While we were in Ukraine we stayed at a little hotel in
Ivanciv. This was the town where the
orphanage was. The best way to describe this hotel is to imagine a double wide mobile home with another one stacked on top of each and about two long. It would shake as the trucks went by but after a week you didn't notice. The hallways were up and down and crooked. It left the feeling of being
tipsy when walking down it.
On the first level there was a few rooms and the rest were used for hotel needs
ie; laundry room etc. The first floor also had a
restaurant. It had a small eating area inside and another one on a patio. Inside had about five or six tables with four chairs each and a small bar that seated five or six more. Every time we went there you could cut the
cigarette smoke with a knife. We ate outside every time, even when the weather got cool.
The owner of the
restaurant was not friendly and never smiled once while we were there. The waitress was the same. No expression, no reaction, no matter what. They had about four or five things on the menu and the best was a steak platter that had a cubed steak covered with grilled mushrooms, peppers and onions and a cheese with potatoes. It came with a salad made with green peppers, onions, squash
cucumber and a light oil &
vinegar dressing. It was good but it was the only thing that was.
I lost about 20 lbs. while staying there. There were no super markets as we know them.The food stores were about the same size as our gas stations. They offered a wide variety of food but in small
quantities. Bread, for instance was brought in twice a week. If you wanted a loaf the day before it came in you had a choice of take it or leave it. We always left it and remembered the days it came in. There was not a lot of choice in foods and we ate a lot of bread ( which was very good) with tuna we brought with us. As long as it lasted. Then we bought chicken cooked there and made
sandwich's, but that got old after a week or two. Our biggest treat was to go into
Kyiv every Saturday and eat at
McDonlds or
TGIF's.
Now , all that being said, there was great food in Ukraine. We only found it when we moved back into
Kyiv at the end of our trip. We enjoyed a few meals that were great with
Friends we made in
Ivanciv but the
restaurants were non
existent while we were there.
The hotel was filthy. No other way to put it. When we checked in the room looked as it would if you had people stay in it and didn't clean it for months. Which is what it was. They give you clean sheets and bed covers and all the dirt you want. The bathroom was so bad I was afraid to use it. We spent hours cleaning it in order to make it acceptable.
We had the deluxe suite which included a towel each, a small bar of soap each, and two wash cloths for three of us, no matter how long you stayed . There was two rooms, one had a bed dresser and
amoire. The other had a sofa that pulled out to make a bed and a chair, Coffee table and end table and a book case that also served as a closet/ storage area. On the coffee table was a huge ash tray with a couple of
cigarette butts left. Under the end table was an empty wine bottle. Each room had a window. In the entryway you had four doors, one to the left had the sink and toilet. The next to it had a shower. Straight ahead was the bedroom and to the right was the other room. It was set up so each room could be rented
separate and you would share the bath.
Friends or ours who
also adopted three girls from the same
orphanage called it "The Hilton Hotel
Ivanciv". They had been there, in the same room, about six months before us. We thanked them for leaving the dirt.
It was interesting to me that the girls and their
Friends who came by to visit were in awe of this place. The girls wanted to be able to spend at least one
nite there before we left.
We were just
living it up at the Hilton Hotel
Ivanciv !!
