Ice Cream

Ice cream at the indoor-outdoor rooftop bar of the Kyiv Hyatt costs 28 Hryvny per scoop (at 7:1 HR:$). Stunning views. Tasty sorbet. European prices.

It is a far cry from that summer night in '92 when I decided that I craved vanilla ice cream on a stick (covered in chocolate.) Some crazy series of synapses fired off in my head and I decided that I would find that ice cream. Never mind that it was already dark (so it must have been after 9pm). Never mind that the supply lines that were cut in '91 were not up yet and everyone hoarded everything. The state-run monopoly was over, but a substitute was not exactly whirring along.

I dragged a few colleagues from work and convinced them that this can be done! We were setting up an alternative to state-run television! We can find ice cream!

It was fun and hilarious. We came up empty handed. No way to satisfy the ice cream craving that day. But then again, that was before the Hyatt.

After my mom and I joined the kids and cooled off in the rooftop breezes, we rode down to Kyiv Mohyla Academy and caught the tail end of Adam Michnik's speech. The event turned into an unplanned announcement to they Kyiv scene that Marta and Rostyk were back in town!