Lviv, Ukraine

I decided to hang around Lviv for an additional day in an attempt to see some of the nightlife since last night’s attempt was a failure. I slept in late, but eventually roused myself out of bed, showered, dressed, and went out in to the town around 16:00. I walked to the Lviv National Academic Theater of Opera and Ballet and bought a ticket for the night’s performance of Mozart’s ‘The Magic Flute’. I then walked around the town, first to the Armenian Cathedral, and then to the Market Square (or “Rynok Square”) and the area around the Latin Cathedral. I then found a restaurant to eat dinner and had a chicken wrap, two sausages made with cheese inside, and beer. Next, I walked to a beauty and hair salon and picked up a few elastic bands to tie my now-longish hair in to a small ponytail. Then, I walked back to the Opera House, entered inside, and found my seat for the show, which started at 18:00. Overall, it was a nice performance of ‘The Magic Flute’, but I found too many of the actors were wooden in their delivery; I did think that the actresses who played the Queen of the Night and Pamina both did a great job. Also, the songs were all sung in the original German, but the dialog was in Ukrainian and the subtitles screen was only in Ukrainian; so I could not understand what was being said and was left watching and interpreting the action while enjoying Mozart’s amazing music. After the performance, I walked back to the hostel, stopping at a chocolate store along the way to buy a treat (I ended up with a dark chocolate pistol, which I used to take some dark and amusing photographs), as well as a convenience store to buy some juice and beer. I then returned to the hostel, had the chocolate pistol and a beer. Then, the Turkish man at the hostel offered me some of his sparkling red wine that tasted of blackberries, apples, and raspberries. Finally, after 22:00; the Ukrainian computer programmer and I decided to walk to the Metro Club and check it out for the night. On the way to the club, we ran in to two Polish guys and an Irish lady who were on their way to the club as well; so we joined together and made it a party of five. We reached the club, checked our coats, and then proceeded to drink vodka, dance, and pose for crazy pictures. After a few rounds of vodka with a cherry juice chaser, we had some beer. Then I lost track of where the Ukrainian programmer and the Irish lady were, but I sat down with one of the guys from Poland and bought a bottle of Gordon’s gin, as well as cranberry juice. I had some gin and offered it to the others and drank some juice. Then, I’m not sure why, one of the Polish guys said he was leaving and I decided to leave as well; in my drunken state, I left the nearly full bottle of gin on the table and I’m hoping that some other partygoers did not let it go to waste as I had done. I walked to the coat check with the Polish guy, but I had lost my tag; luckily, I was able to describe my coat and the lady at the counter brought it to me. At this point, I was alone and it was after 04:00. I then walked back toward the hostel, but decided to pay a visit to the club I had gone to three nights ago; I then stayed there until closing before returning to the hostel. I’m actually quite amazed that I have retained a good bit of memory of the whole night and that I even made it back to the hostel at all considering my failure to navigate while heavily drunk in Kathmandu. Unfortunately, I would pay the price for this night the next day as I recovered in bed.