July 4, 2010

Tami’s Fourth of July Reflections

Today we visited Lividia Palace, former palace of the last Russian czar, Nicholas Romanov. (Ukraine was part of Russia at this time.) The Palace was also the location of the Yalta conference where President Roosevelt, Stalin and Winston Churchill met at the end of World War Two. We saw President Roosevelt’s bedroom as well as many historic photos and rooms involved in the conference. There is a room dedicated to each of the main world leaders who were part of the conference and when family members from those leaders come to Yalta to visit they always bring some historical item to add to the room. These rooms dedicated to Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin were an amazing collection of history that was awe inspiring to see. You also can see the round table that the world leaders gathered around for the first time as well as the table where Roosevelt and Stalin discussed using the atomic bomb against Japan. It was very interesting to make both a Russian and American historical connection in one place, especially on the day America celebrates her independence!

Our second stop for a tour today took us to "Fairy Tale Village," an amazing park dedicated to fairytales throughout the world in all different cultures. Each display is carved out of wood by hand and there were many children in the park with us to see this interesting collection that winds through a gladed forest at the base of the mountians that sit above Yalta. You can see pictures with some of the kids favorite fairy tales--and them inserting themselves into the stories!

We remembered it was the fourth of July when we got out Jeff’s laptop at “Uncle Sam’s” pizzeria (see the sign to the right), which is located in our hotel, the Hotel Bristol. Our hotel was used originally for guests and visitors of the royal Romanov family. Today we seem to be the only Americans around and it was a little sad for me not to be celebrating the country I love more and more the longer we are away from her! I find myself humming under my breath the song, “God bless America, my home sweet home. “

We spent the evening in Lenin Square where a carnival is set up for tourists. It was a really fun atmosphere with many well to do Ukrainians and Russians enjoying themselves on Holiday. At the base of the statue to Lenin you see in this picture is a fountain and pool, and in the pool vendors haves set up these large inflatable balls that the kids could get into and then run around the pool in! All for only 20 Grevnas (abour $2.50). The kids also rented these pedaling tricycles, did some bungee bouncing, had a snack at Mc Donald’s, and I bought a flashing neon toy shaped as an Eagle for my own little light show.