Ukraine Starting Over

If one digs around far enough in Ukraine's panorama of random history, look at the odd things, one can connect all sorts of unrelated dots, add a little bit of  fantasy,  fictional interpretation, and voila : the story leaps off the script ! Events have gone well into the outrageous and unbelievable, information has openly been faked, distorted, and social media is off the charts with innuendo. Why can't it just go back to the most peaceful country on Earth ?  By the way : some of the very best fresh baked pastries/ ever ! can be found here at this little shop in Kiev. I think it's near the American medical Center (no relation ) Maybe it's just me being bored and feeling weird, wanting to write something outrageous... Don't get me wrong, but Victor Yanukovych sold himself to the voters, inveigled his image as some sort of master of pragmatism,  was he thought of  as the go -to guy who could  handle the tough business with the Russian Federation ? . Sort o

Well the mood on the Trans- Atlantic Metro is that Ukraine probably isn't capable of doing much of anything to defend itself beyond the apparent basics it has at it's disposal, even reading the Art of War, it won't get them very far (or something like that) But being underestimated can be a great advantage : the West does want to help in this Narnia style struggle for Europe's future. The Russian class system never ended, it underwent moulting, reformulations based on tactical advantages, some did transcend it, based on pure ruthlessness.In the West, we do have rule of law that is more accessible to the lay person. While we also have arcane forms of corruption that are deftly exploited by the elites, it is not perhaps so egregious as the Eastern Europe, Post communist reality. China, as an ambitious global player has hacked into the soft underbelly of Russia, smoothly positioning itself as a neutral player, stripping away the easy trade agreements in grain supp

I remember that time , closing in on one year, visiting friends in Simferopol, meeting new friends, people asked what it was like on the Maidan, since I don't speak Ukrainian, I could only give my rough impression of what I was hearing being said and things like that: People were nice towards me. In general, it came across to me as unbelievable, an unparalleled situation. In all, I had no right to any opinion, just impressions of it, sharing photos and so forth. My friends in Crimea go back many years, and I am open to some dialogue about the pragmatic aspects of the CIS, in all it felt useless to speak in any detail about anything with them relating to politics. Of  course, I find politics in Ukraine vastly more interesting than USA, I am often thinking how , not trivial, but near sighted people get caught up on issues, friends, family. Not to detract from what they  see as important. Ukraine did not ask for 8 million of it's people to be killed in the Second World War.

I think that for sure, Monday I did not want to look at anyone's mood on the metro. I had enough turmoil on my mind that I didn't want to cross the line of sharing. That lasted until Tuesday evening when I noticed that everyone had a wonderful mix of moods as they finished work and were going home, bright cheery, thoughtful. These people may start the day in a semi-monolithic mood, but they choose how they want to feel, rather than depend on external forces to shape their mood ; the job may own their work time, but not their feelings. One of the aspects of the war in East Ukraine is that people are mixing into Kyiv, my friends from Donetsk and other places are often uneasy, being dislocated from their homes and apartments by geopolitics, and worrying that people in Kyiv blame them in some ways, label them as part of the problem rather than an aspect of the answer. But I also see genuine gestures of welcoming, warmth and understanding being extended to my friends from the East.