Welcome to the Neighborhood

Above, top to bottom: Somebody's goats chained up in front of the neighborhood complex, next to the road; a man offloads cars near the avtovoksal(af-toh-volk-sahl) bus terminal near my neighborhood on October 2nd; near the front of my neighborhood; boys play with toy guns on an unusually sunny and warm day; a brother and sister make their way home not too far from the prison adjacent to my neighborhood.

I asked a friend which part of my blog he likes best(see the poll on the upper left) and he said the pictures were the biggest help.

"I have no idea what the Ukraine looks like," he typed. 

In answer to his request and your prayers, I am including a project on my neighborhood in the blog. I am labeling my posts, so if you ever need to look for posts on my "neighborhood," you can just type it in and search. 

Brett had described this place as a "Soviet *expletive*-hole" before I had come, and the term couldn't be more accurate. Bulldozing outlying villages, the communists erected giant concrete boxes that were the equivalent of filing cabinets for people. Most of the apartment are designed the same way or look exactly alike. The building are in terrible condition and many of them, built with slabs of concrete, are falling apart. The electricity goes out often and at random(sometimes in the middle of my wash cycle) and electricians come at their convenience(sometimes never). 

There are piles of rubble and trash scattered about, water trickles from unknown sources down the roads, and the 'sidewalks' are sunken-in concrete pieces covered in mud. There are a number of mangy stray dogs that wander the block and a few soviet fountains(also concrete) that no longer work and are covered in vegetation. They make good playgrounds for the kids. 

All-in-all, it's not exactly the ritz, but it ain't bad. The neighborhood seems very safe and I feel comfortable walking around at night. It's mostly families and old people, so the number of rowdy drinking parties and male hooligans(5 or so drunken guys, the only group I really consider a threat) is pretty low. My neighbors are nice, but people don't like to be photographed.