Our view of Kiev

From a distance, it was already clear that the cityscape of Kiev would be dominated by imposing panel buildings. These also filled the entire horizon from the interior of the city, which was also adorned with sacral buildings of pompous form, the Dnieper River and vast green areas. Statues and memorials from the Soviet era were also given some space in the city. However, the political developments of recent years - starting from Maidan Square to the war in eastern Ukraine - also shape the cityscape. The Ukrainian nationalist attitude of the government and the population is openly displayed, not even the open presentation of fascist symbols in the East Ukrainian fighting neo-Nazi units seems to be considered offensive in any way, whether in the history museum or at the souvenir stand (we refrain from using illustrations, for good reason).. And this despite the fact that one can get a very impressive and frightening picture of the crimes of the intellectual fathers of these fascists in the museum under the Motherland Monument. Architecturally, the old town, once enclosed by huge fortress walls, has a lot of beautiful and worth seeing things to offer, which we could hardly grasp in the few days. We spent the night in a shared flat with two nice Ukrainians who provided us with one of their rooms. The apartment was not directly in the center, but still in a lively neighborhood where, despite the high population density, you could have heard a pin drop at night. However, after a few days of this bustling city life, we were drawn back to nature, so we set off on the journey towards Kharkiv to get to Russia from there...