Sea Pearl of Ukraine: Odesa
Waves, cats, and humor
By: Olesia F.
Youve seen theUkrainian city that doesnt exist.
You walked with me through theforests, mountains, andflat lands of Ukraine.
I showed youKyiv, the capital of my country, andChernihiv, the soul of the Kyivan Rus.
Now, it is time to discover our south, with its main sea pearl a city that russian terrorists claim as their own and relentlessly target with missiles, bombs, and drones.
Its Odesa, ladies and gentlemen!
A cat living on Odesas beach
? Southern Palmyra:One of Odesas nicknames, a reference to its cultural importance and beauty, similar to the ancient city of Palmyra.
russia came here during the Russo-Turkish War (see 17871792 in the below story) and turned it into an imperial port.
Before that, Odesa was a modest, layered frontier on the Black Sea. Its shores saw Greek traders and later hosted a small TatarOttoman fortress called Khadzhibey, where salt, fishing, and seasonal trade shaped life.
By the 18th century a multiethnic settlement lived in neighborhoods, from the sea and caravan routes: Greeks, Armenians, Moldavians, Jews, Crimean Tatars, and Ukrainian Cossacks.
Odesa National Academic Opera and Ballet Theater
Some facts about Odesa:
???? The place that became Odesa bore Ukrainian roots long before the empire came. The Sotnykivska (Kuialnyk)Cossack cemeterynear Khadzhibey shows Zaporizhian Cossacks and their heirs living and being buried there before the citys founding.
???? Even the citys name was a late-18th-century invention:
In 1795 planners picked Odesa with a nod to a classical Greek Odessos, part of an imperial taste for ancient-sounding toponyms rather than a reflection of a single founding people.
????The Black Sea here keeps time like an old conductor:
Slow waves and a light make every corner confess a story. People listen to the sea as to an old companion whose mood explains every sudden laugh, bargain, and quarrel.
? Sea Pearl of Ukraine: The most popular nickname of Odesa, highlighting the citys beauty and status as a resort city on the Black Sea.
Bye-Bye, Russians!
There was the monument of Catherine II in Odesa.
(She was the empress of russia who annexed the south of todays Ukraine, changed all the toponyms there to sound more russian, and proclaimed herself the founder of those lands.)
Thanks to her most devoted fan vladimir putin, Ukrainians have stopped turning a blind eye to this historical lie:
Given we do our best to get rid of russian myths about our history and reflect on our colonial past, Catherine has suddenly disappered from Odesa a few years ago.
(Oops, does anybody know what happened?)
The flags you can see in the below picture are for our Ukrainian soldiers and officers, fallen when defending Odesa and other cities from russian full-scale invasion.
Another one is the poster I noticed while walking through Derybasivska (the street in the city center), saying (written in black),Bastard! Bandera* will find you anyway!!
*Stepan Bandera a Ukrainian politician, revolutionary, one of the radical and prominent ideologists, practitioners, and theorists of the Ukrainian nationalist movement of the 20th century. russians use his name in their propaganda, when speading the lie about neo-nazism and fascism in my country.
???? Odesas famous, slightly wicked sense of humor grew from that port-city mix of languages and tradesmen a sharp, ironic wit celebrated by writers and still spoken of as one of the citys defining traits.
? Humour Capital: One more nickname the city has. Odesa is renowned for its humor, specific accent, and the tradition of satire and comedy.
? Its also called Odesa-mama, for its unique character and welcoming, hospitable nature.
The marine station, with the hotel destroyed by russian missile (left); the city council (right) with Mister Cat passing by
????Speaking of cats, by the way:
Who needs Instanbul fluffies if we have dozens of our own in Odesa? ????Food and water are everywhere outside for them.
Under a horizon, Odesa still argues with the sea
And always loses with a grin.
? Southern Capital: This nickname emphasizes Odesas significance as a major city in southern Ukraine.
The day will come, and Ill return to Odesa to explore its beauty and character with my closest ones.????
烏克蘭的海上明珠：敖德薩
海浪、貓咪與幽默
作者：Olesia F.
你已經看過不存在的烏克蘭城市(Zhytomyr)https://medium.com/tourist-in-my-own-country/the-ukrainian-city-that-doesnt-exist-4f8ab415695d。
你曾與我一同走過烏克蘭的森林、山脈https://medium.com/tourist-in-my-own-country/western-ukraine-welcome-to-yaremche-149fd45fe751和平原https://medium.com/tourist-in-my-own-country/flat-lands-of-the-ukrainian-west-82db38b4ece0。
我帶你領略了我祖國的首都基輔https://medium.com/tourist-in-my-own-country/tourist-in-own-country-my-way-from-work-in-kyiv-d876c218af5c，以及基輔羅斯的靈魂切爾尼戈夫https://medium.com/tourist-in-my-own-country/old-but-gold-chernihiv-of-ukraine-1738200160f5。
現在，是時候去探索我們的南方了，那裏主要有我們的海上明珠俄羅斯恐怖分子聲稱這座城市是他們的，並無情地用導彈、炸彈和無人機襲擊她。
女士們先生們，這就是敖德薩！
（圖：生活在敖德薩海灘的貓）
?南帕爾米拉：敖德薩的別稱之一，指的是她在文化上的重要性和美麗，與古代城市帕爾米拉相似。
俄羅斯在俄土戰爭期間（見下文1787-1792年的故事）來到這裏，並將其變成一個帝國港口。
（俄羅斯擴張簡史-讓俄羅斯再次成為莫斯科維亞？https://olesia-filipenko.medium.com/brief-history-of-russias-expansion-0909b59b15bd）
在此之前，敖德薩是黑海上一個樸素而充滿層次的前沿陣地。它的海岸曾見證希臘貿易商的身影，後來這裏曾坐落著一座名為哈吉貝(Khadzhibey)的小型韃靼-奧斯曼帝國堡壘，在那裏鹽、漁業和季節性貿易塑造了當地的生活。
到18世紀，來自海上和商隊的多民族社區這附近形成了一個定居點：有希臘人、亞美尼亞人、摩爾達維亞人、猶太人、克裏米亞韃靼人和烏克蘭哥薩克人。
（圖：敖德薩國家學術歌劇院和芭蕾舞劇院）
一些關於敖德薩的事實：
*早在俄羅斯帝國出現之前，敖德薩所在的這片土地就已紮根了烏克蘭文化。在哈吉貝(Khadzhibey)附近的索特尼基夫斯卡(Kuialnyk)哥薩克公墓表明，紮波羅熱哥薩克人及其後裔在城市建立之前就已經居住並埋葬在這裏了。
*甚至這座城市的名字也是18世紀末的發明：1795年，規劃者選擇了敖德薩(Odesa)這個名字，這與古典希臘語的奧德索斯(Odessos)相呼應，體現了一種對古老地名的帝國品味，而不是對單一開國民族的反映。
*黑海在這裏像一位老指揮家一樣凝固了時間：
緩慢的海浪和光線讓每個角落都訴說著故事。人們像傾聽一位老朋友一樣傾聽大海，大海的情緒解釋了每一次突如其來的歡笑、討價還價和爭吵。
?烏克蘭海上明珠：敖德薩最受歡迎的昵稱，突出了這座城市作為黑海度假勝地的美麗和地位。
再見了，俄羅斯人！
敖德薩曾經有一座凱瑟琳二世的紀念碑。
（她是吞並了今天烏克蘭南部的俄羅斯女皇，將那裏的所有地名都改成了聽起來更俄羅斯的名字，並宣稱自己是那些土地的創始人。）
多虧了她最忠實的粉絲弗拉基米爾普京，烏克蘭人已經不再對這個曆史謊言視而不見了：
鑒於我們盡最大努力擺脫關於我們曆史的俄羅斯神話，並反思我們的殖民曆史，凱瑟琳幾年前突然從敖德薩消失了。（哎呀，有人知道發生了什麽嗎？）
下圖中的紀念旗是我們烏克蘭士兵和軍官的，他們在保衛敖德薩和其他城市免受俄羅斯全麵入侵時犧牲。
另一個是我在德裏巴索夫斯卡亞街（市中心的一條街）上散步時注意到的海報，上麵用黑色寫著：混蛋！班德拉*早晚會找到你的！！
*Stepan Bandera (斯捷潘班德拉)是一位烏克蘭政治家、革命家，是20世紀烏克蘭民族主義運動中最激進和最著名的思想家、實踐者和理論家之一。俄羅斯人在他們的宣傳中使用他的名字，傳播關於新納粹主義和法西斯主義的謊言。（https://svidomi.in.ua/en/page/myths-of-neo-nazism-and-bandera-how-azov-became-the-target-of-russian-propaganda?source=post_page-----99e07fae8757---------------------------------------）
*敖德薩著名而略帶邪惡的幽默感，源於這座港口城市多種語言和商人的融合一種敏銳、具有諷刺意味的智慧，受到作家們的讚揚，並且至今仍是這座城市最鮮明的特征之一。
?幽默之都：這是這座城市的另一個昵稱。敖德薩以其幽默、獨特的口音以及諷刺和喜劇的傳統而聞名。
?她也被稱為敖德薩媽媽，因為她獨特的性格和熱情好客的天性。
（圖：海洋站，被俄羅斯導彈摧毀的酒店（左）；貓先生經過市議會（右））
關於貓，順便說一句：
如果我們在敖德薩有幾十隻自己的貓，誰還需要伊斯坦布爾的蓬鬆貓呢？????食物和水在外麵隨處可見，供它們享用。
在地平線下，敖德薩依然在於與大海爭辯著什麽......
但總是帶著微笑落敗。。
?南方之都：這個昵稱凸顯了敖德薩作為烏克蘭南部重要城市的地位。
總有一天我會回到敖德薩，與我最親近的人一起探索她的美麗和特色。
