Wu Wei

Orange smoke for a new government?

The bosses from Ukrtransnafta could not meet us this morning as they had an Extraordinary General Meeting. But they came out afterwards, rather like the Conclave (?) of Cardinals, and announced an Orange Coalition had been formed successfully. We wished them "long life to the government" and everybody laughed, so there are no illusions.

And we have till July to get our work done and in front of the government.

Wonder what the Extraordinary General Meeting was about? Hedging their bets? Still our meeting even without them, was the best so far. Informed people, clear what they wanted, able to tell us in English. In short, easy to work with.

Football

I have to confess we were probably the only ones in Kiev who didn't know about the match last night. We went out to look for some dinner and suddenly noticed the streets were very quiet. When we spotted TVs on very loudly in every restaurant and cafe then light dawned. Since none of us are football fans much we hid away in a restaurant without a TV and got updates via the waitress. That was extra special service for Ukraine.

As a result we missed the celebrations in Kreshchatik afterwards complete with fireworks so I heard.

Everybody was happy this morning.

Kiev in the sun

Definitely below par in the hotel on the great Soviet Breakfast. No buffet and the same menu every day. Our Dane is sticking it out, but we have moved to a nice apartment overlooking the Golden Gate, (not golden as my kids complained) with a nice cafe for breakfast, though even they have only omelette and pancakes. A missed opportunity in such a good spot.

Last night we went to the Opera to hear Boris Godunov which was really impressive (at least to us, none of us opera buffs). We could have done with a better programme in English, it seemed a really incoherent story. When I get back I will have to read about it properly.

Tuesday we have tickets for a premier performance of a new ballet called (I think) Marriage of Figaro, so we will have to smarten ourselves up.

Our work is going OK, with the Ukrainians no worse than the internationals. The cooperation from the Ministry is about what one would expect when there is no government. The news is only getting worse about the type of government to be formed. Since our project is only of interest to a western EU orientated government, not much may come of it, which is disappointing.

In the meantime, Kiev goes about its usual business, working not too hard in the sun, being not too obliging when something is needed, but not barking at customers like in the old days.

New computer, not so much fun as it used to be

Spent Monday in London buying a new laptop, as the old one is nearly 3 and the hard disk has less than 1 Gb of space left, so might grind to a halt.

It's really hard to get excited about a new computer anymore. My first was called a Sirius and had two floppy drives and no hard disk. It ran both MSDOS and CP/M. I used it to write my PhD thesis using WordStar and 5 1/4 floppies. Probably I got through 3 computers as it took me 10 years to finish the PhD. But I was still writing it in Wordstar. Since then I have had both Mac and then Windows machines. I'd really like a Mac again, but should you really buy a computer for its looks?

In the end I bought another Sony Vaio because it was a reasonable price, the last was reliable, and they are prettier than Toshiba or HP. I managed to set it up in an evening so I could bring it to Kiev, but still have to transfer most of the photo and music files. Painless, except for the rip-off Norton antivirus which immediately says the license has expired and tries to make you buy another one.

Even BT, my ISP, which according to the voicemail "has been having issues with Yahoo" managed to get my email back on line in time to use Outlook 2003. Although I already had a Yahoo email, BT insisted I had another, which interferes with with the original one and is an earlier version of Yahoo mail, without the beta "outlook look alike" interface which though beta is still better than what BT provide. With the "issues" preventing the use of Outlook at all, BT had probably screwed up email for a lot of people.
Guess I will have to change to someone else.

Nostagia for Soviet Hotels

Just arrived in Kiev for two weeks to find torrential rain, just like there was in Kosovo most of the time I was there till last week. Seems no way to have a summer, yet it's almost midsummer day.

Kiev is in the midst of football fever too, with a match against Spain going on as I arrive. I've been warned its an unofficial half day holiday, so what with the official holiday on Monday, not much work will get done this week. Haven't heard the result, but the presence of Black Marias with the militia just outside the hotel suggests that they were expecting trouble on the Maidan later tonight. With this rain, even if they win, doesn't look like there will be much celebrating in the streets.

We've been booked into the Hotel Ukraine, which has brought back the nostalgia for the old Soviet Hotel. Not much has changed in the hotel except the name: it used to be the Moskva. The receptionist as usual couldn't find our reservation which had been done locally, though she was looking only halfheartedly, and was half apologetic about it.

The decor in the lobby is fairly typical: a style that probably went out in Britain in the 50s, and has probably been there as long. But it's amusing to think that's all there was. Now Kiev hotels are notorious for being expensive, whether good or bad. At least now there are some international chains trying to set standards for the locals. Yesterday I rang up a small hotel recommended by a work colleague, who like it so much he didn't bother with an apartment. When I asked about the level of service, she modestly said that it was a middle quality then blurted out that there was no hot water. I had completely forgotten that that might be an issue in the summer. 10 years ago, there was always a week or so when the city hot water went off for maintenance in your street, so you had to make do with cold showers and visit someone else in another part of town to get your washing done. Seems it is still going on.

The rooms are not so bad inside, but the keys are still kept by a lady on each floor. They were considered spies by westerners in Soviet days, and were usually old dragons. In practice if you could talk to them, they were quite friendly and would make you tea, lend you an iron etc and try to help if you had any problems. Today's lady is young and helpful.

I enquired about internet and she sent me downstairs into the unreconstructed bowels of the hotel to find the Biznis Center. There after trying for 10 minutes (I kid you not) to load yahoo, I gave up. The office girl said it was always like that, and offered me this internet cafe where normal services are available. I remembered the days I spent 10 years ago trying to send a single email, and it seemed the hotel was not much better than that.

I am looking forward to the great Soviet breakfast, where there is either a really big buffet with food you could stock up on for the day in case the next meal never arrived. Or there is a fixed menu and it is always something you don't like, like really large inedible pink sausages. Makes me gag just thinking about them. Sometimes the omelettes were not so bad, but they only appeared on certain days.

Anyway we will try and find an apartment tomorrow and move out to normal life.

Coming and going

Apologies for the lack of news. Just back from Kosovo and off to Kiev on Wed. Some photos from day trip to Prizren. (not prison, as Bee thought I had said). Haven't even had time to look at the photos myself.

Not much chance to post on the internet in the evenings and much too busy during the day. Weather in Pristina colder in the day (about 12 C ) than in the night in the UK. No need for summer clothes at all. More like wellies as rain all the time.

Panic over too much work and nowhere to live: the landlord in Oxford has decided to sell and the house is much too expensive for us to buy. So somehow have to find house and move while working in Kiev. Not to mention summer holiday, visitors and keeping house clean when people want to view it. Bee being bricklike about move: we can just stay with my friends and put the stuff in the BIg Yellow Warehouse. Well it has only over taken me a week to find somewhere to live in a new country, so it can't be so bad here.

No chance to enjoy the hot weather much. Have to get new computer and transfer files.

Does blogging change you?

Petite anglaise asks the question: "Sometimes I wonder whether I am living my life, or whether this blog is living it for me". Sometimes I wonder about her too. Does having a blog change you, make you more introspective? Are virtual friends who comment regularly better than real friends who don't want to sit in front of a computer to talk to you? Or does it just give you a wider range of people to communicate with, if you are stuck somewhere inaccessible?

I started writing stuff during the breakup with a partner. It was a way of working out things in my head.

I once started reading a book about "how do I know what I think till I hear what I say". It was about how the brain works, and how language works. The implication was that the brain learns by listening to spoken messages, so to learn, you have to say things out loud so you can hear them again and then understand them. I found for me it was different. More like "how do I know what I think till I see what I write". That way I could reject a lot of what I thought I thought. On paper it seemed so ridiculous.

However, I'm not good at blogging what I feel. It needs days or even months of digestion before I can write about it. At least that's partly why I couldn't blog about going back to Kiev in February or Vilnius in June.

I started blogging because I wanted to improve my writing. It gives me a chance to write impromptu "essays", rather than work out personal feelings. However, even that is not working out well, as I just blog whatever comes into my head. Sometimes it's interesting and sometimes not. I guess it depends who reads it and who can relate to it.