A Scale - Finally!
Today was fun! My Phillips Sonicare electric toothbrush stopped working - it didn't seem to be able to take and keep a charge anymore. So I decided to see if I could find a replacement. I went across the street to the big appliance store where I had bought my electric kettle and toaster oven. They only had Braun - no Sonicare (and of course I have 6 brush heads for the Sonicare that I bought before I left and brought with me!). I asked if they had any idea where I could buy the Philips and they suggested MKC, a huge electronics store down the street - I had actually gone to MKC yesterday to look around at because Ed had told me that this was where he and Gennady went to buy the shredder and that I would really like it! So off I went, and they
only had Braun electric toothbrushes as well. BUT I found a really cheap ($8) bathroom scale! So I got it. I asked the salesman if he had any suggestions about my toothbrush (which I had brought with me to show the sales people). He gave me the card of a repair place, also right on Pushkinskaya and very close to our apartment. They were really nice, and the guy there spoke English. He suggested that I might have to replace the rechargeable battery in the toothbrush and sent me to Number 7 Pushkinskaya - not too far away (and it just happened that I would have to pass my favorite Perogie store on the way there!). I found 7 Pushkinskaya - it definitely was not a battery store, butI thought I had seen something that was just before Number 7. And I was right - Number 5 Pushkinskaya is a GREAT store - everything you could possibly want in the way of batteries, extension cords, surge protectors, transformers, etc. They were wonderful. They took a long time trying to figure out the problem. I had guessed that maybe I had destroyed the charger by plugging it into the 210 volt outlet here with a simple plug adapter but no transformer. I had just assumed that an item like this would be designed to take both voltages (like an electric razor or laptop) with no need for a transformer. But when I looked at the bottom of the charger, sure enough it said 120 Volt - no mention of 210. And that was in fact what had happened. So my charger is kaput - and needlessly so, because of course I had brought a transformer (2, in fact) with me to the Ukraine. Oh well, I had found a few great stores, and had dealt with some really nice people who went to great legnths to help me. I went back to MKC and bought a $25 Braun electric toothbrush (a lot less expensive than the sonicare, which is more than $100 at drugstore.com and, besides, they won't ship here). The best part of the morning was that, when I got back to the apartment and weighed myself, I found that I haven't gained any weight since we left home.
The day hadn't begun so well. Last night I had to make several phone calls to the U.S. to deal with a problem we're having at the house. I thought that we had pretty much solved the problem, but I was still a little anxious about it. For some reason I woke up at 3 a.m. and decided to check my emails - problem still unresolved. But since it was about 5 p.m. at home, I was able to contact everyone I had to call to really put this thing to bed, and after about an hour it looked like all the pieces were falling into place. I went back to bed at about 4:30 and slept until 7:30. I couldn't get back to sleep and I just had to get out of bed. Ed was snoring away, so I got up, checked the emails (no further problems), fed Belle and took her for her morning walk (usually Ed's job) and also walked over to the market to buy milk, because we were completely out and we needed some for our breakfast. The store right next to our apartment was out of milk! The store I usually go to was not yet open (I didn't find this out until after I had walked all the way there); the store next to that was also closed too, but I finally found a market that was open and had a liter of milk. By the time I got home Ed was up and about, and we agreed that the scales of eternal gratitude had tipped way over to my side.
I had my second manicure this afternoon (it lived up to the promise of the first), but discovered that both my manicurist and hair cutter/colorist will be on vacation the entire month of August! YIKES!!! Oh well, I guess I'll have to try Alora (Ed's hair cutter) - and maybe I can even gut it out and wait for Yulia (my stylist/colorist) to come back. Time will tell.
We're all packed (it's amazing how my ideas of what I need have changed - I'm taking my little rollie, which is all I ever take, but it's usually jammed packed for a 10 day trip - this time it's half empty!). Now we just have to see if the taxi I think I ordered shows up. When I called the taxi company and said "Taxi?" they said Dah, Dah, and I said, in Ukrainian that I didn't speak Russian, and she hung up on me!! I called back and tried again and she said "no I don't" and hung up again! I called back again and this time it rang and rang and no one picked up! I gave it a rest for about 5 minutes, called again and when the phone was answered I launched right into my rehearsed lines: "Mayni protribni taxi zofstra horanko o piatti hodini. Ya jevu Chubarya odine, vee ehzed ce Pushkinskaya" She said "dah dah." I said "zofstra" (tomorrow) - she said dah - I said "o piatti hodini ranko" - she said "dah dah" - I said "odine, dva, tray, choterray," and before I got to "piat" (five) she hung up. So again, time will tell. Actually, the tram that stops right in front of our apartment (Number 5) goes right to the airport, but I don't have any idea how frequently it will come on Saturday, let alone Saturday morning at 5 a.m., or how long it will take to get to the airport by trolley. We will definitely take it home - it will cost us a total of 40 kopeki each - 80 kopeki equals about 15 or 16 cents!!
I'm really looking forward to this trip. Dian has already emailed to say that our hotel is very disappointing - it looks like a Marriott in Detroit and it's so far out of the city center that it might as well be in Detroit. But apparently it only takes 10 minutes on the metro to get to the center, and the two metro stops that are near the hotel are renowned for their art. So I think it will be just fine. I can see already that this experience in the Ukraine has made me a lot more flexible about my traveling requirements!!
only had Braun electric toothbrushes as well. BUT I found a really cheap ($8) bathroom scale! So I got it. I asked the salesman if he had any suggestions about my toothbrush (which I had brought with me to show the sales people). He gave me the card of a repair place, also right on Pushkinskaya and very close to our apartment. They were really nice, and the guy there spoke English. He suggested that I might have to replace the rechargeable battery in the toothbrush and sent me to Number 7 Pushkinskaya - not too far away (and it just happened that I would have to pass my favorite Perogie store on the way there!). I found 7 Pushkinskaya - it definitely was not a battery store, butI thought I had seen something that was just before Number 7. And I was right - Number 5 Pushkinskaya is a GREAT store - everything you could possibly want in the way of batteries, extension cords, surge protectors, transformers, etc. They were wonderful. They took a long time trying to figure out the problem. I had guessed that maybe I had destroyed the charger by plugging it into the 210 volt outlet here with a simple plug adapter but no transformer. I had just assumed that an item like this would be designed to take both voltages (like an electric razor or laptop) with no need for a transformer. But when I looked at the bottom of the charger, sure enough it said 120 Volt - no mention of 210. And that was in fact what had happened. So my charger is kaput - and needlessly so, because of course I had brought a transformer (2, in fact) with me to the Ukraine. Oh well, I had found a few great stores, and had dealt with some really nice people who went to great legnths to help me. I went back to MKC and bought a $25 Braun electric toothbrush (a lot less expensive than the sonicare, which is more than $100 at drugstore.com and, besides, they won't ship here). The best part of the morning was that, when I got back to the apartment and weighed myself, I found that I haven't gained any weight since we left home.
The day hadn't begun so well. Last night I had to make several phone calls to the U.S. to deal with a problem we're having at the house. I thought that we had pretty much solved the problem, but I was still a little anxious about it. For some reason I woke up at 3 a.m. and decided to check my emails - problem still unresolved. But since it was about 5 p.m. at home, I was able to contact everyone I had to call to really put this thing to bed, and after about an hour it looked like all the pieces were falling into place. I went back to bed at about 4:30 and slept until 7:30. I couldn't get back to sleep and I just had to get out of bed. Ed was snoring away, so I got up, checked the emails (no further problems), fed Belle and took her for her morning walk (usually Ed's job) and also walked over to the market to buy milk, because we were completely out and we needed some for our breakfast. The store right next to our apartment was out of milk! The store I usually go to was not yet open (I didn't find this out until after I had walked all the way there); the store next to that was also closed too, but I finally found a market that was open and had a liter of milk. By the time I got home Ed was up and about, and we agreed that the scales of eternal gratitude had tipped way over to my side.
I had my second manicure this afternoon (it lived up to the promise of the first), but discovered that both my manicurist and hair cutter/colorist will be on vacation the entire month of August! YIKES!!! Oh well, I guess I'll have to try Alora (Ed's hair cutter) - and maybe I can even gut it out and wait for Yulia (my stylist/colorist) to come back. Time will tell.
We're all packed (it's amazing how my ideas of what I need have changed - I'm taking my little rollie, which is all I ever take, but it's usually jammed packed for a 10 day trip - this time it's half empty!). Now we just have to see if the taxi I think I ordered shows up. When I called the taxi company and said "Taxi?" they said Dah, Dah, and I said, in Ukrainian that I didn't speak Russian, and she hung up on me!! I called back and tried again and she said "no I don't" and hung up again! I called back again and this time it rang and rang and no one picked up! I gave it a rest for about 5 minutes, called again and when the phone was answered I launched right into my rehearsed lines: "Mayni protribni taxi zofstra horanko o piatti hodini. Ya jevu Chubarya odine, vee ehzed ce Pushkinskaya" She said "dah dah." I said "zofstra" (tomorrow) - she said dah - I said "o piatti hodini ranko" - she said "dah dah" - I said "odine, dva, tray, choterray," and before I got to "piat" (five) she hung up. So again, time will tell. Actually, the tram that stops right in front of our apartment (Number 5) goes right to the airport, but I don't have any idea how frequently it will come on Saturday, let alone Saturday morning at 5 a.m., or how long it will take to get to the airport by trolley. We will definitely take it home - it will cost us a total of 40 kopeki each - 80 kopeki equals about 15 or 16 cents!!
I'm really looking forward to this trip. Dian has already emailed to say that our hotel is very disappointing - it looks like a Marriott in Detroit and it's so far out of the city center that it might as well be in Detroit. But apparently it only takes 10 minutes on the metro to get to the center, and the two metro stops that are near the hotel are renowned for their art. So I think it will be just fine. I can see already that this experience in the Ukraine has made me a lot more flexible about my traveling requirements!!
posted by Susan Spivak at 5:20 PM
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