First night in Ukraine

My first mission with the OSCE! And an exciting mission it is.. I cant believe Im in Ukraine!!!! Overwhelming.. It's been such a long time since I've been in a big city with metros and looots of people and beautiful statues and something which resembles european architecture (albeit eastern european one). I love the feeling of being here, love the hotel, love my Cypriot colleagues! I cant help but be a bit nervous to see how things will develop with the elections, but I'm happy I'm deployed to a relatively safe place (relatively, cause you never know when troubles will arise). I ll have a Canadian as a partner (excited to work with such a nationality, just hope he is not a very old one, age average of OSCE observers seems to be around 50). Also, I'm not taking an internal flight this time, which is great.. T

So far, so good. Business seems as usual in the Ukrainian capital..except in Maidan square, the central location where all the protests happened.. its like a warzone there and it's quite creepy.. There's military men camping all over, creating barricades, sleeping in casual settlements, obviously armed.. They have surrounded and took over most of the square, which used to be beautiful and impressive and still is huge.. I remember I loved that square when I was in Kiev in 2009. Things were so different back then... It was such a peaceful place and now it's clearly felt that a war will break out soon.. Sad and scary..

I should get to bed, although I'm too hyper to sleep.. I ll try to write often and post some pictures. Stay tuned!