Walking through the metro, Friday afternoon in November. First I go down the stairs, dodging people, passing a small, non-descript puppy drugged and sleeping on the stairs, small hair clips in his fur, a sign in front of it asking for money to be put in a hat. Then past the pretty girls, slender, teetering on heeled boots with zippers, dangling bits of fur and heels thin and pointy enough to be weapons.

The underpass is crowded with people smoking, selling flowers, tables full of random electronics. I pass the long line of maybe 15 flower sellers, a woman seated on a low stool wrapping a new bouquet. In front of the line of flowers are women beckoning to passersby, “Come see our roses. Please look at this bouquet.”

The underground is a warren of tunnels, rows of shops set into the walls, small fast food restaurants selling baked potatoes, pizza and Ukrainian food. After the flower sellers, I pass by the entrance to the metro station, Maidan Nezhalesnosti. People stream in and out of the entrance and exit doors, the heavy glass doors that are nicknamed the “widow-makers.”

Along the glass wall that separates the entrance and exit to the metro is empty but for a line of people lounging against it, looking rather worse for the wear, smoking, drinking, some visibly drunk. Today there’s a young woman holding an older woman who is crying and repeating a phrase I can’t catch amid the low hum of thousands of conversations around me.

Past the metro doors, the portrait artists have their easels and portfolios set up. Amidst the photorealist portraits of attractive women and adorable children is the occasional model. I’ve never seen anyone sit for a drawing but someone must sometime.

After the artists is a table full of partially cured sheepskins, white and black, one cream color.

Soon I’m already at the stairs leading back up the street, having crossed a major intersection diagonally via the underground passage. The night is cold and slightly foggy.

It is just after work so many people are walking along Kyiv’s main street, Khreshiatik, talking, sitting at small outdoor cafes, smoking and drinking beer or coffee. The kiosks are on the right hand side, while shops line the left side. Khreshiatik is famous for the chestnut trees that line the pedestrian part.

Across from Tsum (the former Soviet department store, Central Universal Store), Christopher is waiting for me. We walk to a local restaurant for dinner. OK, I’m feeling homesick, so we sup at TGIF on substandard American fare in a kitschy decorated restaurant with the standard techno music washing over us all.