FRIDAY 3rd JULY 2009 (ODESSA PAPER TRAIL)

FRIDAY 3rd JULY 2009

Paul returned from Kyiv on the train at 10.30am. Our mission today was to complete all paper work regarding exporting the bike from Ukraine. Arrangements were made to meet the customs brokers (Oksana and Alla) after lunch with the original documents from Kyiv.

We arrived to find NO-ONE IN THE OFFICE.....AAARRRHHHGGGGG....!!! Our hopes of finalising the document today just evaporated.

We were told Oksana

'might' be back at 5.00pm, maybe 6.00pm (maybe not at all!). We went back to the Boulevard and just sat under the trees and people watched until we thought the time right to return to the office.

We walked back past the Colonnade and across a foot bridge which had hundreds and hundreds of padlocks along it's rails - a pleasant distraction.

We were ECSTATIC to find Oksana at her desk....that is until....we were told that in order to get the 'Declaration to Export' we must go through many departments to get the 'final' stamp. One such department mentioned was the Ecology Department...!!! For God's sake, what on earth have they got to do with any of this...???

And why weren't we told any of this a week ago when we asked about the procedures involved...?? The other bombshell dropped was a 'possible' fee of $600 US. Now we are really upset. This is SOOOO ridiculous.

What ever happened to the days when you got on your motorcycle and traveled freely around with not a care in the world. That's what we are supposed to be doing - not creating a paper trail large enough to papier-mache the planet...!!!

It was after 7.00pm when we left Oksana's office and stopped at the first cafe-bar for a stiff drink - several actually. Luckily for us there was a sax-player doing his stuff which helped calm the frayed nerves.

We have explored many options but every one of them involves having these documents to enable the bike to leave the country (something we were told was in order prior to purchasing the bike).