The Not So Miracle Train

Here's an update on our trip. Written from Uncle Will. Thought I would share like always. Pictures to come later.


Hello everyone. Sorry it's taken so long to get out our first email update about this adventure -- but, just so you know, it's nothing personal....it's just that nuthin' aint' convenient over here!!! And that's an understatement. We are now in a hotel in Kiev (Hotel RRRRRrrrrrus!) after making a brutal pioneer trek back and forth across two giant Eastern European-Post-Soviet-Block-Radiation-Drenched Countries, and finally we have reliable internet! We're a couple of hours south of Chernobyl -- don't worry, we haven't seen any two-headed pigs... well, just a one-headed pig with two bodies... and that was earlier today (at a museum). And now, we'll back up our story to the beginning -- Moscow... well, let's back up a bit further to the flight... Andrea says it was one of the worst top ten flights of her life (we're not sure exactly why, but that's saying something because we think she's flown about twice a day since 1970). The flight was just fine for the rest of us.



Moscow. What to say. It's just HUGE! EVERYTHING is HUGE! Red Square -- HUGE! Kremlin -- HUGE! Chandoliers at the supermarket -- HUGE!!! Apartment -- extra-tiny! Rat-tail and Mullet hairdos on every other person -- HUGE! I remember mullets being okay in 1968, but it's style that never should come back... Eli kept trying to point out mullets that he thought didn't look so bad and trying to get us to agree that, "hey, yeah, Eli -- when you get the States, that style wouild probably look real good on you" since he hasn't cut his hair once since January. We had about 36 hours in Moscow and did about 72 hours of stuff and it was great. Things we loved -- Eli's friends Kimberly and Acia, Red Square, St. Basil's, a bunch of other church's we can't remember the names of, the bread, the palace, the Vafly (sugar wafer cookies, but that's a real pale comparison). Things we found interesting -- the military setting up roadblocks everywhere for no apparent reason and when asked why, they say "just makin' sure...." Also, one night when we were trying to get into a restaurant to eat borsch, the head waiter ran up to us (another roadblock) and just yelled, "NO!!!!!" We're not exactly sure why... but, Megan almost cried. Before we knew it, we were cramming our 37 pieces of luggage into two of the four taxis we accidentally ordered and were doing it as fast as we could, so as not to create a HUGE scene when the second two taxis showed up. We got to the airport and checked in to our flight to L'viv and as we were going thru security, Andrea started yelling at Eli for some help with a translation... Eli ran over and discovered that Andrea was being accused of smuggling raw eggs and a specific kind of cold cuts in her checked luggage. It all seemed very normal at the time, because we're always freaked out on border crossings over here... (recall last year's Jordan/Israel border extravaganza). We didn't realize how odd it really was until we landed in L'viv several hours later and also realized that the security officer making the accusation climbed over 14 other security station agents to target Andrea and Andrea alone. And, as far as we know, she did not have eggs and cold cuts in her checked bags. We still keep asking ourselves -- "who would pack eggs and meat in their luggage???" Oh well... we move on...



The flight to L'viv was on an airplane that pretty much looked like a magic schoolbus -- a schoolbus with wings and propellers, circa 1938. It actually kind of looked like a whale that was trying to swim higher and higher, but just couldn't and it was soooo loud!!! Then, as Megan describes, our crash-landing where the belly dragged along the tarmac for three miles, sparks flew, eggs cracked (or did they? we'll never really know, but Andrea did have scrambled eggs for breakfast this morning).



Flashback to Moscow... Krishelle was being chased pursued by a "Bob" (aka Babushka = grandma...they run the country) in the metro, yelling at her in a different language and Krishelle just kept running and shrugging, but the lady wouldn't leave her alone. Finally, standing within the Metro car, staring out the dark window, the lady worked her way to Krishelle, grabbed her arm and yelled some more, which Eli interpretted as being, "Hey! Why are you ignoring me! Why won't you help an old woman!!!!!" To which Krishelle said, "Sorry" and shrugged... A lot of those kinds of encounters happen daily to each of us, everywhere.



So, in L'viv, we discovered that if you stand anywhere in the city for more than four minutes, a drunk man will approach you and explain in explicit detail everything he's ever learned or made up about the history of the city in no particular order and with no invitation. This of course already began when we got to our apartment and were standing outside waiting for someone to let us in and one man, making googly eyes at Stacee, found us in a dark alley and said a lot of words that we all thought sounded a lot like "prostitute" and asked Eli about this several times which he confirmed was not the case. This was preceeded by a staring contest with the creepiest man any of us has ever seen (we think he was straight from Transyvlania. . . that is just right down the road you know) who walked into the alley and glared at us with his beedy eyes for about 7 and a half minutes. This was the only 7 and a half minutes of the whole trip where Megan and Matthew weren't complaining loudly about cigarrette smoke, B.O., or Vodka (bless their innocent little hearts).



We walked a few marathons over a short period and bought every art and craft ever created within the L'viv district and still had time for the "Miracle Train." It seemed like a good idea at the time as we thought "Hey, that Disneyland looking 2 box-car contraption bouncing along the 700 year old cobble-stone road would probably be so much fun for the kids (and relaxin'! for the adults). 2 minutes later the man sitting next to Uncle Will and Megan (who we now think may have actually been an old wet horse blanket in human form) and the rest of the crew who hadn't showered since before the Cold War got to be a bit much within the ride which would have put your jerkiest roller-coaster to shame. Even with the bumps and the Ukrainian speaking intercom which was up loud enough that we were sure a couple of you could probably have heard from home, Matthew was "miraculously" able to nod off to sleep for the entire hour as the rest of us were planning our escape plans. In fact, every time the "Miracle Train" slowed enough to reasonably jump out without breaking too many bones, Megan had her right foot heavily dragging across the cobble-stone asking as sincerly as anything has ever been asked, "Now Uncle Will? Can we get out now?!" Between all the craziness going on around us, we somehow felt trapped, like we could never get off, even though the train circled the same city block 30 times, just a few feet from our apartment. So we sat in there and fermented for 1 hour and 7 minutes (we were falsly promised it would only be one hour).The only thing we hadn't seen yet on the tour that we really wanted to see was an old consentration camp and the tour seemed like it was going to be all worth it when the intercom mentioned it but then followed by saying in Ukrainian "that consentration camp is down the road that way" as the "Miracle Train" briskly turned the oposite direction and started blasting horrific pop Ukrainian music. After all that, there were a few encounters with some gypsies -- one, in particular, who made a whole lotta empty promises regarding our posterity.



L'viv was gorgeous!!! Amongst my top ten favorite cities in the world (and that's saying something, cuz we've been a lot of places). Lots of beautiful churches, but more than anything, the people were so nice and beautiful -- in complete contrast to the unique Russian experiences we had... We got to meet some of Eli's peeps from his mission and when we said goodbye to them at the train station last night, we were all bawling our eyes out for some reason -- it was a strange and extremely emotional connection we all made in the few hours we knew these Ukrainians. I don't know what words could describe that goodbyes we made -- like an old movie where long lost friends meet at a train station and then have to say goodbye again and the ones who stay there chase the train down the tracks, while the others are waving and wiping tears. The most amazing thing -- Eli's peeps sang several beautiful songs to us as our train departed. Krishelle was sobbing (makeup running), even me (stoic Uncle Will) was bawling... the end of that part... it was precious and we're grateful it happened... but, it was overwhelming, in a very spiritually good way.



So, that train we got on and felt so wonderfully emotionally enriched to be on.... well, within about three hours into our 11-hour journey, that spiritual high was long gone, as it was replaced by overwhelming stench of recycled air in a closed cabin. Hot, hot hot. All I can say -- if you ever come over here -- FLY from L'viv to Kiev... except you would NEVER want to miss the opportunity to see the landscape go by your windows... so, although it was painfully hot at times, the scenery more than compensated. The train seemed modern enough to have A/C in the sleeping compartments, so at about 3 a.m., when I had absolutely had enough of the McGyvering situation with Matthew and sheet hanging out the side of the train and trying to create a wind-tunnel in our sleeper car, I decided to try to reason it out with the train hostesses who didn't speak a word of English (or Spanish -- I tried that, too). So, I resulted to sign language for "it's hot in this car" and they looked at me, looked at each other, looked at the switches on the wall, looked at me again (I made some more hot-flash movements, afraid they didn't understand that I was really, really hot), looked at each other again, looked at the switches, pointed at the switches, spun one finger, picked a switch, flipped it, and sent me back to my cabin...where we continued to roast for the next five hours.



Now, we're in Kiev. It's beautiful. We've shopped, and we're going to bed now. More later.



We love you all. We're having a blast. Not sure how long we'll have good internet... but, we'll be home this weekend.