Journal was written by one of the student of the LIYO LIYO Concert Tour Journal July 16, 2007 Day 20 Our hotel was quite nice. We had a quick rehearsal in the morning, and the entire afternoon was set for touring. We visited this place where it is basically arrows, stating how many kilometers are to the neighbor areas. We stopped briefly on the historical Odessa Steps. Matt got a leaflet that said: "The soldiers and the officers of the USA -- the NATO! We demand you to leave immediately our sacred country. The country which we inherit from the winners over the fascism. Our grandfather gave their life in the battle of Moscow, Stalingrad, Kursk, in the battle for the Dneiper, defending the cities Odessa, Sevastopol, Kiev and Kerch. We are the descedents of the heroses who took Berlin in the sring of 1945 and you haven othing to teach usw, you who are responsible for the victims in Yugoslavia, Iraq and Afghanistan. You are the participants and the representatives of the aggressive organization the NATO that has been extirpating the peoples of the world more than 50 years. At the public referendum ofr this year more than 90% of our people opposed the Ukrainian entry into the NATO. Go home from our country! Don't desecrate our millennial culture and the state system! The USA -- the NATO go home from our Land! No to the Ukranian entry into the NATO! The Ukrainian union of the soviet officers." Of course, we thought it was quite amusing and false. We had a .....dinner; the performance at the Odessa Philharmonic Hall was quite ..... ..it was a very important performance. Hopefully, the perforamcne at Yalta would be ...... LIYO Concert Tour Journal July 15, 2007 Day 19 Today was basically a one-day bus ride. After we checked out of the Black Sea Hotel, we had a 12-hour bus ride to Yalta. We stopped for a quick lunch, an odorous stop and a practically unncecessary stop at the woods for the men to pee in the woods. We arrived at a magnificent hotel, Hotel Yalta, at 8:30 PM, after approximately 12 hours bus ride. We had a buffet dinner, and the day ended with a curfew of 10:30pm. LIYO Concert Tour Journal July 14, 2007 Day 18 Today we finished riding the ferry. Odessa turns out to be a very interesting place. We got on one bus first. Then, the people left behind went on another bus. The hotel, in my opinion, is definitely a four-star hotel. Its rooms are magnificent; only its recreational activates, including the Internet, is shockingly expensive. After we put our luggage in our rooms and cleaned up, we walked around town for lunch in a mall. I had pizza with ham and a ......... warm Pepsi. At four o' clock, we all met back at the lobby of the mall. The lunch was actually quite excellent, since breakfast was quite unavailable when I went up to get some snacks at the ferry, but the cashier told me to wait. He then closed the store, so I just watched the movie Transformers instead. After lunch was touring. We went to the Opera house first, where a Russian native tour guide told us about the still-renovated opera house through a translator. In my opinion, it was a long, long narration. Some people, to the best of my knowledge, zoned out. After all, the scenery seemed to be much nicer than rather the history of the Opera House stated by a monotonous translator. She left us behind, to my relief, while we went to the music school. To my surprise, David Oistrakh studied there! Many photos and pictures of Oistrakh lit around the wall. I was so surprised, as with many other people! In addition, with the consent of most of the orchestra's members, the person who played all sorts of woodwind instruments looked very familiar, but no one could put a hand in that matter. Kiku said that he looked like Captain Kangaroo, while Andrew said he looked like the Wizard of Oz. The music school held a performance for us. There were many dancers, and there was one performance where there was a female saxophonist (tenor) and hyer female accompanist. We went with a former sea captain to tour quickly around town. Then came a ......dinner. Especially me, the salads and even bottled water were .......... Its rice and chicken were ....and dessert contained sour wild cherries. We were entertained by Ukrainian folk dames that sounded very similar to the ones we saw at the music school. The violinist was quite good, but he looked quite androgynous. We returned to the hotel, with a very early curfew of 10:30pm. Tomorrow will be the wonderful concert, with definitely many distinguished guests. LIYO Concert Tour Journal July 13, 2007 Day 17 Today was another free day. After an organized checkout out of Hotel Neptun, we went around town with group-s of varying sizes. There were groups that went to the post office, bank or simply shopping and lunch. At 4:00 PM, LIYO met at the cathedral and we had a last-minute tour of Varna. We first went to the Aquarium, which was supposed to be a very exciting place. However, the horrendous Aquarium charged student rates of 1.60 levv, to begin with. Then, the Aquarium was impossibly dark, making it practically impossible to take pictures or video. Some specimens were dead, making the museum more morbid. No positive comments described the Aquarium. Near the Aquarium was a very interesting map of Bulgaria, portrayed in a rock form, in a children's playground. After that, we went to the Archaeological Museum, where everybody looked forward. Bobbi said that it closes at 6, but the Museum, which actually closed at 5, denied any entry. Dejected, we went into the Sea Garden, but it was not exciting, unfortunately. We had a mediocre dinner of salad, relatively good bread, something with cheese, a fatty chicken leg and a vanilla ice cream. We split up into groups afterward. I was in the "meandering" group, as Katie so kindly puts it. After we wandered around in the dark, we went to buy some snacks. Then, our mini-group split up even further, and we went onto the buses to go to the ferry. The ferry was in an airplane-style. The chairs, .............., could not be reclined. I fell asleep around 2 AM. I woke up with a crick in my neck, being that I slept with my head on the palm of my left arm, where my left elbow was resting on the windowsill. I woke up, actually, to the beginning of a Russian version (bootleg) of "Transformers." From prior knowledge and tidbits of English, I believed that the movie was about a boy who recently bought a shockingly beautiful yellow car. It then changed into a robot, and the robot told him that they are invading from another planet. That part reminded me of "The War of the Worlds," with Tom Cruise starring. At the end, the robots were dropped into the sea. In my opinion, it was not a bad movie. We got off the ferry, with some people claiming that they were seasick. Now, I wait in the seaport, waiting for further instructions. LIYO Concert Tour Journal July 12, 2007 Day 16 This day was quite relaxing. It began with a relatively mediocre breakfast, in my opinion. After that, we all trekked out to the Horizonts Hotel, where a beach connected with the Black Sea stood. Umbrellas filled literally the whole beach, and space under each umbrella costs 2 levv for the whole day. My friends and I tried to find a leader around 12:30 PM in order to go out for lunch. I settled with a spaghetti "bolonaise" and a loaf of bread. As I was eating, thunder boomed. A few seconds after, rain spontaneously began to pour. Amusingly, everyone started to panic, and the waiters and waitresses scrambled to keep the table dry. Everyone tried to take cover from the gradual downpour. Miracously, after approximately 30 minutes, the rain stopped. After the beach fiasco, LIYO met in the Grand Casino International(e) Hotel, where we boarded the buses and left for the hotel. At 7:00, we went to the Horizonts Hotel, once again, and had a relatively excellent dinner, with chicken, fried cheese, and a melon-chocolate-vanilla ice-cream for dessert. After dinner, we voluntarily went to watch a rock concert for about 15 minutes, and we went on the buses. There, Erica gave apparently ............ announcements. It turns out that the supposedly wonderful boat ride to Odessa, Ukraine, required at the maximum 15 pounds in terms of luggage, and that we were traveling in the economy class, which is technically a trivial matter. After a curfew at 11, the day, in my opinion, ended quite wonderfully. Long Island Youth Orchestra, 45th Season, 2007 "Around The Black Sea" Concert Tour to Greece, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Georgia and Turkey. .

• published: 14 Jul 2007
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