Off to Kiev (or Kyiv), Ukraine's capital

I'm about to leave Kharkiv to take the train to Kiev (or Kyiv in Ukrainian). Lots to see there, including art and history museums, the Chernobyl Museum and various churches.

Kyiv is much more "Ukrainian" than Kharkiv, which is close to Russia geographically and linguistically. Language is a big deal in this country -- a "fault line" in journalistic terms. It divides Ukraine in several ways: The western part of the country, toward Poland, favors Ukrainian; the eastern part of the country, toward Russia, prefers Russian (as does Crimea, Ukraine's southern region, which used to be part of Russia).

Language overlaps with politics: The western part of Ukraine tended to support the "Orange Revolution" and the current president, Viktor Yushchenko; the eastern part of Ukraine tended to support Yuschchenko's opponent (and current prime minister), Viktor Yanukovich.

The politics of language plays out in several ways. The Ukrainian parliament -- the Verkhovna Rada -- has been pushing Ukrainian as a sign of the country's independence. It's the official language, of course; hence, the spelling of Kyiv. (But most outsiders consider to spell it Kiev, and some people say that for pragmatic reasons, the Verkhovna Rada should acquiesce to the "ie" spelling. I heard that the Kiev Post, a well-respected English-language paper, made that argument a few years ago. But even the Post eventually gave in, because it's now the KYIV Post.)

There is a mass communications aspect to the language debate. I have a tour book (Ukraine: The Bradt Travel Guide) that talks about how modern and tech-savvy Kharkiv is. This is true. The book then goes on to say, "Bill Gates chose Kharkiv as his base from which to launch the Ukrainian version of Windows." If that's true, it's a blunder -- along the lines of selling the Chevy Nova in Latin America (where "no va" means "doesn't go"). Kharkiv might be an appropriate launch pad for the Russian version of Windows -- but not for the Ukrainian version. Most of the media here are in Russian. (The exception: government-published newspapers.)

Language also was the focus of a recent proposal by Yushchenko. He wants a law requiring foreign films to be dubbed or subtitled in Ukrainian. Presumably, this would apply even to Russian films -- which are popular here, especially in the eastern part of the country.

Speaking of films, here's one that just opened in Kharkiv and Kyiv. Rocky speaks such a universal language :-)

I wonder how this was translated into Ukrainian: "I just want to say hi to my girlfriend, OK? Yo, Adrian! It's me, Rocky ..."