Blogs from Kiev, Ukraine, Europe - page 4

The whole reason I came to the Ukraine was to visit Chernobyl. For those of you that don’t know Chernobyl is the worst industrial accident of all time where a nuclear reactor exploded on 26thof April 1986. The official death toll is 20, 2 workers at the plant and 18 firefighters. However the real number of deaths from exposure to radiation could be as high as 100,000. If your interested in the subject the best documentary I’ve found is called “Battle for Chernobyl.” It’s available on youtube. For some reason the Russian death toll from the accident is listed as 31, not sure from the difference. The number is much lower than is real, for example recently footage has emerged from inside the reactor days after the accident. This was taken by an anonymous KGB agent, ... read more

In the evening of the 2nd day, I went to the city center but as Anastasiia still had something to do at work, I first met her 2 friends Zhenya and Sacha to walk in the city for a while around the Stadium, which is kind of a business district with higher and modern buildings. This stadium has been completely rebuilt for the Football Euro Cup last year. On that walk, I saw a Catholic Church -the other churches and cathedrals I saw were orthodox ones-. This walk was nice because we were just talking about our life, our plans,... After walking with Zhenya, I went to dinner with Sacha, as Anastasiia was still working. We went to the same restaurant, where we were yesterday after opera -there are a lot of them in the center-. ... read more

Who would have ever thought that an offer such as this would come my way? My travel blogs are a labour of love for they combine my passion for learning more about the world with the art of crafting the English language and seeking to capture that ever elusive perfect photograph. It so happened that one day on Twitter my attention was drawn to a retweet from two friends in Malaysia seeking travel bloggers based in Dubai or Abu Dhabi for a media trip to an unnamed Eastern European country. Since I fitted the criteria, I sent an expression of interest, but believed that my chances of being selected were virtually nil. Not so as it transpired, for a few days later I received confirmation of my invite for a four day journey to Ukraine. Furthermore, ... read more

Tonight I had the pleasure of being taken for about $150.00. Here is how it went down. This guy walks past me at a rapid pace. He reaches into his fanny pack as he is walking and drops a plastic bag with bills inside. The outside bill is one US dollar. I see him drop his money, so I yell at him, “Hey! hey ... you dropped your money.” Immediately, I am suspicious, because, who keeps a wade of one dollar bills in a plastic bag with a rubber band on the outside? But he turns and says, “Oh my god you saved my life, what if someone dishonest and watched me drop it, I would be in so much trouble.” Then he looks in his fanny pack, and says, “My Euros are missing, did you ... read more

Arrived in Kiev in the early morning after an overnight train journey from Warsaw. Around midnight the Ukrainian border guards had woken us and taken our passports away for a couple of hours, whilst we waited in a desolate train garage in an unidentified location, listening to the crashing and banging of train works all around us. Our passports were returned and we reached Kiev on time, but feeling flat and sleep-deprived. Early impressions of Kiev station didn't lighten the spirits: one of the first sights was a huge board of photos of cherub-faced missing children. We sat down in the waiting area to collect ourselves but found that this area of the station is the sleeping place of a number of sad, down-and-out homeless alcoholics. They didn't bother us, but then a larger-than-life, tough-looking old ... read more