Ooops, Lessons Learned

Today at lunch Paul, Shiva, and I went off in a different direction then yesterday so we could explore the neighborhood some more and not get into a rut of eating at the same place twice in a row.  We settled for Chinese food even though there is not an Asian population to speak of in Ukraine.  The restaurant was gorgeous inside, I don't think I've seen a finer place to get Chinese food.  

After ordering I went off to find the "facilities".  I found the "W/C" and stepped inside to what looked like a fancy parlor.  Then I tried to figure out which next door was for the girls and which was for the boys, they're not marked like back home.  I chose wrong but luckily there was no-one else around.  But for reference, in case you are wondering how it's done here, the one on the left is for girls and the one on the right is for boys. 

Not to disappoint you all on my daily food feasts, here's lunch...

I guess I should talk about work some since you all think all I'm doing is eating and critiquing food.  Today was a day of research on e-government and what the objective is for e-government in Ukraine.  We've broken up the work to be more efficient, Paul and Shiva do research and I collect their data and pull it into a file and try to organize it all for now.  We had a productive meeting with our Ukranian team and each time we chat we get a little more comfortable with each other and the pace of conversation since so much needs to be translated.  Artiom our translator is a third-year student at the university and is amazing at translating for us.  Artem (seems it's a popular name) we discovered is the guy responsible for deploying e-government and Olexiy is responsible for the e-government strategy.

Seven of the team met for dinner at 7:30 p.m. and we tried a new spot, a French restaurant which, by comparison to other places we've eaten, quite pricey.  They had several risottos on the menu which is a favorite of mine but I wanted to try something I've never had and since I had a big lunch, I opted for something small, fish, Dorado.  Well I got a fish like none I've ever seen before.  Yes - that's it - the whole meal.  I've never had a whole fish before, they've always come as a filet.  You should have seen the look on my face.  How are I supposed to eat a whole fish, it has all the bones still in it.  Hmmm..... Thank goodness we have Darren on our team and that he was with us for dinner because he looked at me and said, "Would you like me to cut it for you so you can eat it?"  Uh, yeah!  So here is Darren, cutting up my food for me.  Thank you Darren, you're a lifesaver, literally.  I managed to tackle the second side of the fish and as you can see there wasn't much left.  It was a tasty meal but I think I prefer how it comes at home.

Darren is Asian as he tells us, he's Chinese but was born in Malaysia.  It's been very interesting getting to know the team on a personal level.  Tonight's topic was about courtship and marriage and he was mentioning that when he decides to marry, he would need to gift about $3,000 USD to the bride's parents.  It's a cultural practice that he's not happy with, it's not the money, is the payment for a bride.  Randy, you got off cheap!