Summer wrap-up

In Kyiv, September 1st is the first day of school. This morning the sidewalks were packed with parents walking their children to school. It was easy to see which kids were headed to class for two reasons. First, kids here dress to the nines on the first (and last) day of school. All the girls were in their best dresses with fluffy white bows in their hair approximately equivalent to the size of their heads. And the boys were all wearing suits – I even spotted a couple little boys dressed in tuxedos. Very classy. Second, it’s traditional here to take flowers to your teacher on the first day of class. From small bouquets of 5 roses to huge flower arrangements (again, approximately equivalent to the size of their little heads) – I can only assume that most classrooms look like funeral parlors on September 1st.

The weather changed dramatically here over the weekend, as a reminder that summer is officially over. Which means we’ve made it through summer number two here! Unfortunately, it only reminds me that we still have to make it through winter number two…

We took Laika out to the parking lot behind our building yesterday to play frisbee. Apparently she finds the crisp autumn air rejuvenating.

And I’m a little behind in discussing it, but August 24th was Ukrainian Independence Day. The President decided to stage a huge military parade in downtown Kyiv in part to display Ukrainian military might to Russia. A little warning, if you will, in case they decide to move in here next. So after a week of traffic jams in downtown Kyiv while 90 or so tanks practiced driving in formation and hearing military jets practicing fly-bys above our apartment, we decided that we needed to see this parade for ourselves. Unfortunately, most of Ukraine also showed up, so we didn’t have a very good view of the Ukrainian military prowess. Here are a few photos, though. Most of them are hazy because as soon as the first tanks started rolling through, the air was immediately filled with diesel fumes. Lovely.