""Excuse me, are you American?"" Dnipropetrovsk by lemkouk

When I was visiting the Music Academy, the former City Hall in the Czarist period, a well dressed businessman came up to me and asked, "Excuse me, are you American?" I explained that I was Canadian, and he said it didn't really matter. He invited me to speak to a meeting of business persons who gathered to learn and practise speaking English. Unfortunately I was leaving in just a couple of hours and could not participate. But boy, would I have liked to do that since I am an active member of our local Board of Trade. Maybe it is indicative of the climate of this thriving city – open and striving for better.

Unfinished building, now a bank advertisment

Dnipropetrovsk was founded in 1776 by Prince Potemkin, the Governor of South Russia newly taken from the Ottoman Empire. Under Czarina Catharine II, he was to build it 20 versets long and 15 versets wide. Although the Czarina's commands took more than her lifetime to complete, the city has become much larger than that. And the Cathedral was many years in the building. There must always have been unfinished buildings standing for long stretches of the cities history.

Today's unfinished buildings of Ukraine are interesting. Every city has some. This one has undergone some changes in its unfinished state. Locals told me that homeless people now use it. The building used to simply show its concrete face. Now however it has been turned into a giant billboard for a bank! Go figure.

Former Red Cross Hospital

This is part of the Red Cross hospital built ca. 1900. It was used as a training centre for medics bound for the Russian front in WWI. Part of it is in use as a pharmacy. Much is empty. Across the street was a non-descript 5 storey building which had been KGB headquarters during the Soviet era. Detainees were tortured in the cellars there. What contrasts!