Thursday, 13 August 2009

• Two long years I've waited to show them Ukraine!

  My parents arrived on a Saturday night July 18 after 11 p.m. in Kyiv. They were supposed to arrive at 10:43 so, as you can imagine, I was content while I waited. If by content you mean I got to the airport at 9 p.m., tried to read a book, tried to watch a video on my I-pod, tried to listen to music, but was disturbed by the compulsive need to get up from my waiting bench every five minutes and lug my two backpacks over to the screen to see if the plan from Munich had an arrival time posted yet. Not to mention that I called every person I could think of while I waited. Friends in my town, Oksana, then Svyeta in the village, my “relatives” in Kyiv who we’d be staying with that night. Whining to all of them, I’m bored! I’m just waiting! I want them here NOW! Thumping my knees anxiously against the ground like I needed a restroom. And so you know, the arrival time did not post until about 10:50.

   

  I drew a little notice. First by a burly fellow who tried to point me in the direction of “Departures” because, with two bags, I was obviously going somewhere. No, I said in Ukrainian, “I want to go over there.” At his insistence that I wanted to go to the right, not left, I said adamantly, “No! I’m waiting.” He got my point and left me alone. This was shortly after I’d gotten there. Thirty minutes before my parents were due to arrive, I finally couldn’t take the mounting pressure anymore and bounded out of my seat to stand in the waiting crowd for arriving flights.

   

  Then another large, forward man asked me if I needed a taxi for 150 hryven. “Maybe I’ll want a taxi later,” I said, thinking I certainly wouldn’t be taking for a fool again about the cost of taxis (the price of a taxi from Boryspil to the train station at Christmas had cost me a fortune). My friend had given me the number of a firm that would charge 115 if I called them to come. However, I hadn’t ruled out the possibility of bargaining my way down to that price with one of these guys here. The man took this as an imminent transaction and stationed a man at my side. I only noticed that this guy was still right behind me 20 minutes later when I decided a bathroom break would take up a few minutes. The man asked if I was ready to go and I said, “No, the plane is late, I’m going to the toilet.” I didn’t see him when I got back out.

   

  The flight had the audacity of being 20 minutes late and then I had to wait MINUTES, MINUTES! for my parents to get through customs while my head filled with thoughts of how maybe they hadn’t made a flight, something had gone wrong, but at last, they came through the sliding door that had been driving me mad into the public part of the airport. Pushing a cart piled with a mountain of luggage. A mountain. And suddenly there was nothing to say but, “Have you come to LIVE here?”

   

  We headed towards the airport exit and I stayed alert for the perfect taxi driver. I like to look for the kindly ones. A driver noticed us and made his bid of 150 and I countered (my phone out and ready) that I had a better offer, and he lowered his price to 120, and we accepted.

   

  I walked out of that airport with the glow of victory. I had my parents AND I had bargained successfully. As the driver then tried to fit all of our luggage into his car like a jigsaw puzzle, he muttered that we needed our own mashrutka (small van-like bus).

   

  Yes, probably true.

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