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Parties, Paris and London

Wednesday, June 14, 2000

Hi Family and Friends,

It's been a month since we sent a note about our new digs. Since then we've basically returned to normal life. You know, parties, plays, banquets, dancing in the street, travel, etc. Sounds good and we have to admit we do enjoy our stay here, but here's the rest of the story on "parties, plays,..."

On May 20th we had the first major party in our new place - almost our first party since coming to Kiev. It was an Open House where we expected to put people in every room and on every porch. We started preparations in the morning and about 10:00am Marianne inspected the front porch. Pleasant spot: new plastic chairs, view below of the electric trolleys, street view of a normal city life. Not a couple minutes after her inspection we saw a small drawback of this little getaway - it was falling apart. Big chunks of concrete. Guess no one goes out there. After that, the party was easy and we enjoyed seeing a couple dozen people in the house. It's definitely the right style for parties.

As for the play, it wasn't exactly Broadway. It was amateur theatre and we went because we had friends in it. Good friends. Bad actors. Actually, THEY weren't so bad but the material was weak. Written by some flake named Woody Allen so what can you expect.

And the banquet? Of course it was one of the series of banquets schools are blessed with this time of year. One had a stage full of kids, just like a thousand other stages throughout the world - or at least throughout the American world. This end-of-the-year celebration for schools may be peculiarly American but the picture shows that no one has a monopoly on enjoying the events. By now Marianne has had her fill of kids but I've learned to expect this once-a-year phenomenon.

The other type of party that's normal for us now is a Going Away party. Unfortunately we live in a transient community so every year friends move on. We had a dinner for a half-dozen of them and Marianne enjoyed some cooking. It will be hard to see some of these people go because I don't know if we'll ever make it to their new homes - especially the couple who are moving to Guagadoudo (sp?). (Extra points to anyone who can identify the country. One of the poorest in the world.)

And the "dancing in the street"? Well, maybe not exactly dancing but we did join the throngs in the street on the annual "Kyiv Days" celebration. Wonderful celebration with little or no political overtones. Strictly commercial. Makes an American proud of the style and culture we've managed to overwhelm the Evil Empire with. Marianne dove into the crowds enthusiastically- somewhere in here. In case you ever have a chance to come to Kyiv, try the last weekend in May; it's fun.

Now TRAVEL. Of course we have travel. That's one of the reasons we're over here in Europe. Well, in some form of Europe anyway. Last week I had a business trip to Paris and London. Is everybody jealous? No need. I really did miss my normal travel partner and it really was cold and wet and it really was work. I had one day in Paris to wander around taking pictures but with the weather the only shots were of some places I saw where we could maybe do some renovation. I saw three small "row houses" that were in a very quiet neighborhood. Not much space but the location was great. I also ran across a bit bigger place. In reasonable repair but upkeep might be a bit steep. The place lost tens of thousands of trees last year in a wind storm so there's lots of firewood available somewhere.

But at night, we did have some nice dinners with some nice business folks. Here I am (on right) with my office mate Peter (on left) and my colleague from the States Sergey. That's Sergey's Mom next to him. I first met Sergey and his Mom in Rio de Janeiro 18 years ago. Small world. One day I'm a good tour guide and a few years later he's getting me a job in Ukraine. Maybe I wasn't such a good guide. But, in any event, his mom was as charming as she was 18 years ago.

Finally, travel to London. I took the train from Paris. Great way to travel. Painless and no hassles at either end. Earlier in the week one of these 200km/hr trains jumped the track but we had no problems. In London, it was mostly work. I had to meet with the bank that's managing the funds for our project. The guys are worriers. Paid to do that I'm sure but it makes meetings tense even if I'm not in trouble (for now).

In case you wonder what sort of luxurious accommodations we international travellers use, I'll show you my room in the East End of London. Not exactly like the advertisements I guess. It was so small the bell man and I could not be in the room at the same time. After two days here I was definitively ready to go home. So I did.

Take care and write in between summer vacations.

John and Marianne

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Originally mailed June 14, 2000. Reformatted for web on May 20, 2001. This page created on a Macintosh using PhotoPage by John A. Vink.