I'm sure some of you may have been watching the news and seeing that Russia and Georgia are in the midst of war. Althought those countries are very close to here, Ukraine is still a safe country. They used to be a part of Russia but are now their own counry. We should not have to be concerned about what is happening in those neighbouring countries. We did sign up with the Canadian Governement so that they can inform us if we need to leave the country for some reason. Although I'm sure we will be fine. Nevertheless, please keep us in your prayers as we still have one more week here.

Today the Divisional Commander of The Salvation Army Ukraine arrived here in Dnepr. When we meet her we were very surprised by her fluent English speaking! It was like music to our ears! She is from Sweden but is serving here in Ukraine. She is a very lovely lady and we enjoyed lunch/dinner with her today. When we leave Dnepr., we will be leaving via Kiev and she has offered for us to stay with her for the night. She will give us a tour of Kiev. We are looking forward to this part of our journey.

Peter has created another list of lessons we have learned. He writes these to his family every second day, so I copy them to send to my family and to post here on my blog. Thanks to Peter for providing this to us for our entertainment purposes only!!

1. Restaurant names do not always indicate what type of cuisine the are selling. For example we recently ate at a restaurant known as The Pregnant House. I assure they do not serve whatever it is that has just popped into your head. Mostly traditional Ukrainian cuisine there.
2. Potato chip flavours are not always the same as in Canada. After seeing Lay's Crab Chips I think they should change their slogan to "I bet you can't eat even one!"
3. If you play foreign music on the streets when you are busking you can get away with playing just about anything. The other day a gentleman was playing a rousing rendition of Jingle Bells on some form of Ukrainian instrument.
4. The crosswalk signs here feature a picture of a person sprinting across the street. I figure this is because if you simply walk across the street you will get smoked by an oncoming vehicle!
5. Some (well at least one) Ukrainian women can all out yell at you and finish their ice cream cone at the same time. I am still not sure how she managed to do this or what she was yelling about!
6. Regardless of the size of your group it is more appropriate to walk side by side down the sidewalk then in a few smaller groups one behind the other. This gets very interesting when you have two fair sized groups walking towards each other.
7. When approached by a transit cop do not expect him to say anything to you. Rather he stands there with his badge out waiting for your stellar telepathic abilities to discern that he wishes to see your ticket. Also, don't expect him to be in any form of uniform.
8. If the tram stops well short of the station (at least a couple hundred metres) and the doors open and every single person suddenly gets off it is probably best to follow suit.
9. When you are invited to come over for Borscht for lunch expect to be served what would be considered in Canada to be a very large bowl (twice the size of a regular cereal bowl) of Borscht. However, do not expect the meal to be over because this is followed by a heaping dinner plate of veggies, rice, and chicken, This then is followed by cookies and tea! So go easy on the Borscht and remember to wear your turkey pants.
10. I have recently learned that Kwas can also be offered in a soup bowl with as many vegetables as you can name added to it. Keep in mind that Kwas is carbonated like root beer and flavoured like vegemite. I may have to look for an alternate dish if I am offered this tasty treat!

Just to add a comment about number 5 (the yelling lady)....this was actually quite interesting to watch....we were trying to enter our apartment and she was yelling at us and the security guard lady at the front door. Who knows what it was that she was trying to say to us....I guess we will never know. We haven't seen her since.

That's all for now....enjoy your weekend and keep in touch!