15/10/2007 by admin.

Well it is getting decidedly chilly here - and yet today was supposed to be the great “turn on the communal heating day”. No such luck.  So I have battled with the air conditioning controls and - rather like Back to the future - tweaked the “inverter”. Seems to have worked as I am getting some heat and time seems to have spun backwards… the TV is playing Buggles - Oh… it was before.

Please send fingerless gloves.

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14/09/2007 by admin.

Expectations were high but ultimately the Ukraine team were beaten fair and square by the Italians. The main problem was that the whole team is built up towards Schevchenko but ultimately he is just not good enough. Scheva may have scored a goal in this match but his performance was lacklustre in part due to the fact that he is not match fit and carrying a bit tooooo much weight.

As for atmosphere though, the players could not knock the support they got - every seat had a Ukrainian flag and these were waved furiously throughout.  I even felt a lump in my throat when they played the National Anthem. Must stop chewing gum.

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27/08/2007 by admin.

I have driven on some pretty ropey roads. Komasi to Accra with monkeys hanging on your wing-mirror; The St Bernard Pass with Fiats three abreast trying to overtake a coach, but nothing quite compares to the Kiev - Kharkov road. It lulls you into a false sense of security - dual carriageway till the golden domes disappear in your rear view mirow and then about 500Km of gently undulating straight single lanes interspersed with the odd village and police radar gun team.Along the route small crosses and flowers - most fresh - serve as a continual reminder that air travel is much safer. 30 minutes may pass without incident then…the 50kph lorry belching smoke ahead of you moves out to overtake a 15kph tractor. A convoy of blacked-out jeeps approaches you - headlights blazing. At the crossroads 200m ahead, two oil tankers pull out crossing each other. Behind you a subaru flashes and moves to overtake. You are doing 150kph. You brake slightly. the subaru overtakes, brakes at the overtaking lorry and cuts inside to see the tractor, brakes and swerves onto the hard shoulder throwing up dust. The two tankers pass and like opening curtains, a gap appears through which the jeeps emerge at full tilt. You drop a gear, clear the tractor and lorry squeeze in as the jeeps motor past and wait for the next incident some 20 minutes later: 2 4×4s have collided head on and it is not a pretty sight.

The police are there having a cigarette.

Elsewhere along the route their colleagues are raking in 20 UAH “fines” as you were clearly going 96 kph - it says on his radar gun. Production of a UK driving license causes raised eyebrows and a hesitancy to require the fine - I pass unscathed.

This time.

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