Although the private house of Gorodetzky is also known as the monster house, this name is really not appropriate for this building. House with Chimaera is the real name. Sylvie had a chance to visit the inside of this house with a small and privileged group. Tours are only on Saturdays and all tours in 2009 are already fully booked.
The house is being used by the president for smaller meetings and he has his big office building right across the street.
All the facts about the house can be found on Wikipedia at (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_with_Chimaeras).
An interesting detail is that all the animals on the outside of the building are living animals and on the inside of the building, the hunter Gorodetzky used fur on the floors and stuffed animals for decoration that he brought from his hunting trips to Kenia. Also the other animal sculptures inside the house mainly show the wildlife as dead trophy.
Gorodetzky always tried the latest and newest and this is why his house (built from 1902-1904) featured electricity, an elevator, and many tile stoves.
Gorodettky also built the national Art Museum of Ukraine, that the whole family went to visit one Friday evening. The occasion was the vernissage of an exhibition by Anatoly Krivolap. His daughter, the painter Anna Krivolap, had invited us and we got to see many interesting paintings (non-figuartive). The kids discovered that the paintings had no titles, just great colour and structure, and so they went on to attribute a title to every oeuvre. Father and daughter share a website: http://www.akrivolap-akrivolap.com/.
20090331
20090317
Signs o' the Times
In the half year that we have been here, the world economy has radically changed and as well reported in global media coverage, Ukraine has been a little hit......
How do we feel it? In our daily life, we are spared direct impact, but we can see people around us being hit. The upward feeling that was there when we came (growth, ever-increasing variety of western goods, European perspective, etc.) has gradually changed to a feeling of disorientation.
Imported food is slowly disappearing from the shelves. Dried tomatoes (2 Euros per glass in Austria) cost 12 Euros per glass over here. Shredded cheese has gone. Nuernberger Bratwuerste (only at Auchan) are rarer. The Expat Magazines (Kyiv Post and Kyiv Weekly) that were formerly distributed free of charge are now for sale on news-stands. The concert hall is less full ...... or was it simply because we had chosen strange music for our last concert (Beethoven's Symphony No. 7 and Silvestrov' Symphony No. 5)? The ads along the metro-escalators are becoming less, the people offering their work with a cardboard around their neck are becoming more. People we know can't get their savings out of the bank and revert to massively purchasing tangible values via their credit cards (which boosts consumption at the moment). Expats with children are moving back to their country of origin in the middle of the school year because some investments are stalled or cancelled. But surprisingly, others came in the middle of the school year... so what do we make of this?
Some investements are scaled down to a minimum without total withdrawal. A lot of building sites (there are many here!) have stopped all activities. The house being built across the street from ours stopped all activities, then they hooked a diesel-generator to the tower crane they are using (apparently, their power supply had to be reorganized) and now............... they are attaching insulating panels to the outside walls! Very surprising move that we hadn't expected.
So we can report mixed symptoms to an unclear economical situation.
And people tell us: "this is nothing compared to our situation in the early nineties, so don't worry!"
The poltical situation seems to be clear:
A recent poll shows that 85% of the interviewed see the country going in the wrong direction. 42% are ready to go to the streets for political rallies and that number was only 26% 2 months ago.
The former speaker of parliament Yatsenyuk seems to be the man on the rise (see also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arseniy_Yatsenyuk. In recent polls (http://www.rb.com.ua/eng/), he comes in well ahead of the other candidates for the presidential elections due to take place in January 2010.
How do we feel it? In our daily life, we are spared direct impact, but we can see people around us being hit. The upward feeling that was there when we came (growth, ever-increasing variety of western goods, European perspective, etc.) has gradually changed to a feeling of disorientation.
Imported food is slowly disappearing from the shelves. Dried tomatoes (2 Euros per glass in Austria) cost 12 Euros per glass over here. Shredded cheese has gone. Nuernberger Bratwuerste (only at Auchan) are rarer. The Expat Magazines (Kyiv Post and Kyiv Weekly) that were formerly distributed free of charge are now for sale on news-stands. The concert hall is less full ...... or was it simply because we had chosen strange music for our last concert (Beethoven's Symphony No. 7 and Silvestrov' Symphony No. 5)? The ads along the metro-escalators are becoming less, the people offering their work with a cardboard around their neck are becoming more. People we know can't get their savings out of the bank and revert to massively purchasing tangible values via their credit cards (which boosts consumption at the moment). Expats with children are moving back to their country of origin in the middle of the school year because some investments are stalled or cancelled. But surprisingly, others came in the middle of the school year... so what do we make of this?
Some investements are scaled down to a minimum without total withdrawal. A lot of building sites (there are many here!) have stopped all activities. The house being built across the street from ours stopped all activities, then they hooked a diesel-generator to the tower crane they are using (apparently, their power supply had to be reorganized) and now............... they are attaching insulating panels to the outside walls! Very surprising move that we hadn't expected.
So we can report mixed symptoms to an unclear economical situation.
And people tell us: "this is nothing compared to our situation in the early nineties, so don't worry!"
The poltical situation seems to be clear:
A recent poll shows that 85% of the interviewed see the country going in the wrong direction. 42% are ready to go to the streets for political rallies and that number was only 26% 2 months ago.
The former speaker of parliament Yatsenyuk seems to be the man on the rise (see also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arseniy_Yatsenyuk. In recent polls (http://www.rb.com.ua/eng/), he comes in well ahead of the other candidates for the presidential elections due to take place in January 2010.
Bowling with a snake
Alioscha, the bowling pro, brought an unfoldable "snake" to be used on the childrens' lane only (unfortunately only there......). Result: the kids loved it!
The rest of us had a great time, trying to stay on the lane and making them cones tumble over.
Pirates in Kyiv
Isabelle's 8th birthday was duely celebrated with her friends after our vacation with a wild pirates' party.
Happy pirates, a few broken swords and a successful bounty hunt.
Visiting Essen
Directly from the ski slopes, the two younger girls took the plane on their own and stayed for a long weekend with their respective god-parents (and fiancé, in one case....). For Nathalie, this visit was happily extended for some days, because (when the girls were finally joined by their mother) we were all graciously invited to stay in the "granny-unit" of their flat for some days(thank you!).
One day, we were joined by Omimi and had a real city day including a visit to the movie theater (Hexe Lilli).
At the end of the week, we flew back home and were greeted by snow flakes on the runway.
One day, we were joined by Omimi and had a real city day including a visit to the movie theater (Hexe Lilli).
At the end of the week, we flew back home and were greeted by snow flakes on the runway.
Alpbach under the snow
Coming back to this fantastic ski vacation:
we went to Alpbach, close to Innsbruck. On the invitation of Inge and Anders, we stayed in their extra-flat, that was fully equipped and super convenient for us.
On our first day, we celebrated Isabelle's 8th birthday with a Sacher Torte and she proudly wore her pirates' costume. Pirates are THE thing at the moment!
There was so much snow (falling all the time, except one sunny day), that we always put on our skis in the driveway of the house and skied down to the first lift. What a luxury!
The kids went to a very good ski school (Alpbach Aktiv) and were happy with their groups and instructors. They learned how to ski in the deep snow and they now always look for the bumps to jump on. The race saw them take all the turns without missing a pole :-) The award ceremony shows the rightful reward for this feat.
20090303
Future is looking good!
On the way back to Kiev after a phantastic ski-vacation, Peter reads "Kyiv Weekly", the only remaining Ukrainian newspaper that's written in English.
Apart from all the crisis -talk, there are also 2 interesting articles about the "rules of the Game".
1) Ukrainians never give in, and whatever happens, it's not bad, so don't worry!
So when the article writes about when and how, not IF the government should declare bankruptcy, the conclusion is simple: The outcome will not be that bad. People might maybe even not realize something has happened.
2) Inflation will be tamed by strong measures taken:
There is a lot of discussion about the inflation effects coming from the devaluation of the UAH versus the USD. Since Summer last year, the UAH has lost about 50% of its value compared to the dollar, which is the main currency for selling big-ticket items or renting flats, housing and the likes. So the described measure which "limits" bribes to judges to below 10 kUSD (If they accept more, then they will maybe get punished) is really good news! Will this bring down real inflation by up to 1%, as well-informed sources say over a couple of Vodkas? 
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