Ukranian Sauna (banya) in the Carpathian Mountain

We love baths. 

Being a big fans of hot spring, sauna, steam bath, massage, exfoliation, spring water bath and actually all kinds of baths, we are happy to discover the sauna in Ukraine.

We have tried the Japanese onsen, Taiwan hotspring, Korean Jjimjilbang, Finnish Sauna, Turkish Hammam, Mexican cenote, Hungarian furdo, Slovakia thermal spring, German sauna, aqua caliente in Colombia, Pamukale in Turkey and the salted mineral water in Tuzla (Bosnia), if not more... We are really happy to add another one to our list - the Ukrainian sauna, which is actually the Russian banya. (And now I finally realized how the name of the luxurious  spa in Bangkok 'Banya Tree' comes about!) 

Thanks to our host, Victor in Yaremche, we were brought to a banya in the neighborhood. 

We strolled towards the residential area and arrived a gate. It was occupied by the owner and his B&B. Through a flowery garden, we proceeded to a wooden cottage. Walking up the stairs, we found a rest area, called predbannik or pre-bath, with a changing area, table and some benches. Further inside, there is a toilet, a shower room and finally, the sauna room.

Victor told us that first we need to get naked, wrapped with the big towel provided and go straight to the sauna room.

 




The sauna room is connected to stove of the predbannik, heated by burning lodges. It was a gloomy, rainy day and the room was already heated, with tea set and even a set of backgammon. 

We proceeded straight into the sauna, which is somewhere between 95 to 100 degree Celsius, and sat for a few minutes. Then we returned to the benches to cool down and get some rest.

We made some herbal tea and enjoyed the warm fire by cooling down slowly. 

Then we entered the sauna to get heated up again.

The heating and cooling circuit is supposed to warm our body gradually, bringing heat into our bones.

I started sweating and blushing after a few rounds.

We enjoyed private use of the whole cabin and it was an perfectly gloomy late afternoon to sit at the stairs outside the wooden cottage, cooling down under the fresh air and drizzle with a cup of warm tea.

Victor explained that banya used to be a Saturday social event, to get cleaned up before Sunday church service and sometimes an activity only for men. Unlike Finland, it is not quite a family regular weekend event in winter. Ukrainians nowadays may go sauna with  friends or relatives as a big group, where all women will enter into the sauna for one round, while men gather for the next; sometimes it is just a once in a while guys' gathering or simply a tourist attraction.

The banya we tried is in fact quite an upscale one. Costing around 60 Ukrainian grivna (around HKD57) per person for 2 hours. But we got a little discount and stayed longer as the owner is Victor’s friend and Ukrainine wishes to show the best hospitality to tourist. (Meaning - us!) 

There could be smaller cabin where the shower area is also the resting area, with hot water heated by the steam room stove and a bucket of cold water, or having water from tap, for mixing lukewarm water to a desirable temperature. 

In banya sauna room, the heater is consisted of a water tank, the rock chamber and connected to the rest room heating fire box. If higher temperature is required, we will splash cold water to the rocks. If it’s too unbearably hot, we could open the banya door or sometimes a connecting window for fresh air. 

Being very similar to Finnish sauna, the most unique part about Banya is in fact, the 'whipping' and the felt hat. 

Our banya have prepared us some bunches of dried thin branches and leaves, called 'venik', the bath brooms, usually made from young branches of white birch, oak or eucalyptus, soaked in very hot water to soften before clients arrived. 

After a few rounds of heating and cooling. It’s time to start the smacking massage. 

For us, everyone took turn to help each other with such massage. Victor trained Adley to execute the massage and all I heard from outside was “ouch”, “Yes”, “Good”, “harder”,“Ahhhh”! And then showering with a bucket of ice-cold water from above, then it’s “Ahhhh” again!  

Sound quite Sadomasochistic! What were they doing!?

Then it's finally my turn. 

The sauna room was filled with aroma of the leaves. I placed a towel on the top level of the sauna, lay flat naked. Then Adley with the felt head, started splashing some cold water to the hot stones. He then pulled the veniks from the hot water bucket, shaking off all remaining drips to the hot stone and waved the veniks on top of me like a fan. A flow of hot steam swang pass me, intertwining with the cool leaves caressing my back. Then he started smacking my back briskly with the veniks. The branches are young and softened in water, which made the whole process not at all painful but ultimately relaxing. The other side followed, repeating the same procedures all over again.

The special felt hats are typically worn to protect the head, from the intense heat when someone wishes to stay inside the steam room for a longer time.  While I’m having a good time lying flat to enjoy the heated steam and cool leaves caress, Adley had to stand inside the sauna room to endure all the heat for almost 5 minutes to finish the 'ritual', which could be rather unbearable.  But the felt gave an excellent protection.

The banya is believed to clean skin, to fight sickness, to build body resistance, to lose weight, to improve blood circulation, to improve skin condition, to exfoliate and to help anti-aging.  Wow! I need to get smacked more often!!

In winter, similar to Finnish sauna, after the 95 to 100 degree Celcisus sauna, people may roll in the snow naked or dip into lakes with holes cutting through the ice for cooling.

After 2 rounds of smacking for everyone, with some relaxing herbal tea, an almost tied game of backgammon (that Adley lost), some stories about banya and more heating and cooling - we were already too late for dinner. Victor’s wife, Anna (a professional photographer turned housewife and mother, whom reminds me of Linda McCartney), was waiting for us at home. She had prepared us the mouth-watering white mushroom from the forest of Carpathian mountains.

Our eyes were all redden after the hot steam and we slept like baby that evening.

Our first caving adventure in Zatyzine, Ukraine

We planned to go hiking on the Ukraine Independence Holiday weekend with our CS host, Andrii in Ivano Frankivsk, however, as a mountain guide, he suddenly got a job appointment for a 3 days trip in the Carpathian mountain.  

To our pleasant surprise, Andrii introduced and arranged us to spend our weekend with his friends, a couple who moved to the mountain in Zatyzine, some 2 hours drive away.

 

We were accompanied by another CS-er from Hong Kong, who was staying with Andrii on the same night. And Chin Wang is the first Hong Kong couchsurfer we met on our trip.

Jeremy waited for us at the bus stop and we were led into the mountain, among bushes and forest. After walking for about 20 minutes, we finally arrived their cozy little house among the forest, with only one or two neighbors afar.

Jeremy and Svitlana are excited to have guests and are very happy to meet us. 

They believed in the benefit of eating food uncooked and preferred eating everything raw including meat and vegetables. Hence, our first lunch together was salad and bread.

We had some exchange and learnt that  the couple are speleologist, serious cavers who had spent as long as one week continuously underground! They took almost a whole year making maps of their cave, discovering virgin passages and naming them with their team. They moved to the mountain for the love of caves and nature. 

In fact, there are many caves in Ukraine, especially in that area. We are told that when there is a patch of trees in the middle of the farm field, it means there is a cave underground! As they cannot harvest in a hole. 

After lunch, they took us out to explore some gypsum caves nearby. 

We are advised to wear enough warm clothes and something that can get dirty, with hiking boots ideally, plus head lamp. 

Svitlana is the one who led her husband into caving and she is also a cave guide, who take amateur spelunkers to caving adventure. She is very educational in teaching us about the structure of caves, how to move our body inside the cave safely, how to use equipments for cave diving and how to preserve the minerals, by not touching them. 

We hiked around the mountain after a short drive from their home and there are more than five caves at least. Unfortunately, they were covered by mud and trash, until we found a clean entrance that is more deserted.  Svitlana is an adventurer, she is always the first one trying to get in and explore how it is like.  After a few attempt, she eventually  found one in a good condition for beginners, like us, to try. 

The entrance of the cave was small and the path that followed was even smaller.  We have to squeeze ourselves in.  There were some 10cm big spiders inside the cave, near the entrance, then some baby bats. But further inside, there were only rocks, crystals without insects nor animals.   Moving further in, there was a really difficult part that need to crawl like a worm, then we have to climb down by 1.5m to find a wide open area. We climbed one by one slowly, while Adley came last.  We were all standing in the cave looking, but he suddenly fell down among us! Luckily, there was no injury! Just cramp.

It was a wonderful experience to try caving, the cave was dark, cool and quiet. In fact, it was the same cool temperature all through the year, somewhere around 15 degree Celsius I suppose. But I can't imagine living inside the cave for a whole week!  I appreciate the calmness inside the cave but I can't wait coming outside to see the sun.  

We tried a second one with a huge entrance and not very deep inside. That's quite enough for me for my first time and all I can think of are: hot shower, laundry and a warm dinner!

明日香港，今日烏克蘭

 
在烏克蘭中部郊野村莊做梳化客，閒來拿一本時事雜誌讀，了解烏克蘭現在的政局。驚見有香港類似的情況，在此分享一下，讓讀者以此為鑑。

該期專題報導有人受僱支持現任政府及騷擾反政府示威者，他們恐嚇甚至毆打和平集會者。這是一石二鳥之計，一來直接暴力壓止反政府示威，不需警察出手(他們會因怕被批評用過多暴力而受制)；二來由羣眾打羣眾可以把破壞社會安寧形象推到示威者上。

這些嘍囉的背景不同，一部份來自體育會 - 都是一些年少氣盛，好勇鬥狠年青人聚集的會社；亦有包括紀律部隊參與其中的會社，所以這些人和警方關係密切。每當他們在反集會中使用暴力或恐嚇，很多時警察都隻眼開隻眼閉，對他們的非法行為視若無睹，選擇不執法。有傳媒拍攝到在反對政府集會中，當這些嘍囉出現滋擾示威者，有內政部官員在附近大厦天台出現。雖然這不代表政府請槍壓止反政府集會，但是在訪問這些嘍囉時得知他們是被"大佬"指派做嘢之後收錢。約1000烏克蘭克尼亞，在失業率高和平均月薪只二三千克尼亞的烏克蘭，這些很好的工錢。

誰找這些大佬找嘍囉? 可以是政客請槍威嚇其他政敵、或地產商請他們騷擾小業主、或商人請他們破壞競爭對手業務、怎會沒有政府官員找人打擊反對者? 這些大佬有接頭人去接生意，而這些接頭人亦有中間人聯絡不願曝光的金主。收費高低視乎唬嚇程度，普通威嚇當然不及見血高價。破壞和平示威只是小事一椿，普通失業青年樂於參與其中，可以一嘗破壞滋味，舒展筋骨，有警方包庇更無後顧之憂。

其實這些以羣眾鬥羣眾的政治技倆是共產黨喜歡用的，就算蘇聯已解體，這陋習在俄羅斯還通用。橙色革命後的烏克蘭居然神推鬼㧬選了個親莫斯科政府 (其實也因為烏克蘭東部有很多俄羅斯移民有關，本土烏克蘭人已經給前蘇聯計劃經濟餓死大部份人)，在社會不同領域深受俄羅斯影響，主要經濟活動被俄羅斯支配、傳媒被軟性受控(因為廣告收入大多來自俄羅斯)。政府重施共產陋習針對反對自己的人。

一向有留意香港時局，知道有"愛""關"字頭的親共組織和反政府示威唱對台，甚至有建制支持者騷擾甚到毆打示威者而警察視若無睹。加上後者縱容這些親共組織打壓和平發輪功人士 ，而當中這些組織有成員有黑社會背景。當然這些組織容易把責任推得一乾二淨，說這些黑底嘍囉不屬他們。這些情況很有共產黨收買嘍囉鬥羣眾的意味。親共建制社團有財力請槍為所欲為，傳媒自我審查和公安機構私相授受難以揭發這些嘍囉的財政來源。其實共匪的魔爪已威脅我們的言論自由，講句粗口就被文革式批鬥，不需起它們底已經可以從他們的行為嗅到他們的共匪妖味。以前都無咁猖狂，在這個狼英政府時代居然出然，牠不暗中支持? 搵鬼信 !

香港人如果繼續沈默，對這些惡行視若無睹，更暴力的打壓反對聲音及言論自由，如烏克蘭今日所見的，會在香港出現。