Odessa Ukraine Information
Guide.
The most
comprehensive English Guide to Odessa, Ukraine ever written!
Odessa, Ukraine has
always shown more color, spunk, and irreverence than other
cities in the former Soviet Union. There's an excitement, an
anything-is-possible feeling in the streets. The city has a
reputation for its irreverent humor that is flaunt each April
1st with Odessa's most famous holiday, "humor day".
Odessa is referred to
as the "Pearl of the Black Sea" is the 3rd largest city in
Ukraine, the largest city along the Black Sea, and the most
important city of Ukraine for trade. Odessa's mild climate,
warm waters and sunlit beaches attract hundreds of thousands
of people year around. Its shady lanes, beautiful lightly
pastel buildings and cozy squares impart to the city a certain
air of intimacy.
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And the city, sunny and free,
Stands with its front to the winds,
And even wars, not to mention waves,
Have no great power to shake it.
-- Ivan Riadchenko
Odessa Ukraine, A kaleidoscope
of colors.
Odessa is simply
enchanting with its marvelous architecture. Odessa's
history as a thriving enterprise has left the city with
some splendid architecture from the 18th and 19th
centuries and a multifaceted, irrepressible spirit. Some
buildings display a carious mixture of different styles,
such as distinct French architecture with a distinct
Russian flavor, and some are built in the Art Nouveau
Style which was in vogue at the turn of the century. Its
stately 19th century classical architecture is set on
orderly planned streets that are surrounded with green
space, giving the city an air of elegance. |
 Strikingly
ornate buildings of the late 19th and early 20th century are
reminiscent of Right Bank Paris. Most buildings in
Odessa were built with white stone consisting of calcareous
materials imbedded with seashells, which appears to be
saturated with hot sunshine. This gives many of the city's
buildings a whitewashed appearance. The extracted limestone
resulted in the formation of an entire labyrinth of
underground galleries.
One of the few
planned cities in Ukraine, Odessa's central core is laid out
in a grid. The first city plan designed by the engineer F.
Devollan in the late 18th century was executed by the
generations of Odessa architects that followed. As early as
the first half of the 19th century, the numerous landowners
who had moved to Odessa attracted by the profitable grain
trade, started constructing their private residences. As a
rule, they would build palace compounds: two-storied mansions
with forecourts, wrought iron grilles and porticos indicating
the entrance. Even today, the formal halls of these palaces
are strikingly opulent. The mansions of wealthy merchants and
factory-owners built to the designs of the best Odessa
architects were concealed in the verdure of Frantsuzsky
Boulevard.
Alexander Kuprin, the prominent Russian author, wrote of
Odessa in his "Autumnal Flowers":
Flashing on
the left and on the right are enchanting glimpses
of Odessa millionaires' villas with extravagant openwork
grilles,
decorated with dragons and coats-of-arms;
brightly lit terraces in the depth of the gardens adorned with
Chinese lanterns,
a kaleidoscope of colors in the foregardens and on the
flowerbeds;
rare plants with intoxicating aromas...
Odessa, Ukraine - Ukrainian
Women! Not simply women - but romance.
With its balmy climate,
seaside vistas and sandy beaches, and year round lively street
life, Odessa has an ambience more Mediterranean than Slavic.
Odessa is a bustling industrial hub but also an alluring
holiday destination with dozens of large sanatoriums,
miles of sandy beaches, and arguably the most beautiful women
in the world. Wrote one admirer of Odessa:
The ladies of
Deribasovskaya, there are beauties to suit every taste,
hats furs, diamonds…St. Petersburg women are thin, tallish,
Anglicized;
no number of revolutions will suffice to beat their
haughtiness out of them.
Odessa women are the Parisiennes of Former Russia, not simply
women--but romance.
Cosmopolitan Odessa
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There
everything reminds of Europe:
The colors gay, The air's like
syrup;
Italian heard Throughout the
streets,
Where aproud SlavCan
a Spaniard meet;
Moldovian, French,
Albanians, Greeks,
Forget not sons of Land Egypt
--"Eugene Onegin" Pushkin
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"Never I say in any country
so many nationalities
almost opposite of
manners,
languages,
clothes,religions,
and customs on such a
little territory"
--
Duke Richelieu wrote in a
letter to
Emperor Alexander the First |
Over 100
nationalities reside here, and non-Ukrainian inhabitants make
up more than 45% of the regional population. The city is rife
with opportunism; corruption is said to permeate official
circles, and bribery is an art form.
A Second Home
"I had not felt so much at
home for a long time
as I did when I "raised the hill" and stood in Odessa for the
first time.
It looked just like an American city….
---Mark Twain,
The Innocents abroad (more on Twain's
experience, click here)
Welcome to Odessa
Ukraine, an enchanting and unique city. We hope that by
reading this guide you learn to love Odessa as much as we
have, and as you leave, you feel as
Pushkin
did, over 150 years ago:
I'm sad
to say farewell to the sea.
Your hum at night will long be with me;
Wherever I am; in woods or steppes
I close my eyes to see your grace:
Your sparking waves,
Your rocks and bays.
--"To the Sea" Pushkin
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Introduction inspired and adopted from the following:
- Welcome to Ukraine, Airport magazine
- Guide to the Soviet Union, Lydle Brinkle
- Odessa Ukraine, My City
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