In case you have been hiding under your duvet all winter, which is quite likely, you will have felt the buzz about the recession wherever you are. And now mindthegap can confirm that yes there really is a recession and Kiev is definitely feeling the squeeze.
Nevermind not being able to buy butter at our local supermarket and a dearth of decent fresh fruit and vegetables because import taxes are being buggered about again. Nevermind the nice fruit and veg lady and man in our underpass disappearing overnight. Forget about the endless clothes shops with closing down sales.
No, all that pales into insignifance when you are faced with this:
fizz at the opera
Last night Little Miss Moi and I went to the beautiful Opera house and saw a fabulous performance of Swan Lake. Half the fun of the opera are the perfectly spaced bar breaks. If you are clever and can situate yourself near a door opening onto the bar area to be first in the queue your experience is greatly enhanced.
So being experienced pizzers – well, LMM still has her post baby licence plates on but she managed to do the Dairy Queen before she left home so was free to indulge in a few drops of fizz – we were first in the queue every time.
Despite the high gained from watching men in tights, our spirits were dampened at the bar. When mindthegap first arrived in Kiev one could get a decent sized glass of fizz for near on ten grivnia (about $1.50). Now you get about 2 drops for near on $4. AND the (first) glass was flat. In the good old days one munched on smoked salmon sandwiches but last night one manky bag of M&Ms was shared between two.
Hells bells if this isn’t the clearest indicator of a recession tell us what is.
