Bashkortostan Blues.

Europe
March 19th 2008

Published: March 19th 2008

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JonathanCampion

Ukraine's faded beauty: a building near Yaroslaviv Vals.

Kyiv.

After four months below freezing the temperature has risen above zero - spring has arrived. My body feels more relaxed with some warmth inside it; sunlight, not pains in my back, wakes me up at 7 each morning, but I still stumble from my bed to the shower via the biscuit cupboard so clumsily that vulytsya Melnikova's other residents must think that Chinggis Khan's Mongol horsemen are invading again.

The view of the Orthodox Church from my balcony - my favourite part of the flat - is disappearing spire by spire behind one of the dozens of construction projects which are dotted across the city. My kitchen now looks not toward one of the last standing splendours of Tsarist Russia but at dirty grey scaffolding instead; eventually I will only have another post-Communist housing block to look at while getting dressed.

But some places keep their Eastern European charm: behind my building is vulytsya Biloruska - a street of rustic old buildings which are all the more handsome for their faded paint. Every second shop is a small grocery store, with colourful signs for Kovbasa and Hlib in their windows.

The 8th of March was the last of

The Lenin bust in Teatralna metro.

Kyiv.

winter's many Communist holidays, Women's Day, and at work we celebrated in an endearingly Communist way. On Friday afternoon we gathered in the kitchen and corridor; Aleksei Nikolaevich arrived with an armful of red roses and distributed three to each lady with a kiss on the cheek, and by four o'clock we had all enjoyed enough chocolate cake and Crimean champagne to make sure that the rest of the afternoon passed in a tipsy blur. The occasion gave me a chance to keep to my resolution to improve my cooking skills: I set about making oladiki pancakes for Ana on Saturday morning, an experiment which became a joint effort as soon as she wrestled the mixing bowl out of my arms.

I didn't get a chance to say goodbye to Helen before she left for London as she had to work the last time we were supposed to meet. As the research trip took place on her last night in Ukraine I suspect that at some point before the end of her tour of the Nemiroff vodka factory she exchanged her clipboard and pencil for a shot glass.

The hall behind the Lybidska Church has become a sociable

A park near St. Sophia cathedral.

Kyiv.

place to spend my Friday evenings, with Jared and Lyuda's friends. The venue has been christened 'Kofe Hauz', after the expensive café chain which was such a novelty when I first arrived in Ukraine but has now become a familiar part of Kyiv culture. With half a dozen types of tea on the counter actual coffee cups are rare; perhaps the caffeinated name comes from the latté-coloured bricks and mocha beams which give the place a comforting atmosphere - and, of course, from the strong Americano who brought the idea to life.

Kofe Hauz's regulars are members of the Church: Paul the pastor and his wife Christine, a warm couple from Wisconsin; Oksana, a well-read and artistic university student; Jo the talkative Australian; Hannah, an energetic English teacher from Iowa, and Olga, an extrovert translator with stylish cropped hair, academic glasses and a voice which might carry to Kharkiv. Her overcoat drapes over her shoulders as she stirs her tea and mulls over which language to deliver her next witticism in.

There is also a cluster of Kyiv's foreign students: Abdoule-Malique is a long-haired medical student from Kenya, who speaks six languages and has a laugh so enthusiastic

Ana.

Kyiv.

that it shakes his whole body. Ruvimbo, a small, dreadlocked bundle of energy, is continuing her studies at the same academy as Malique. She finished a medicine degree in Australia in 2004 and - having swapped Brisbane for the Shulyavska international hostel - hasn't been home to Zimbabwe in seven years.

It's an open-minded, spirited crowd. We sit around two oval tables - émigrés from six countries and four continents - play cards, sip tea, and, often, discuss what brought us to Kyiv. Lyuda, Olga and Oksana have always lived nearby; Hannah, myself and Ana moved here to work; Ruvimbo and Malique to study; Jo, Jared, Paul and Christine each have projects within the Church. Everyone has stories to tell which are more exciting than my own.

Their stories are braver, too. Students from Africa (and many from China, especially in the neighbourhood where I live) are drawn to Ukraine by the chance of a European education that isn't as expensive as in other countries. But the country's abrasive nature - the cold winters, the language barriers, and the racism - makes it a nervewracking experience.

My favourite singer played a concert in Kyiv last week. I

Aladiki pancakes and jam.

listened to Zemfira's music so often during my time in Russia that her voice - so clear and dramatic in 'Nebomoreoblaka' and 'Iskala' - came to define the emotions of life there. When I reminisce about snowy streets and poetry lessons there is always one of her songs playing in my head. Before the chance to move to Ukraine arrived I was planning a trip to the town of Ufa, behind the Ural mountains in the Republic of Bashkortostan where she grew up.

Zemfira Talgatovna Ramazanova's star was fading even before I picked up "Chetyrnadtsat' Nedel' Tishiny" (Fourteen Weeks of Silence) three years ago, but she is still loved, not least by the hundreds of jumping teenagers bumping against us in the fan zona in front of the stage at the Sports Palace. Her dark, spiky hair and thin lips contribute to an idiosyncratic beauty. Her songs are eccentric - sometimes dizzyingly abstract, sometimes charmingly mainstream, sometimes agonisingly deep.

But for a while she just sounded ordinary. Even with a green light illuminating her body she looked exhausted; her tour started in Eastern Siberia and she still has to travel to Kazakhstan before her she can go home.

Bulvar Tarasa Shevchenka.

Kyiv.

The songs from her new album are tired too, but the Zemfira who had captured my imagination all those years ago appeared as soon as she began to sing her older ones - 'Samolet', 'Prosti Menya Moya Lyubov', 'Macho' and others. She leapt across the stage, and for an hour the concert was perfect.

The week in which it became too warm to wear a winter coat was also the week when holes appeared in my work trousers and shoes. So I bought new ones. Shopping in Kyiv is harmful to my self-esteem as well as to my wallet, as I fret about possessing neither the striking dress sense nor the same shapely nose and high cheekbones as the Slavic boys and girls around me. People of intimidating beauty are everywhere, not just on Ukrainian television but at work - stepping into the office's coat closet feels like trespassing backstage at a Paris fashion show.

I bought a turtle-neck jumper which hides my belly, and was about to leave the boutique when the frizzy-haired shop girl in a very short leather skirt flirted another 550 hryvnya out of my pocket in return for a trendy jacket. A rainy

The entrance to Bessarabskii market.

Kyiv.

Khreshchatik became my personal catwalk for the evening.

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The Russian presidential election took place at the beginning of March, at the same time as its massive, government-owned company Gazprom was holding Ukraine to ransom over an unpaid billion dollar gas bill. For two days the supply of gas to Ukraine was cut by a quarter, and relations with Moscow became yet more hostile.

Since the 1917 October Revolution the leaders of the Soviet Union and Russian Federation have been alternatively bald and owning a full head of hair. This trend (Vladimir Lenin, Josef Stalin, Nikita Khrushchev, Leonid Brezhnev, Yuri Andropov, Konstantin Chernenko, Mikhail Gorbachev, Boris Yeltsin, Vladimir Putin, Dmitry Medvedev) is something which Russians have become rather superstitious about.

Next diary: Confessions of a Pignapper.

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