Where's Ron?
Summer 2002
15 July 2002
Afton, Virginia, USA
Dear Family and Friends,
Below is Ron's first message from the Ukraine, from Uzhgorod, a town just inside the western border with Slovakia. A word of explanation about the last paragraph. Those of you who know us well will know that we occasionally drink wine, but that neither of us likes beer or hard liquor and we don't enjoy drinking for the sake of drinking. Ron has found in past travels that in some cultures he needs to give people an unbreakable excuse for not joining the multiple rounds of drinking, and has often told his companions "My doctor won't allow me to drink". He was worried that might not be a strong enough statement in the Ukraine, and thus decided to tell people he couldn't drink because he is an alcoholic (which he isn't, but it seemed like an iron-clad excuse). Apparently that excuse doesn't work. Guess he'll just have to run the risk of being considered unfriendly and unsociable when he refuses to drink!
As far as the weather, when we were in Denmark and Prague, we generally had very pleasant temperatures with a few warmer days -- but nothing hot enough to make the road bubble!
Love to all,
To Ellen and our friends,
It has been difficult to explain to people why I wanted to go to Ukraine, and now that I am here I wonder why myself. But crossing the border from Slovakia into Ukraine and then into the city of Uzhgorod I could really feel the adventure and a bit of fear.
My first impression reminded me of Saigon. Something about the wide tree-lined street and the concrete buildings. As I continued to try to understand the thought, I realized that there was a Russian style of development that I experienced in Vietnam, Georgia, and Poland that I was seeing again.
But let me back up to how I got here after Ellen took her train to Munich from Prague.
In Prague, sitting in the main plaza, I met two young tourists from Israel. Turns out one of them was born in Vinitza, Ukraine and left when she was just a kid and has no desire to ever visit there. She thinks the people will be blond and fair (she had brown hair and a dark complexion).
Then later I watched the sunset with a PhD student from Rio, Brazil, who was there waiting for the dark and for the night lights to be lit so she could take a picture. We were near the Charles Bridge where Ellen and I in the fall of 2000 had watched the seagulls bath and do their little twist dance before they flew off for the night. Instead of the sun setting behind the mountain on the other side of the river, it set further to the right behind a cloud bank behind the castle, and then it stayed light a long time. As a result the light did not make a dramatic change and the seagulls performance I had hoped to see again was not performed. (It either rained or was cloudy for the previous 6 nights). I had to leave before the prime picture-taking time to catch my train to Slovakia.
Getting here from Prague was much easier and more uneventful than I had anticipated - the only problem was getting my bike on the train in Prague. I was to be at the train station an hour before the train departure to check in my bicycle. When I arrived the baggage section was closed for their evening break and when they opened again later they said it was too late to check my bike. After quite a bit of conversation which I could not understand, involving several bystanders and other cyclists getting on other trains, they said to fold up the bike and take it on the train with me. Which I did, and it presented no problem in what turned out to be my private second class cabin, meant for three people, which I had chosen instead of the 1st class cabin with two bunks because I thought it would double the chances that someone interesting would be in my compartment.
In Kosice, Slovakia, the first hotel I checked from the Lonely Planet guide was closed. The second had doubled in price and from there on, I was on my own, finding a nice place for around $20. Later I found the Metropol with a private room for $4 if I go back that way. It was a large and very nice "tourist hotel", like a hostel for travelers.
In trying to use the computer at the Internet Cafe, I met three 15 year old girls who could speak English. This conversation was the only meaningful conversation I had in town. Two of the girl's mothers were Ukrainian, and they had never been to Ukraine. They could not understand why I was going.
On the main plaza, which was a walking street that went for blocks, there was an elaborate water fountain that danced to classical music. The only other one I have ever seen was in Zongking (spelling?), China but someone told me there was also one in Prague.
After a night in Kosice, I plotted a route on the area's bike map (much like the detailed ones we used in the Czech Republic in 2000) using small country roads to avoid the main highway.
I put my Beethoven CD in my walkman and made the difficult climb of 10K out of Kosice, being chased by a horsefly that bit me a couple of times before I stopped and killed it, only to find several more took its place, along with some gnats I could not outrun going uphill. So I pulled out the insect repellant that I have carried for years and hardly ever used. It worked just fine and made the Beethoven a much better experience. But the heat is something to experience, and so hot the patches in the road are bubbling, and when I roll over some soft sections it feels like the road is trying to grab and hold my tire.
Coasting down the other side of the mountains reminded me why I was doing this. Beautiful country and the breeze created by cycling at 64.9 km/hr removed the heat. The corn is getting tassels, other grain fields are brown and being threshed with a piece of equipment that should be in a museum, with the grain being hauled off in antique Russian dump trucks, and fields of sunflowers in bloom for as far as the eye can see.
I stopped at the bottom of the mountain in Slanec for a cold bottle of water and settled for a lemon drink. The woman gave me a post card of scenes from the town with my change, including a picture of the ruins I had stopped to photograph. She couldn't speak a word of English, but we had a wonderful conversation!
I ended up in Trebisov for a night and then the next day biked to Michalovce where the main street was completely torn up and being rebuilt, perhaps along the line of the main plaza in Kosice. The owners of the bicycle store along the plaza let me use their computer to email home that I was well.
After Trebisov, I have used the primary roads and found the traffic light and usually a narrow paved shoulder. While I still found it safer to ride in the lane, the shoulder was useful when a truck was coming towards me and another vehicle was passing me from behind. All in all, none of the roads I have experienced so far are as dangerous as the road that passes my driveway back home: VA 151 & 6.
When I found a hotel/restaurant in Sobrance, they had to call the waitress to translate. She was a beautiful bright-eyed 21 year old student who plans on being an English Professor in the University in Bratislava She was working for the summer and said she hoped I was going to stay for several days so we could talk! And we did have a very long conversation in the afternoon and evening when there was a break between the rush of meals. She told me about falling in love with a peace corp volunteer who had recently returned home to Dallas to marry his American girlfriend. She also introduced me to a Ukrainian guy who had a contract to play football with the Sobrance team for 6 months. His last contract was in Moscow. We had a long conversation about soccer and what I should expect in Ukraine.
My first night in Uzhgorod, as I went without dinner, I remembered back on my dinner in Michalovce: hot garlic soup, grilled trout, tomato and onion (white and sweet) marinated salad and mineral water. It was a wonderful meal and Ned would have approved my selection of restaurant and menu. The memory even increased my hunger. The next day I realized that somewhere between Prague and Uzhgorod there was an hour time change, and since I was looking for a place to eat late, it was an hour later than I thought!
But now I have found a couple of wonderful places to eat, have the correct time, know my way around town, and am trying to figure out what I do next.
When I was on the legislative bicycle ride at the Washington DC Bike Summit, I met a woman from Ukraine who told me the name of a travel agency that could get me a visa for Ukraine. She also gave me the name of her cousin in Uzhgorod, which I finally retrieved from my email and called him today. While he didn't speak English, his wife is an English teacher and their 12 year old son could also understand and speak some English. We met at the middle of the main bridge, a place we both knew, and they invited me to their home for tea, which turned into dinner. Then we went to the hospital to visit his mother, where I also met his brother, then visited his new sound studio where he is the sound engineer, before dropping me off at an Internet Cafe where I am writing you this message. Tomorrow she is taking me to a travel agency to help me figure out a bike route and accommodations for a trip to the Carpathian Mountains to the South. Stay tuned for the next chapter.
The availability and cost of accommodations is my primary concern. It didn't help to be told that the hotel I am staying in charges Ukrainians about $5 or $6, while they are charging me about $16. I understood this practice had been dropped, but I guess not, so now I fear the robbery from the desk clerks more than from the street. But at these prices I still cannot really complain. It just means that I will stay in places not as nice as I would if I paid the same prices as others. And when I get to a place that only has one choice which is upscale to start with, then I will have a budget problem.
Until tonight most of my conversations have been with young people who have studied English in School. Older people will have studied Russian instead. This seems to be true in Romania, Hungary, Slovakia and Ukraine. If I ask a young person or group if they speak English, usually I can get at least one yes, if not several. The women seem to have more experience speaking English than the men, but I have also had some good exchanges with young men, however in most cases the conversation leads to a toast, a bottle of something appears and a glass is offered. This happened the last night in Slovakia as well as at dinner my second night in Ukraine when there was a wonderful group of young guys celebrating the 18th birthday of one of them. Before my meal we had had some good conversations. As my meal progressed, I could hear them drinking in the next room and practicing a toast to the US Independence. Sometime later, in a more advanced state of inebriation, they appeared at my table with a bottle and glass. I have tried saying I am a recovering alcoholic, but my friends tonight explained to me that they do not have the tradition of AA here and people may not understand what I mean. But I have learned that one drink turns into two which leads to three, etc so I would rather work it out at the beginning. However the wine seems fine.
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Last updated: 28 July 2002