It was about 200-300 acres of rolling hills and woods with little villages placed here and there. The villages consisted of old houses and other buildings, mostly from the 1800's, which were taken apart, transported here and rebuilt. They showed what life was like before collectivism in the various regions of Ukraine. We hired an English speaking guide who was wearing a mesh shirt and seemed to miss the soviets. I was very quiet at first and he asked me in Ukrainian if I were an American because he thought I was a local. Well, after a month it's getting that way. Ivan was pretty scattered in the way he described things and it would have been more confusing except he repeated a lot of the same lines from village to village such as " this windmill is easily recognizable as being Ukrainian because it is wooden and has a round shape not like those of...." He added a lot of humor, unintentionally.
After he left us, we had lunch/dinner at an outdoor restaurant in the park. Meals require much more patience than at home. We were so happy, after about 15 minutes of waiting to be given menus and then another 10 or so of trying to decipher the Cyrillic writing and Ukrainian words on the menus to be offered English menus. We all wanted shish-ka-bobs and we found them, sort of, on the menu. After another wait, the food came and luckily most of it came at once (often one of our meals comes way before the other so you just stay flexible and plan on being there a while) and the meat was very good. I was happy that it had been identified as pork on the menu. After seeing grilled horse meat on a menu I'm nervous when it just says "meat". I think the horse meat is unusual here (it was an Italian restaurant ) and that when the menu says "meat" it probably means pork as that is the most usual meat.
As we finished eating and enjoying the Ukrainian beer (which is cheaper than ordering water), a troubadour group came in and started to entertain us. There was a man on an accordion and two women singing with great gusto. People around us started singing along. Very fun!
After lunch we walked over to the other part of the outdoor museum which shows life after collectivism. In the 1930's the old villages were mostly destroyed and all the farms were turned into collectives. At first, about a million people starved and then they managed to make a go of it somehow. This part seemed to be intended to show how nice the modern, soviet villages were in comparison to the old ramshackle peasant villages. Suddenly there were nice little houses with pretty windows and neat little gardens. Oh, the wonderful pleasures of country life under the communists! I noticed two things: almost none of the locals visited this part and it looked nothing like the reality of miles and miles of poverty stricken farm villages I've seen in my travels here. It made me disgusted.
We took a bus and the metro home and had a quiet evening back in our apartment. It was a beautiful evening and I went by myself to the little gastronome (deli) to purchase a few things and they didn't care that I didn't have correct change. Usually you get disgusted looks and sometimes even a deep sigh from store clerks if you give them bigger bills (like a 20 when you need to pay 14) or don't have the right coins. I decided that they think I moved here, so they might as well be nice.
I know you are wondering about whatever happened regarding the t-shirt that I needed to return. It turned out to be very easy. Someone spoke a little English and it was not an adventure at all. You can't predict adventure, it just comes your way on its own.
Today we hope to get some previews of available kids. We'll update later and hope it will be good news.
Here is a nice view of the windmills:
Troubadours:
Old houses:
A nice example of a rural and really lived in Ukrainian house:
A fictional soviet style house:
Seen on a car in downtown Kiev today:
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