So it’s been a while, I just realized. I guess not much has been happening…the usual day to day stuff. We did celebrate our one year anniversary in Kyiv last weekend. Well, not so much celebrate as look at each other over the dog sleeping on the couch between us and say, “Well, we’ve survived a year.” Then turned back to watch Bear on Man vs. Wild eat a scorpion. We’re not ones for fanfare.
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Today is Laika’s first birthday. There have been many, many times when I wondered if we’d make it this far. There have been threats of leaving her out on the street or returning her to the pet market; there have been near-misses by Ukrainian drivers (which typically means it was a near-miss for me as well); and there was the terrible day that she made a break for it so that the entire neighborhood could see her crazy American owner running around the park screaming for her for over half an hour.
Breaking news - Kyiv, Ukraine. Coffee lovers in the capitol city were stunned earlier this month as local chain “Coffee House” announced that they would begin allowing customers to take their coffee with them, rather than drinking it in the cafe. Coffee ordered “to go” will be placed in a small paper cup with a plastic lid so that customers can conveniently carry it with them to work or, more likely, a park bench. The introduction of the lid feature will allow Ukrainians to have their coffee while smoking and talking on their cell phone without the fear of spills, which has long been a problem with MacCoffee from kiosks (previously the only coffee available in this “to go” style). Local expats are thrilled that they will no longer be required to struggle with drinking hot beverages at “Coffee House” through a straw from an awkward glass without a handle.
So I was kind of surprised that I didn’t get any questions about why all the protests and demonstrations yesterday. Perhaps you’re all smarter than I give you credit for. Or perhaps no one besides my mother even read my entry and she already knew the reason. (By the way, if you want to see some video of one of the protests in front of the Embassy, CNN has a video here.) Anyway, the reason was this: