   
Marv Feldman
Senior Member Username: Marv
Post Number: 495 Registered: 02-2005
| Posted on Wednesday, October 04, 2006 - 07:54 pm: | |
KIEV - 4 After pulling into our dock at Kiev after 15 days of fascinating cruising, we had not yet completed this Great Adventure. The final excursion to the open-air Pyrogovo Museum of Folk Architecture, gave us the opportunity to look at one of seven "villages", representing Ukraine's regional areas - their cottages, churches and dress. When Marvin saw the thatched roofs, straw and wooden buildings, dirt floors, and ornate Orthodox church in the village of 500 people, it immediately matched his mental picture of Ponadelys, Lithuania, as described to him by his late grandfather who fled the Czar to come to the USA 100+ years ago. It was appropriate for us to visit Babi Yar on the morning before Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement and holiest time of the Jewish calendar) and in the week of the 65th anniversary of the massacre. Here, in a forest ravine on Kiev's outskirts (now suburbs), we visited both the (Soviet built) and Jewish memorials at the place the Nazis murdered over 100,000 people (mainly Jews) between 1941-43. Today, this area has the atmosphere of a park where families gather - for us, it was a sobering time of reflection. Tomorrow morning we leave before dawn on our return flights to Jacksonville and will dispatch our final thoughts in our bulletin. |