Decades ago, Murray's family was contacted by his second cousin Liliana, in the Ukraine. Her grandfather, and Murray's father were brothers. Murray's father had grown up in an area in Poland that is now part of the Ukraine. Murray's father fought with the Brits in WW2, first as a Rat of Tobruk in Libya, and then in Italy in Montecassino where he was wounded. He was then repatriated from London out to Australia, unable to return to war-torn Poland due to the separation of the country between Germany and Russia, and he never again returned to his homeland. Murray's father had lost contact with his family after the war. Up to this point, none of Murray's family had met any of their Polish/Ukranian relatives.
Liliana had travelled to Naples as part of an orchestral music tour from the Ukraine, and she then thought moving to Naples might give her better work opportunities than back home in the Ukraine. However, when she got to Naples, music gigs were hard to break into, and so she did other work, and eventually moved to the Italian island of Sardinia about 16 years ago, and settled into the capital, Olbia. Her son Rostyslav and her daughter Khrystyna joined her once she was settled. Murray discovered Rostyslav on Facebook many years ago, and they have been communicating ever since.
With our cruise ship docking in Rome, we knew that Olbia, Sardinia was only a 1 hour flight west of Rome. The opportunity to meet the cousins was too good to pass up. Sardinia is apparently one of the oldest geological lands in Europe, dating back to the late Stone Age, or Upper Paleolithic (about 5-8,000 years BC) for those history buffs. And yes Gemma, it is believed that the English word 'sardine' came about in the 15th Century as those small fish were plentiful around Sardinia in those days.
Rostyslav could speak some English and Liliana and Khrystyna could only speak a few words of English. We only knew how to say hello, thanks and goodbye in Italian. Amazing how much you can get across with sign language and the odd word here and there.
Rostyslav and his mum Liliana met us at the airport. There weren't many other people there, but there was no hesitation with Liliana - as soon as she saw Murray, she hugged him and was one very happy lady. Rostyslav also had a smile on his face the whole 3 days that we were in Sardinia - despite lots of issues with cars!! Their own car was being fixed, and so he had borrowed a car from a friend, and then on our second day, the driver's door refused to unlock, and poor Rostyslav had to get in the passenger side door and slide across - he is tall and slim like Murray thank goodness, and young enough to be able to manage it ok.
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| Emotional meeting at the airport: Lilliana, Murray, Rostyslav |
Murray had done a lot of work preparing family history documents for them - copies and photos of his dad's birth and wedding certificates, military history, medals and associated documents and family photos. To say they were overwhelmed with the documents is an understatement. They have been tormented for years with lack of knowledge of what happened to Murray's dad after the war, so Murray was able to fill in a lot of blanks for them. They are studying Murray's notes very keenly.
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Wine tasting
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They were so warm and welcoming - Every day they invited us to have lunch and dinner at their home with them, but in the end I had one lunch and one dinner with them, and Murray had a few extra meals while catching up on family history. Liliana works as a nurse's aide doing home visits, Rostyslav is a 29 year old musician who plays the keyboard with a few small groups for weddings and other events, and his younger sister Khrystyna works in a bar while she works out what she wants to do, as she is only 19. On the way to their place for dinner, we called into a wine maker to sample our red and white dinner wine. 5 Euro per litre - nice wine too. The winemaker seemed a bit non-plussed, but then he probably didn't understand us chatting in English.
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| Porto Cervo |
One day Rostyslav took us for a drive north along the east coast - known as Costa Smerelda - to the beautiful Porto Cervo. The water in summer is supposed to be an amazing clear turquoise colour, but it was a bit early in the season to be tempted for a swim. They normally get their best rainfall in Winter, but it had been a dry winter, so the land was very dry as we flew over it. Interestingly they talk of the mainland of Italy as Italy, and although Sardinia is an Island of Italy, they see themselves as Sardinians, not as Italians. If they travel to Rome, they say they are going to Italy - we understand that a very clear distinction is made between the mainlanders and the islanders.
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| Rostyslav, Khrystyna and Murray |
On the way home from our coastal drive, we called into the bar where Khrystyna works, and Murray got to meet the 3rd of his Ukrainian cousins. She would like to learn English to help with tourism employment opportunities.
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| Four cousins: Liliana, Khrystyna, Rostyslav and Murray |
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| On the steps of our accomodation |
Our bed n breakfast was in an ideal location and an easy walk around the village square. Ours was a huge room, with a spacious entry, large bedroom and an efficient bathroom complete with bidet. The breakfast room/outside patio was shared between 3 couples but we only saw one couple each morning (a different couple each day). You could sit inside or out, but to make the most of the glorious weather, we sat outside and enjoyed 'the aura'. A continental breakfast was set up each morning with the usual selection of juices, fruit, breads, condiments, cereals, and a plain cake. One day there was a quiche, another day a loaf of freshly baked grain bread. A lady came in every morning and served us and waited on us - she made speciality coffees, eggs, toast etc. Our room was serviced every day, so it was nice coming home to a clean room at the end of each day.
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| Breakfast Patio |
On our last evening, Rostyslav was booked to play in a band at a local sailing club as part of a trio - there was him on keyboard, a male drummer and a female singer. We got there as the sun was setting (click on the photo below and you can see the sun illuminating the mountain at the rear), and the scenery was so beautiful. The dinner and wine was kindly provided by Rostyslav and the music was pleasant to listen too - sort of pop jazz is how I would describe it.
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Olbia, Sardinia
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| Rostyslav on keyboard |
It was a short but sweet visit, and Murray is thrilled that he got to meet 3 cousins, and share their history together. There is still Liliana's mother Lena, and Liliana's brother Oleg and his daughter (also named Khrystyna) living in the Ukraine, who he hasn't met yet.
As you can imagine, we saw some beautiful sunsets, and some nice sunrises - well, I think I caught one or two of the latter! We had glorious spring weather, and were wearing t-shirts until the second last day which turned cool.
