Damn, I didn't even know I hadn't updated in so long - somebody should've told me. I'm starting to forget when things happened now, but this could be a big update.

Well, I don't remember anything of note of the week commencing 22nd Sep, but on the Friday we did what we often do and went to Mamamia, the pizza restaurant: good food at semi-reasonable prices (though one of us seemed to get forgotten by the staff with his pizza, and none of the useless staff seemed to care...) and they have beer too, which obviously helps. I didn't go overboard, however, as the following day...

...we went to O'Brien's Irish Bar for a student/teacher social event. We expected about 50 students but only around ten or so came, which was still a reasonable amount. We all had a good chat and a good laugh (I even tried their approximation of an 'Irish breakfast', which was pricey, not very Irish/English, but tasted okay) but there was something of an altercation between us and the owner, who objected to us standing near doorways, for some reason. Apparently this is normal behaviour for Ukrainians, so I'm not sure where he was coming from - he should be aware of this cultural quirk.

Nevertheless, after virtually every student bid us farewell, we (the teachers) went to The Drum, a somewhat popular ex-pat-type bar, which has live music occasionally, apparently. Despite the fact that I spend all of my time with English language natives, I don't appreciate ex-pats, and the fact that they seem intent on not integrating with their surroundings. I would very much like to hang out with Ukrainians all the time (and the few times that I've done just that have been very rewarding experiences thus far) but my Russian is at basement level. Until I can fix that, I will continue to hang out with other English speakers. But I digress: The Drum is a diminutive place. The beer is numerous and enjoyable, and the food takes too long and doesn't have a good taste/cost ratio, which could be said of many places.

After we'd finished up there and most of us went home, a hardcore few decided to follow the advice of [removed] (our near-fluent Ukrainian buddy) and go to a huge nightclub called Forsage. It was huge in more ways than one: the entrance fee was 90 UAH for men (less for women - a crime!) which is a lot even by London standards, let alone Kyiv. Mercifully the drinks were a litle more reasonable, not that I sampled many (we were all feeling the pinch as we drew closer to payday). The place was pretty much standard club fare, a bit more 'clubby' than Shooters (big fish, little fish, cardboard box and the like), but we had a good time, and eventually just got tired and went home.

Sunday has become my sleepy day, though frustratingly the internet stopped working that weekend, which was doubly frustrating as I'd just bought a headset to use with Skype. Still, it also explains why I've taken so long to update. All I did on Sunday was go shopping, watch the F1 (Felipe running off with his fuel hose was mightily amusing) and try desperately to get the net working again. It finally came on at 4am Sunday night. Grr.

Yesterday was a good day for several reasons: I got paid at last, so I can relax a little now; and it was Teachers' Day in Ukraine (Wikipedia tells me that World Teachers' Day is tomorrow, which may explain it, but Teachers' Days are common in many countries - though not the UK). Most of the women got flowers, though I just had to settle for a box of chocolates. I kinda felt left out with all the girls getting flowers... not that I actually wanted any, but that's not the point, really.

And so to today. I'm going for my first private lesson (which will be more a level check and social event than a lesson, but hey) and then a party for the [other school] at 3pm. Should be fun. I'll update again when I can be bothered.