I meant to post this yesterday, but couldn't, so this is from yesterday's musings...This morning I woke up to a wintry wonderland, a snow-covered city with temperatures regularly dipping below freezing already. Our first snow flurry was about a month ago, when my mother was here, but nothing stayed on the ground. So, this is more like our first official snow of the winter season! I love snow...it makes the cold of winter worth it and beautifies an otherwise less than beautiful Stalin-style cityscape. With the coming of consistently colder weather, comes noisier flats. Because cold air is more dense, sound travels more easily now than in the warmer months...which means that when I go to bed, I can now easily hear normal conversations of my upstairs neighbors, whereas before I could only hear their arguments. That makes me wonder what my downstairs neighbors hear from me!
Speaking of Stalin, today (7 Nov) was the old Soviet "Bolshevik Revolution" holiday. For those of you who think of it as the Octoberists or October revolution that's because was on 25 October 1917 old style date (aka Julian calendar), which is 7 November new style date (aka Gregorian calendar) (more on old vs. new-style ->). Anyway, as far as celebrations here went, the only celebration I observed was a small group of about 30-40 Ukrainian communist party members and onlookers standing in front of the city's theatre with a few red Soviet flags. I suppose in Kyiv or in Russia it may have gotten a bit more fanfare, who knows. Read more about this holiday ->
Today I also got to meet my new friend, Esther, face to face for the first time and talk with her in person instead of via email, which was nice. And boy can she bake some "delicious" chocolate-chip cookies! :-)
I hope that Friday I really get a day off b/c I'm totally exhausted, wiped-out from too much early morning traveling and late evening/night activities. Perhaps if I remember to turn off the phones and doorbell that will be more likely to happen. We'll see!
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