Day trip! Day trip! This is going to be a picture-heavy post, which I'm sure you'll be glad to hear. Me and a few friends went to the town of Zhytomyr, a little over 100km west of Kyiv. It's very easy to get to, as a 30 UAH marshrutka from the aptly-named Zhytomyrska Metro station will take you right there. We arrived at the main bus station (Avtovoksal), which was a little under 3 kilometres from the main town square. So, after a bite to eat at a rather pleasant cafe opposite the Avtovoksal, we hopped on a bus to the town centre (75 kopeks, sure beats walking). As we stepped off we checked out a 19th-century church called, funnily enough, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. Hmm.
And here is the main town square: Soborniy Maidan. There are a number of squares in Zhytomyr of which this is the biggest and most central. From the sky you can see that there are markings all over it for cars to drive through. From the ground it looks very confusing.
A brisk walk to the next square, Maidan Peremohy (Victory Square, similar to the one in Kyiv - in name anyway). This has the rather bizarre sight of a tank on a pedestal, as seen here. The Hotel Zhytomyr can be seen in the background: it seems as though every Soviet town had a hotel in the main town square, Kyiv included.
This is the second church we had a look at: Spaso-Preobrazhenskiy Kafedralniy Sobor (that's what my map says, but buggered if I know what it means). I was moaned at inside for not removing my hat: I was aware that women had to cover their hair in Orthodox churches (and the Lavra), but didn't know men had to uncover theirs. Seems a little odd to me.
We stopped on our way back towards town to snap this interesting monument (anything with a hammer and sickle catches my eye). I think it's a Soviet award to the town for cultural buildings and the like. Something like that.
After taking a short cut through some classy-looking blocks of flats (note: sarcasm, Soviet blocks of flats are anything but classy), we walked past the park along Kafedralna Road (Google Earth pictures by people suggest it's beautiful in the Summer; right now, it looks depressing) and came across yet another church, this time the Khresto-Vozdvyzhenska Tserkva, which is actually not quite a church anymore, as the sign advertising an exhibit of waxworks of myths and legends suggested. Intrigued, we walked in.
And what wonders we found! Easily the highlight of the trip, it was a travelling exhibit from St Petersburg, so everything was in Russian. It's one thing going to Madame Tussauds to see a lifelike waxwork of Kylie Minogue or whatever, but quite another to see Greek gods brought to life in wax. Like this fella.
If that wasn't enough, there were several real historical figures, such as Cleopatra here (the cyclops with the fan actually waved it up and down too!!). Other famous real life people included Napoleon Bonaparte, er... David Copperfield (he's famous in Ukraine) and, um, Lolo Ferrari (famous for having the largest artificial boobs in the world). I'm not making this up. Sadly (for Pete) I didn't get a picture of Lolo.
Here's an Aztec chief making a sacrifice to the gods.
And here's the poor schmuck whose heart was required for said sacrifice. Nice.
Apollo and Aphrodite, I believe. There was an unusual amount of naked women in this exhibit.
And here's another naked woman, shaped like a tree. No idea who it is, though, or who the berk with the beard is.
Hercules! The man, the myth, the lion-skin-wearing legend, beating off a hydra (as it were). Some bird seems to be helping.
After a jolly good time admiring those waxworks, we ventured down by the river, and I caught a nice snap overlooking the valley. Not much to see, in truth, but a nice viewpoint nevertheless.
In the awful-looking park, there was the city-founding stone of Zhytomyr (from a distance, I said "let's go look at the egg!". You can see why). It's a nice enough monument, but I didn't hang around as there were some very dodgy-looking guys loitering there.
And were back to the main square again, with our old pal Lenin. It seems that there are so many Lenin statues around Ukraine, but lack of funds sees their removal unlikely. After this, we stopped for lunch at an American-themed cafe, eating chili con carne, which was surprisingly good.
Here we have a town hero: Serhiy Pavlovych Korolov, the "head Soviet rocket engineer and designer during the Space Race between the United States and the Soviet Union in the 1950s and 1960s" (thanks, Wikipedia). He was the main reason the Soviets did pretty well with their space program. This is in Maidan Rad, as we walked towards, funnily enough, the Cosmonaut Museum.
You know Pushkin, right? Well, this is his bust, at the head of the rather nice-looking Stariy Vulvar (Old Boulevard, I think).
I should've taken a picture of the impressive rockets outside the Cosmonaut Museum, but I limited myself to an amusing translation of the Ukrainian text. Oh my God! They connected their com-puter to INTERNET! But I digress. They also showed us an American documentary about the space programs in 3D, with glasses. Not very good 3D, I must say, but at least they're trying. There were lots of physical things to see too, like space capsules and cosmonaut food. I should've been more camera-happy but never mind. After this we walked back to the bus station, though a busy market, and ate again at that lovely little cafe. All in all, it was a nice day out, but Zhytomyr doesn't look too good right now. In summer I'm sure it's lovely, but now it's dark, gloomy and horrible. Shame. Still, nice to get away from the bright lights and big city of Kyiv for once.
And here is the main town square: Soborniy Maidan. There are a number of squares in Zhytomyr of which this is the biggest and most central. From the sky you can see that there are markings all over it for cars to drive through. From the ground it looks very confusing.
A brisk walk to the next square, Maidan Peremohy (Victory Square, similar to the one in Kyiv - in name anyway). This has the rather bizarre sight of a tank on a pedestal, as seen here. The Hotel Zhytomyr can be seen in the background: it seems as though every Soviet town had a hotel in the main town square, Kyiv included.
This is the second church we had a look at: Spaso-Preobrazhenskiy Kafedralniy Sobor (that's what my map says, but buggered if I know what it means). I was moaned at inside for not removing my hat: I was aware that women had to cover their hair in Orthodox churches (and the Lavra), but didn't know men had to uncover theirs. Seems a little odd to me.
We stopped on our way back towards town to snap this interesting monument (anything with a hammer and sickle catches my eye). I think it's a Soviet award to the town for cultural buildings and the like. Something like that.
After taking a short cut through some classy-looking blocks of flats (note: sarcasm, Soviet blocks of flats are anything but classy), we walked past the park along Kafedralna Road (Google Earth pictures by people suggest it's beautiful in the Summer; right now, it looks depressing) and came across yet another church, this time the Khresto-Vozdvyzhenska Tserkva, which is actually not quite a church anymore, as the sign advertising an exhibit of waxworks of myths and legends suggested. Intrigued, we walked in.
And what wonders we found! Easily the highlight of the trip, it was a travelling exhibit from St Petersburg, so everything was in Russian. It's one thing going to Madame Tussauds to see a lifelike waxwork of Kylie Minogue or whatever, but quite another to see Greek gods brought to life in wax. Like this fella.
If that wasn't enough, there were several real historical figures, such as Cleopatra here (the cyclops with the fan actually waved it up and down too!!). Other famous real life people included Napoleon Bonaparte, er... David Copperfield (he's famous in Ukraine) and, um, Lolo Ferrari (famous for having the largest artificial boobs in the world). I'm not making this up. Sadly (for Pete) I didn't get a picture of Lolo.
Here's an Aztec chief making a sacrifice to the gods.
And here's the poor schmuck whose heart was required for said sacrifice. Nice.
Apollo and Aphrodite, I believe. There was an unusual amount of naked women in this exhibit.
And here's another naked woman, shaped like a tree. No idea who it is, though, or who the berk with the beard is.
Hercules! The man, the myth, the lion-skin-wearing legend, beating off a hydra (as it were). Some bird seems to be helping.
After a jolly good time admiring those waxworks, we ventured down by the river, and I caught a nice snap overlooking the valley. Not much to see, in truth, but a nice viewpoint nevertheless.
In the awful-looking park, there was the city-founding stone of Zhytomyr (from a distance, I said "let's go look at the egg!". You can see why). It's a nice enough monument, but I didn't hang around as there were some very dodgy-looking guys loitering there.
And were back to the main square again, with our old pal Lenin. It seems that there are so many Lenin statues around Ukraine, but lack of funds sees their removal unlikely. After this, we stopped for lunch at an American-themed cafe, eating chili con carne, which was surprisingly good.
Here we have a town hero: Serhiy Pavlovych Korolov, the "head Soviet rocket engineer and designer during the Space Race between the United States and the Soviet Union in the 1950s and 1960s" (thanks, Wikipedia). He was the main reason the Soviets did pretty well with their space program. This is in Maidan Rad, as we walked towards, funnily enough, the Cosmonaut Museum.
You know Pushkin, right? Well, this is his bust, at the head of the rather nice-looking Stariy Vulvar (Old Boulevard, I think).
I should've taken a picture of the impressive rockets outside the Cosmonaut Museum, but I limited myself to an amusing translation of the Ukrainian text. Oh my God! They connected their com-puter to INTERNET! But I digress. They also showed us an American documentary about the space programs in 3D, with glasses. Not very good 3D, I must say, but at least they're trying. There were lots of physical things to see too, like space capsules and cosmonaut food. I should've been more camera-happy but never mind. After this we walked back to the bus station, though a busy market, and ate again at that lovely little cafe. All in all, it was a nice day out, but Zhytomyr doesn't look too good right now. In summer I'm sure it's lovely, but now it's dark, gloomy and horrible. Shame. Still, nice to get away from the bright lights and big city of Kyiv for once.
1 comment:
A few waxwork lasses with their waps out, and you're like David Bailey. Good stuff that won't appear in the west, like say, the Soviet Space programme and nadda!
Oh well.
The tank is a T-34/85, a fairly common decoration to the Great Patriotic War in ex-Soviet block.
You do know Lolo died a good few years ago now, don't you?
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