Deckard's trip report - POST #7
Return to Simferopol * August, 2001
Upon our return to Simferopol I would get to see family life much more, as I was living with them the whole time (as opposed to while in Alupka), and I would also get to see city life much more as well.
Luda and I spent almost every waking minute together. At home, there were multiple chores to do, including preparation of food, cooking,baking, and of course eating three meals a day. Sometimes the family worked in their garden outside, which, while rather small, seemed to have every variety of fruits that I could think of, and lots of tomatoes. House cleaning was a major chore, which was done religiously every Saturday. Minor cleaning of the kitchen and dining room was done every day, sometimes twice.
I quickly saw how hard the family worked, and I imagined that other families in Ukraine worked in a similar fashion.
Father worked every week day, leaving around 8am or so, and coming back around 5-6pm usually. Mother usually stayed home, and she seemed to always be busy doing something, whether it be preparing food, cleaning, working in the garden, etc. Luda and her sister helped with nearly everything. However, Luda got a break from her parents, since they knew that we needed time to spend together too 
.
The longer I was over there, the more I realized what a special girl and family it was that I had found. Her family is like a unit of ONE. They did everything together, helping each other all the time. I never saw them fighting physically or verbally. I saw disagreements, but they were civil. Luda and her sister NEVER talked back to their parents, and their parents never yelled at them. Even the sisters were best friends. Considering that I lived with them for 3+ months, I saw everything about their family life. It was the most stable and loving family I've ever seen before in my life, no joke. It was the kind of family that we dream of having over here. The kind of family we *used* to have a couple of generations ago (or so I'm told).
Luda and I went for many walks, whether it be for shopping for food at the market (something which was done about every other day), or for fun and leisure. I became used to long walks. Almost every day we went into the city to do something. We would take a small bus or large bus, depending if we were in a rush or not. We went to see several movies in theaters, ate out a lot at different cafes, visited some parks, ate ice cream, and shopped for items that the family needed. We found a computer club that would transfer my pictures from camera, to a computer, and then burn them to a CD for me, which I had done periodically, to keep up with my steady picture taking. We went to a few dance clubs, sometimes with Luda's sister, and one time we went to a concert.
I was always observant of life there, and I noticed several differences in men/women relationships.
****SIDENOTE*
In my experience, if you are a gentleman to a lady in America, i.e. opening a door for her, carrying a heavy item for her, etc ... you will usually get one of two responses. "Thank you", or a "thanks, but I don't need the help.", or at least something along those lines. This seems to go along with KenC's fairly recent posting of a column written by an American woman after the WTC attack.
Behave yourself like a gentleman in Ukraine, and you'll probably get either nothing, or a smile. These were the only variations that I saw.
Does this mean that Ukrainian ladies are not as polite or kind? Not at all. It puzzled me at first, and it actually irked me a bit for a little while. After holding the door open for a lady, and not getting so much as a glance from the lady, I would mentally think "You're Welcome!!". But I gave it some thought. I had to look at things from their point of view. I realized two things. Ukrainian ladies EXPECT a man to behave himself like a gentleman. Almost every man that I observed in Ukraine seemed to behave like a gentleman around the ladies (with the exception of a few rowdy teenagers). Men are gentlemen, women are "ladies", if you know what I mean. This is expected in society there, as near as I could tell. So if you are a gentleman to your lady in Ukraine, don't be too proud of yourself, you're behaving as almost any man would over there.
The other thing I realized, is that usage of "thank you" or "spasiba" is less common than here in America. To be more specific, here in America, we say "thank you" all the time, just to be polite. Many businesses even make their employees say "thank you" at the beginning or end of a telephone call from a customer. In Ukraine "what you see is what you get". Shopkeepers rarely seem glad to help you, don't frequently smile, and don't thank you for coming into their store. You may only a get "spasiba" from them if you actually buy something from their shop.
Don't expect the lady you're assisting to thank you for some small gentlemanly gesture you make. Pulling a chair out for her, opening a door for her, carrying an item for her, all of these things may not get a single "thank you" out of her. If you expect her to actually say "thank you" for your actions, you'll probably be disappointed. She will acknowledge your gentlemanly behavior in other more meaningful ways, rather than paying you back with a "thank you".
This applied to Luda as well. Many times my initial instinctive reaction was wondering why she didn't say "thank you" to me. Then I started to realize that "thank you" is just a reflexive response to anything where an acknowledgement is due, rather than actual return of favor that means something concrete.
*END SIDENOTE ****
More about differences in the next post.
---- To be continued in POST #8 ----
