Sunday Morning and another victim.....

It nothing short of amazes me that there are 2 hotels in this town, and the one we are staying at is considered THE best INTERNATIONAL hotel around. They advertise this proudly by flying several country flags outside the building. It really builds your confidence, that. They also pride themselves in having a wonderful translation service available, and English is even on it.

There is also a laundry service here. You can have them wash your clothes and you get them back within 24 hours. Reasonably priced even. Yay!!!

Now now...hold your horses. Or better even, save those horses. I am fairly certain that they will out perform the taxis ten to one. They are probably in a better mood also, considering many of the taxi driver's here behave like the behind of previously mentioned horses.

We never used the laundry service, because that would add up with 3 people. So we just buy Dreft and wash our duds in the handy dandy sink. Works fine, although I am pretty sure the maids have a great time poking fun at those crazy Americans who have the hotel room decorated with shirts and underwear in various stages of dryness or lack thereof.

However, what do you do if you are a single man who is staying here for work and you do not speak any Russian whatsoever?

Imagine the following scene upon entering the lobby this morning:

Three ladies behind the desk are looking mildly amused. To the left, we see a lovely bride being nearly completely swallowed up by the biggest white wedding dress I have ever seen. Taking full advantage of the fact that no one understands a thing I say anyway, I smile at my 6 year old daughter and say:" Look honey, it is a Ukrainian Princess! Maybe she will let you take a picture with her!" Hannah checks her out from the corner of her eye, decides that the dress is scary as hell and declines politely. Oh well.

Now to the right, at the front desk, is a man holding a plastic bag. He is using hands, feet and whatever other body parts seem useful at the time to get his point across. But his point keeps bouncing off the 3 ladies (who by the way look like the ladies in "Are You Being Served')because NONE OF THEM SPEAK ENGLISH!!!!!!

Seriously. A major international hotel and no one, absolutely NO ONE on site speaks English. So what about that translation service? Well....imagine asking for it. In what language would you accomplish that, exactly?

One of the ladies starts to ramble in Russian to the poor guy. He says loudly:" No thanks lady, speaking English is hard enough! (English is a second language for him, apparently).

The plastic bag holds his dirty clothes. And he wants laundry sevice. Now he is seriously irritated. One of the ladies grabs a brochure.

Lady: speaks Russian while pointing at brochure

Guy: "What on earth are you saying this time?"

Lady :more Russian speak

Guy:" Oh you DO do laundry??"

Lady: Points at bag and then outside.Where it is raining. Hard.

Guy: Oh. You do laundry, but not when it rains??"

Lady: More Russian words

Guy: Tosses his bag of dirty laundry all the way across the lobby while yelling :" I give up!"

Then Guy goes to the other lady at the desk and asks for internet. I am not sure how he will get that idea across, but I admire him for trying.

I can't wait until he finds out the hot water they advertise is only on sometimes, and when it is you will have to learn to master the skill of showering under a shower head that offers that precious hot water up in a small drizzle. I also feel kindof bad for the 3 ladies, because they really are very very nice people. As are most people we have met so far.

Except for taxi drivers.