My Adventures Where in the world is ….

Saturday night We cr decided to talk a little walk (almost a two hour walk) and go somewhere we had not yet been but not far away.  We walked north on the road by our apartment and the river – mostly on the side across the street from the boardwalk (or so they call it).  It was interesting and since it was a cool evening a good evening for a walk.  It was getting dark when we got home.  Here is some of what we saw.  Not as interesting as some walks but still…..

We had looked at the map on line and learned that there was an oil plant on the road we were going to walk – oil as in cooking oil. As we neared it we could smell oil – like McDonalds french fry oil. As we were passing the smell changed and was not as pleasant. The entire plant has high brick walls around it with barbed wire over the walls – guess they do not want an visitors.

Another view with the name in Russian over the building on the right.

These brightly painted storage units seemed out of place with the rest of the buildings all in grey and looking old.

Across the street some businesses – mostly for either shipping or cars. One is a detailing shop for cars.

A Volvo dealership.

We crossed the street as we got closer to home and walked along the river. Here is an interesting fountain. The last time we saw this one it was spraying all over the sidewalk and whoever passed it. This is much more contained – kind of a cool shaped fountain.

St. John the Baptist Church at night. I thought it looked so pretty with lights on it. We actually have seen it many times now.

So that was our short walk on a Saturday evening.  It is the first we have taken in a while.  It has just been too hot.  For the first 22 days of August it was over 90 degrees outside and for 14 of those days it was over 95 – it was just too hot to go anywhere so we had people over and just stayed home.  We do our shopping first thing Saturday mornings before the heat is unbearable and before the stores are crowded.  The store we shop at is open 24/7 and we like to go and get home by 9 or so.  That makes it much easier.  Then we have hibernated in our air conditioning.  These last few days have been so nice to be able to have our windows open and fans maybe going.  So much more comfortable – even if I am cooking.

By the way, I actually bought a muffin pan to make muffins in.  The first ones I made were banana with too ripe bananas.  Wonderful.

Saturday, August 5th.

This morning we went shopping like we usually do. We were out early as it was supposed to be in the high 90s. When we were going to the store it was not too bad but coming home I could really feel the humidity climbing.

Elder Morgenegg took an exercise walk and was gone a while and so I while he was gone I wanted to get our budget and finances caught up so that took some time but all is well and all balances so that is always a good thing. I guess I take it a little too far as I balance the checkbook and then I created a spreadsheet to track our cash as well as our other expenses while we are here. I think we spend more cash here than we did at home.

Then we did laundry and our usual Saturday cleaning.

Sometimes necessity is the mother of invention.

I wanted to make muffins. We had these delicious blueberries and I was so hungry for Andrea’s blueberry muffins but no muffin time available. One day I found muffin papers at the grocery and I bought them. Yesterday I was thinking, why not create something that would hold the muffin papers to create my own muffins. I took a Ukrainian version of a 9×13 pan and used used foil to divide it into three sections lengthwise. Then I put in the papers and they sort of fit. Then I made the muffin batter and topping. I carefully put the muffin batter in the muffin papers and added the topping. They are not exactly round but they cooked all the way through (in a longer time – between the oven and the situation it took longer). We will eat them latter. I am excited to try them.

Blueberry muffin invention

Not so perfect mufins

Do not send me a muffin pan.  I don’t know where they have them here but if they have muffin papers there must be muffin pans somewhere as well.  We will see if I ever see one.

I also made cookies. I had remembered cookies I have made from time to time – kind of like a sugar cookie but not so sweet. You cut out circles and on one circle you put a raison filling and then another circle on top. Crimp it and delicious filled cookies. I had not uploaded or saved my recipe so went looking for something similar. The filling only went for 13 of the 20 cookies so I used blueberry jam in the rest. The look delicious. I hope they are. They are bigger than I would choose so next time I will have to find a smaller cutter. I just used a round container from something we had bought.

After I cleaned up I suggested we take a walk.  It was seven thirty and I thought maybe a little cooler.  It probably was but it was still hot.  I suggested we walk up to the park that is not far from our apartment where the missionaries had their bubble activity.  Elder Morgenegg had been there earlier in the day and I had wanted to see what was called the “Palace of Students.”  The reviews on line were mixed.  Some said it was a must see, a few said it was a typical Soviet structure – beautiful in its day and now run down and falling apart.  It was both.  I was surprised how huge it is though the pictures on line do not do it justice in that way.

This is the entrance gate from inside. The entrance is actually on the street across from the park where the large church we went to a few weeks ago. It is also very near to the upper end renok we have been to. And it is around the corner form where our mission president and his wife live.

Our first view of the palace through the trees.

Here is the front of the palace. I think it is quite impressive.

The words basically say National University. It is another university – there are many here in Dnipr.

Across from the entrance is this garden with an interesting sculpture – no idea what it means.

Close up of the sculpture

A view of the entrance from farther away.

Going towards the back you can see somewhat how big this building is.

A view of the side shows the crumbling exterior

This may be an entrance or just the back. It reminds me of a scene in The Count of Monte Cristo with all the stairs. There is a group of people evidently a dance class of some kind. We watched for a moment before going on.

This is a view going down the hill from the back of the palace.

This is a picture of the lion statue in the back of the palace. I took a picture of Elder Morgenegg by it but it is too dark to see. So you need to imagine it.

As we walked down the hill we noticed that the ferris wheel on the island was all lit up.

We also saw three girls with an interesting looking item. We were not at all sure what they were doing. Two girls were holding a perhaps fabric item that looked almost like a heart. The third girl lit a fire under the fabric and it sort of expanded. I think it was a kind of hot air balloon. The third girl then took pictures of it. Interesting. Perhaps they were students and this was a project of some kind.

In reading about the university later I learned it is a preforming arts university that has lots of activities.   The pictures on line are varied and interesting.  I don’t know if we would ever go there or even if we could.

As we walked home the sun was almost down and there was lots of activity as always across the road at on the river walkway.

We came home and turned the air conditioning back on to cool off.  Thank goodness for air conditioning.  I feel bad for those who don’t have any at all.  It is just plain hot here and the humidity (although not as bad as New York) makes it hard to handle.

All is well and we still have lots to see and do.