We received detailed instructions on WhatsApp from Ed between visits to Kyiv’s main synagogue, Tootsie Club and umbrellas at Golden Gate. That’s Ed from smokey New York City, from the Yugoslav wars and Day 211. He worked in some of the most dangerous places in the world, including Sudan, Sierra Leone, Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Yemen, Northern Ireland, Sarajevo, Kosovo, and Haiti.
One of the mottos Chien-Chi Chang and I have been kicking around during walks around Kyiv this week — “Out with the old, In with the new.” We also contemplate panopticon as a theme in the 2019-2020 Hong Kong protests.
FYI about Tootsie Club, new Martial Law hours: doors open at 4 p.m. and close at 9 p.m., until the war ends.
We are not supposed to make public any information that Russia’s invaders can use against Ukraine during this dicey so-called counteroffensive phase of all-out war, so I won’t blab about anything remotely confidential.
Stefan provides military operational awareness on a regular basis you won’t find here. We concluded early last year that what will happen can’t be avoided2.
I watched bits of Z’s 90-minute press conference with Ukrainian journalists the other day. Ouch!
This part of the pow wow was interesting:
It gists to:
“The people found criminally responsible for letting Russian invaders cakewalk into southern Ukraine at the start of the all-out invasion will be punished, according to law. Investigations are underway. I think I know what happened.”
Finally, big news: Stefaniia successfully defended her thesis, in Ukrainian, becoming one more third generation college graduate from our clan of Irish and Belarusian bricklayers.
Congratulations!