Pre-K

Дитячий Навчальний Заклад номер 171
Маркіянчик Хомічак and his mother invited us to his closing program at the end of his pre-K school year. The nursery is on the main street of Kyiv, Хрещатик. It is right next to the movie theater called Дружба. If you've been to Kyiv, then you've gone past it. The school itself runs a Ukrainian-language program (as most schools are now required to have). Twenty years ago, however a nursery school that ran the program in Ukrainian was the exception, not the rule. The teaching materials are still catching up. The teaching corps is still catching up. When my mom and I walked in, the staff clued in quickly that we weren't from around these parts. I did notice, however, that they did not make a big fuss about it. Having foreigners in the room was no longer as exotic as it was in 1989 when I'd regularly be put up on a stage in front of hundreds of people just because I was (the only American and) in the room.

At the number 171 Nursery School on that Friday morning on May 22nd, however, we were not the only foreigners. A kid in the program was not originally from Ukraine. His grandparents sat in the audience with us.

I'd been in the market for nursery schools in Manhattan so I'd toured a few recently. The one in Kyiv looked sweet. It had some definite Soviet elements (e.g. slippers to put over your shoes to keep the street dirt out). Overall, however the room was cheery.

It turned out that the school got the location and used an adjoining yard. A few years ago, a residential development was going up. The owners of the developmetn agreed to build a private playground for the school. It's lovely. They leveled the grade, put in sparkling equipment and made a high fence all around it so kids can play.

The teachers switched to Ukrainian in front of the kids (but spoke in Russian amongst themselves). The kids all had (complicated) costumes and performed little rhymes and songs. My nephew played the part of 'kolobok' who took the audience through a journey to each of the nursery storied they'd read throughout the school year.

#1 Spot to Buy Children's Books in Kyiv

/Knyharnia Ye/ Книгарня Є

vul Lysenka 3 (Just behind the Opera theater. The entrance is in a courtyard, but there are signs at the sidewalk.

I'd heard about this bookstore from my cousin. A mom of three who lives in Kyiv. She said that she prefers to shop there rather than in Petrivka because the prices are almost the same and the atmosphere is much better. I've been around long enough to take that with a grain of salt so I did not raise my expectations very much.

One Monday night, I got a chance to go because there was a book launch and my father was asked to speak after the author's presentation. Hmm, I thought, a bookstore that an accomodate an audience. A far cry from the bookstore I visited on Khreshchatyk in 1989 that had all the books on display on shelves behind a counter. You had to ask the clerk to bring you a specific book. They while you leafed through the tome (invariable hard bound) the clerk hovered as though you were on Fifth Avenue fingering a diamond ring. That bookstore certainly has no room for an audience.

Since there were five of us, I called a cab. (MAKE LINK TO POST ABOUT THE PLETHORA OF CAB COMPANIES). We made our way through Kyiv traffic and got to Lysenka Street. Nothing that looked like a bookstore storefront, but we did see a large sign with the letter 'Є' and an arrow. Following that arrow, we found another sign (with the same logo and graphic! 'Hooray! A victory for brand consistency,' I thought to myself.) The trail of signs led us into a courtyard, down a small (covered) staircase and into what looked like 'Politics and Prose' in Washington, DC.

I was thrilled with this store. It had hardcovers, paperbacks, workbooks, games, even card games and tiles with letters on them to build blocks and buildings. The kids section was right next to the section of 'parenting' and 'children's education' books so I was able to pick up a book about the curriculum of teaching kids Ukrainian.

The staff was helpful and even held on the 4 bags of books I bought. I couldn't take them with me that night since I wasn't heading straight home so the sales person held on to them for me until I came back the next day. They picked up the phone when I called. And even answered a question about the availability of a specific DVD.

The weird thing about the bookstore was that when I mentioned it to several of Ukrainian-speaking parents who live in Kyiv, they did not know about it. But when I walked in with my friend, a sculptor, he was familiar with the store and even spotted an old friend who was walking in. The bookstore seems to have filled it's business with a certain niche and hasn't done much marketing to grow its audience base.

Книгарня Є
Київ, вул. Лисенка 3
044 228 05 66
www.book-ye.com

Pros:
All books are in Ukrainian
The collection is curated, so the junk is minimized. There is less noise.
The kids section is large *and* it has a small table and small chairs so little kids and leaf through books on their own.
(There is also a room that can be set up classroom style for book presentations with closed circuit TV so you can watch on the flat panel monitor above the chaeirss' heads (plural!).
If you buy 300 UAH worth of goods, you'll automatically get a loyalty card for 5% off all future purchases.

Cons:
The airconditioning is inadequate, if even in existence

#2 Spot to Buy Children's Books in Kyiv

Petrivka Rynok

A classic. At the Petrivka stop of the metro, you'll find a huge maze of stalls that are stuffed with books, DVDs, and games. It is a covered market. Several people discouraged me from going, saying that it was chaotic and mess, and you really needed to know what you were doing to venture over there.

One Saturday, my cousin (a cardiologist) was in town from Lviv for a conference. Before he headed back home to Western Ukraine, he wanted to check out up to three medical books. He could buy them in Lviv, but he was certain that he'd get a lower price at the market since 'all books in Lviv get there via Petrivka.' We agreed to go together and I met him on the subway platform at Maidan Nezalezhnosti.

A few stops later, we emerged at Petrivka. A bit of a mess. It looked like a bunch of stalls that had grown organically, where one stall was attached to the one right next to it and the only way it stayed up was by leaning on its two neighbors.

We made our way to the book section. Row upon row of a hodge podge of books. It reminded me of a photograph by Andras Gursky (the guy who does large format images of repetitive spaces that mess with reality.)

The way to shop for books here is to know precisely what book you want, then to walk up to a seller and ask if they have it. If they don't, then they might hustle and ask their buddy a few stall down or they might just say no, and you'll need to try your luck elsewhere. My cousin was looking for a specific video game in Ukrainian and for Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, also in Ukrainian. The book was easier to find. We knew the publisher. The game was trickier because it had been done in both Russian and Ukrainian, but not all versions of the game give you the choice of language. One kid who was selling games hunted down a copy, but was unsure of the language. He got his buddy a few stalls down to lend him use of his computer and he tried to boot up the computer and the game. While we waited, I bought some workbooks from a neighboring stall.

Unfortunately, they guys never quite got the game and computer working correctly, so we couldn't confirm the language. We gave up and moved on.

Pros:
Petrivka is a good place to buy DVDs and CDs of titles that you know about ahead of time.
Many stands sold workbooks and study guides for school. It was the biggest selection I had seen.

Cons:
It's a market, not a store so if it's crowded you need to jostle to get at the goods.
You can't actually pick up every book without asking the sales person to hand it to you.
There is lots of stuff, so there is lots of junk. The selections are not at all curated, unless you know a particular sales person who stocks the kind of material that you like. (And who you trust.)

#3 Spot to Buy Children's Books in Ukraine

Bookstore in the Underground passage near Hotel Salut

There is a tricky intersection between the Hotel Salut and the park for WWII (and now the Famine). Several roads come together at that point. One of them is paved with cobblestones and has a steep descent. In true Soviet fashion, the roadway was designed to force people to walk underneath the roads in order to cross it. Pedestrians who want to get from the side of the street where Salut and the Arsenal metro stop to say, the side of the street where the National Transportation University (check name) has its (main?) campus, have to go down a long wide staircase of polished granite stairs. (This is a particular joy in the winter when the stairs are slicked over with slush.) Then they had to wend their way through a series of dark tunnels to get to the right egress that can spew them out the desired corner, but only after a treacherous climb up a similar staircase.

The 'perekhody' are all over Kyiv. Babushky used to line the halls of many of them and sell bunches of fresh flowers, or green onions, or sunflower seeds, or whatever was in season.

The 'perekhid' in front of Salut, however, was renovated several years ago. I heard about it from my parents but I couldn't imagine it until I saw it for myself.

Gone are the dimly lit hallsways. Also gone are the babushky with the sacks of sunflower seeds. In their place are a well-lit series of shops, primarily a mall of bookstores. One of those stores is the Ukrainino-Yazhychna Knyharnia (check name). It is not the largest one in the complex, but it is stuffed full with books only in Ukrainian. The back right corner is dedicated to children's literature. Hardcovers, paperbacks, and magazines are all piled up vertically and horizontally on shelves. It reminded me of an old Village bookstore in New York. The staff was friendly, and gave some recommendations based on what sells well.

It was tiny and cozy. Somehow two stools were jammed into it, but it was not the kind of place where you'd want to spend a few hours leafing through books. My mom and two kids barely fit in there.

I was thrilled. I had not seen anything like this on any of my previous trips to Ukraine. I started to understand what all the fuss was about. I piled a huge stack of books on the counter and pulled out my Visa card. Then I hauled it all back to the apartment.

Pros:
It is very convenient to get to. I liked the fact that all the books are in Ukrainian so I didn't need to constantly scan the text for the letter 'i' to confirm that the particular book I was holding was, indeed, in Ukrainian and not in Russian. They accepted payment in cash or by Visa card.

Cons:
Only books and magazines. No games, blocks, workbooks or puzzles. No reading area.
The slippery stairs are still there but they end in a line of gleaming glass doors that lead to the shopping center.

Top 3 Places to Buy Childrens Books in Kyiv - Intro

One of the things that I wanted to do while in Ukraine was to stock up on books in Ukrainian for my kids. I grew up with paperbacks of storybooks that were printed in Ukraine. Each one had a big purple stamp on the title page that says 'Printed in the USSR.' Needless to say, captivating children's literature was scarce and what did exist was full of references to Lenin and lacked the slick bright colors that leap out and grab a 4 year-old. The color and texture combination that Disney has perfected to lure all little girls across the globe to the magic of 'Disney Princesses."

(When I worked in Ukraine in the early-90's it was very difficult to get high-quality paper so when I helped some artists translate the copy in their catalogs I'd get a gift of a catalog that was on matte, recycled paper with ink that was off-color. Or they shipped their materials over to the Baltics to be printed on Finish paper at a high cost.)

My mom had been bringing back books for kids for a few years now, so I was eager to shop around and see the options first-hand. I knew that the selection was good. I wanted books, workbooks, puzzles and workbooks for kids entering school (who can recognize letters and sound out some words, but who were just getting started). I also wanted some magazines, videos, and games that had Ukrainian writing. It needed to be flashy and interesting for a kid to what to pick up and read.

I had some recommendations and suggestions. I'll write up my top 3 finds.

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!