Get OFF the trampoline Rich! But I'm not "on it"

Odessa Communist Market

Lady selling her wares at Odessa Communist market

Just Ain't No Debating

My overnight train pulls into the station at 6:10 AM. I offer a surly cab driver more than he can refuse, though he does initially until I make the offer to someone else.The farther from the city center my taxi takes me, the more run down the roads, the cars, and the buildings become. The architecture swiftly morphs into pure Communist Vomit, and my hostel/hotel, while getting a decent location rating online, is out in the middle of nowhere, the streets a maze of windy, twisty passageways all alike.The cabbie has troubles finding my lodgings, irritating this unhappy man even more than usual.I get dropped off in an impoverished neighborhood. No one speaks any English. and I'm no better at reading Cyrillic. There's no reception at the hostel, and no one to let me in. I explore the surroundings in the meantime, the breeze blessing me with the fragrance of raw sewage as stray dogs eye the unusual foreigner walking their neighborhood with interest. There is little if any beauty to be found in this rapidly decaying concrete jungle. Eventually I ask someone to call me a cab, which arrives a good 40 minutes later. I ride back to the center of town, switching hostels.It's much nicer downtown, although I'm certain that the poverty I witnessed in the outskirts is how most Ukrainians live.Restaurants catering to foreigners abound, and the architecture in this part of town is largely pre-Soviet, and therefore quite beautiful. A large church acts as my geographical marker, and the surrounding square has children's rides draw which draw me in like the Pied Piper."Get off the trampoline!!" yells a woman in Ukrainian, translatable merely via voice tone and body language, "50 kilos maximum."﻿ ﻿ ﻿I meet a tall Russian girl , Anna (20), her father ex-KGB. Should be interesting to hang out with. We bring with us Claus, a Danish giant, to insure our safety I assume. Anna wants to go to a flea market. Normally the idea of shopping makes me nauseous but this market is exceptionally cool, a sort of outdoor mini-museum to Communist Times.I find a plethora of World War II Nazi Germany and Soviet Medals. I pick up an Iron Cross, "Is it real?" I ask the seller, with Anna translating."Yeah, yeah, real of course."Everything about it says it's brand new ... "It doesn't look real," I retort, "The paint, the colors are too fresh."﻿"No no. Real. Old. Real.""Fake.""Real.""Fake!""Real!""Fake!!""Okay, you want real?" he calls over to a neighbor vendor, "Oksana, this guy wants real. Show him real."It ain't easy trusting people out here.And that goes for me too apparently. Now, I am trying to purchase a cute little backpack for my Goddaughter. The old lady offers it to me for 20 grivnas ($2.50.) All I have are 200 grivna ($25) bills, the largest denomination in the Ukraine. I offer her one, immediately she shies away, telling me she has no change.Anna tells me the lady is a pensioner, and her income is $100 a month, which she augments by selling her superfluous items on the street. The woman is worried that she'll get stuck with a fake bill, which are common in the Ukraine, and be out 25% of her monthly income.Eventually she makes change for me.While Claus and I see eye to eye on many subjects, our female companion views the world "differently." We attempt to engage Anna in a discussion about her beliefs that women should largely be subservient to their men, killing is not such a big deal, and that democracy is "unnecessary." While it's interesting to see such a different model of the world, a completely foreign reality, she's also very rigid in her beliefs, Claus and I wave the off-white flag of truce pretty quickly. We're not changing her mind. Change after ossifying Communism, is difficult here in the former Eastern Bloc.