I must say upfront that my Ukrainian is not very good, in fact, it’s effectively nonexistent. It is a Slavic language with Cyrillic script and often displays combinations of letters in words than seem impossible to pronounce. With that introduction let me begin.

We arrived in Ukraine without much delay or hassle. Once on the ground at Boryspil Airport, located on the outskirts of Kiev, we negotiated our way through passport control and customs without any trouble. We were met by our very happy and enthusiastic friends and hosts in Ukraine, Vera and Vladimir Kruglov.

After the obligatory photos at the airport, we jumped in our host’s car and began our tour in earnest. Not a minute to waste. Allane and I were thankful for the movement. If we had paused we may have just decided to take a nap.

We knew it would be a no-nonsense holiday after we were handed a binder with our itinerary and descriptions of each place we were to visit. Our first stop was Pereiaslav-Khmelnytskyi, an important city in Ukraine’s history and now home to one of Ukraine’s cultural heritage sites.

I could regale you with details of the significance of the location as an early diplomatic center (mid-17th C) and site of a prominent Cossack defensive outpost, but I won’t. It is now famous for being a “museum city” with some 30 museums clustered in the area.

We went to the Folk Architecture Museum and wandered through trails of homes, churches, and displays that represented the variety of Ukraine’s rich and varied culture. It was clear this is a point of pride for Ukrainians.

We topped the day off by arriving at Vladimir and Vera’s apartment in downtown Kiev. Our settling in was going to have to wait until we enjoyed a fabulous meal with many trimmings and ample amounts of beer and vodka. One just can’t celebrate without such ceremony, as Vladimir reminded us.

It was clear Vera had cooked up a storm and gathered the requisite delicacies and traditional dishes to make sure they properly blessed our visit.

We toasted our friendship, the ladies, our collective health, and on and on. We quickly learned that the act of toasting is an art and one not to be taken lightly. It was beyond any form of hospitality that we are accustomed to, but so wonderfully enjoyed.

Our next adventure, Eastern Europe! We’ll spend nearly 3 weeks traveling from Kiev and Odessa in Ukraine, to Istanbul, Turkey to Bucharest, Romania and a neat side trip to Transylvania, and end with a return visit to Kiev. This has been a trip we’ve talked about taking since leaving Viet Nam some 14 years ago. The friends and colleagues we made and had in Hanoi opened us up to a part of the world we had little knowledge of. Be it the gracious dinners with numerous toasts, or the open arms and the “what can I do to help you” attitude whenever we met, Allane and I made wonderful and, now we know, lifelong friends from such places as Bulgaria, Romania, and Ukraine. To be able to visit these friends in their homes and nations is something that we feel very lucky to be able to do. Next stop, Kiev!