My language revenge

Russian is not my strong point but sometimes English has its torture too.

When my Devushka and I were in London, I mentioned that we may go shopping at Selfridge’s. I did not notice the  confused look on her face. Later at my parents’, the subject again came around to shopping, and devushka said, why are we going to a shop that only sells fridges  to look for a dress ?

Today she asked me what a sandwich course was. He who laughs last laughs longest.

The Bitter taste of life

I am in the Rost supermarket where they have a juicing stand.

As I ponder the menu a woman pushes in front and orders a kiwi juice. I wait patiently.

I order an apple and carrot juice. There are no carrots available (this is a supermarket..). OK, I’ll have an apple juice then. It will taste horrible she says, as she just made a kiwi juice. Ok I say, then maybe clean it first? She looks at me in a strange manner. She says she cannot as she has no water.

I do wonder if I could make this stuff up sometimes.

Borispol to Kiev Station

As I’m always being asked..
There are 3 options;
1) Taxi ; a real pain, need to be able to negotiate with the touts, helps to speak russian or they will ask stupid mo ey. The fare should be about 150 griven ( a litle less if you can haggle well) or can be higher later at night, maybe 200. Best way to deal with this is try and find one or two other people on the plane or in the baggage hall to share with. Taxi is obviously the fastest, 40 mins or so.
2) The big bus. Runs every 30-45 minutes from outside the main terminal. (as you come out into the main terminal through the taxi touts bear right and take the right door outside and they are right there to the left off the ramp. (also an ATM near the airside exit if you need local money, though dollars will be accepted otherwise, about 8 gryven to one dollar). This bus is a large coach, cost 25 gryven a few months ago and goes to the station (voksal).
3) The little bus, marshootka. These leave when full and also leave from the same place as the big bus and also cost the same. Tend to be a bit faster but may make some stops. You’ll want to get off at the end.
4) The best alternative really is to fly ! Aerosvit costs $60 and is so much more comfortable (kind of) and not that much more. That’s to kharkov, not the station.

Yet another Kharkov expat blog

Kharkov attracts all the wrong sorts … http://kharkov.tumblr.com

Hence the revolution

I was explaining to my devushka what Royal Ascot was. In my perfect russian it went something like this…

“It’s a spectacle where horses race, the devushki wear big hats and it is watched by the cow”.

One syllable in russian makes such a difference. There goes my knighthood; i’ll stick to spying.

Well at least I am making progress on ordering water with gas; I am up to a 50% success rate, which goes higher when I just say Perrier.