Ukraine, The

Which raises an interesting question.  Why "The Ukraine?"  Why do we always put that little article before the name?  Technically the country's name is "Ukraine."  I don't hear people saying they're traveling to The Germany, or The France.  The USA, but that's different.

Anyhoos...

These...well, they're chickens.  And they live next door to the Lynch family.  And they stare at you as you walk into the house, and they stare at you again as you leave the house.  It's rather comical.  And maybe a little creepy.
This is Thanksgiving dinner.  We had tons of fun helping out, first with the shopping, then with the cooking, and most especially with the eating.  We had not been sure at the beginning of our trip if we would actually get a Thanksgiving while we were out and about (whatever that phrase means), and we were quite happy and blessed to spend it with this wonderful family.
One of the few sightseeing things we did in Ukraine.  This is us with Olya, who showed us around and interpreted for us quite frequently.  She was fantastic.  Here we are taking a lift over a park there.  You couldn't see much of the city from there because of the trees, but you could see the outskirts.
This is a section of one of the hospitals where they keep babies abandoned by their mothers.  These babies lack the necessary paperwork to be adopted, so they have to stay in the hospital sometimes for as long as a year.  One of the women from the church runs a ministry that goes into these hospitals and holds and plays with these babies, as they receive little to no attention otherwise.  This little girl's name is Liza.
Apparently John's uncle creates his own instruments.  He just thinks up different kinds, and decides to make them.  You should check out his website: www.wowmusicalinstruments.com.  This particular instrument is a fretless bass made of just one piece of wood.  It was a beautiful instrument, and I enjoyed playing it a little, even though I don't play bass.  (By the way, yes I got my hair cut.  Tanya's mother is a beautician and was kind enough to give me a haircut!)
Ah, the family.  Here we all are, except for Aaron, the latest addition.  John, Tanya, Ariel, Elizabeth, Igor, Arlen, some girl, and Narco...er, I mean Soombir.  I call the cat Narco because he could just fall asleep at a moment's notice, and no matter how much you moved him, he'd just sort of...flop.  Ergo, Narco, short for Narcoleptic (perfectly fine one minute and then unconscious the next...hee hee!).  Warm fuzzies to anyone who can place that quote!
On our long long long train ride from Kiev to Bucharest, we were fortunate enough to be joined by two boxers named Julia and Svetlana, who were on their way to a competition in Bulgaria.  They spoke a little bit of English, and were so excited to practice with us, so we got grilled with every question they could think of.    :-)=  And I was able to show off my nine Russian words: hello, goodbye, thank you, please, sorry, yes, no, cheese, and my personal favourite, milk.  I would write them in Russian, but you couldn't read it.  Also, I don't have a Russian keyboard.  Also, I don't really know how to spell them.  But we don't talk about that.  Our most exciting bit of fun was when we were stuck at the entrance to Romania for an extra hour.  Unfortunately, there was a problem with the boxing group's visas, so it took a while to straighten all that out.

Did ew know...?

The train tracks in Ukraine are different from the rest of Europe, so they schedule two hours at the border both ways, where they lift the trains and change all of the wheels...every time.

Thank you for choosing Lod's Little Tidbits, and have a nice day.

Breaking Into Topkapi Palace...(and other Turkish adventures)

I will do this post with one...well, with just short words.  ‘Cuz I want to.  But names don’t count.  So, we got to Turkey (it’s a name!), and took a bus from Cesme to Izmir, and from there to Kusadasi.  We had a lot of fun there.  Once we checked in to our h...er, our place to stay, we got to walk and shop a bit.  Here are some things we saw and tried in Turkey.

Can't I have just one piece of Turkish Delight?  Or a whole box.  We were told that the Rose taste was the first one made, so we wished to try it.  I thought of Edmund from Narnia with each piece.
My pose here is of Hadassah from the Mark of the Lion books.  She all but died in Ephesus, which is where this is.
Pamukkale, a day trip from Kusadasi, was quite quite cool.  There were a bunch of pools to walk in and rocks to climb on.  This pic does not show the white stuff the wet stuff sits in.  It looks like snow but is in fact stuff like ore, talc, tin, so on.  This was one of the best things I've seen, a far cry from 'some place that's else.' (that's a quote...don't hurt me)
This is Topkapi Palace in Istanbul.  The price to get in was droll, but my plan was to sneak in by way of the wall in back of me, as George did in Broken Sword.  Did it work?  Hah.  Would not you like to know?
Here are we at the Blue Mosque, with the scarves we bought in Egypt.
On a bridge that spans the Bosphorus in Istanbul, lots of men fish all day.  Right next to the bridge are a lot of sites where they sell the fresh fish with bread.  Quite good.
We had to wait for a while for our train to come.  I sat on a bench and a cat ran up to me.  I put my hand down and she jumped up on my lap, curled up, and lay down.  It was so hard for me to leave when the train got there.
The train rides can be quite nice, with a nook to sleep in.  Elizabeth snapped this pic while I slept.  It's a bit blurred, but oh well.
The train rides are more nice if you have food to last the whole time, which we did.  These treats were some of the best from Turkey.  I loved them!  We first had them on a bus ride (they take good care of you on the bus rides in Turkey...with snacks and tea...more like on a plane), and then found them in the store in Istanbul.  I was pleased.
At last, we got fresh Turkish Delight.  This had those nuts I love on the side that is out, and that sweet stuff that Elizabeth loves rolled up on the side that is in.

And that's all for Turkey.  That post was quite hard.  I had to think too much.  Phew.  On to Ukraine!!!!

Did ew know...?

For one to speak with just short words does not show lack of wit, but if they do it for too long their brain might up and split.

Thank you for your choice of Lod's Not Large Brass Tacks, and have a nice day.

Greece Wants to be Finished

Why do I seem to be victimized by technology so much?  I’m no expert, but I’m decently competent with technology, and yet, oh, and yet, it’s always preying on me.  It’s like trying to kill a spider with a feather duster...trying to get my blog site to work, to load pictures...grrr.  And so I growl.  But perhaps I can at least get some of the typing done (while the internet takes a day off and laughs in my face). 

Okay, the current verdict seems to be...make Rebecca load the pictures one at a time.

While on Crete, we took a day trip to Aghia Nikolaos, which is on the east side of Crete.  There was a nice walk along the coast, where we ate our sandwiches and enjoyed the ocean without having to get too close.

From Aghia Nikolaos, we took another bus to Elounda, the peninsula where they used to send leprous people.  Thankfully, it’s just a nice place to walk around now, and I’m pretty sure we discovered Atlantis.

I’d been craving ice cream.  I didn’t think I was, until we almost got some and then didn’t.  A lot of the stores don’t carry ice cream in the winter.  Seriously...it doesn’t get that cold there!  These people have issues.  Anyway, we went to a little restaurant which had big special ice creams.  Not the best ice cream, but it made me happy.

Ah, Heraklion.  We tried so hard to get pictures that made it look like a nice place.  We aimed the camera to avoid the construction and creepy men.  And I believe we succeeded.  Here are some really cool arches that we walked through along the coast to get to our hotel.

Tell me this doesn't look like my kitty.  But don't really tell me that.  Because I know it does.
This was on the island of Syros.  Greece had tons of cats, but this particular area seemed overrun.  Unfortunately, they seem to be bullied by the dog on the left, who unfortunately took it in his head to adopt us.  It was fun on the beach.  Not so fun when he started scaring all the cats away.
Another cannon fiasco.  Here we see that Elizabeth has found more cannons...
...and I don't know where she's gotten to now, but clearly I'm frightened.
This is Ouzo.  It's supposed to be the Greek...I don't know, special drink.  It was nasty!  It was like a cross between black licorice and...nastiness.  Blech.

After surviving the horrible cities of Greece, the islands were a coveted respite.  (Oooh, good words!)  However, with the entire Greek experience a tad bit tainted...well, significantly tainted, even after some great times on the islands I was relieved and excited to get to Turkey.  And so on the island of Chios, we said goodbye to Greece and boarded a ferry that would take us to Cesme...

Lod's Little Anecdote Session

Well, I'm in Ukraine, with our laptop (hee hee, notice how every possession is now ours...we have no individualism) hooked up to the internet.  Which means we should be able to post pictures soon.  Yay!  But for now, allow me to amuse myself with a few anecdotes I meant to tell before and didn't.  Except between sitting down and typing all that, I have, of course, forgotten them... but I should be able to recall a couple.

Okay, remember how I said we would have wrecked our boat on Lake Bled if Caitlin had been with us?  (Just say yes)  Well, I suppose I should admit that ironic and tragic things do happen to us occasionally even without the Caitlinator (I was testing out a new nickname.  It failed.).  The particular instance I'm referring to took place in Heraklion, on Crete.  For a typical sojourn into a new land, we would have booked our accommodation online ahead of time...for two reasons.  One is that we're paranoid freaks who don't want the hostel to fill up before we get there.  (Hey, it happens.)  The second reason is that especially in the off peak season, and especially especially in Greece, if someone doesn't know you're coming, they may not be there to greet you.  However, we threw caution to the wind in this instance, and arrived on the island of Crete without a reservation.  (We had our reasons.)  And so, for the first time, we felt like real, honest to goodness (what does that phrase even mean?) backpackers.  Because before we went to look for a hotel or hostel (we had some addresses), we had to figure out if we were really going to stay there, and how long.  It was all dependent on whether or not we were going to be able to scuba dive.  And so we set out with our big packs on our backs to find either a tourist information office or a travel agency.  Possibly both.  From the bus station we walked from place to place until we found the center of town.  From there we went back and forth, back and forth, trying to find something that was open and could help us.  Of course, once we found the tourist office, we discovered that though they said they opened at 8:30, they really didn't.  Nor did they open at 9.  I really don't know when they opened.  We finally found a travel agency that was not only opened, but also helpful (imagine that).  She found a number we could call to see if we could arrange a scuba diving adventure.  Then we had to find a place where we could make a phone call.  We were directed to a place that might have a call center, but in the end it was just a place where you could buy phone cards.  Since our call was local though, they let us use their phone for free.  We got in touch with the scuba guy, who said he could possibly arrange something, and that we should call him back that evening.  Question semi answered, we decided it was time to find a place to stay.  We had walked a long way, and were a little turned around, but with a little help, we were able to find our way all the way back to the bus station, and from there followed our directions around towards the two best accommodation options we had.  Unfortunately, the first one was not even open (quite discouraging, I can tell you), but the second option was, and so we checked in.  In the end the scuba trip didn't work out, but that's not the irony or the tragedy.  After all, we later got to scuba dive in Turkey, at probably a much lower price.  No, the irony is this: on our final day in Heraklion, we were walking around the city a little.  Well, a lot.  We had stored our luggage at the hotel, and were finally headed back.  As we were almost there, we found ourselves in a little park.  We had been in this park several times before, but had usually approached it from the other side.  Suddenly, things started looking familiar.  I said, "Hey, it's another one of those phone shops, like we went to on our first day here..."  Until, to our horror, we realized it was the same shop.  We continued past the park down a little street, which we had indeed ventured down that first day.  And had we gone further still down that street that day after wandering all over creation, just walked even five more steps, we would have turned a slight corner and seen our very own hotel, standing proud. Instead we walked back, got lost, got found, walked all the way around the main square and down the incline towards the bus station, all along the coast, and in towards the city again.  Maybe you had to be there, but it was just about the funniest thing...our slow realization...it was pretty priceless.  And since that little anecdote turned into a long winded story, there's nothing for it but to dive into another one.

Hem hem.

The Lod Who Went Up a Ladder and Came Down On Her Backside

Hmm.  Well, that about sums it up.  But since that wasn't nearly long enough, let me elaborate.  We're staying in the attic at the Lynch home.  It's a very nice attic, with carpet and heating and all that.  But in order to get up there, you have to climb a ladder.  A vertical ladder...no slope.  Normally, this wouldn't bother me.  I love perching.  Actually, it doesn't bother me.  Even when I have things in my hands, it's kind of fun to figure out how I'm going to manage the climb.  However, a few days ago, as I was climbing down, my hands and feet decided to let go at the same time.  Unfortunately for the rest of me, they made this decision when I was at the top of the ladder, rather than at the bottom, like good little hands and feet.  The result?  I fell.  All the way down.  One couldn't say I fell off the ladder, as I didn't fall backwards (which would have been much much much worse, I'm sure you can imagine), but rather a fell downwards, with my hands (and apparently elbow) banging along the rungs on the way.  And I landed on my bum.  Yeah...um, it hurt.  But no worries.  I'm just dandy.  Except that I'm a little sore.  And it kind of hurts to sit.  And it's a little embarrassing to fall down a ladder ("Really, Joanie, I don't do this a lot...").  But I usually like to get these things over with early on, so I can enjoy the rest of my time at any given place.  Like when I started a fire in a microwave at L'abri.  After that, everything went smoothly in the kitchen.  And no, not because I was kicked out.  Because I wasn't.  Actually, oddly enough, they put me in the kitchen a lot that week.  Go figure.

Hem hem.

Wellllll...yup, they're all gone.  I have loads and loads of anecdotes from even months ago, but they leave my brain pretty quickly.  I'm sure someday some conversation will trigger them.  But whatever.  Cheers!

Did ew know...?

People in Europe care more about American politics than I do.

Thank you for choosing Lod's Little Tidbits, and have a nice day.

To Be Brief...

We just arrived in Bucharest after a very long train ride.  It was supposed to be nineteen hours, but since it was late (as usual), it became twenty-two hours.  We get a short night's sleep, and then are back on a train in the morning for a twenty-seven hour train ride...which will probably become about thirty hours.  Fun stuffs.  Actually, it can be fun, as it was on this last ride, since we had couchettes (essentially beds) and a cabin to ourselves.  You can just relax and look at the scenery out the window.  Today we got a slideshow of Bulgaria.  Anyhoo, don't really have time for pictures and all that, but since I'm not sure if we'll have wireless access in the Ukraine for the next two weeks, I thought I should say something.

So, that's about it until next time.

By the way, Brook, you're funny.  Did I brush over the history of Knossos too much?  :-)=  I'm sure Elizabeth will do a job much more to your satisfaction.  So, there there.  (Of course, everyone really knows that Indy's adventure is the important part...don't pay attention to Brook's delusions...)

Cheers!  :-)=

Did ew know...?

Everyone knows it takes about two hours on a train at the border, but no one seems to schedule it in.

Thank you for choosing Lod's Little Tidbits, and have a nice day.

Bits of Greece

Well, sadly, two of my pictures wouldn't load.  One was supposed to be of Serbia.  Well, it was me eating a burger in Serbia.  Waiting for our train to start boarding.  And they were good burgers too.  Much much better than McDonald's.  But we don't speak of that place here.

The second picture was of kitties.  Kitties in Greece at Mt. Olympus.  And as we all know, kitties are very very very important.  Greece had kitties all over the place.  Probably still does.  And it's one of the only good things about Greece. That, and the food, and the ruins.  And some of the sites.  Which leaves...well, the people.  Hee.  Okay, generalizing is a bad bad thing.  Bad Lod.  Still, a lot of the people (especially the men) were pretty awful.  Once we got to the islands it was much better.  We also tried Greek coffee, which was really grainy...blech.  And basically, Greece shuts down in the winter...though I wouldn't really say they have much of a winter.  It's really hard to get anywhere or do anything.  Okay, that said, here come the pictures of the good things there...

This is dedicated to the Prosphatos dance team.  'Nuff said.  Well, not really.  It's also at Mount Olympus.  Now 'nuff said.
This is me being dramatic at Mount Olympus.  Be afraid.
I forget what this is.  Something like the Parthenon, in some place called the Acropolis.  Who knows what that is.  I mean, history, ruins...meh.  :-)=
This is Greek food.  Gyros.  Really yummy Gyros.  In Athens.  Mmmmm...
This is at Delphi.  More ruins, but a much prettier setting because it's up in the mountains, whereas the Acropolis is in the middle of a sprawling city.  However, I'm sad here because of the sign.  They had the audacity of telling me not to climb on it.  Are they allowed to do that?
Kitties!!!!!  In Greece!!!!!!  This is at Delphi.  This poor kitty was subjected to my cuddling.  I think Patience won't be pleased with this picture.
More Greek food!  Greek pizza, and Greek salad.  Feta cheese....mmmmmm......
Aaaah, Knossos.  This place was very important.  I mean, yeah, it's ruins...really old ruins...but the important thing is that Indiana Jones went there on his hunt for Atlantis.  But really, there weren't many tourists there (until after we left, when buses and buses and crowds and buses of tourists showed up), and we got to walk around and through, and it was tons of fun.
This is me following in Indy's footsteps.  He used these bull horns to find a stone disk.  It's all very complicated, and a long story, and I'm sure it would be beyond your comprehension anyway, so we'll leave it at that.
Here I am finding a stone disk.  Shut up!  It is too a stone disk.

So...that's Greece...so far.  Of course, now I'm in Turkey.  I'll finish up Greece some other time though, because I haven't picked out any pictures from Syros and Chios, the two other Greek islands we went to.  So that's all for now.

Thumbcrusher

Let me tell you a story.  A tale about an ant who has gotten too big for his britches...if he had any.  Which he doesn't.  Which is another problem.  But we're not talking about that right now.

Deep in the jungles of Slovenia, where the jungles are very un-jungleish, there dwells a giant Amazonian ant.  An ant who bullies everyone around him. An ant who believes that he has magical powers.  An ant who refuses to wear trousers.  This ant calls himself "Thumbcrusher."

The presumptuous little twerp stole my name.  He believes that though his kind has been crushed by many thumbs throughout the ages, he is ready to crush back.  But lest you begin to think he is a brave ant, soldiering on for the betterment of antkind, be assured that he has only selfish motives in his stone cold heart.  "He's always stealing the biggest breadcrumbs for himself!" complains Minger, an ant unfortunate enough to have to work with Thumbcrusher.  Many such complaints have arisen, drawing much attention towards this giant ant, who claims his size and ability come from magical powers.

His latest desire is to win the annual Bridge Plank Competition.  In an effort to unify ants across the world, the ants have been holding annual olympics, with the main event being the BPC.  In this dangerous, possibly life threatening competition, an ant must walk between two bridge planks, jump across the gap to the next plank, and continue on.  But Thumbcrusher is not content with the standard size of gap.  He is determined to prove larger gaps possible, and thereby extend the current standard.  Such a change would make this already formidable event quite lethal.  But Thumbcrusher, as usual, is determined to get his way.

However, we have born witness to something that may shatter this invincible image Thumbcrusher has tried to portray.  Indeed, he seems to have found a gap too large for his britches...or lack thereof.  He was rigorously training again, when he approached a gap, and tried to no avail to jump across.  Unfortunately for him, his acrobatics could not get him past this obstacle, and he eventually turned back.  Will this new information be enough to rid antkind of Thumbcrusher's opression?  It may at least be a leap in the right direction.

The two "Thumbcrushers" face off

Thumbcrusher (the imposter) trying to get across the large gap

Thumbcrusher gives up

Lbljbl

OoPs.  Hee hee.  I kind of forgot to show the picture of Ljubljana in the same post where I talked about it.  

This was the Dragon Bridge.  Legend goes that a dragon was slain by the hero Jason by the river Ljubljanica.  Anyhoo... that's that.

How We Managed to Rent a Boat, Sink It, and Wreck it On the Rocks...

Well, that would have been a good story, but since Caitlin wasn't with us...

It goes more like this...

We visited Lake Bled in Slovenia, and enjoyed the castle and walking around the lake.  There is a small island in the middle of the lake that you can ferry over to if you want.  To have someone take you over there is fairly expensive.  To rent a rowboat and go over yourself is fairly cheap.  Plus you get the rewarding experience of pulling yourself across the water.  Once we got settled into a rhythm, we were practically pros.  We parked by the dock, explored the island (it's tiny), and then proceeded to row back to shore.  The trick was, after approaching the dock on the mainland, you had to turn the boat around, and then back right up into the parking space, which was a little notch just large enough for the boat.  Ready for it?  We couldn't have done it more perfectly.  We slid right into that notch with grace finesse.  So it makes for a more boring story, but we were rather proud of ourselves, so there you go.

And now, for some pictures of Lake Bled.  Only a few.  Because really we have thousands. Well, maybe hundreds.  Okay, dozens.  Of that little thing called a castle.  On the cliff.

Here is a little person I like to call me, in the castle on the cliff at Lake Bled in Slovenia in Europe.  Can't remember which planet.  I liked the orange leaves.  Because they're orange.
This was also at the castle.  The roots of the tree looked spiffy cool.  Elizabeth also looked spiffy cool.  As always.
This was what the trash cans looked like around Lake Bled.  Very cool.  I suspect that they're yelling, "GOOBS!!!" but I can't prove anything.
The infamous boat that I told you about.  And those two people are us.  Very proud of us.  And very crunchy.
The purty castle.  Through more orange leaves.

Other than that...well, our hostel was fabulous.  We got a wonderful, traditional, home-cooked meal...four courses.  We also walked around Ljubljana (which we fondly refer to as Lbljbl ((LIH-buhl-jih-buhl), which is the capital of Slovenia.  They had some cool folklore, and some interesting sites...mostly we just walked around for a few hours.  And met the nicest postal employee in the world.  We toasted our completion of Slovenia with cocktails, and headed next into Greece...with a few stops along the way... (dun dun dun...)

Starvation

OoPs.  I almost got them loaded correctly.  Hmmm...maybe next time I'll manage.

This is Plitvice.  And so is the next one.  It would have been beautiful enough if there were just paths around the lakes, but they've built wooden walkways that actually go over them and around the falls.  It was absolutely amazing!

This is Heidelberg, which was actually before Plitvice, but whaddaya do?  This was a view from the Philosophers' Walk, next to Heidelberg Castle.
I liked the leaves.  They were orange.  So who wouldn't pose with them?  This was at Heidelberg Castle as well.
Here is a statue of a folk jester and entertainer from Croatian folk oral tradition.  He was also a spokesperson for the common folk.  And he's also surrounded by flower stands.  He stands on the outskirts of the city market, which was very loud and busy, but entertaining as markets always are.
When we arrived at our guesthouse in Plitvice, our hostess offered us tea.  What we got was a cute tray with really good tea and some yummy little cakes.  It was lovely, and we felt very welcomed.
Another picture of Plitvice.  This was one of the most stunning viewpoints, in my opinion.  And Elizabeth's capture of the orange leaves could only be an improvement.  Fall just makes everything wonderful.
Apparently, Elizabeth had no idea she gave this kind of expression.  But she does it occasionally, and it always makes me laugh.  So now I finally have it captured in a picture.  Of course, we were ushered into a small box and whisked away through the Black Forest with no end in sight, and fog began to surround us, and I proceeded to channel Gene Wilder's Willy Wonka in the boat scene, so she might have had decent reason to be a bit frightened.
It seemed as though the Black Forest couldn't decide what season it wanted to be.  The higher up we got, the more wintery it was.  Go figure.  Of course, with all the snow, I was in heaven.
Once at the top of the ride, we walked around a little and then headed into the restaurant for some hot chocolate.  And when we asked for hot chocolate, the man said, "With rum?"  And I thought, haha, I'm not in the states anymore.  It was quite good, of course.  And the spoon was cool too.
Here's the Black Forest being all creepy.  The story Hansel and Gretel may have been based off of this forest, so of course it had to be creepy.
Here's the Heidelberg Castle again.  Elizabeth is pouting because we're up there.  And down there is a cannon.  That we can't reach.  And so she pouts.  Verily.  But I survived another day.  And there was much rejoicing.

Today was a fabulous day, as it was a much needed rest day.  It's been a very very long time since we had a day to just do nothing, so today we slept in, walked around a teeny bit, and mostly stayed in our room and recovered a bit from all the moving around.  Of course, we inadvertently starved ourselves too, but we'll survive.  The market closed early today, and we stayed in until later, and we didn't want to go out to the restaurant twice in one day, so we ended up just not eating anything besides chocolate until dinner time.  But before my numerous mothers freak out, we don't make a habit of that.  One need only look at the number of meal pictures I put up on this site to know that.  Well, tomorrow we'll catch a bus back to Zagreb, and then the train over to Slovenia.  La'uhs.