A Postcard A Day - Tuesday 4 January 2022 - T for Tauric Chersonesos and 'New Beginnings'

 Good morning and happy New Year my friends! A new year has started and I hope that it will be a better year for all of us. This pandemic seems to be fizzling out slowly, so I hope we will have a relatively normal year (until the next pandemic. Gotto be realistic: I'm sure there will be another crazy virus).

With 2022 dawning, I thought I'd share another dawning:

It comes to me from the Ukraine and it shows the Tauric Chersonesos - an ancient Greek city-state in the south-western part of Crimea (within Sevastopol). It was founded in 422-421 BC. Added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2013.

The sender of the card, Iryna, lives in Kyev, the capital of Ukraine, and she tells me that the Crimea, where this site is, is now occupied by the Russians.

The UNESCO website writes this:

The site features the remains of a city founded by Dorian Greeks in the 5th century BC on the northern shores of the Black Sea. 

The site is within Sevastopol (South-west Crimea)

It encompasses six component sites with urban remains and agricultural lands divided into several hundreds of chora, rectangular plots of equal size. The plots supported vineyards whose production was exported by the city which thrived until the 15th century. 

The site features several public building complexes and residential neighbourhoods, as well as early Christian monuments alongside remains from Stone and Bronze Age settlements; 

Roman and medieval tower fortifications and water supply systems; and exceptionally well-preserved examples of vineyard planting and dividing walls. In the 3rd century AD, the site was known as the most productive wine centre of the Black Sea and remained a hub of exchange between the Greek, Roman and Byzantine Empires and populations north of the Black Sea. It is an outstanding example of democratic land organization linked to an ancient polis, reflecting the city’s social organization.

Life in the K household has been very quiet. In between Christmas and New Year I managed to get a hair appointment:

The day before i had an appointment in the morning, but I completely forgot about that and felt very stupid and I have to keep telling me that I'm 70 and I'm bound to forget things from time to time. Anyway, I felt very bad about that! Luckily my hairdresser was able to fit me in the day after.

On the way back from the hairdresser, it had got dark and I could (for the first time) see the illuminations in the village as I walked through the little park.

The weather has been absolutely glorious these days

22 Degrees C is about 71F, which is warm for December! 

We eat many meals out on one of the terraces. Here I am having a coffee:

Of course it is wonderful for drying washing. (No we don't use tumble dryers in this country):

There through the 'door' you can see the table where we have meals or coffee in the winter sun.

But the evenings are cold and I have made this mulled wine. (I cheated and bought some sachets), but it was very nice.

As today we are joining the other ladies at the T-Party which is hosted by Elizabeth and Bleubeard, I am showing you a drink:

It's cider. In Europe cider is alcoholic. You might be able to see on the can that it is 5 %. I love this English cider. When we go to the coast and shop at an English shop, I always take a six-pack of cider home. I love it.

For New Year's Eve I made my traditional potato salad with beetroot. It's called a Russian salad or in Dutch 'huzarenslaatje'.

The bottle is an old wine bottle and I have put some lights in it to make it look festive. It was just the two of us for new Year's Eve. 

Here we are singing Auld Lang Syne to ring out the year. And then we went to bed. 

Happy 2022 everyone and happy T-Day!

Stay safe,

Hugs,

Lisca