Where is West?
We started our Ukrainian adventure 18 months ago in a small village an hour north of the nation’s capital, constantly curious about the location of our future home. I would explore the corners of the map with my newly minted grandparents, having them share tales from different pockets of Ukraine over warm compote and stale ginger cookies. My upstairs grandma, Hanna, would recount her childhood in the Carpathians in a quick lilting Romanian accent while her best friend, Halya, would share the former glory of her life in central Ukraine, grounded in industry and life near the river. Often the conversation would drift towards the distant “West.” We were told, “In Western Ukraine people think differently, they act differently…it’s a whole different world.” When we were finally given a place to point to on the map we thought we might just find out.
In our first weeks in Shepetivka we were dazzled by the brightly lit new cafes, free WiFi, french fries and pop music; the shops filled with goods from Poland, Italy, Germany and beyond; people driving Toyotas, speaking Ukrainian and discussing their hopes for economic reform.
Although monuments of its Soviet-past lingered, this place was decidedly closer to the “Ukraine” we were told awaited us. Just 20 miles east of the seemingly forgotten Molotov-Ribbentrop line, our city was proud of its strategic importance in Ukraine’s tumultuous history. But it didn’t take long before the weeds began peaking through the cultural cracks. When asked which Ukrainian cities we’d visited our new colleagues would reminisce their own times in the idyllic West; the beauty of Ternopil’s lake in the summer, the modernity of Lutsk’s infrastructure and once again, how Lviv was the cultural epicenter of “a whole different world.”
Our first blush of Lviv proved to be a whirlwind of expectations met, Ukrainian flags flying with the lighthearted confirmation that Ukraine belongs among the gems of Eastern Europe. A cultural pride oozing from the seams of every café, street performer and trident laden gift shop. At once a bigger Krakow, a smaller Prague, and a place that Ukrainians can be proud to showcase to foreign tourists.
But after passing through a few more times (and history books) it was hard to ignore the emphatic presence of UPA flags, the Bandera Bros lurking around tourist squares to strike up debates with foreigners about their rustbelt “civil war” and the times I’ve seen Ukrainians shamed for the language they spoke. Like much of the current world, it became hard to ignore Ukraine’s precipitous tread through the undertow of populism.
All this leaves me fascinated by where exactly we live on this nebulous map.
During a recent conversation about our holiday schedule with my Vice Principal, a jovial Turkmeni woman who came to Shepetivka 30 years ago with her Polish military officer, she noted that it was common to have off Good Friday in Western Ukraine and Easter Monday elsewhere. Befuddled, I looked beseechingly at the history teacher who had overheard us and asked, “So where is West?”
My VP smirked, flipped her hand over like a pre-Lenten pancake and replied:
Не такий, не такий.
(Neither here, nor there.)