Vorokhta

Kolomyia, Ukraine, May 6, 2018, 7:30 PM

I'm in Kolomyia after a very pleasant 1 1/2 hour train ride back from the Carpathian Mountain village of Vorokhta which I had reached a few days earlier with a 2-hour bone-rattling ride on a bus so crowded that every seat and standing space was filled.  Fortunately, the bus didn't fill up until it was well into the journey and I got to sit the whole way.

Last year I visited a family in the mountains in Vorokhta and I hoped to find them again at home and well.

Timing and Luck are everything.  For me, in recent days, it's been all luck as the timing was part of the luck.

After checking into my Guest House/Hotel in Vorokhta, I decided to take a nap as I knew I would need all the energy I could muster for the long hike up the mountain to see my friends.   I didn't wake until 4 PM, but I knew they would insist on feeding me so I figured arriving around dinner time might not be such a bad idea.

Now a year older I was curious how I would do climbing the hills.   As it turned out I was pleasantly surprised to find it no harder than I remembered my last hike up the mountain.  But certainly no easier!

The first part of the path and the dirt road it paralleled had lots of turns with no way to know what to expect around the next bend.  And, indeed, much to my surprise I stumbled into the middle of a herd of goats who scurried away as I took their picture,

Then further on two dogs came out barking at me from a house perched with one corner right on the edge of the trail hiding what lay beyond.  The dogs' owner called to them and shouted something to me,  Some kind of warning.




Almost immediately two horses appeared around the corner of the building pulling a wagon and bearing down on me, I jumped to the side of the path and watched them pass by with just inches to spare.

It all happened so fast that it wasn't until they had passed that I registered that this had been an encounter of some potential peril.  What brought it home to me was my retrospectively registering the driver's grim expression of strain and concern.

Pleased as I was to be able to make the climb it wasn't easy.  And as I got further up I found myself sweating and my heart pounding.

But I said to myself just keep putting one foot ahead of the other as I anticipated the wooded area I remembered farther on, where I would be able to cool off in the shade which eventually I was able to do,

As I proceeded I came to two forks in the road and luckily I remembered or guessed right and stayed to the left at the first and took a right.at the second.

And as I looked up the big hill ahead of me I said: "Dear Lord let this be the right way and the final hill and show me the red roof of my friends' house when I crest this next hill".  And he did!

Still, as I approached the house it seemed very quiet.  I hoped they weren't away.  Then I saw there was clothing on the line, a hopeful sign, and further on I noted a door was open on the smaller building next to the house. As I drew nearer I heard music and as I stood at the open door out came the son whom I had met last year when he was home from college for Spring break.

He greeted me with a big friendly smile of recognition which I really appreciated and took me into the kitchen of the main house next door where his sister was lying on a sofa facing away from me.  He said something to her and then told me to sit on the couch across the room from his sister. Where I sat and waited.

And waited.

I wasn't sure what was going on here.  His sister hadn't greeted me and continued to lie facing away from me. But I did as I was told thinking all would become clear eventually.

I looked at the clock on the wall and noted it was almost 6 PM.

And then, about 6 or 7 minutes later the mother and grandmother came into the room. The mother clasped my hand with a big smile, They both seemed genuinely delighted to see me.

What ensued was my midterm exam to test my beginner's Ukrainian on which I have been working with some diligence.  The result?  I'm going to give myself a C mostly to encourage myself to persist rather than be discouraged by a lower grade although I had to use Google Translate more than I would have wished.

We chatted and struggled to understand each other. They had had a long winter here in the mountains with a lot of snow. The daughter had gotten married and now had a 5-day old daughter whom I now understood she had been nursing when I arrived.

I showed them pictures of my two young grandsons 2 and 5 years' old, to well deserved and expected oohs and ahhs.

We had a very nice meal of borsch, meat, and cheese.  And we downed shots from the bottle of vodka I had brought accompanied with "Za zdorov'ya!". 

The father, who invited me to their home after we met on the trail last year, did not appear nor did their new son in law which I found puzzling.  Gradually from our conversation, I was able to decipher that they were away but would return the following day.

And so we agreed I should also return the next day.

As I left the mother walked me to the fence and showed me the new barn they had built and with equal pride pointed out their view of Mt. Hoverla just as her husband had the year before.

Mt. Hoverla is the tallest mountain in Ukraine a sight I had been looking forward to rephotographing with my new camera.

The way down is directly through fields and meadows. It is a much faster and steeper route than the way up along the winding dirt road and paths.  And it's much easier, of course, going down.  But it took me just as long as the way up as it was a perfect evening in the country and I did not want it to end.


So I found myself continually stopping to savor the view and feel the peace and quiet and listen to the chirping of birds, taste the clear air and perfect beauty of this place so far from the troubled world in which we live.

The next day I napped again in preparation for my return.  This time, however, I awoke to a torrential downpour that went on for several hours.  There was no way now for me to return.

Fortunately, I had not gone up earlier when it was sunny or I would have been caught in the storm and been thoroughly drenched or worse.

My cold has returned but not with the devastation, I'd have experienced had I gone up the mountain again.

So I'm feeling really lucky in how everything turned out.

I'll just have to come back and complete my visit next year.

Thanks for reading!

Kolomyia

Kolomyia, Ukraine,  Sunday, April 29, 2018

It seems otherworldly.  A bit gritty.  Kind of a ghost town.  Everything's closed up.  But the few people walking on the streets seem normal.  And they don't seem to be paying much attention to me.

Wearing a camera.  A little unsure on my feet. And obviously lost walking up the street and then back.  I'm glad they are not paying much attention to me.  Must mean I'm not as out of place as I feel.

And as everywhere I've been in Ukraine, no fear of attack or crime.

I'm recovering from "train lag"  like jet lag but only because of lack of sleep. No time zone change.  I'm trying to find my way to the center of this little city/town using Google GPS.   It takes me a while to get oriented on the map.  There must be a better way than just walking back and forth on the street looking at the GPS marker to find my direction?

Then suddenly, as I round a corner, it's a different world. I  see people and activity and realize it's Sunday that's why everything was closed up on the roads into the center. And here in the center, it's fresh and polished

The 16-hour train trip wasn't all that bad.  Considering the fact I shared my compartment with a family of two hyperactive boys Maxine 4 1/2 and Alex 10 and their mom and dad (alternately as  they had another berth in an adjacent compartment where they took turns avoiding the tumult of their boys who ran up and down the corridors and jumped from one upper berth to the other until Maxine suddenly fell off the bunk and crashed to the floor with a huge bang followed by crying and Mom and Dad administering to a cut he sustained on the back of his head.

This event signaled the end of the 5-hour raucous disruption and as it was just 10 PM, as we settled down to sleep I thought I might get a goodly amount. 

The next morning as I spent a couple of hours with them, I became as fond of this little family as I was annoyed with them the day before and was almost sad to leave them, particularly little Maxine in spite (or because?) of his joy in sticking his hand in my face.

I'm guessing I got about 5 hours sleep.  Far less than I needed hence the "train lag" as I walked into town after checking into my strange hotel/ guesthouse and taking a brief nap.

Nice people, the owner, and his wife. The room and bathroom really nice but the windows don't seem to open, there is no shower curtain (have to take a kind of bath or low shower)  no place to hang towels in the bathroom only one electrical outlet to charge computer and phone and its next to the sink with no place other than the bathtub to rest the computer and phone but at $12/night who's complaining?  Not me.

First impressions?  Not much to see here except for 2 notable museums.  A great place to practice Ukrainian since no one speaks English here.  A quiet place to chill and decompress after the Train, and the big cities Odessa and Lviv.

Undecided if I'll stay the 4 days of my reservation but I found a nice restaurant/pizza/coffee (not on Google but just from walking). A place to hang out and where I am writing this and although this isn't Karpaty it's enough of a change to look deeper.

Update. Wednesday, 10/2/18 10 AM.
First impressions can be misleading.  Very.  I found the hook to hang towels in the hotel bathroom.  The hotel owner showed me how to open the windows. And another electrical outlet, And I've been taking baths to relieve the aches of travel.  Nice.

And now I find this is the best town ever.  Lots to see. Rather than cut short my 4-day visit I've decided to cancel my 3-day visit to Ivano Frankivsk and return here for 3 days after my 2-day visit to Vorokhta where I head tomorrow.

What I like about this town is the beautiful architecture and the many pedestrian streets to wander about. No cars in the center of the city.  Makes it peaceful and provides good air quality. Just the place to chill out after the big cities.  The pace is slower. A welcome change.

And a great place to learn Ukranian as they don't speak English here.

I've found the cafeteria, finally.  Every town seems to have one in Ukraine and its the best place to eat and get healthy food at bargain prices.  You don't even have to know Ukrainian you can just point to the food.  Well, that's what I use to do, now I know most of the names of the foods.

I had a nice chat with some boys.  Between us we were able to translate to English the sign on this building, It's the center for young people providing training in dance and programming. An eclectic grouping.  I asked the boy with the best English if he was a programmer.  He said no he's into dance.

There seemed to be a lot of group gatherings in some of the restaurant/dining halls that I wandered into.  I took a quick picture in one of them and escaped to the street to avoid objections.

Bur, as I was walking away, this really big guy suddenly appeared in front of me and pointed to my camera and with a threatening manner asked me what  I was doing,   Uh oh! 

I wouldn't mind if he asked me to delete the photos but I feared he might seize my camera which is new and I am quite attached to and has priceless pictures and videos from my trip here. 

In my flawless English (fortunately) I told him I was a tourist just taking pictures.  His face immediately broke into a big smile and he shook my hand and said "Good Luck".   "Good Luck" is what people say instead of goodbye here when they know you're a foreigner.  Whew!

Today, I walked to the Bus station, 20 minutes from the center and got my bus ticket for the trip to Vorokhta tomorrow where I hope to head up the mountain and visit my friends like I did last year.  

I've been working on my Ukrainian and this will be the midterm exam for me as they speak no English.   I was able to read the schedule board and order the ticket all in Ukrainian which is very satisfying.  I think of it as like the thrill for my grandsons as they learn and improve their English and we empower ourselves, learn and grow even much later in life.

I've lots of beautiful pictures of this small city's architecture, but I plan to focus on them in a  Blog post when I return in a couple of days.

The trip tomorrow will be my first by bus this year over terrible roads but for only a little over 2 hours.  And I am rested enough to climb up the hills to see my friends if they are there.  I think they'll be quite surprised to see me.  I'll let you know how it goes.

Thanks for reading!

Odessa Symphony and Language

Odessa, Saturday, April 28, 10:30

Today I head out for my longest train ride.  A 16-hour overnighter from Odessa - Northwest to Lviv and then Southwest to Kolomyia, a small city in Western Ukraine where I'll start my this year's visit to the beautiful Carpathian mountain countryside.

Last night I saw a great concert.  I really like the conductor Hobart Earle and the Symphony here is really good.  They perform in what was the former stock exchange building.



At the concert, I chatted with some nice citizens of this town.  The conversation was in Russian (them) and English (me) and a little Ukrainian (me).  Not exactly sure what we discussed (given the language gap) but I think it was about how we all love Odessa, where we're from and they invited me to come to the next concert with their great conductor.  But alas I'm headed off to "Karpaty".

Talking in mixed languages is quite a challenge but fun and nice that people want to do it.

Like the two young (around 12) Asian boys who addressed me on the elevator riding up to the 6th-floor cafeteria, I go here for breakfast.  They quickly switched to excellent English when I so responded to their Russian and told me they speak 4 languages Russian, Ukrainian, English, and Chinese.   A humbling but uplifting (pun intended) experience given their spirited friendliness.  A great way to start the day.

Navigating the language barrier is both challenging and fun.  Like yesterday when I did my dry run to the train station to get my boarding pass printed out and was sent to 3 different counters where they supposedly spoke English but in fact only Russian.

Like all the train stations here Odessa's is an architectural gem as are nearby cathedrals.

Well, that's it for now.  Wish me well on the long train journey ahead.
Thanks for reading!

Classical Odessa

Odessa, Ukraine, Monday, April 23, 2018, 11 AM

I'm here!   But getting here wasn't easy.

I got a bad cold and cough in Lviv, Ukraine which I treated by resting.  Not fun except for the great Netflix series "Money Heist" which entertained me as I lay up in my hotel room.  The rest of my course of  "treatment" was to "will it" to be over by Friday when I was scheduled to take the train to Odessa.  I sure didn't want to be annoying the 3 passengers sharing my compartment on the 11-hour overnight train.

As it turned out I was fit to travel right when I needed to be, but not a day sooner.
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The train left Lviv on Friday night at 10:12 PM.  I knew the first part of the trip would be noisy but, I found myself thinking this is ridiculous.  Even worse than I remembered.