Monday in Kamyanets-Podilsky and Kharkov

Today I stayed up very late (4AM) before heading to bed and waking up at 7:30. I don’t know why I do such things. I just get into the best groove on whatever I am working on and I don’t get tired. I really don’t. Even at 4AM I have to force myself to stop and go to bed. I take after my father, who is the same way.

Oksana picked me up at 10AM and we drove directly to the national university. I was teaching her first class, which started at 10:35. It was an American Journalism class, so I tried to incorporate the role of the media throughout the history of American social movements. 

Afterwards we had lunch in the cafeteria at the university…more bread, fried something, borscht, and cabbage salad. The borsch and bread were good. Afterwards, Oksana took us to the ethnography museum in the building, where 2 women showed up to photograph me walking through. Evidently it was a big thing for them to have us there, and they were very gracious hosts. Then they took us to the university’s museum, and then down to the International Relations Dept, where we met the Dean of the Faculty. I think Oksana was trying to get the Rector of the university on her cell but that didn’t work out.

They showed me a notebook of folk songs. Evidently students get academic credit to go into local villages in the summer and record village music and write down the lyrics. I thought this was great. I told them about Furman's engaged learning programs and they seemed very interested.

Here is one of the university buildings.

Then we decided that since we have such a busy scheduled coming up and since we’ve been on the road for so long that we wanted to see the Old Town of KP and Khotyn Fortress in one afternoon and the head back to Chernivtsi. The Old Town was great. It dates from the 11th century, and stands entirely on a tall rock island surrounded by a deep gorge and river. We crossed a bridge to get to the Old Town.

First we went to the Saints Peter and Paul Church (the photos of which you can see above). I’ve written about my new fascination with churches and mosques that have served both purposes. Well, this church was a church, then the Turks invaded and built a minaret on it. Then the Turks were pushed out, and they surendered with the caveat that the minaret had to stay. So, the people decided to put a statue of the Virgin Mary on top of it. Hilarious.

We saw the Polish Market Square (the Lituanians and Poles ruled here from the 15-17th centuries) and the 14th century ratusha (town hall).

The Madgeburg Laws dictated that the different ethnicities live in different areas of the city and this was the Polish part. We also saw the Armenian part, witha very old church (12th c, I think) that was closed. We walked the 11th century Turkish Bridge (the Turks fortified the medieval construction in the 17th century when they conquered it and ruled for 27 years before the Poles got it back, only to have the Russians conquer in 1793) to the fortress, which was impressive. The Russians used the fortress to house Ukrainian nationalists.

Pretty cool, huh?

We enjoyed walking around it, and I shot a bow and arrow and nailed the target! I must take after my Mom, who was an excellent archer back in her college days.

Afterwards, we returned to the car to head towards Khotyn (pronounced Hotyn). We crossed the tallest bridge in Western Europe. I found it so interesting that she used the phrase Western Europe, since I don’t usually categorize Ukraine as western Europe. Eastern Europe, central at best, but not western. We crossed the Dniester River, which is evidently the area where Podillya ( the region where K-P is) becomes Bucovina (the region where Chernivtsi is).

After about 35 minutes of driving, we arrived at Khotyn Fortress. Khotyn Fortress is situated along the Dniester River. It is difficult to find and I was glad we had a guide who knew what she was doing. When you arrive, there is a monument to a famous Cossack hetman. Cossack warriors were active in this area (the Cossacks were militarized communities active in the 15-18th centuries).

Beautiful...

It ended up being a very beautiful day but I was tired and eager to return to Chernivtsi. It felt great to be back, until I had to jump the breaker about 40times bc we could not keep electricity on in the flat. Finally I called Lilliana who came over here with a repairman. By that time it was working, of course. The man left a wire and tried to explain how to do something with it.

It felt great to get a shower and begin to get reorganized before we leave again on Wednesday afternoon. The family arrives in 3 days…can’t wait!!!