Well the amusement and culture shock never ceases.
In my hotel there is a lounge, the lounge happens to be on the same floor that my room is.
Last night I had asked Anna and Kristina up to the lounge, just for a glass of wine. They agreed and thought it would be a nice cap off to the evening.
Well..........standing at the bottom of the stairs were two gentleman dressed in dark blue suits. As we made our way to the stairs, my chest walked into the hand of the larger gentleman. Of course neither of the gentleman spoke english and Anna had to interpret what they were saying. It appears that ifyou ask a lady up to your room, she becomes a guest of the hotel and since I was bringing to women to my room I was being charged double. Although having two women in my room at the same time is something I would not turn down.......this was not my intent. So after about 10 minutes of a flurry of Russian we were allowed to go the lounge for wine.
The smaller of the two gentlemen followed us upstairs, we went to the lounge and he went down the hall. As I watched him, he posted himself right outside my door.
Interesting.
So we talked for a bit and little while intot eh conversation I asked Anna and Kristina who the were, she said they were "security" which she made the sign for the quotes symbols. I said "Security?", she said yes.
I am not sure if they were actuall hotel "security" or if the warm blanket of the mafia was afoot. In either case I was not about to venture down that road.
Unfortunately today Dmitri and Alexander cannot make it today so I am off with Anna and Kristina again to sample more Ukrainian food, walk the flea market again and maybe play some pool and talk.
Afew more observations of the culture. I had noticed that most of the cars are real junkers. So I started joking about the cars and each time a unker came by I would say "crap car" and when a nice car like a "BMW" or Humvee" came by I would say "Mafioso". Well.... it appears that I was not far off. I was told not to point at the cars for obvious reasons. C'mon! Is this for real??
More about the automobiles. To get a "taxi" all one needs to do is stand on the curb and wait. It turns out, that if you are a person with a car and want to make some money, you can be a taxi.
Taxi drivers; The old men that drive the real taxi's are a lot of fun to talk with and enjoy learning English phrases. The younger drivers however know a little English. The last driver we had was a young man about 28-30, he was interested in knowing if I would like to go to the ocean and go for a swim with him. I DON'T THINK SO. Anna and Kristina had a good laugh at my expense. It took the entire trip in the taxi to explain to him that I really do like girls and I was not about to be swayed to the "dark side".
I must have the look.... hey when you got it, you got it......but how do you get rid of it when you don't want it??!!
Ahhh morning breakfast, I had forgotten to mention. When ordering a cup of coffee, it is best to order the espresso "size". Since I stand out as an American, it was assumed that I would like to have an American "size" cup of coffee. Little did I know that they take a regular size cup and fill it with espresso! Right now I feel like I could run a one minute mile and not even break a sweat! GOOD COFFEE!
