I was quite shocked on my way home at the sight of a significant number of people covering their mouth and nose with scarves and masks. Swine flu has been declared an epidemic in Ukraine, because one person died. 220 miles away. PANIC!! Remember that this is a country that thinks standing next to an open window will harm you. From what I've read, masks do nothing to stop you getting flu, and may even be counter-productive because it gives wearers false confidence and panics everyone else. It's true: I felt genuinely ill just seeing them. I'm not worried about this whole situation, as the whole swine flu thing is nonsensical hyperbole. This happens every bloody year, why should this year be the year that 10 million die? Rant over.

Anyway, time for Lviv part two. I'm glad I've bothered to get up to this point, because I have my recent adventures in Kyiv to document, too. I thought I'd do a little thing about the political situation in Ukraine, too, given that the presidential elections are coming soon. Or, maybe I won't. Maybe nobody cares. Also, it looks like I'll have a super-fast trip to another country very soon, but more details about that when it happens.

So, onto Lviv. Our hotel was very nice for a reasonable price, and it included a straightforward breakfast of eggs and bread and stuff. So, with this start to our day, we set off on our journey around Lviv again. Unfortunately, the weather started bad - as it had been the previous night - and got worse as the day continued.

To make matters worse, as well as my girlfriend losing her phone the day before, she'd accidentally set her camera to take pictures on the highest quality setting - and by 'quality' I mean megapixels. The pictures look no better, but they take up three times more space. So, her card was full. And I think the battery was perhaps finished too. Whoops.



So, for most of these pictures, she took charge. Which is why there's a picture of a tree here, because she likes trees.










I think the reason she likes Lviv is because of the 'atmosphere' that the old buildings and such provide.










This illustrates quite clearly the inclement weather.








Mmm, lovely. We spent a while here, taking more pictures.








But they all look like this. Bleak.








Shame this door's out of focus. Let's step inside.











She wouldn't stop going into these old buildings with rickety staircases.







More rubble that constitutes the streets of Lviv.











Agh, scary dog!








This can't be normal...








Beret.











Kyiv doesn't look like this. Mostly.








Not very Soviet.








She liked this building so much...











...she took a closer look at the flowers.








Trams are quite common here, much more than Kyiv, mainly because they don't have a Metro system, I guess.










Monument time. This is a monument to the people who suffered during WW2: Ukrainians, Poles, and (cough) Jews. Notice how the Jew bit is all dark, wonder why... Nobody likes them, do they?






The main part of the monument. Cool.








And here's the detail mentioned before, but in English.








Somebody's having a wedding. Woo. After this, we journeyed north to look through the less glamorous side of Lviv, and sadly took no pictures (you ain't missing much, trust me). We circled around and ended up back in the centre and had coffee.





By this point the rain started to fall pretty badly, and walking around the city became less fun as our shoes slowly filled with water. This is Mr Ivan Franko.






And here he is up close. I didn't care about the rain: I had a brolly, and I wasn't gonna miss such a big, stylish Soviet monument.










This is just to illustrate the weather.








After this we went and sat in several cafés, which wasn't really what we wanted, but we couldn't think what to do in such nasty weather. Eventually I discovered that waxwork exhibit that I showed you in Zhytomyr (go back and find the pics). It's a travelling exhibit, you see. That cheered us up a bit, but the weekend kind of ended on a downer, as the weather stopped us really enjoying the city at its best.

I'm told Lviv is 'the London of Ukraine' because it always rains, so maybe we weren't unlucky, exactly. Nevertheless, I think that on the whole it was worth going, but perhaps having been to so many wonderful cities around Europe has made me hard to impress. I still love travelling, anyway.

So, that's all my travels up to now. Aside from my aforementioned upcoming foreign excursion, I just have my local stuff to clear out. I'll do that when I get round to it, which may be very soon. Hopefully I won't die from the lurgy before my next post.