See - he DOES smile!

In the beginning of June, I was invited to M's school to give a talk to upper school students on foreign assistance abroad, and a little bit about what I do. While I was waiting to go into the classroom, I happened to look out the window. What did I see? A happy teenager. I was glad that I had my camera with me, since such a sighting in the wild is a real rarity. Enjoy!

Border Guard Day

(Above: the Border Guard Singers)

For those not in the know, Ukrainian Day of the Border Guards is celebrated every May 28. And there is always a big production with awards, singing and dancing. Which, by necessity, the law enforcement liaison officers from the Embassies are invited to attend. This year was a command performance as President Yanukovych made an appearance. He gave a nice speech praising the BGs reform, including project managed by yours truly. So I was extremely pleased. Slightly less pleased, though, that he appearance pushed back the time of the event. After almost 2 hours of the Border Guard dancers and singers presenting a pastiche of historical songs about the border from WWII on (in honor of the 65th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day), I had to leave by 5:30 PM. I also noticed many of the performances were the same as last year. I guess you can only find so many songs that involve the word border, huh.
I did take pictures of the president, but I haven't figured out my new camera, so they are dark and blurry. I've enclosed the best one, and I apologize for its awfulness!

And below is a video of the art piece they do that represents trafficking in persons. I am a big fan of the camoflauge and mesh look.

Lyuda

For those who miss our tireless nanny after her great shopping sojourn to the States, in which she single-handedly erased the budget deficit of the state of Pennslyvania, here she is, hard at work. She turns 60 in the middle of July. I suppose I had better get cracking on finding her a gift. But what hasn't she bought herself?

Getting Wet

I know it seems silly to buy a bathing suit for a tiny baby, but it is SPF 70 and my children inherited my very fair skin. Plus she looks so darn cute. Especially when she and mommy are getting ready to get into the bath...

Tbilisi - Part 2

Jvari, the monastery on the hill, overlooking... Mtskheta, ancient capital of Georgia, where the Mtkvari and Aragvi rivers meet. As I mentioned before, we both wore shorts. When visiting Tsvetitskhoveli Church, the most sacred site in Georgia, where allegedly Christ's robe is buried, I thought I should show some respect. Aaron took a picture of me buying a scarf, not for my head, but to wrap around my waist, to show people I was making an effort.

And here is the church itself, from the outside. It's a UNESCO world heritage site, and with good reason. Below is from inside the courtyard.Above, a view of the scarf that covers my legs, although with the wind, it was more symbolic than functional.

Below is the pillar built on top of the original pillar, which is supposed to house the robe of Christ.

Tbilisi - Beautiful Tbilisi Pt. 1

OK, there is going to be some Tbilisi madness on this blog. Seven full years since I left, I still harbor a special place in my heart for this mysterious, crazy, emotional country. They've been through a revolution and a war, I've been through a marriage and 3 kids and 3 countries. But we can still meet at the end of the day for a glass of Georgian wine, some cucumbers and tomatoes, and some good khachipuri.Despite having served in other wonderful places (New Zealand comes to mind) Georgia really does occupy a special place in my heart. I suppose it was for that reason that I decided to surprise Aaron with a romantic 5-year anniversary weekend getaway to Tbilisi. It wasn't exactly what he expected in terms of romantic suprise destination, but he is resigned to my oddities, which is why our marriage has worked so well so far. We did also have to take the youngest, who is still nursing, which cast a decidedly mellower cast on the "festivities". No bar-hopping in cigarette-filled Beatles Club or Hangar. Although with how much Georgians love babies, it possible wouldn't have been a problem to just leave here at the hotel. Case in point, at one point in the lobby, I was negotiating something with the front desk, look over and she is gone from her car seat. Umm, she didn't learn to walk, did she? No, one of the women at the front desk had scooped her up and was introducing her to the other employees. On Rustaveli street even big, strapping Georgian men (with their big strapping beer/wine tummies) would stop and literally coo and tickle.

We arrived Friday night, to a brand-new , fantastic airport, complete with cameras for identification as you enter through passport control. We were picked up by the Radisson's Mercedes, and drove into town on George Bush highway. Smooth and quick, and amazingly, the police were only stopping people who were breaking the rules. It really is true! The traffic police used to be the most insidious and visible sign of corruption and the breakdown of society there, as they are here in Kyiv. And they were gone! Viva la revolution!So these are photos from our trip Saturday with Dave Gehrenbeck to Jvari (the church on a hill behind Aaron in the photo, and which I am standing next to up top) and to Mtskheta, which is where the Mtkvari and Aragvi rivers meet, and which will appear in the next set of photos. Mtskheta is the ancient capital of Georgia, and the centerpiece is the Tsvetiskhoveli church. But more importantly, in the photo above, you can see the redone highway to Gori, birthplace of Stalin. When I lived there it took two hours to get there. Now? 40 minutes. Amazing what $1 billion in aid will get you. Great highways - all of the Georgian roads I saw were phenomenal. What a difference. Jvari. Aaron is posing in front. He and I both wore shorts. I don't know what we were thinking. You can't wear shorts on the territories of the churches - it's considered very disrespectful. But our guide was nice about it and explained to people if they complained. Above is the view from our hotel. We stayed in the Radisson Blu Iveria. When I lived there it was a run-down Intourist hotel, filled with internally displaced persons from the war in Abkhazia and with Chechen refugees. People used to keep their livestock and their chickens there, and hang their laundry out of the windows. Now it's a phenomenal all-glass structure. We were on the 17th floor, and the views were amazing, as you can see. Below is the Rose Revolution square - you can see the construction which used to be the reviewing stand during the Soviet period, where the parades would go by the high Party officials. Guess it's getting a makeover, much like the rest of the city!

Bring out the good stuff!

On May 16 we finally took the plunge and fed the littlest her first solid food. By solid in this case I mean organic imported German rice mush. As with her big sister, there was a moment of hesitation, and then the instinct kicked in. I think she was more than ready, but I had wanted to wait a little longer since she was born so early, and also, the longer she could exclusively nurse the better. You can find good baby food here, but for the first few solids, I ordered Gerber first foods from abroad - just in case! Quality control here is nonexistent, and I didn't want to mess around with potential allergens. The food was tasty, I suppose, but apparently more delicious when mixed with spit and chewed off of one's own hand. I'm going to take her word for it, and not try it myself. This was only a test run, as you can see by the fact that she wasn't even wearing a bib. What a good eater, clean and charming - I can guarantee that by now, the time I write this, we have had prunes up her nose and on the ceiling, as she gets more engaged. She's a tough one, able to take care of herself!

As you can see from the pictures, we had a matching helper who just loved putting the spoon in her sister's mouth. She was surprisingly gentle, but I think it will require watching like a hawk to make sure she doesn't choke the little one.

Play Kitchen. Oh, Yeah!

Our poor long-suffering oldest daughter finally got a play kitchen in mid-May, joining the ranks of the toddlers with enough toys to occupy them... almost. I wanted wood, even if it is more like pressboard in parts, and I didn't want to spend the $900 for a Pottery Barn Kids pink kitchen (like our neighbor bought, not naming any names!) So we have a compromise solution that, most importantly, fit through the Diplomatic Pouch, which has stringent size restrictions. It's got a microwave, oven, cell phone, sink and stove. I bought the whole shebang, including a set of wooden pots and the four food groups.
As you can see in the second picture, S really enjoyed the whole experience, but wasn't so sure about being served microwaved "stinky fish" for dinner!

Sofievska Park - Uman

Day 3 of the 4 day weekend we went on a tour of the beautiful Sofievska Park, about two hours south of Kyiv, in a town called Uman, which is also well known for being the birthplace of a certain strain of Orthodox Judaism. The park was created on the basis of a particular horticultural style where manmade gardens are specifically designed to appear natural. The guide explained in detail how certain rock formations were meant to symbolize certain great literary works, like Homer's the Odyssey, or the formation of Greek isles.

The thrust of the park is that the owner, Count Potocki, fell in love with a Greek slave girl, married her and built her this enormous park in 1802 as a wedding gift. It is really lovely and surprisingly well-maintained. I've linked the wikipedia article to the title for more information.

After we finished the tour, we sat on the slope near the main house to have a picnic. There were about 50 people spread across the lawn. But as we finished, a very cranky guard came over and yelled at us - apparently we weren't allowed to picnic on the lawn. We feigned ignorance of Russian, but since we were done anyway we left shortly thereafter. I didn't envy him his job - there were no signs, it was a beautiful day and the lawn was around 2 acres of clear space. Perfect for a picnic!
And in this post we have the fantastic Aaron-as-post-Soviet-posing-woman photo, where he is standing in a burnt-out tree. We were a bit giddy and silly!

May Holidays - Botanical Garden

May is the best month in Ukraine, since we have 5 holidays, and they all fall on Monday or Tuesday. I think we end up working one full five-day week. June also has two Monday holidays this year, but that's an anomaly.

So on the first long weekend, a celebration of May days from May 1-4, we went to the Botanical Garden here. Apparently, so did half of Kyiv as you can see from the photos. And the gorgeous, stately grand staircase was a total pain with a stroller, but we muddled through. There aren't too many photos of the actual flowers, since there really weren't that many of great note. And of course our darling oldest daughter is vehemently against posing properly in any photo, so here are the best options with mommy and daddy. She actually was happy, it's just hard to tell!

You'll see in one photo the crowds gathered around the magnolias, but if you've lived in Virginia, it's not as exciting. We were limited in our travel again, since there were lots of big down and up hills and little signs threatening ticks and bugs. We stuck to the path. Aaron took an artistic shot of people climbing a hill and you can see the church and statue of Mother Kyiv in the background. It was quite a hot day, so we had to stop and have ice cream, which was nice but there wasn't anywhere to sit other than on the garden, and we felt odd doing that.

What you can't see in the photos is a phenomonon familiar to those who have lived in the former Soviet Union - the floral cheesecake pose. That's where a woman or child stands pretty uch directly in a tree or in a flower bed and pulls a plant near their face and snaps a photo. It's very mid-80s, soft fade artistic. You'll see an example modeled by Aaron in the next set of photos - he is taking the mickey out of the Ukrainians.