often boisterous. Gallia was especially amused by Kevin's butchering of the Russian language and my inane memory tricks for learning new words. It was a great time and we hope to be able to reciprocate eventually.

It was nearly 9:30 when Gallia called Leonid for us and we waited for him outside. On the way home, I stated that I wanted to sleep and Leo said. "It's been a hard days night", a Beatles fan to the end. I got ready for bed and was looking forward to watching Bones again. However, my computer was unresponsive to any commands. It wouldn't open any programs or even shut down. Control/Alt/ Delete did nothing as well. I just pressed the off button and then tried to power back up. The computer said it could not detect any hard drive. This was greatly alarming. I opted to run a diagnostic and a re-boot program. I was not hopeful, and since it was taking so long to run this scary-looking process, I began praying and telling the devil to get the heck off my computer. Shortly thereafter, I saw the prompt to restart and hit it. My computer started up perfectly and there was much rejoicing! We watched 1 episode and crawled into bed. What a day!