A Glimpse of Kiev

Wow! It's so nice to have all those comments! I don't have much time, but I wanted to write a little something before we go to Rz. for the day/night/tomorrow. I'm really excited to meet the Crowe's friends there, but suddenly I've become nervous because I guess I have these unexpected expectations. Hm. I just want my expectations to be on the Lord. Been thinking on Prov. 10:28.

I've been up since 2:30, and a gross thing happened to me. I chewed up a plastic capsule on accident! On my way here, I stuck a few of the capsules I was taking in a plastic bag with the sesame sticks I was carrying on for a snack.

So last night, when I woke up, I was starving to death because the time at home would've been about an hour after supper. I remembered my snack, so I got up in the dark, found the bag, and dropped a good handful of sesame sticks into my mouth. I chewed and crunched, and then bit down on something pretty hard, sort of plasticky, and extremely nasty tasting!!! It was a raspberry capsule, and it did NOT taste good.

So I spit it out and went on eating a few more handfuls. Then I went back to bed. I tried really hard to be good and go back to sleep, but I just couldn't. And I got hungry again. So, I got out the bag again, grabbed another handful of sesame sticks, and guess what...did it again! Talk about disgusting.

Moral to this story: Never eat snacks in the dark. Better yet, never travel to a foreign country where you'll have such bad jetlag that you wake up in the middle of the night wanting to eat supper because it's supper time where you came from.

No, actually, it's all worth it. Rasberry capsules and all. Last night the Crowes took me downtown to see Kiev. On weekends they close some of the streets around the square so that people can just walk around. It's like we have festivals downtown at home, only here, every summer weekend is a festival because they have to enjoy the weather while they have it! There were hundreds of people milling about, venders selling sun glasses and cheap toys, and young guys dressed like the 80's break dancing. King's Kids would have drooled :) I don't know if break dancing is really my style...it makes me a little uncomfortable, but at the same time, it's pretty fascinating. The Crowe kids loved seeing it.

So here was my favorite part, the fountain. (Finally, some pictures.) They all just wade around in the fountains, which is probably not sanitary, but is a whole lot of fun nontheless!(Brent, me, Bron, Tucker, Broderic)

And here is one of the magnificent statues we saw. They're warrior guardians of some sort. On the high hill near the bridge where we crossed the river, there was a similar statue standing tall sort of like the Statue of Liberty, only it was a guy, and he had wings, and he carried a sword and what looked like a candle. It made me want to cry; it was so majestic and powerful looking, and yet, it was a gentle power. It reminded me very much of our God who is a mighty refuge, who keeps us in the shadow of His wings. I don't have a picture of that one yet, but here's a smaller one...
And here is a flower garden near the fountain...
I takes my breath...God is so beautiful. And then, here is a picture of the people "milling about the square." They were just walking, talking, wading in the fountain, some of them drinking and just hanging out. The air was around 70 degrees at that time, and it felt awesome. Don't get too jealous...in a few months I'll be moaning about frostbite!
After that we had pizza at a nice pizza place called "Cili's" and went home.

Ok, I really do have to go now. I can hear little people playing legos in the other room and I need to figure out what to take with me to Rz. It's so hard to find my things because they are so randomly buried in several different suitcases. I packed everything really tightly, and nothing broke or exploded, but it is definitely a mess now!