Here and Now!

Okay. so, now you know about me and where I am and what I do. What about my "experiences here".

Lets start with life. Its tough. Food is horribly expensive and the quality is not good. Our food bill here is at least as expensive as it was in England, and the wages levels are not even half. Not that I am not well paid here in Ukraine, I am, but I wonder at the amount of poverty there must be in the general population. As an example in England we have beggars, but normally they are proffesional beggars who are earning quite a bit off the idiots who fall for their "I am homeless" con. they mostly consist of young people with dogs (that look amazingly healthy seeing as their owners are supposed to be homeless). Here in Ukraine the beggars are elderly. Poor, in rags, holding an old used plastic cup or simply a battered hat, and they really are poor. The peosion here is a joke and most elderly either have to rely on their families to support them or keep working part time to support themselves, or simply beg or starve or both. the poor here really are poor and it saddens me that these are people who lived all their lives in the soviet system that promised them comfort and security in their old age and has left them like this.
housing is incredible here. I have never seen anything like it and its disgustingly expensive. considering the wage levels the housing here is at least as expensive as in England (honest!). I have seen three room flats (thats 2 bedrooms to me and you) for an average of $200,000. It's a regular thing here, everywhere in the cities is expensive.
In England we have a mentality that you buy expensive outise the city or in the suburbs to get away from the city itself. Here EVERYONE wants to live in the city, its nuts.
The building blocks are old and not maintained at all. Dark stairwells and no corridoor lights are normal. Huge towers half a kilometre long with hundreds of flats crammed in are a regular sight here and when you see them you can see the brickwork (yes brickwork in a tower block, think concrete platforms with brick walls) cracking and falling out. Rotting balconies hang precariously off the sides of walls that dont look as though they have the strength to hold them. Gas and electricity cuts are a regular thing here in Ukraine which surprises noone and the water is filtered or preboiled. these are average building, the norm, and they rent out for $400 to $500 a month (mad when you think that the pension rate isonly $100... and the average wage is $400. for a "decent" falt you can pay over $1000 a month.
Electricity is a joke, its not regular and we sit at home watching the lights glow bright and dim as the supply flutuates. As an example I have a UPS on my PC at home and the power supply is supposed to be 230volts (I think) but it regularly flucutates between 160 and 270 and the UPS goes nuts a lot screaming at me to unplug it.
So the mentality to want to live in the city is exactly that in my opinion, mental!! I am happy with a water pipe in my garden and an outside toilet afterlooking at some of the flats here in the city.