The past month has been pretty interesting, though, because all the parties are campaigning like crazy. Huge banners have been attached to the sides of buildings and light posts, and small tents with flags have been popping up everywhere. The tents seem to be the major campaign vehicle here - they’re in the color of the party and people sit inside handing out small flags, pamphlets, etc. This past week has been especially interesting since tent villages have been taking over different parts of the city. Party of Regions has taken over Maidan with their blue tents and huge stage and BYUT (Bloc Yulia Timoshenko) has taken over the public square near our house. One morning last week, on a walk with Laika, I turned the corner and was startled by the sea of white tents with red hearts on the sides.

 

Yulia definitely wins in the marketing department, in my opinion. Not only does she have a better logo than the other blocs, her bloc has distributed tons of swag. And I have been thoroughly involved in the business of swag collecting this week. I’ve managed to gather small flags from 3 of the groups, but I hit the jackpot last week walking through the BYUT tents.

One of the reasons I hadn’t gotten much up to this point (other than what had been given to me by a friend in the Political section at the Embassy) is the fact that once I open my mouth, it is painfully clear to the people handing out swag that I am not Ukrainian, and therefore will not be voting. However, last week, I threw myself in with a group of Ukrainians, kept my mouth shut, and just grabbed as things were thrust into the crowd. Pretty clever, I know. And I don’t feel bad about it now that I’ve seen several babushky taking stuff by the bagful - which I assume I will soon see being sold on the street. Anyway, I scored a bandana, several bumper stickers, regular stickers, and, drumroll please…a pretty sweet t-shirt.

Due to popular demand, here’s a photo of the above mentioned t-shirt in all it’s glory. No, Yulia does not look like a cyborg in real life, but apparently she’s really into flowers. The back of the shirt says “Veer-yu” - it means “I believe” in Ukrainian and is a clever use of her initial (”yu” is one letter in Cyrillic). Very clever.

So that’s about as involved as I’m getting in Ukrainian politics. Shawn, on the other hand, is currently out in the field preparing to monitor the elections in his quest to spread democracy. It should be pretty interesting. There’s already a rumor that one of the parties is paying the equivalent of $10 a vote…not illegal, but also not really in the democratic spirit. Hopefully he gets to witness some other funny business during the 24 hours he has to stay awake and alert. I’m sure he’ll be excited to share his experience on his blog in the coming week.

(Postscript: It is 8pm on Saturday evening. I just came back from taking Laika on a walk and can hear the rally around the corner from our building. I have 5 words for you: brass band playing “La Bamba.” Excellent.)

For the sake of not grossing anyone out too much, I’ll just say that Laika had completely emptied her digestive system in various ways within an hour of waking. After several trips outside, her eyes were cloudy and she could hardly stand. We decided that an emergency trip to the vet was in order, despite the horror of having to drive through the streets of Kyiv during morning rush hour. The trip there was stressful, but Shawn did a great job driving and only had to lay on the horn and “bump” his way through one intersection. The three of us stumbled into the office, and using various internationally recognized hand gestures managed to explain our situation. (Why didn’t they cover puppy bodily functions in our Russian class?!)

The vet on duty whisked Laika into the back room and we helped hold her down as he tied her legs to a metal examining table and inserted an iv. We spent the next hour standing next to her as the vet gave her shot after shot and eventually had to use a clamp to pry her mouth open in order to get her to swallow some Barium. Then we were told to return at 5pm for an x-ray of her stomach. The main concern was that she had swallowed something that was causing an intestinal blockage, so the x-ray would hopefully show how far the Barium moved through her system during the day.

Shawn then headed off to work and I got to sit at home and worry for the next several hours. Laika received some quality petting, which rarely happens because of her normal refusal to sit still for longer than 30 seconds. This is how I knew she was really sick.

She had perked up a little by the time Shawn returned for work and we piled in the car for the trip through afternoon rush hour traffic back to the vet clinic. However, once we reached the door to the examining room, she remembered what had happened that morning and totally froze. It took Shawn, me, and the vet’s assistant to drag her into the room for the x-ray. Shawn and I had to hold her down on the table while the vet took the shot of her tummy (Shawn later stated, “So how many x-rays were we just exposed to?”), then we waited to see what would show up.

The result: Gas. A lot of gas. We could have told the vet she has a lot of gas. But I guess the good news is that there’s nothing seriously wrong with her. She probably just ate something that made her really sick. Any one of the million things she picks up off the ground each day could have caused it. On the plus side, we now have an x-ray of our dog’s stomach. And my left hand.