KIEV.

The City Torn for Freedom.

Captains Log Day 24 – 24/01/14 5:34pm.
Location: Conti hotel Vilunius.

Once again we challenged time and reached the airport 4 minutes before
check in closed. I guess the act of rebellion we had witnessed on the streets
over the few days settled in our hearts, or it could simply be the bottles of
vodka we drank till 3am the night before.

Kiev felt like a forgotten city, in which when you walk the streets
talk to you, the grandeur and the historical significance of the city yells
messages that only your eyes can hear. The beauty lay in the churches and the
castles of this magnificent place.

This is the first city my Co-Captain and I arrived which was covered in
snow. The temperature dipped to minus 20 degrees during the night, safe to say
our drinks were kept cold.

We arrived at possibly the worst time to visit. The streets filled with
rioters and civil tensions at peak. My Co-Captain and I had to explore. We
walked the streets which to our amazement were barricaded everywhere by
protestors to keep the Military out. There were people everywhere, some on the
barricade out posts, preparing food and supplies in tents and others simply
chopping wood for fire, they all had tasks in this revolution. We walked to a
point and stood there, after 5 minutes of standing there a local asked us where
we were from, a conversation ensued, in the end we discovered we had been
loitering at the area which was most prone to Military attack! It was then very
kind of him to take us to where the actual fighting had been occurring.

At this point we saw things that resembled a movie, Molotov cocktails
being thrown, fireworks being shot at police, raging citizens, fire, chanting
and finally Tear Gas being unleashed. We carried on observing. I joined the
chanting. We saw the home made catapult brought in, that thing was insane. It
was fun and games till the Tear Gas hit, after coughing our lungs out we
decided to head back home.

What surprised us was that aside from these crazy protests it was
business as usual, you could walk the streets safely and go about your daily
activities, people were even carrying batons and baseball bats in shopping
centres. A fascinating sight. However a heap of places had been shut due to
this. We carried on and bought rabbit skin hats (haters going to hate) and fit
in with the locals.

The following day we visited one of the scariest places in the world.
The Chernobyl Nuclear plant. Words can not describe the utter eeriness of this
place. As you walked around the abandoned town (previously home to 50k people)
you could see how lives were shattered when they had been given 2 hours to
evacuate never to see the homes again.

We had several radiation checks throughout the tour to ensure our
radiation levels were safe and asked not to touch anything (which I admittedly
broke several times). My Co-Captain also decided is a good idea to pee on the
plant which I didn’t disagree with. We left this place which now had urine on
it, deeply disturbed and decided to head out later.

That day happened to be the first day the law was going in action. It
was also the independence day. People were going crazy. 3 protesters have been
shot and 2 NBC reporters have been shot at point blank range. It was crazy the
streets were filled with people. Even the bus didn’t drop us home. Reception
has told us not to go out anywhere.

As an executive decision and it being our last night in Ukraine we
decided against common advice. My Co-Captain started getting ready and I went
to get cash out. As I walked to the ATM I heard a gun shot. I hurried back to
find out another protestor had been killed. Fearing death the executive
decision was reconsidered and revised.

KIEV: The City Torn for Freedom