We woke up around 7:30am as the train was scheduled to arrive at the L'viv train station at 8:29am. I had had cold feet all night as the train was not heated and we were assigned only one rather thin blanket. This I attributed to my less than restful night, although I had drifted into a deep sleep several times – most likely due to lingering jet lag and exhaustion. Rosemary had called my name in the morning, but I didn't respond, so she laid in her bunk and prayed that God would open the doors at the church and that somebody would invite us into their home like they had done for the apostles in the Bible times. Upon my waking, Rosemary related with my sleep difficulties until some point of the night where she was miraculously enveloped in warmth and was able to get some decent rest.
As I was building up the courage to use the train's toilet, the conductor we had met last night walked by, but not in uniform this time. We discovered later he had been relieved for the shift by a younger gentleman. Last night, we found that he was from Vovche, a neighboring town to Zhukotyn and Berezhok. He was never married and had no children, but did have a sister who had two children. He was not familiar with our family name, but it was still very interesting to find someone who was only an hour's walk away from where my ancestors have been living for hundreds of years on a train that would pass at its nearest point a 3 ½ hour bus trip from that tiny corner of the planet. He had shown us pictures on his cell phone of gigantic mushrooms he had picked in the forest and flowers from around the area. He was very proud of the richness of the area in that regard. We showed him pictures on our cell phone of the family and house in Berezhok. He knew all about digas – the homemade trucks common to the area of which the first was allegedly built by our family – but didn't recognize the house and people. This wasn't too surprising as he didn't have much reason to travel further away from Turka than Vovche.
The train car we rode was a Ukrainian Platzkart, an arrangement of short and narrow bunks stacked two high with no cabins or curtains to afford even an illusion of privacy. Surprisingly, ours were the only two bunks occupied in the six-bunk arrangement in our immediate area.
Once we both braved the Ukrainian train's toilet, we folded our bed linens and rolled our sleeping pads and pillows up. The new conductor handed us back our train tickets – a sign we took to mean that ours was the next stop. We packed away the few things that were outside our suitcases and prepared to disembark. The tickets we now held in our hands represented ten US Dollars each, a trivial amount to us. In contrast, Ukrainians saw this as 80 UAH (Ukrainian Hryvna), a much more substantial amount in their estimation.
As we waited, the Ukrainian countryside glided by. Scenes of small brick and stucco cottages sparked imaginations of a simpler life, each one with rectangles of charcoal black earth prepared to grow the sustenance that the families who lived there needed to survive the year. Ducks and chickens meandered about with the occasional pig, horse and cow thrown in for good measure. Handmade wooden wagons, many equipped with car wheels and tires no longer fit for their original purpose, adorned the side of the dirt street that passed the cottages. There was no doubt these people lived a simpler life than what we were accustomed to, but we had no misgivings that this life was also a harder life in many regards.
These idyllic scenes were all too quickly ransacked by the harshness of several high-rise buildings perhaps fifteen stories in vertical dominance. One was now just a shell, but in years past must have been a monument to Soviet advances. The others seemed to be occupied, but those that lived there would not be envied by many.
As the brakes of the train slowed us to a stop, a sudden onslaught of Ukrainians filled the narrow aisle leading to the single exit door. The heaviest-laden Ukrainian held a single duffel bag, so we decided to wait until the aisle cleared to extricate our three enormous suitcases. All our concentration was then focused on getting these three suitcases down the narrow and steep stairs to the train platform. The conductor provided some assistance, and before long we were rolling, carrying and hefting our luggage across the platform, down the stairs, under the tracks and back up to the train station. The L'viv train station was an absolute bustle of people going to and fro. Ukrainians are very good at squeezing between throngs that would never occur to us to attempt due to the heavy body contact and invasion of “personal space” that it would entail, but we somehow managed to make it through only to be scoped out by a cab driver.
He asked where we wanted to go and then offered a price of 40 UAH. Knowing that it was customary to overcharge tourists, I demanded he lower his price to thirty. He countered with the sad story of the price of petroleum and the expense of maintaining his vehicle, so we finally settled on thirty-five. We set out across the cobbled streets of L'viv in an old Russian Lada automobile with two suitcases in the trunk, Rosemary and another suitcase in the back seat, and me in the front seat. Upon arriving at the “Old Ukrainian Home” hostel, we unloaded the suitcases and paid the driver 40 UAH, to his amazement. We were glad to be there safely.
The building looked like it had been built in the 1500's at least, and was not apparent to be a hostel other than a small sign in one of the windows saying “Hostel” in Latin letters. Rosemary waited outside the door to avoid unnecessarily lifting the suitcases up the stairs while I went inside to find if there really was a hostel inside. I found a door that said “Hostel”, but it was locked. Further investigation uncovered a doorbell which when rung summoned a short and thin young Ukrainian lady to open the door and inquire as to my business. I told her in broken Ukrainian that we had made reservations online to which she invited me inside in near-perfect English. I helped Rosemary with the suitcases and we were soon standing at the counter in the reception area. The lady couldn't find our reservation although I had a picture of the confirmation on my cell phone, so she said she would have the manager show us a flat that they would offer us after noon.
We rearranged the contents of our suitcases as the advertised service of luggage storage translated to leaving your suitcases in the common area accessible to all. After moving all the valuables and gifts to one suitcase, we commandeered a map and set out across the old city of L'viv in search of the church to which we had received the address on a text message from our contacts in Kyiv. It was a walk which entailed only a few blocks, albeit much larger blocks to what we were accustomed. We passed ancient buildings built by the Austrians and Poles during their occupations of this region. The streets were all an assortment of cobbled stones as were most of the sidewalks. We dragged our large suitcase down streets lined with Victorian and Gothic architecture, past the L'viv University, a beautiful park and across still-active streetcar tracks while avoiding hurling taxis, cars, Marshrutky (short Ukrainian busses) and the occasional bicycle.
We finally completed our trek and arrived at 19 Sychovikh Stril'tsiv street. It was a massive building several stories high sandwiched between other massive buildings several stories high. Walking through the partially opened enormous gate, we found a passageway leading deep into the building. Stairs and doorways opened up on either side, most of which had some writing in Cyrillic near them. However, none of them said anything about “tserkva”, the Ukrainian word for church. Our fall-back plan was to go back out the gate and call Igor on the number given to us by our new friends in Kyiv. Igor answered and I asked, again in broken Ukrainian, if we were at the right address. He replied in Ukrainian that we were, and that he would come out and meet us. By this time, we noticed other Ukrainian families walking through the gate, so we felt understandably silly needing an escort from a stranger into the building.
Igor introduced himself in English, and we found out he was the pastor of the church and had lived in the US for six years, although he was truly a Ukrainian. His English was very good. The church's meeting place was at the end of the dark corridor and up a set of stairs. The sign in Ukrainian above the door translated roughly to something like “Military Officers' Club”, which is why it didn't seem to be the likely candidate for the door to the elusive church we had been seeking. Inside the door at the top of the stairs sat a security guard at a table, not smiling and not responsive to greetings. The church appeared like an auditorium with a stage at the end, something that could be used for entertaining military officers, but was at this time being used for church services. A guitarist and four women were on stage warming up for the musical portion of the worship.
Pastor Igor gave us a primer on the introductory customs of Ukrainians, and then introduced us to several of the people who had come to participate in the service. He had to excuse himself to prepare, and others came up and introduced themselves to us on their own. We found a place for our enormous red suitcase in the corner and selected a pair of seats not too far forward, but not too far back. Now that I reflect on it, that selection was not dissimilar from our normal placement in our home church in Ukiah, California, minus the suitcase.
The pastor started out in Ukrainian. I was able to make out greetings and a prayer, and then an invitation to stand and worship as the band started to play and sing worship songs. There were familiar and unfamiliar melodies, but the words when translated were all wonderful songs of praise. I took an opportunity to video record some of the worship time.
The guest speaker was introduced. An American missionary who had graduated from seminary in the US and decided that Ukraine would be his mission field. He preached in English, and Pastor Igor translated into Ukrainian. He preached on the parable Jesus told of the nobleman who left to be appointed King and had given ten servants one mina each. He taught how Jesus was preaching about his kingdom on earth and how we all have a decision to make regarding what we are going to do regarding what God has given to each of us. How would we respond when Jesus returned and asked for an account of a return on the investment he placed in each of us? Would we be like the servants who multiplied what they were entrusted with, or would we be like the one who returned what was given to him without anything additional?
After the service, we met with the people in the church hall and then went to a room downstairs for coffee, tea and pastries.
After this, we went outside and Rosemary and Nadia went to Pozata Khata (a Ukrainian cafeteria) along with Nadia's granddaughter, Solomiya, while I went with Nadia's husband, Boris, and Igor to pick up our suitcases from the hostel and take them to their house. The people in the hostel seemed like they felt sorry for messing up on our room reservation.
Boris and Igor dropped me off after the hostel at Pozata Khata and we got our traditional Ukrainian food and talked with Nadia about her ministry work in the Turka region.
After lunch, we all walked a few blocks to the city center and Nadia and Solomiya went on home while we met Nadia Matsur. Because of some deep conversation we spent three hours walking in circles not caring where we were or where we were going. She answered many questions about many topics. We bought her some coffee and then her boyfriend, Yura, came and we were able to meet him. He is very sweet, gentle and kind. They both walked us up the hill to Nadia's house and the two Nadias met. We made our way in where we got an in-depth instruction on all the locks in the doors and where all the light switches were. We called the children back in Ukiah and talked for a while. We went to sleep at about 10:30pm. We were so tired we couldn't even watch a video before falling asleep.
