PART I – My Introduction to the Ukraine
My stay in Kiev was overall a very good experience, I got a chance to vacation with my future wife and see first hand what was to me a very different country. Of the many memorable events, we took a boat trip on the Dnieper River not far from where the Battle of the Uman Pocket took place 66 years ago in World War II. This was where Colonel-General Von Kleist’s Panzer Corps circumnavigated twenty five Soviet Divisions and forced them into a wall of German Infantry …
The river today, peaceful and lazy despite being adjacent to a major city, with only a few small crafts, outside of our party boat. It was early evening before sunset - the sun and humidity were mild, on board were younger couples drinking vodka and listening to low grade Russian alternative rock. I found their demeanor refreshingly less angry and better behaved than their American counter parts.
Later, some short visits to the Ukraine countryside were nothing short of spectacular, especially seeing the outdoor museum and meeting and talking to the local people – goats, warm winds over rolling green grass and lovely windmills and churches. We explored and hiked through these hills, came across overgrown hedghogs, farm houses and cottages .. Hansel and Grettle settings in spring conditions.
Part II – The local Officials and procedures in Kiev
Back to the city - a very bad experience and I do council all .. the police - the officials, the jackboots that you see avoid period. Don’t kid yourself, if they get a chance they will intimidate and threaten to arrest you, and as was done to my girl shove her around inside a rusty bus until you intervene - and it better be to throw money at them. They made some crazy claim that we didn’t pay the right amount to board the bus. Kiev is really poor – a society within a dead economy and getting worse and things get desperate. Although I get the impression the more serious crimes are pretty rare, experiences such as this are not easy for first timers who have a much higher degree of confidence in official members. After some adjustments and convincing my girl that a taxi fare was really quite reasonable, we were able to move around the city with some peace of mind.
My trip was about two years ago and at that time the requirement to have my passport stamped/validated was still a mandate. Getting this done was nothing short of jumping through fire loops. Visits to federal buildings, moving around between notorization services, banks waiting in lines etc. all within the Ukrainian bureaucracy. And much of the paperwork could only have been done by my girl who was incidentally, not happy to be involuntarily chosen to assist. All in all it took a full day and a half. I understand that the stamp is no longer required, but have been told that some of the officials still haven’t quite “understood” the new procedures yet.
Part III – The Girls
As for the girls in Kiev, they are extremely beautiful and in many cases simply stunning – you really have to see this to appreciate it. It’s the quantity too that is really astounding, the numbers throughout the bus stops, walkways and shops. And many of the gals will drop whatever they are doing to spend time with you. In the “college” sections of the city I found the young people to be completely open to any anything American in general. I had to continually remind myself that it’s the American Mystic and my American Money that beckons so much of this attention.
I look back on this time in Kiev very fondly. I left a silicon valley, pretty much at the height of the bubble, a madhouse internet technology arena where there seem to be nothing but phones, handhelds, pagers and projects. In Kiev, I found, a simple people, practically no technologies, and very very little materialism. This experience, at the time, made for a perfect vacation for me.
PART IV – The Visa Paperwork
After returning from Kiev the paperwork for my girl’s k-1 was efficiently pursued and completed ahead of schedule. I was able to reduce the timeframes by being especially accurate and using fax and email transmissions whenever possible. Six months later we were together in New York. Once here though, I was slightly shocked and disappointed with my fiancés immediate slack pickup between her third and first world trade up. We stayed in some fancy places in the Manhattan area - of course spent time in Little Italy - made our way up to Boston for the next few days in a pleasant mix of warm rain, sun, and scenery. Finally returning home to my small house on the west coast proved interesting.
PART V – Home
Once back I made all but 4 of the meals and not entirely by my choice. We ate all kinds of things that she had never even imagined, tried a lot of new recipes topped of with discussions of word translations made for the start of some good evenings. And many trips around the Northern California areas re-introduced me to some gorgeous scenery in my home area. As for most of us, marriage is a big decision and during the visa stay I was looking at some things within the relationship pretty closely, but still optimisticly to “happily ever after”. Despite all of the great experiences things were beginning to move steadily in the wrong direction - we wade in deeper ..
Part VI – Differences
Early on there were situations such as one at dinner out one evening, we met another girl from Russia who was our waiter. They spoke - all in English, when my girl was asked how she arrived here in the US she responded; “I decided to come here to visit and travel”. I wondered if she placed a higher priority in impressing the waitress in the restaurant than her fiancé.
My girlfriend learned quickly to complain about any food less than SF/NY four star quality. At a couple of social occasions out she drank way, way too much. Around the house I was able to control this as I was of course, in charge of the money and the purchases. But she did argue and disagree with me on this point. I wondered what it would be like once she attained greater freedom of action on income and spending and this issue came up.
Well into her stay, I made her an expresso which she could hardly believe, she just loved it. All of my meal leftovers and more, she ate the following day. She gained no less than 15 pounds in the first 3 months and denied any knowledge of it. And for some reason she seemed to be permanently dressed in one of my old teeshirts, the one with stains and paint crusted on it. I asked her why she didn’t wear some of her nice cloths, some really kool stuff and her response was short and uninformative.
And our relationship was changing too. Despite many upper class vacation like conditions, it was becoming increasingly difficult to avoid confrontation with her. This made me wonder if her relationships with those around her back home were by nature contentious. She avoided just about any kind of work, including taking any part time job where she could have earned some pretty good money and would have had the opportunity to meet other people, I took every opportunity to encourage this. Finally she managed to befriend the only neighbor that I had a poor relationship with, and did this despite my requests to her to please refrain from doing so. I found a mysterious overconfidence with many of these rude actions of hers.
Part VII - The Decision
But for me the number one crutch was really starting to become evident. We all speak of the lost trust of the American women and these things, many of them I do agree with particularly in the big city areas of the US. But it is hard to understand the huge communication and cultural difference between American and Slavic women, until you experience it - man it is vast. Despite the fact that my girl’s English was quite good – the words and meanings simply didn’t and don’t crossover accurately to English. And the emotional contact, the emotional communication that I was accustomed too with American women was simply not there – and I know that must have been the case for her too. These feelings - and trust me, this part of having a gorgeous women right there in my arms left me feeling very very empty. I became convinced that with the ending date of the K-1 closing in, hard decisions would soon need to be finalized and gently conveyed.
A short while later, my decision against marriage was disclosed and discussed openly with her. From that point on ... a heavy and difficult feeling permeated every minute between us, and even in those times we were apart. It was compounded by actions of hers to amend or ascend some of her actions and even her own personality. This made me feel terrible.
So there you may find yourself. In a position where three months tells you something you may not have wanted to consider. And you’re staring at the possibility of a difficult and long drive to the airport - All this after a long, hard and costly effort of over a year … ends where it all started.
It was a long ride on that return trip from the airport, out of SFO, on the way home, in the rain, single again, and back to my small home in the East Bay.
I hope that my experience helps, I wish the best for all of you in your searches and yes God bless and good luck to all of you..
I am in the process of writing up some conclusions and recommendations for any of you who may be interested, just let me know.
