Loose Ends

So - I sort of dropped out during the last week and half or so of the trip. This last entry to the Eastern European blog will be an exercise in piecing together the events of those past few days and summing up the trip. The last entry finished up with Chris and I about to leave Kiev. After saying good bye to Lana and Zoia at the station we climbed aboard a night train bound for Uzhorod - the town bordering with Hungary and Slovakia. Having learned the importance of being well-prepared Chris and I stocked up on healthy train snacks like pig lard and potato chips as well as a good supply of beer. I expected I'd be pretty popular with that 3 litre plastic bottle of Ukrainian suds at my side but Andre, our Russian compartment companion, outdid me with his bottle of cognac and bucket of fried chicken. Naturally, the drinking session began only a few moments after the train left the station. Andre called his best friend in from another cabin and the four of us began to down the cognac and carry on general hand-sign-grunt type conversation. The cognac came and went and we quickly started on the beer. My 3 litres quickly disappeared and Andre surprised the whole gang with a large bottle for each of us and quickly bought a second round from the bar. It was already apparent that I wouldn't be going to bed comfortably and early that night. In the bar car Chris insisted once again that we were morally obliged to buy our cohorts booze and I had to spring for another bottle of cognac (which Chris still owes me for). Aside from a flash memory of looking out the window and screaming some nonsense my last memory of the evening was standing between the train cars as Chris and the Russians lit up a joint. Trying to recollect this night makes it clear to me that I've got a touchy relationship with alcohol and need to take it much easier in future. I had blacked out and the next memory I have of that nighttrain was waking up at 6 in the morning with a busted lip and covered in my own vomit and also our compartment itself being covered in my vomit. What a humiliating and terrible situation. After being yelled at by the car manager, having to clean up the vomit and also having to pay a bribe to get myself out of the threat of being arrested (I wasn't going to question the legitimacy of such an action) I fell back asleep for a period. Andre, who I susupect was probably the one who tucked me in with a knuckle sandwich, asked me every few minutes or so, "Alive?" and I would respond "Little" before pinching my fingertips together. These last couple of hours of the train ride were terribly awkward. After our drunkenness, rambunctiousness and my vomiting our compartment companion, a middle-aged babushka, was moved to another compartment but not before I was told-off again by the car manager. Andre was the next to leave and he was off to a business meeting (vomit stains fresh on his pantleg were a fair trade-off for my busted lip I thought). Chris and I were left alone in the compartment with another hour and half to our destination. We locked the door and hoped that there would be no more trouble. We were truly ready to leave Ukraine at this point and Chris spoke of making a run for any border at the earliest possibility. The threat of "police-militia" was still ringing in our ears and I said my goodbyes to Chris and disembarked at Chop, because it was supposedly the best place to head to Hungary as it was right on the border. I admired the socialist realist murals in the train station before walking, hungover and dirty, to the bus station, only to find that no busses crossed into Hungary from there. At this point I boarded a bus for my original destination, Uzhorod. At the bus station in Uzhorod I had discovered that I would have to wait until the next morning before catching a bus to Hungary so I went to a hotel and freshened up before heading out to see the town.

After a night of severe drinking, violence and vomiting it was nice to check into the Hotel Baltika and have a shower in my very own hotel room. Although Uzhorod didn't offer much in the way of excitement or sights it was a worthwhile place to spend my last day in Ukraine. I walked around the typically cute streets of the old town past old abandoned buildings and eventually found my way to the castle. Like everywhere else in Ukraine the neglect of decades was present here as well. Cobblestone paths andd streets were overgrown. The castle itself housed various ancient museum exhibits on the evolution of man, the history of the surrounding region and an extensive exhibition of stuffed animals and fish and lizards soaking in formaldehyde. After making my way out of there and quickly surveying a mock village of traditional Ukrainian houses and churches I made my way back to town. There, were crowds of people hanging out enjoying the weather. I took a bench overlooking the river and watched a group of Gypsy kids run back and forth from the river to the square above and scrounge for cigarettes and change. They'd all run back to the river and smoke their butts (some of them couldn't have been more than 5 or 6) and fight with each other.

At one point I decided to investigate an odd Moorish building on one side of the square. Although beautiful the building was in a state of disrepair and surrounded by fences on all sides so passerbys wouldn't be subject to the falling masonry and bricks that were falling from above. Inside I encountered two old ladies who urged me to go upstairs where a concert was going on. I made my up to the concert hall above and sat down to take in the show. It's interesting that in this part of the world a brass band can fill a concert hall on a hot Wednesday afternoon with no problems at all; the hall was full of enthusiastic music lovers. I quickly realized that the band's repertoire was composed mostly of tv show theme songs and sappy show songs from the 60's and 70's. I can't recall the exact program but "My Way" and the theme from Dallas were certainly in there. The height of the show for myself was the rousing version of Tequila they played and at the end the whole band shouted in unison "TEQUILA!" before exchanging knowing smiles (I can only imagine the weeks of preparation required to realize this glorious moment). That shout of "TEQUILA!" I took as my cue to leave.

I walked out on to the square outside and wandered around town before making my way back to the hotel. I had to catch the bus to Hungary at 5:30 the next morning and planned on taking no chances of missing it.

At the bus station the next morning I struck up a conversation with a guy who had spent time living in Toronto. He was from the Czech republic but had gone to Canada as a refugee and after eight years of living there was refused landed immigrant status. It was odd to be standing at a bus station in some grimy little town in Ukraine listening to someone tell me how he had invested eight years of life into my country and in the end was sent back to his own; Canada seemed so remote, not much more than a concept, that I felt as if I couldn't have counted on it as refuge . He also volunteered the fact that he was illiterate, something he may not have been proud of but seemed to think was important enough to share with me. Seeing as my bus was about to depart I wished the Czech well and climbed aboard to join the ranks of gypsys and marketeers going to sell their goods in Hungary (I forget the name of the town exactly). The atmosphere was jovial and people passed around snacks and shared their thermoses of coffee. The gypsys seemed to be pre-occupied with preparing themselves for Hungarian customs; whisky bottles and cigarette packages were creatively stowed so as to go unnoticed during inspection. One guy took several minutes to pad his shoes with wads of cash and this obviously held the attention of all of those around. As Hungary is part of the EU inspections at the border were an incredibly long affair and we were not long idle after leaving Uzhorod; only a few minutes after leaving town we were parked on a bridge between Hungary and Ukraine. The gypsy men and myself jumped off the bus to have a smoke and watch the river below and at 6 in the morning it was beautiful and fresh outside. I was looking at my travel guide when one of the gypsys asked to look at it and I watched as 3 of them studied it intently; they couldn't read English but struggled to make sense of the words and they obsessed over the maps and pointed out the places they knew. I don't think I've ever seen anyone taken so much by the very act of holding a book and turning its pages - let alone one that they could not read; their enthusiasm was a treat in itself. As we finally approached the customs and immigration checkpoint on the opposite bank of the river one Hungarian Ukrainian guy on the bus grabbed my arm and motioned for me to grab my bags and follow him. It seems he had secured a ride with two guys that were going through customs in a van - apparently the public buses were subject to a great deal of scrutiny and took a long time to get through customs and this guy thought I shouldn't have to experience the longer wait. In any case I made the rest of the trip to Budapest with the Hungarian-Ukrainian, driver Dmitri from Israel and his business partner Andre. They fed me lunch along the way and the best part was I arrived in Budapest hours early and didn't have to pay for the ride.

From here there's not much to tell. Arriving in Budapest almost felt like arriving at an airport. I was tired and simply wanted to get home but I had 4 days to go. My enthusiasm for travelling was pretty much exhausted but over the next few days I took in the Hungarian National Opera (the best possible way to spend 4 dollars that I know of), the Terror Museum and explored the caves under Budapest Castle. I occupied my Saturday by going to Lake Balaton and cooling off at the beach. Other than that I was too tired and it was too hot in Budapest to party or drink. World Cup football matches occupied my evenings and I had one memorable conversation with a French guy (on his way to do volunteer work in Syria) who absolutely insisted that the United States was as bad as the Soviet Union in terms of being a police state and abusing human rights. I didn't pay to much heed to his words - the French are simply contrary and after experiencing the remnants of Soviet style arbitrariness in Moldova and Ukraine I couldn't take him too seriously. Other than that I visited the famous baths again and enjoyed eating and drinking to my gluttonous heart's content... ...... I KNEW IT WAS TIME TO GET BACK TO MY BEAUTIFUL AND WONDERFUL GIRLFRIEND, JESSICA.

It's been couple of months since I've arrived home but that's about as good as I can sum it up. Hope you found the blog interesting.