«All the People Necessary for Happiness.» A Ukrainian Summer.
Honest stories from the rivers, forests, and mountains of western Ukraine
«Fantastic. That was why we came here. So we can keep saying ‘fantastic.’»
As September begins, we send you some stories of summertime Ukrainian adventures, as observed by American Joe Lindsley. Maybe you cannot travel so easily these days but in these stories you can take a small journey. Throughout, the names are changed to give people a freedom to speak authentically.
«In the rivers and mountains, you can be clean inside. You can be true with you.»
Finding the Fantastic in District 13
FOUR FRIENDS traveled to the ancient Carpathian mountain land of the Hutsul people. They battled rivers and sojourned on horseback. Excerpt:
THAT NIGHT, the last one, back at the cabin in the glen, in the ubiquitous Ukrainian enclosed octagonal dining hut, we looked at our feast of steak and mushrooms surrounding the fire pit in the middle of the table. We were unusually silent, a little last-night sadness. Petro raised his glass:
«To the four happiest people in Ukraine,» he said.
Soon storytelling and laughter competed with the voice of the water winding around us. Olha noted that the day before, singing on my horse, I had «looked like a Looney Tunes character, just happily plodding along and singing,» like one of those characters with birds circling about the head.
«Because I found inspiration,» I said. «It was all … I wish I had another word besides ‘fantastic’ to say, but–»
«But that is why we came here,» Petro said. «So we can keep saying ‘fantastic.’«
«All the People Necessary for Happiness.»
AMID A STRANGE symphony of sights and sounds, Americans and Ukrainians talk about life while standing in a river and walking in a forest. Excerpt:
«This forest was once full of good witches and bad witches,» said Tetiana, always adept at crafting some fairy tales.
«Who was more afraid of each other?» I asked, as we walked back to the psychedelic green of the Zarinok. «The good witches or the bad?»
«Ah the bad were more afraid.»
«I would think it would be the other way around.»
«No,» Tetiana said, «because the good witches can harness the power of nature. They’re on the same side as the trees and mushrooms and flowers. Nature is more powerful in the end than all weapons and evil in the world.»
Two Days at Dniester Canyon.
«Down by the river people are happy to give,» sings Creedence Clearwater Revival in «Proud Mary.» An American discovered the truth of this in the Dniester River Canyon. Excerpt:
As the singing-raft approached the shore for disembarkation, the rafters cried out «Слава Україні [Slava Ukrayini]!» «Glory to Ukraine!»
And from the shore people returned the volley: «Героям слава [Heroyam slava]!» «Glory to the heroes!»
«I have an idea,» Taras told me. «Why don’t we build a raft, and sail it from Lviv region, a three-days journey, to this beach. It will be a great adventure.»
Later on, I heard more noises coming around the bend.
An assemblage of rafts headed toward us, against the backdrop of the painted cliffs. People were jumping off the back and swimming. Music was playing. A few sat upon a hammock. Some of the swimmers began to pull the raft-complex to the shore. They welcomed Taras, Oksana, and I to wade aboard. I said I was American which elevated the welcome.
Soon, I was standing aboard under a canopy at a table for twelve, across from a kitchen area with a grill. A man in a captain’s hat, jovially well into his cups, handed me a shot glass of samohonka and soon there was food. Ah the generosity of the river-people.
We talked and joked in Ukrainian awhile enjoying life on the lovely river, sheltered by the cliffs, in this free pocket of the world, a far cry from the everything I currently read about in the news most everywhere else.
«Why Do People Start Wars?»
Lviv with its cafés and calmer pace of life is a city of conversations, a place to make sense of the world especially in wild times. Excerpt:
“Why do people start wars?” John asked.
My lungs heaved and my eyes grew blurry as we ran a narrow forest trail at the base of Lviv’s Bald Mountain. This summoned in mind the madness of Modest Mussorgsky’s «Night on Bald Mountain,» featured in a ghoulish scene of Disney’s The Sorcerer’s Apprentice. In my time in DC; later, in New York; I felt like the sorcerer’s apprentice, a little mickey mouse to those people who have the influence to start, stop, continue wars.
Because we were running I had an excuse not to answer swiftly: breathing. But I soon mustered some words:
«Sometimes, I think Afghanistan has been the temple where we sacrifice our blood to keep our planes in the sky,» I said.
«People Need to be Scared of Being Fake»
«Maybe your mission here is to write the truth. Maybe you can’t tell the truth in America. Here, in Ukraine we don’t often get the truth, but we still want it. So start telling it.» Excerpt:
I told my friend about the Hemingway story, the Snows of Kilimanjaro, the dying writer regretting not having written stories, and about the French girl I had just met, who was sad because she was not writing.
«Man,» Petro said, with seriousness.
«What?»
He pointed to a portrait painting behind him. It was a cross between Bemelmans and Van Gogh, whimsical but sad, part of a temporary art exhibit at the bar.
«No way,» I said. «I hadn’t noticed.» It was Hemingway. The old master sat in a chair, sorta smiling down on us.
«See? The signs are all around. Just do it.»
I said nothing, thinking, making sense of it.
Petro spoke again:
«This is the problem: People do not say what they want to say, because they are scared of being wrong. But no! People need to be scared of being fake. That’s the thing to be scared of: being fake.»
United in Blues. How Music Heals.
Even in the pandemic time, live music has thrived in Lviv. In June, the Leopolis Jazz Fest brought global talent to the city and ignited a summer of jazz—and conversations about music. Excerpt:
THE WEATHER was unusually hot, and the LV Cafe jazz club felt like a proper juke joint in New Orleans or Mississippi: steamy. Soon we entered a lucid dream in that humid, ancient cellar: the jazz, the heat, the potato pancakes with porcini mushrooms combined for a psychedelic effect.
Local Lviv jazz cats were playing toward the edges of known music with visiting Americans—including a pianist for one of the world’s top voices. A saxophone player, one of the LV regulars, showed up after a gig at another place and together the musicians played a free-range rendition of «Autumn Leaves,» with trumpet and saxophone challenging and complementing each other as the dreamlike piano infused a heavenly sweetness.
«What’s your favorite country in the world to play music?» I later asked the visiting American singer, who lives in Europe. Eight or so others, all musicians, mostly Ukrainian, sat around a table.
«Ukraine.»
«Why?»
«People here get it.»
«What do you mean?»
«I think no other country appreciates my music like Ukraine,» he said. «Ukrainians have felt pain, they know suffering, so they can appreciate my music, which also comes from a place of pain. The blues, the music of black Americans. Here, they suffered famine, they suffered under communism, lived through revolutions. We suffered in America, years of racism and oppression. That gave birth to the blues.»
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Lviv Now: Showing How Strong a Community Can Be When Creating Quality Changes Together
LVIV NOW created by Ukrainian and American journalists, brings you the universal ideas of a vibrant city, a place of culture, freedom, and innovation. Join the conversation about how we can build better cities and democracies.
Lviv Now is a project of Tvoe Misto (“Your City”), Lviv’s solutions-focused media hub, working with American journalist Joe Lindsley.
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