11:57 - Kotovsk

It's a 11:57 and we're in Kotovsk (it basically means Catovsk!). 

I'm not sure if this is a legit station....  but it's a nice spot to watch trains! 

Kotovsk is next to a very rustic and ethnic village, which looks very gloomy now, but take my word for it, it's rather funky. Like that cow chillin' on the railways (I didn't get a chance to snap it though...)

Some scenery around

Man, this trip is taking so long.... but the scenery is rewarding. 

Those grain containers aren't really scenery, but the were pretty awesome.

Another bad thing with this trip is the constant loss of signal, thus no internet... Oh well, who needs internet when you got books :D 

8:09 - Vinitsya

Internet is slowly disappearing, and sleep is taking over. Fighting the terrible urge to ditch everything and take a nap, I inspect Vintsya, a famous city with a rather shabby train station. 

Actually, I seen worse. This is pretty nice.

Leaving, I managed to take a shot if the city itself.

Sadly I was to lazy to take more pics, but belive me the rest of the city is pretty!   Wonder what I'll see next....

4:57- Kiev

At 4:50 am we got on the train and met a very sleepy coordinator who showed us to our places. After 7 minutes of utter chaos we final set sail! Don't you just love the tingly sensation you get when something as massive as a train starts moving! 

That's the station. It's pretty empty but still...

The massive clock tower with huge letters on it spelling out "Kiev".

Watching the sun rise on a train. That's cool! 

From Kiev to Chishineu in 10 hours!

Hi! 

I'm leaving for Chishineu, Moldova, today and the trip will take us about 8 hours to pass Ukraine and 2 hours to pass Transnistria and Moldova! 

I plan to take photos of every train station I see and every pretty landscape. 

It's 5:07 am a now, we'll be arriving in Chishineu at 5:50 pm. Hope everything goes ok! 

Ps: since you will see lots of short posts today, have your eyes peel for the first train station in the series! 

And keep in mind that all the photos are taken on a moving train with an iPhone... No good quality guaranteed. 

Awesome Wedding!

Driving by we saw the coolest wedding ever- Motorbike Wedding! 

And who said that all wedding had to be traditional and boring?! 

Lots of peeps honked and the bride happily waved back, while the groom was busy being badass. 

The best part were the Best Mans' leather pants. They were really cool, shiny, leather pants. 

Apart from the awesome fleet of motorbikes, they were followed by a vintage Volga 21 (forgive me if I'm wrong, I'm not good with cars....).

I though it was too cool to be left unmentioned, right? 

Ermergerd! A Cloud!

Ok, I know it's not Kiev, it's Bila Tserkva. And I know this blog is called KIEV Tonight, but the view was so pretty, I felt like it was my duty to share this with you. Note that as I'm writing this, I'm actually stuck in a thunderstorm, the rain is so strong that we can barley see what's ahead our car!

Anyway, I'm glad to announce that now that my consultants assembled and that the next HipHunt post is in the works!

 

Have some Doge to brighten your day! 

 

HipHunt Part 1 feat. The Doge

Ha! There we go. Up there you see a sneaky shot of the first victim of the HipHunt (don't mind the leaves and twigs- I used them a camouflage...). 

This pic was taken during an intense sneaking mission with my consultant- the Doge! (She's a hipster too- you can tell by the flower crown!) 

With the help of Doge, we found this place. She can smell hipsters miles away, which is natural, just look at that adorable dog-face! 

What you see is Cafe Charlotte, a super fancy place for super fancy hipsters. Theses super fancy scarf-fans are usually middle-class Americans and rich Ukrainians. But the hipsterness of these guys is just over the top! 

 

If ya really want to look at those rich hipsters go there! You can wait for the full report of my hunting mission later. AND get your spying binoculars out for part 2 of the HipHunt! 

Woohoo! Hipsters!

Every city has hipsters! But in Kiev, hipsters are like a rare species of Homo Sapiens, you gotta hunt for 'em. That's why I devised an incredibly evil plan- THE HIPSTER LAIR or WHERE THE HIPSTER LIVES (I'm still working on the name...). Basically, I'll walk around with my hipster-consultant and document all the places hipsters hang out! 

If you're a hipster- you will find a place to polish your sweet Ray Ban glasses and complain about the mainstreamness of the world. If you're not one- you can, I dunno, spy on hipsters...? 

Anyway, seeing that my mission is rather time-consuming, I plan on posting the data and research results sometime this week! 

Have no fear! Your friendly blogger iPhone Guy is here! Post any requests or stuff down in the comment section, I'll respond, because most of the time I have nothing better to do.... 

P.s: please don't hate me, hipsters! 

Creepy City Centre

In most big cities, when you're in the centre, you know you're in the centre, it has that city-centre-ish feel, but in Kiev you never know what you will find walking around the main streets! For example:

It doesn't look like it much, but this abandoned old house is just 2 minutes away from the ill-famous Maidan (the city and revolution centre!). 

I don't know for sure, but I got a feeling that this was quite a fancy house before. Right now it's occupied by homeless people and drug dealers...

If you look closely at the photo, you will see that the second floor is occupied by people who collect plastic bags.

I got a creepy story related to that place. One time, when I was walking by with my sister, we heard a painful dog cry. The dog was so loud that we had to break into that house and set it free! After multiple failures (trying to climb the fence, wall and the nearby tree), we decided to try to go inside the house. When we finally found the main entrance, we were very disappointed with our discovery. Apparently the owner of the house was sued for financial fraud years ago, and the place turned into a dump... the doors were locked and haven't been reopened since. I honestly don't know how did the people in there get in, but we sure didn't know how to.
I hope that that dog is ok, because the people who live nearby said that they heard it cry before. I think calling the pet-saving people is the best idea at the moment.
well, enough about sad dog stories! My point is that Kiev is unexpected in every single way, walking around you might find anything!

The Olympic Stadium

Well here it is, the Olympic Stadium, AKA "Olimpiyskiy National Sports Complex". Renovated in 2011, this little baby is a dream of most football fans all around Kiev. 

I'm not much of a sports person, but I think it's still pretty cool! I've been there on a few occasion, and I certainly recommend you to go just for the sake of it if you get the chance.  

Since I;m just a guy with an iPhone, I felt like it was my duty to take a hipster-ish photo.

iPhone hipster shot

But if you're more into fancy stock photos, have a pretty sky-shot:

fancy stock image

Kiev Tonight

Welcome to Kiev Tonight, a blog dedicated to Kiev!
You may know Kiev by the latest events happening here and around, but the purpose of this blog is to show Kiev as it is.
Kiev as seen by the iPhone guy. With photos made by a guy with an iPhone. Simple and true...
So, tune in for some low-quality photos of builds and places you probably don't have anything to do with!
Keep your eyes peeled for my first corner of Kiev posted.