Christmas in Lviv

We took one last trip in 2011 – together this time – and spent Christmas #1 in the beautiful and historical western Ukraine city of Lviv.  

We were just in time for the awesome holiday market.

After much sampling from many vendors, we selected the best gluhwein stand, and became regular customers. 

We couldn't quite bring ourselves to try the hot spiced beer. There are even orange slices floating in there. Egads!

New to Lviv since our last visit is the Salo Museum/Art Cafe. 

Salo is pork fat, and it is a Ukrainian passion. The museum entrance fee also gets you a sampler plate in the cafe after your tour of the exhibitions. Lucky Igor, he got to have both his and mine. That's a lot of salo!

And a very happy Ukrainian.

All in all, a lovely Christmas in Lviv!

A Legal Alien in Ukraine

The two people who still read this blog (Hi Jayne and Marybeth!) will recall that I’ve been “officially illegal” in Ukraine since September – no visa, no work permit. Well, good news – as of yesterday, I am officially legal again! And not the old kind of temporarily legal, but permanently legal – I am now a permanent resident of Ukraine! (But always a Buckeye at heart!)

Happy Holidays!

Yes, we’re alive. This fall kicked our butts even more than last year, I think. Although we didn’t have the apartment renovation to deal in between our various work trips, our apartment seems to be on some Kyiv B&B list – some days the sheets barely had time to dry before the next guests arrived! We love having company, and are ever so grateful that our friends enjoy our apartment as much as we do – it was just a hectic fall!

But, the insanity is winding down, we’re both done traveling for the year (yeah, yeah, I know, there’s less than 2 weeks left in the year, but still).

We put up our Christmas/New Year’s tree the other night, and I took some pictures of our neat ornaments from all over. When I went to upload the photos to Flickr, I realized I have photos from way back in September that I hadn’t posted yet. Good grief! I’ll work my way through them soon, I hope.

In the meantime, Happy Holidays!

Our international Christmas/New Year’s Tree, with ornaments from Ukraine, Crimea (yes, part of Ukraine, but Crimean Tatars are unique ethnic group), Germany, Russia, Moldova, Mongolia, Nepal, the USA, Serbia, and Azerbaijan.

The newest ornament – picked it up last week in Baku