Train to Ternopil

Ukraine, March 2019.

Time for an update from the field. Wednesday and Thursday were all day briefings in a conference centre in Kiev. The content was similar to the briefings in Moldova last month, but there was some material specific to Ukraine and, of course, some observers were on their first mission.

The biggest difference to Moldova is the scale of this EOM. There are 34.5 million voters in Ukraine but 29.8 on the voter list. The discrepancy is because voters in Crimea and in the war zone to the east of the country are effectively disenfranchised.  In Moldova there are only 2.8 million voters. Accordingly there are many more observers. 37,000 Civil Society observers have registered from 71 organisations. Each candidate for the Presidency has the right to appoint a representative in every polling station – there are 39 y candidates. Theoretically there could be 138 observers at a polling station. In Moldova my Area of Observation was in the capital, Chisinau. This time I am deploying to Ternopil, about 420 km west of Kiev, in a group of 24.

It was an early start yesterday morning but our hotel, conveniently, was beside the railway station. We gathered outside at 6.20 am ringed by police. International election observers offer rich pickings for muggers and pick-pockets. We need to carry quite large amounts of cash to pay our drivers and interpreters, meals and perhaps drinks if we are off duty. It would be better really if some of this was done in advance but I think there are contractual issues with drivers and interpreters. One of the UK observers has had 600 euros stolen from her bag already. The police accompanied us until we boarded the train.

Kiev Station, March 2019, picture by Thomas Bell.

It is a 5 1/2 journey to Ternopil on a modern but not fast train with a broader gauge than I’m used to. It reminds me of the trains in Belarus, Russia and Mongolia that I took in 2013. Another similarity is a belt of trees to stop snow drifting across the tracks in winter. I was in the coveted middle seat, flanked by observers from the US.

Ternopil Station, March 22019.

I am truly delighted to be staying in Hotel Ternopil. Ibis in Kiev was like Ibis in Kingston-on-Thames. HT was built circa 1950 and parts had a make-over in the 1980s. It is a delightful example of a largely untouched luxury Soviet hotel with some differences: plumbing and wifi that work almost always. Look at their website but let me add some pictures of my 5th (top) floor room looking over the lake.

Hotel Ternopil, March 2019.
Hotel Ternopil, 5th floor room with a view, March 2019.

More about this lovely town, likened to a Swiss lakeside town by our interpreter, tomorrow. Today Anna and I will be doing a recce of our AoO in Bodhan’s Mercedes estate car wth Tatyana.

5 comments

  1. How exciting.
    Let us imagine that we can summon an author from the past to use Christopher’s adventures for a new novel. Waugh or Greene are a bit too obvious, Kingsley Amis a bit unfair.
    Perhaps a new Ronald Psmith adventure?
    I am sure the learned audience can do much better.

  2. I thought I was the only person left who had a working rotary dial telephone. How utterly delightful to see one gracing the room of a twenty-first century hotel.

    For your information, fellow blogger, The Irish Aesthete, today has featured a landmark you know well: Sir Patrick Bellew’s tower, or Bellew’s folly, if you prefer.

    1. Thank you for drawing my attention to The IA’s post which I would have missed because of Ukrainean election activities.

  3. There were 19000 noble families in the region …almost 3 percent of the population …when the Austrians took over late 18th c. Suitable landscape and opportunities for Patrick Leigh Fermor if he had taken a northern arc and spurned the koshtoys for the Austroschnitzel schloss and dacha world of Lodomerian travel. Robert Byron a possible candidate as well …the Uniate Greek churches and the amazing diversity of Lemburg/Lvov. Both Fermor and Byron excellent candidates for the regions most famous product—Esperanto . Ah,well.

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