Last night Colette and I stayed out "late". We were hanging out at McDonald's, where all of the cool, beautiful people hang out. Really. The McDonald's on Pushkinskaya (Pushkin Street, named after the poet) is THE place to be at night if you're 20, size 0, wear pointy shoes, and blonde. I'm none of those things, but it's still fun to hang out there. They eat McFlurry's (McFlurries?), drink large Fantas, and smoke their Koccak cigarettes (which are a little less than 20 cents a pack) out on the patio. If it wasn't for the playground and the bright red "I'm Lovin' It!" umbrellas on the tables you'd swear that you were at a cafe in Paris (although it would smell better and everyone would be smoking Galouises instead - which, according to Wikipedia, have not been sold in the States since 2003 - take that you Freedom-Fry eating Americans!).



This morning we went out and got Cheboureki and strawberries at the market before getting on the metro. We gave an old woman some strawberries and a snack (quite possibly the only thing she'll eat all day) from the kiosk. There are so many older women here who are homeless (or if not homeless, living in extreme poverty). Most are single and have no families, their husbands/boyfriends killed in WWII or elsewhere, and have no children or other family to take are of them. It's heartbreaking to see them. They're not the people who we generally think of as being homeless (e.g., mentally ill, drug/alcohol abusters); these are the women who built the Soviet Union who have had their country and everything that they ever worked for taken away from them. They spent their lives working, enjoying a decent standard of living. Working in the USSR they were guaranteed a decent pension in their old age, but when the USSR fell that was gone. Their pensions are now around $30/mo. These women are everywhere, doing whatever they can to make a bit of money - selling flowers and vegetables from their gardens, standing on the street with a makeshift lemonade stand (a bottle of juice and cups) selling drinks to passersby.



Today we will go to the zoo and buy our tickets to Kiev (EDIT: We did not buy our bus tickets at the zoo.) - we only have a few more days left in Ukraine and will spend our last 2 in Kiev. And of course there will be more walking aimlessly around the city! :)