Saturday, March 23, 2013

Living in the City Center


I have often been jealous of my many friends here who live in lovely big houses outside of town with gardens, pools and oodles of room. And I have often cursed our 59 steps up to our apartment door. Today I want to give our city center apartment a huge hug. We are in the midst of a monstrous blizzard- on day 2 with no end in sight. At least 3 feet of snow has fallen as of Saturday night with massive 6 foot drifts all around.  Many cars are completely buried and traffic is crippled with roads filled with abandoned cars and trucks.  On one busy road just outside of town a 14 hour traffic jam was finally relieved when they cut a hole in the center guard rails and allowed the cars to escape.  Paolo left ours last night in the Podil neighborhood after being stuck in a jam for nearly 2 hours.  Luckily he was near a metro station so he hopped aboard and road home in style. It is a 3 minute walk from the train to our apartment- such a blessing on days like this.  Last night we headed out in the raging storm, walked for less than 10 minutes (some of those underground) and were able to enjoy a lovely dinner at one of the city's finest restaurants.  Today we hopped onto the metro and within 20 minutes we were donning our bathing suits and got to spend 4 hours splashing about at Dreamtown's water park, Gio's favorite place on earth. Here are Gio and his best friend Grace having a blast in the very warm water....  

Paolo was able to rescue our car and it is now parked happily under our alley's tunnel.  Since all of the cars parked next to our apartment are completely buried we are not blocking anyone by parking there.  Lucky us!  And another hug I want to give?  To our trusty Volvo.  Living in Kyiv these last 3 winters, and especially this one, has shown me how very important it is to have such a reliable car with excellent snow tires.  Seriously, this car has never failed us.  Blizzards, hazardous drives over the Carpathian Mountains, unpaved roads, whatever.  
No one is happier about this weather than Enzo. The boy was built for just this sort of thing. 
Two hearty Kyiv-ites intent on a game of chess right in the middle of day #1 of the blizzard. Believe it or not, these two were right back at it on Saturday afternoon (day #2)! And for those of you wondering why I was even out in all of this, well, remember I have a 120+ pound beast who (1) LOVES snow, and (2) does not use a litter box! 
Gio's favorite playground on Saturday morning.  By Saturday night the swings were completely buried. 
Our beloved babuska statue. 

Enzo and I spent 2 hours out walking this morning. We explored the abandoned botanical gardens and made the first tracks at 6AM.  
On our second outing at 4PM the snow was up to my thigh
and even Enzo was having trouble getting around.
Here is where we normally park our car.  These cars may not escape until May or June. It turned out to be lucky we had to abandon our car near the river last night as now it is safely parked in the tunnel just to the left of this photo.  Tomorrow we are going to drive our landlord to the grocery store since his car is the one in the middle here! 
Gio loved this and insisted I take a picture.  He predicted it will take "a million hours plus 4" to dig it out.  
This is one the MAJOR roads in Kyiv at 4PM today. Yep, those are skiers.  
Something else I love about living in the city center?  Our neighbors, including our landlord who lives in the apartment across from ours.  The two-building complex where we live contains about 10 apartments.  All of our neighbors are local families, some quite poor, others firmly middle class.  No oligarchs here with flashy LandRovers and obnoxious attitudes.  Everyone around us is friendly, amused by Gio and in love with Enzo.  Our dog is like a celebrity, greeted by name whenever he walks by and is showered with affection.  Yes, in general Ukrainians are very tough and stone-faced, but in our little pocket here on Gorkogo we are lucky to be surrounded by a warm, welcoming community.  There are many things I will NOT miss when we leave Kyiv in the summer of 2014, but shutting the door of #17 (and walking down those 59 steps) for the last time will be hard on all of us.

3 comments:

  1. Beautiful post. I can't imagine doing the 59 steps with the baby but I envy you during this snow storm. We don't have a house and we live in "the city center" but not the "absolute center" and they had just cleared our ice and snow before we went on vacation two weeks ago. Our living circumstances are the polar opposite of yours. Once warm weather hits it won't matter as much but please enjoy this crazy weather with your cute dog and cuter son.

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    1. Thank you! We are in a very "exclusive" pocket here being in the IMMEDIATE center. There seems to be a real focus on having the area around Shevchenko Park cleared immediately. We benefit from that. Plus the back door of our apartment leads nearly to the entrance to the Tolstovo metro station. Ironically this was the only apartment we looked at that was within our rental allowance AND allowed dogs. Turns out to be very lucky this was our only choice!

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  2. Great photos!! : ) I love the skiers and the chess players!

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