L'viv - September 2009, Part 2

When making plans to go to L'viv, Mel had asked Doug (the team leader in L'viv) how to get from the train station to the flat we were staying at. Doug told us how to find the taxi stand, and that was great.

We arrived in L'viv a little after noon on Monday. We'd gathered up all our stuff and were out the door of our coupe' and off the train fairly quick. We walked down a set of stairs, into a passageway under other train tracks, and voila! We were already out into the entrance area of the train station.

Now why - tell me WHY - does the Kiev train station make you go up AND down stairs (or vice versa - down AND up stairs) to get to your correct train? The system in L'viv is wonderful - one set of stairs, period, up or down, not both. All these thousands and thousands of people getting on and off trains with bags and more bags and boxes and other stuff. Old ladies carrying heavy things up and/or down stairs just to get to the train where you have to climb up very steep steps to get on to the train. Why not just make it simpler? Like platforms at train level? And if there must be stairs - just ONE set, and not two that have to be negotiated?

Or, to continue this rant I find myself on - why schedule two trains to arrive at one station at the same time, from opposite directions, on two different tracks with a platform inbetween that train A unloads on to, while train B unloads on to the platform directly in front of the train station. Thus train A people must climb down out of train A with all of their baggage, walk down the platform until they find the correct wagon on train B that has opened it's doors and put out it's steps so you can now climb up off the platform onto train B, walk across train B to the other door (yes, I know it's just 4 or 5 steps, but that is NOT the point here!) and then climb down, with all of your heavy luggage and stuff once more, so you can go find a taxi or your driver or your person who is waiting to welcome you? Why do they make you walk THROUGH a second train? Tell me why they do this?? And yes, the train from L'viv was train A and the train from Kiev was train B this morning and we did the mountain goat/Ukrainian train trek down and up and down again with all of our stuff, along with a couple hundred or more other people today. Of course, it's funny - all these people getting off of one train, out of maybe 8 or 10 wagons (maybe more, I didn't count), all funneled into one doorway on the train opposite. Up and over, up and over - and old babushka - if you push me one more time or try and cut inbetween Mel and me one more time - I may just step on your foot. I've already had it with the young woman who came and stood so close to me that she actually set her heavy purse/bag on top of my purse so I could bear the weight of both. I just "accidently" bumped her aside with my very ample hip. The nerve some people have! I think I'm developing a national attitude - one I deplored when we first got here. Shove, push, shove, you are in my way, get out of my way. sigh

You know, when I thought about writing this post, I in no way had a rant in mind. Hmmm. Guess it was in there, just waiting to come out. I like riding the trains - I just get tired of the stupidness and rudeness at times.

Enough! Enough! On to other things!! Please! That was then - this is now!

We walked out of the wonderful makes sense L'viv train station, turned right and walked over to the taxi stand. Just as the people in front of us finished their discussion about where and how much a taxi would be for them, Mel's cell rang, so we stepped back and he answered it. It was Doug saying he was on his way to pick us up. Yea!

Doug took us to the building we stayed in before. He had reserved a room for us on the 4th floor. Now the first time we stayed there we stayed on the 2nd floor and really liked the flat. It was very Ukrainian, only slightly modernized, and that was fine with us. We don't need a lot - just a bed that will hold us both, a table, something to heat water with, a couple chairs. That flat had even more, just older stuff. The flat this time was on the 4th floor, as I already stated. Now, our flat here in Kherson is on the 3rd floor - 42 steps up from the outside level. The 4th floor flat there in L'viv (just one floor higher) was 88 steps up from the outside level. Come to think of it, this may be the beginning of my rant about the train station - we did a LOT of stair climbing, walking UP hills and down hills, and more stairs this week! :-) I was very pleasantly surprised to find that if I hadn't been out walking all over L'viv, I could do those 88 stairs without stopping. However, at the end of the day, when my legs were tired, my feet hurt and I was in desperate need of a certain room in that flat - well, I had to stop each time and take a few breaths on the 3rd floor.

The room was wonderful! Moderized, light and airy, very nice. The chairs were so-so and the table was so-so, but the bed was great. I didn't take a photo of the bedroom because I didn't think to take one until just as we were leaving - and the bed was unmade. Excuses, excuses! Here is the view out the window in the bedroom, though: I'll write more about this photo in another blog. For now, let me just say - this was wonderful. It was very relaxing. We set up our laptops on the table in the evening and did email and facebook stuff. We sat and talked. We did NOT watch tv. I watched fireworks one night over the building opposite from us. But really, we didn't spend very much time there, except for sleeping. There is a lot of traffic on the streets in the immediate area, but the windows are new YevroSteel (EuroStyle) and we only heard the loud music and the chanting of the priests a couple of times for about half an hour each. Not bad. Not bad at all.

All for tonight. I have more photos to post tomorrow, but right now I've hit a wall - what with climbing all those stairs, and going through the Kiev train today on my way home, and so forth and so on, and all the excitement of having guppy babies in the house, and catching up on the news. Whew! And tomorrow - laundry, and cooking, and changing the sheets, and getting ready for Sunday. Such an exhausting life! ha ha! Maybe tomorrow I won't be in such a "mood" as I've been in today. This is unusual for me...will have to ponder awhile and figure out what why....