Hot at Home, Graduation Time in Chernivtsi

I've now been home for just over 2 weeks and it has flown by. I has been in the mid-90s everyday since I have been home and I have loved it. 

 I will post the pics and journal entries from my last few days in Ukraine and my first few weeks back home soon. For now, however, I wanted to congratulate my sweet student Anna who is now the proud new holder of a master's degree. Graduation was yesterday in Chernivtsi, complete with a parade of graduates through the town. Here she is on the far left:

What a special day!

Fulbright Gathering in Kyiv

We ate breakfast with some fellow Fulbrighters and before our meeting at 3, visited the National Gallery of Western and Oriental Art. It is a small museum but they had some nice pieces. The museum is also a former home to a couple who developed much of the collection. I love museums that have been converted from mansions, such as the Frick in NYC. This place was somewhat similar. The home was built in the late 1880s to display the collection.

Taras Schevchenko Park was full of activity!

At 3, we met at Myron’s place to have lunch and to discuss our experiences as Fulbrighters. We had anice discussion dns it was enlightening and at time, riveting to hear about what others had experienced…good and bad.

Natalia has been SO helpful:Kyiv train sation:

We didn’t get to go to the ballet or the philharmonic with some of the others bc we had to catch the 8:21 train to Simferopol.

Now we are on the way to the Crimea!

Friday in Kyiv

Today we arrived in Kyiv at the vogzol at 9:20AM. Thankfully, the ever reliant Yuriy was right there on the track with a man with a cart to help us with the luggage.

Here are our gifts from Mykola:Lots of horilka released for Chernivtsi's 600 anniversary in 2008. Cute!Heading into Kyiv on the train from Chernivtsi, one last time.Remember this from January?That is Yuriy with our baggage cart. Here is our baggage cart and Yuiry now.BIG moment!!

This brought back some memories. The last time we did this, however, it was in sub-zero temps and I was trying not to fall on ice. I greatly preferred it this time.

Yuriy and this other driver he had with him dropped us off and they took all our bags to the Fubright Office. Nice. We had breakfast and re-organized our stuff before going down the street to St. Volodymyr’s, my favorite church in Kyiv. We needed to kill some time before 3, when I had to meet with the Fulbright accountant in the lobby.

After spending some time in the church, I purchased a few more icons and then Jeff and I split a French press at Double Coffee. Soviet-style building in Kyiv:

I met with the accountants and then we immediately left to walk to St. Sofia. St. Sofia is an incredibly historic church. We have been here three time and each time it has been closed. I was not going to leave this country without seeing it.

It was open! St. Sofia was built in honor of Vlodmyr the Great’s adoption of Christianity. Volodymyr the Great was the leader of Kyivan Rus, the first great Slavic civilization. He thought that every great civilization needed a religion, so he searched for oneI have a few conflicting sources about why he chose Christianity (one was that he chose Orthodox Christianity bc he loved Hagis Sofia and wasn’t wild about the Roman Catholicism or Islam). St. Sofia’s exhibits seemed to suggest that he selected it bc he married Anna, a Byzantine princess from Constantinople (modern day Istanbul). Regardless, the point is that his decision had major implcaitions in world history, as it tied the future Ukraine, the future Russia, USSR, etc. to Christianity as opposed to Islam. It certainly makes me stop to think of that implications of his decision…what if he had chosen Islam or Roman Catholicism? Lots and lots to ponder there.

So, in the 10th and 11th centuries the people of Kyivan Rus adoped Christianity. Mass baptisms were held in the Dniper River in Kyiv and St. Sofia was built in the 11th century to honor his adoption of Christianity. This place is GORGEOUS inside…lots of gilded work and frescoes. I very discreetly snuck 3 photos.

Mural recently redone with pysanky eggs by a well-know Ukrainian artist:

Afterwards we were hungry so we had an eary dinner at Puzhata Hata on Khreshatyck. Then we enjoyed just people watching on Maydan. People were played in the fountains barefoot, so needless to say this place is very different from the Kyiv of January, when I first laid eyes on Maydan.

Then we went into Globus Mall to get some gelato before walking back. On the walk back we decided to take a few detours to see the place where we stayed when we landed in Kyiv inJanuary, the first place (Coffee House) we had breakfast, etc. Brought back a lot of memories. We even saw the Raddisson SAS where we went inside to use the ATM. We had read that it wasn’t safe to use ATMs on the street. The Radisson runs about $500 USD per night (western hotels in Kyiv are greatly overpriced) and there is security at the front door, so we feel safe using their ATM.

We had fun laughing at how much our relationship to this country has grown and evolved since those VERY scary and exciting first few days as we faced a 4.5 month experiecen in this very cold and foreign place with a language and an alphabet we couldn’t make any sense of.

The Golden Gate:

The Golden Gate in January:

Ukrainian police car:First apartment building (apartments are much nice inside than they are on the outside):Interesting architecture:

My how our perspective has changed!