General Information About Odessa

Odessa is situated in the South of Ukraine, on the Black Sea coast. The precise coordinates of Odessa are: 46°28'N, 30°44'E.
Odessa is a relatively young city for Europe, over 200 years old. The population is about one million people. Odessa is a port city. Due to its geopolitical situation, Odessa is a major cultural and transport center in Ukraine.
The main language is Russian, although the only official language in Ukraine is Ukrainian. This does not mean, however, that the Russian population comprises the bulk here. First of all I must mention the most Odessites do not think themselves Russians nor Ukrainians nor anyone else but just Odessites. And the Russian language in Odessa is unique, different from the one spoken in Russia, especially in the Russian backwoods. If you look seven or ten scores back, you will see that Odessa is much like America. A whole lot of nationalities blended in this city, first of all Russians, Jews and Ukrainians, but also many Romanians, Bulgarians, Greeks, Germans, Frenchmen and Italians... It is not for nothing that there are Jewish, Greek and Italian (now named after Pushkin) streets, French and Italian boulevards, Big and Small Arnautish Streets, Lutheran lane, Lüstdorf Road and others. Russian became a common language for all those nationalities.
What is also typical of Odessa is that we have virtually never had any antagonism between different nationalities, ethnic cleansings, etc. Which is no wonder if you remember that all Odessites born and bred, be they Jews or Russians by origin, in fact belong to the same nationality—the Odessites.
There are a lot of sights and objects of interest in Odessa that I will not talk about here, but mention just one. There are piles of beautiful women in Odessa and it is not just my view, it is a fact. Many factors are responsible for this, first of all the aforementioned blend of nations, and also cultural traditions. What do traditions have to do with the beauty? Well, to be born beautiful is not all that you need. You must also know how to dress up and many other things… The women in Odessa stick to their principal tradition very closely, that is to always be beautiful.
Another Odessan object of interest is the market Privoz. Its peculiarity, the pride of its traders is their Privoz kilogram. Privoz is the only place where this unit is used. A Privoz kilo has about 800 metric grams (depending on the trader) unlike metric kilo which has exactly 1,000 grams. No wonder! In the USA they have short ton which is .907 of metric ton. And we have Privoz kilo! So, if you buy 5 kilos of apples, and get 4, calm down and think where you got them.

Back | First Page | Previous Section | Home | Next Section | Last Page | Forward
Articles | Datings | Languages | Stirlitz | Radio | Mail | Search | Soft | Windows | Volga | Odessa | About | Links | Contact
 © Igor Kalinin  4.7.2000—30.9.2003 The number of hits at this page www.igorkalinin.com/odessa/general.en.html