Handmade glas Christmas ornaments

The French ladies had organized a bus and it was full!

We drove 45 minutes north east to Ljublanka. There, a manufactory for glas balls was set up a couple of years a go and is apparently very succesful with clients in Ukraine and Western Europe. (phone of the director +380674445316)

First, the glass is heated and blown into shape by three ladies

Then, the balls are lined with silver from the inside. The technique is rather intriguing, with a lady punpming a liquid into the balls and then swaying them in a tub with warm water. Out comes a silver ball.

Storage place for the colours and the paint

And at the end of this process are the painters, who really do all the decorating by hand. Very impressive handy work!

The World in Kyiv

Every year, the IWCK (International Women's Club of Kyiv) organizes a charity Bazar, where countries present themselves and sell specialities for a good cause. This year, it was on December 6th.
Two stands were very close to home....... as you can see:

The French showed off the one really important culinary speciality that makes this great country stand out (and carried Sylvie through childhood): Carambar!

The Dutch had a special thought for Tina and positioned their country as what it is: all cheese (don't even think this sentence in German....!)

The event was a big success, the expat community was there but not just them: it was packed!

The Russian (or American?) Bear

Winter is coming to town ... we went shopping, looking for wood for our fireplace, as we believe it's better to prepare for the central heating not working one or another day ... and when we turned round the corner, the BIG BEAR was waiting for us ...

The first snow!

Part of a Minority: French Speaking Catholics

Nov. 9:

Our friend from Austria Elisabeth wrote us a mail that she is contributing to an orphanage in Kiev, which is run by a catholic priest "Vater Viktor Simon". With the address, we find out that he is at THE catholic church in town. They have services in Ukrainian, Russian, Polish. One Sunday per month there is a kids' prayer.

Every Sunday, they offer also a service in French, but in a smaller chapel in a Jesuit outpost that happens to be close to where we live.

The German speaking community seems to be smaller, as they only gather every second week in another chapel. So we decide to go and join the French Community on Sunday.

We meet quite a few people from the school, class-mates of Nathalie and Isabelle and their parents.

Important remark: The priest has a certain accent ... afterwards, when seeing his car in the backyard, we find out why ... as in all of Europe, Catholic church seems to work only by the help of Polish priests!!

Kiev Zoo

Friday October 3rd

1st visit to the Zoo as special treat for Nathalie (with Isa still sick at home), taking advantage of the nice weather.

The conditions how animals are being kept are depressing for Peter, who concludes it’s better that quite a few of the cages are empty. Nathalie enjoys the Dino-park for photo-posing, then a huge “Zuckerwatte/Barbe-à-Papa/Cotton Candy”, and riding the Riesenrad.

Nathalie’s Animal of the day: The little cat running around everywhere.

Getting started for Music: Buying a Piano

Oct3 after lunch, Peter and Isabelle meet with Lena, the piano teacher to check out a piano that is for sale.





Meeting point: A Metro station on the other side of the river.

The way to the “storage” is an adventure, leading through deserted ex-production areas, a real ex-soviet-feeling is guaranteed!




At the final destination,
in one of the garages, “the master” keeps our piano and some parts of other pianos



Isabelle’s teacher tests the piano, thinks it’s good enough, so we agree on the final price (400 UAH for the piano, 200 for the transportation, 240 for the strong men, and 200 for the tuning. The sum of 1.040 UAH is some 150 Euros). Isabelle is happy and we drive off.
We wait for delivery … but we can be sure it will come, as no payment was made yet.

While we wait for the piano to be delivered (will it really come here?), we prepare for our first “big dinner with guests” with Martin from Kyivstar. We didn’t manage to buy meat for Schnitzel, so Isabelle helps to prepare the usual “Indiander-Fisch”, but it’s bigger than in Vienna, like many things here …

During dinner, the piano man calls and agrees on a delivery time tomorrow at 1pm with Peter…. in Russian!

On Monday, Peter changes the delivery time of the piano to 4pm-5pm (over the phone in Russian!).
It's Sylvie’s first real working day in our home-office: the printer works for the first time, the noisy repair works in the neighboring flat are quite restrained today,….maybe the deadline for her report to the Austrian Ministry can be met!

The piano arrives at 5:30pm, 2 strong men carry it inside, then the master (http://www.musicsalon.info/) takes it apart and tunes it for 1,5 hours. The piano is from a state combine in Moscow and the inner mechanics are from St. Petersburg.

Then he discusses storage problems for Steinways and other large pianos with us. Peter is tempted to give our new piano away and host a better piano for free. After some discussion, we decide to stick to what we have and propose the big piano to friends who don't have one already. Anybody interested?