I’ll explain that title in just a minute, since virtually no one outside of my immediate family will understand it. (And they might not remember either…)

So, if you’re ever in Kiev and have the opportunity to visit their Hydropark (or as they pronounce it, HEE-dropark), don’t. Imagine an outdoor amusement park that is waaaaay past its prime; that’s the Hydropark. It’s kind of sad, really. It’s easy to see how it probably once was, but now things look tired and worn out, if not outright broken or overgrown.

Still, going to the Hydropark is a good way to get to the beach. The Dneiper (Dneipro, for our Ukrainian readers; pronounced “knee-pro”) River runs through the middle of Kiev – in fact, it runs through the middle of Ukraine, splitting the country into rather well-defined east and west sections. Based on my three trips to various parts of this country, it seems that Ukrainians are very fond of laying out on their beaches, right in the sun and everything. That’s not exactly my thing — my pasty white skin doesn’t just happen naturally you know… oh wait, I guess it does — but I actually had a good time hanging out at the Dneiper today. It was a tad hot, but a little wading cooled things off. And then a strong south wind kicked up, which I thought felt great.

Weather-wise it has been a little hit and miss. When there’s a little breeze, being out and about n the city is just fine. But the wind has been something of a precursor to storms, and while I love the rain, being in the rain without an umbrella is not fun at all. That’s how my trip to the Lavra ended, with something of a mad dash to a Metro station.

But anyway, back to today, where it did not rain on me. Today I learned two things about my Russian language skills: one, I have a lot more to learn before I will ever be fluent, or even passably awkward, and two, I still have picked up quite a bit and it has been helping tremendously. Even so there are times when #2 is less than ideal. Today, my brain really failed me by not remembering sooner that “zoloti” means “gold” (the color, if not also the metal). And so it wasn’t until I exited the Zoloti Vorota subway station that I realized that I had ended up at one of the places I had wanted to see: Kiev’s Golden Gate. This is the last remaining bit of an old kiev fortress wall, really just a portcullis and some of the surrounding structure. Sadly I arrived too late in the day to get inside – this attraction closes at around 5 – so I just had to settle for some external pictures.

I don’t know if I’ll get back there, but it wouldn’t be hard to make a day of it. The city has been built all around this artifact, so I could easily stroll on over, do a little shopping, have a bite to eat, and then visit a centuries old remnant of Kiev’s past. Granted it can be similarly bad at some American sites as well, but here it is sometimes to the point where if you we’re riding in a taxi and blinked at the wrong time (or, if it was rush hour, had a sneezing fit, which as everyone knows reflexively causes your eyes to close), you could breeze right by something historic.

So about that title… Furr’s Cafeteria was, as you probably guessed, a cafeteria. It was one of the last cafeterias (outside of school) that existed when I was growing up, and it closed up some time after I finished high school. However, it seems that it simply changed names, learned to speak Ukrainian and moved half way around the world. It is now called Puzata Hata (http://www.puzatahata.com.ua/eng/), and it’s a quick and easy way to sample assorted Ukrainian cuisine. Fine cuisine, no, but reasonably authentic. The only real downside is that because these places are pretty popular, it sometimes takes a little while to get checked out and so your food cools off quite a bit. Just like a real cafeteria. Still it was an interesting thing to try. Unlike a normal restaurant, I didn’t have ask for an English menu; I could just go through the line and point at things.