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The beautiful city of Kiev is the ideal place to meet your future partner. The romantic atmosphere of the many onion domed churches and cathedrals add to the charm of this city. Once the capital of the first Slavic empire, it has a history dating back 1,500 years.
The Kiev Rus stretched from the Black Sea to the Danube. This city has seen many waves of invaders, which is reflected in the mix of appearances of the inhabitants.
Built on the steep sides of hills overlooking the wide Dnepr River, Kiev is also a busy port serving ships travelling South to the Black Sea nr Odessa, or North through Belarus towards Russia and the Baltic States.
If you visit the city in summer you may wish to visit the extensive woods and sandy beaches, which line the river, practically in the centre of the city.
Anyone expecting drab poverty will be very pleasantly surprised. I've lifted a quote from a book by Mark Llewellyn, describing his experience riding a bicycle from Sevastopol, on the Crimea to the Kola Peninsula in the Arctic. During his stay in Kiev he took a ride on the Metro, and was affected by the depth of the tunnels but he continued:
'Once on the train I began to relax and to examine my companions more closely. There were sandy haired Slavs and dark skinned Mongols, Northerners with alabaster skin and cyanic eyes.
The dowdiness, which I had expected was missing. Instead they dazzled each other with tangerines and limes and iridescent stripes. Men of all ages wore Hawaiian shirts and baseball caps, and younger women flaunted their bodies in mini-skirts and see-through blouses, which showed off their lacy bras.
It passed my mind that I was seeing the fruits of new-found Capitalism but I found out later that Kievians had always dressed like this, it was just that you had to catch them in season, like cherries.'
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