The rain finallly came...and the brewers' grain

That rain that would have saved the corn crop two months or so back finally arrived this week. Sunday we went to church and it seemed that everyone was still on holidays, there weren't very many people at church and we brought back most of the milk Garry took there. He had forgotten (and I didn't hear) that the week before everyone was invited to a wedding on Sunday after church downtown. We went and it was a lovely ceremony in Russian the only language the bride and groom share, I was told. The groom Izzy is from Nigeria and speaks English, we have seen him at Morningstar since we moved here. The bride was tall and beautiful in an ivory strapless gown, and is from Angola, she speaks Portuguese. They met here in Dnepropetroesk while in medical school, and got married in the language they share. I am sorry that I did not have the camera to take a photo of the happy couple.

Monday we went to Dnepropetroesk to go bowling- really to buy paper towels for the ladies to use while milking the cows- Garry forgot we were supposed to buy them on Sunday. It was 40 C as we were driving away from bowling, and we hit a big thunderstorm right after Garry stopped to buy some cold Pepsi (which is harder than you think- every store has 50 kinds of beer in their coolers, but hardly any have cold sodapop.) It poured, and some small hail hit the car as we approached Heroes of Stalingrad (street.) Of course the streets had lots of water on them, because drainage is a little underused (or broken)  in many places, so the downhill parts of the city become huge pools of running water whenever it rains hard and fast. The water hides all the holes .....   that you normally see to drive around, so doubly harzardous driving, with some loss of control by drivers as they hit the puddles.

When we got back to the village, Garry was disappointed because it had not rained here yet. It did give him a chance to drive at and look at the field of millet he planted last week, and he was excited to see tiny plants up in rows all over the field. We did get one storm in the evening, but not as much as he hoped. I pointed out there was rain in the forecast for the next couple days, and when he got up to go feed the the cows on Tuesday, it was raining. In fact here is a photo of Garry when he came in from feeding the cows...

a smiling soaking wet guy

and it rained more...

Garry changed out of his wet clothes and sat inside looking over material for teaching his dairy classes for the trade school, and checking out the window periodically when it would start pouring and raindrops were bouncing off the cars, even flooding the front yard at times. Garry was happy that he got to fill the water cistern for free with rain water off the roof for the first time in a year.


Garry decided we should drive to Zaporosia for the afternoon- I had been making taco sauce in the morning, we picked up tomatoes on our way home on Sunday from one of the fruit/veggies stands along the highway.

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Our trip to Zapporosia

1944-1948 That's WWII

We stopped at a monument that we must have driven past hundreds of times without seeing it, but it caught our eye a couple weeks ago driving out of Zap. Turns out it is a WWII memorial, complete with eternal flame, and a grieving mother stature, and about 2,000 names and three heroes names on the tablets to the side. Very well maintained, it was just starting to rain when we got there

She's holding a branch of oak leaves.

 The names under the star are the heroes 

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 On the corner of the park was an old gun (maybe anti-aircraft?) tires intact, painted silver, bolted to the ground, it seems to be a popular kind of WWII momument, because there are a lot of tanks and guns bolted down like this in Ukraine.










By the time we got to the middle of the city, and sat down in Mc Donalds for lunch- mmm.... french fries and hamburgers; it was pouring out. For those of you who don't like eating at Mc Donalds- I am sorry, but spend a year living in Ukraine and you'll love the taste of home!  It is the only hamburger joint that has come to Ukraine, and they love it, and so do all the Americans and Canadians here, when they are a little homesick, it's as close as you get unless you have big bucks to spend at one of the TTIFs in Ukraine (there is one in Dnepro)

Mc Donalds is packed for lunchtime

Then we drove around trying to locate a botanical garden we found on the internet, we saw some parts of city we had not seen before (and more rain), but finally gave up when we drove past the "central market" and walked through and bought a half dozen peaches- they weren't quite as good as the ones we bought in Crimea, they had tasted like fresh New Jersey peaches right off the tree. We walked past where they were selling meat and milk. Had to get my umbrella out as it was raining lightly, so we headed back to the car and drove to the city mall and did a little grocery shopping and found some hardware Garry was looking for to make a set of harrows to get ready to seed winter wheat next week--after the fields dry out!

People selling milk under a roof at the market

Main street has rose bushes planted in the meridian 

Power's out and more rain

Tuesday evening it was still raining and the wind had picked up, the ladies were busy milking when our half of the village lost power- a tree had gone down knocking down a hydro (telephone) pole. Did you know that they are square and made of cement here, by the way? Garry went out with the little battery powered lantern we took camping and looked for the problem- strangely when it first happened the barn was without power but the house had power for about 5 more minutes. Then no one had electric, so Garry had to drive to the gas station because his can that is supposed to be full to run the generator was empty (the guys 'borrow it" when their scooter is empty). So when the ladies finished evening miilking, he turned off the generator until morning, when he put it on again for milking and cooling the milk in the tank. It was still raining, and rather cool, only 14 C in the morning, and most of the day.

A job no one wants on Wednesday morning- herding the cows all day in the rain!

Garry did not look as excited about the rain when he came in dripping for the second morning in a row from feeding the cows their corn silage and brewers grain (both have to be brought inside the barn by wheelbarrow from outside.) Mid-morning he was headed to the gas station for more gas so he could start the generator up later for milking, when he saw the brewers grain delivery truck drive past him. It was supposed to come on Tuesday with some old stuff since there was no new beer brewing yet. They got the truck backed in and over to the pits. Garry and Andrei jumped in with buckets to get rid of some of the rain water inside before they dumped the feed into the cement pits, it was still raining as they did this
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Look right near the level of the hay rack, you'll see the water coming out

Garry took off his shoes and socks and rolled up his pants to his knees, before jumping in and letting the muddy water fly out of the pit. When the load started to dump out Garry was really happy, as you can see in the second photo, a big cloud of steam rose as the brewers grain sloshed in to the pit, because it was fresh stuff, the brewery is making beer again. The truck left without getting stuck in the driveway, a bonus!

Shoes in hand, Garry watches the steam rise with Andrei

Garry had the generator running again for the afternoon morning, as the rain slowed up some later in the day. It was off for several hours, good thing I don't need much light to crochet, I am working on an afghan for Garry to stay warm this winter. We played Racko with a candle until almost seven- the cows from the village herd come home at 6:30 now, with the rain and getting dark earlier. Garry turned on the generator because the ladies would be milking soon. Andrei said he had just past some men looking at the power lines, but Garry didn't think they would have it fixed until the next day. I happened to notice lights on next door just before eight pm, so Garry went and turned it off and put us back on the power grid.

Thursday was cool and partly cloudy, they were selling brewers grain all day it seemed to people in the village, since there wasn't any to sell last Saturday. It will be next week before they are in the fields I think, the ground is really soaked. Too bad this didn't happen a couple months ago...