OK... I am still working on my trip report.
But I have a few days of it done now, so I will start posting.
A warning before I start: I go into tedious detail, and I apologize to anyone who finds that kind of stuff boring.
I write this trip report as much for my own benefit as anything. I want to remember the nuances of my trip later... so I record them all. Some of what I focus on I know only interests me, and I ask for your indulgence...
Right now the full report is about 35 singlespace pages in Microsoft Word. (and it's not done yet...) I don't know if you guys really want it all.
I might just post a few "chapters" and then put the rest on the web somewhere so I don't take a lot of Patrick's bandwidth.
Also, I have some more pictures up at:
http://communities.msn.com/TogetherinKiev
I will be adding some pictures I took of Kiev as well, so if you are looking for some background stuff, please don't forget to check back there over the next couple of days, because I will be adding to the pictures...
Anyway... I have posted a lot of my thoughts and preamble...
But to fully understand my mindset, you need to know that last year, I travelled to St. Petersburg, and met a pretty young 23 yeard old Phd student named Maria.
Everything had seemed promising as I went to meet her, and we did have a good time, but in the end, I had to realize that she was just not the right person for me...
The St. Petersburg trip, which started with such promise, ended up being so discouraging that I almost abandoned my search.
Maria had seemed perfect. I loved her letters, and I so very much looked forward to meeting her. Even though Jack kept advising me to line up many dates, I wasn’t really listening. I kept hedging my bet. I kept setting aside extra time for Maria. And, when LOT Airlines Chicago Delay ended up costing me a day in St. Petersburg, I ended up only having enough time to meet two women, and, in my mind, I was only really meeting one.
Maria was everything I thought I wanted: Young, pretty, extremely intelligent, and she spoke very good English. She was also very much taken with me, and it became obvious that if I had proposed, she would have said yes.
But… when I was honest with myself, I knew she just wasn’t the right one.
So… when I came back from Russia, I realized that this whole foreign bride thing was very dicey. I had spent quite a lot of money, a lot of energy, and I had found exactly what most men are dreaming about… A beautiful, intelligent, sincere woman… and she wasn’t the right one.
I suddenly saw things in a very different light. I suddenly realized that it could take a very long time to find someone this way.
Faced with this realization, I gave up. I decided that it was just too difficult, too expensive, and with no guarantee of success.
And that's where things stood just six months ago...
