Snowing again in Kharkiv

G'day Readers.
Before you start reading the blog, please take some time to look at the updated header pics. Thanks to Mishka updating them for me, your the IS man that every one should have!

Yep.... Woke up this morning, looked out the window & it just looked like it was snowing ! But before I get to that, last week I went to the park beside Freedom Square  & as I was walking through the park, there was lots of what looked like cotton wool flying through the air. I looked up & some of the trees were dropping this cotton wool. It was thick & fluffy with little seeds. So this morning when I saw this "snow", I knew exactly where it was coming from.... the trees & unfortunately they are right outside my apartment! I can see the vacuum cleaner is going to get used alot until all this stuff drops! Goodness help those people who get hayfever during Spring, this stuff is everywhere. The other thing I have noticed is that this stuff is highly flammible, more so than dry Aussie bushland on a 45 degree day. I have seen locals put a flame to puddles of this stuff and it is just like gas burning! 

It really doesnt show the volume of the stuff, but it was quite thick!

I left my washing on the balcony with the

windows open. The snow made itself welcome !

Spring snow on the
streets of Kharkiv and
some more painted
trees!









Speaking of trees, the locals love their gardens and greenery second only to ice cream. The parks are all full of trees & now that spring has arrived, everyone is out planting annuals and making the public gardens bloom with colour.











What a difference a couple
of months make !My neighbours
verandah during winter & now


By the way, this is where
the big black dog lives
I cut the mans head off
but it was the dog I was
trying to capture. He is
huge, & the only exercise
he gets it a very slow
walk out to the kids
playground. Very sad!















On the way to work, there are a few fields where people plant their own vegetables for home consumption. Everything is done manually. They plough the ground, mark off their own little patches of soil and plant the seedlings. Speaking to one girl at work, this has been going on for about 10 years. Aparently life 10 years ago was a bit tough & so people began growing their own food. The tradition continues today & everyday, you see people out there tending to their plots. They walk from their village to the growing fields with all their tools and most of them look to be elderly. I guess at least they know the food is fresh and where it has come from & the soil looks quite healthy & very dark brown.


I meant to put this pic in last weeks blog.
Eee, this is a local "high speed" persuit car !




Hehehe... maybe they could use some of our Commodores !






A couple of the local churches










 






















I am seeing a lot more motorbikes / mopeds these days. However, here in Ukraine, you dont need a licence to ride them, nor do they wear helmets! Very dangerous & sort of reminds me of Malaysia a little bit. I have seen three people on one bike speeding though the traffic on the pot holed roads.  No one wears seat belts in cars either. I saw a 4x4 smash into a pole today, all airbags deployed, but someone hit the windscreen! Shows you the value of seat belts.


Opps... how did this beautiful baby get in the blog ?

My Middy

 

And yes the other baby, Bella
Thanks Catnap cattery, they look
happy and healthy & I cant
wait to have a cuddle on my
return.

















Andrey  ( Maryna's Andrey, picture, above, for mums sake) called me the other night & asked if I wanted go to Svyatogorsk where there were beautiful Monasteries set on chalk hills (Holy mountains). Still on the tail end of a cold, being run down & feeling zapped of energy I almost said no, but as Andrey said, the fresh county air will make me feel better ! So I accepted my first car trip out of Kharkiv! It was about a two hour (depending on the road surfaces) drive East of Kharkiv into the Donetsk region.














One thing I noticed immediately when we left the Kharkiv region, was that the roads surfaces improved immidiately once we crossed the boarder. They were like chalk and cheese & it was so nice not to have to ride the bumps! The countryside was relatively flat, a few hills but nothing like Crimea. Most of the fields had been recently ploughed and had seeds laid. One of the fields had sunflowers in it & Andrey said that in July it would be completely yellow. That would be a nice sight!

As Andrey promised, we arrived in Svyatogorsk in about two hours & there set in the hill behind the river was the monastary. There are three of them actually & the monks actually live there & maintain the chalk caves .The hills  are called Holy Mountains and a monastery was founded here in 1844. The monks discovered the ancient caves, continued the underground corridors and built cave churches there. Svyatogorsk monastery deteriorated in Soviet times. It was used as a coalminers’ sanatorium for 70 years. In 1992 all the buildings were returned to the church and the monastery was opened again. It became a Lavra (merited monastery) in 2003.

The rules are that if you are female, you must cover your head & if you are wearing trousers, you must also cover them. So the girls, Christina, Paola and I covered up. Men were walking around in singlet tops and shorts, but that didnt matter. !!!!!

 click on the pics to
enlarge them. The covered
walkway leads up from
the caves.






There are two ways to get up to the top. Via the road or via the caves. Yep thats right, there are chalk caves that you can travel through, but you have to book a tour and from the research I did after we got back, there are only two or three per day. We missed out, but I got a pic from my research.... later.


This is Artiom Monument















Artiom was a Communist party functionary Fiodor Sergeyev (1883-1921). He was the Prime-Minister of DKSR (Donetsk-Kryvyi Rih Socialist Republic) in 1918-1920.
The huge monument was commissioned by the Prime Minister of the Ukrainian Socialist Republic Grigory Petrovsky and created by the Soviet sculptor Ivan Cavaleridze. This huge monument is a monolith designed in a cubism manner. Its height is 22 meters and along with the foundation its height comprises about 28 meters.

Christina and Andrey
overlooking the river
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
A little place by the river
where the hold baptism
ceremonies
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
Holy Assumption Cathederal
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
Cathedral of the Protecting
Veil of Mother of God
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
    
 
 
The colours were truely
magic














Ringing the bells











A pic of inside the caves
from research!

Church inside the caves










An old style church made of wood












Andrey & the Ukraine
countryside







The monestary at the top
great views










Me with my veil on!












You can see how it is
built into the chalk

Paola, Filepe, Christina
and Andrey








A great day in the Donetsk countryside! Thank you as always Andrey, for giving up your time to take us to this beautiful place. We really did appreciate it & hope that one day, we can return the favour.

Getting close to hometime! 33 days is all I have left.......

xm