From Kyiv to Helsinki

I got back from EPT Kyiv about 4 days ago and needed that much time to recover. EPT ‘s are easily my favorite tournemtns to cover. The tourney staff clearly love what they do, every night after play ends it always involves playing some more. I had some reservations about doing a tournament in the Ukraine, much less Eastern Europe. Kyiv did give some quirky experiences: power went out on Day 1b, which gave new meaning to the term Poker After Dark. Floor staff walked the floor with a flashlight to complete hand in play when the lights went out. What made the power outage a little weirder was the venue. It is a hulking sports arena which only a week before hosted the World Cup of Gymanastics. Half the floor was poker tables, the other half a huge press room. The floor was that harsh bright blue always seen during the Olympics. I kept expecting a gymnast to bouce across doing cart wheels…It never happened.

What made the whole trip stand out was the food, and a stupid beneficial exchange rate that made me at least a thousandaire. We lurked out of the venue a couple of times in search for food, but due to late ending times each day always ended up at our hotel. That in most cases would be a bad thing, but this was Kyiv. The first day the PokerNews staff ate there I tried chicken Kyiv. I felt it was appropriate and frankly had no idea what was in it. It’s butter; Imagine chicken breast wrapped around a stick of butter and deep fried and you have Kyiv signature dish. A copius amount of caviar in the city made most eating experiences adventure way beyond the norm.
Oh Yeah, and there was poker. Most players the EPT draws have working English, enough for interviews to some degree. Not the case in Kyiv. Most players were Russian or Ukrainian speaking with rudimentary English only. I ended up interviewing all the Americans at least once, not to mention rooting for all the English speakers. Was happy though when Maxim Lykov took it down, even though he wore Ed Hardy. I’m so tired of Ed Hardy.

I lucked out and instead of a 15 hour flight home that all my PokerNews people had to do , I had a quick two hour flight to Helskinki to see the BF. Helsinki has been a defacto base for me. I’ll be in the Europe until after EPT London. I’m lucky my BF doesn’t mind me crashing at his place between tourneys, saves me the maddening long flights. There was a small high stakes tourney in Helsinki the past couple of days. A closing party thrown by Pokerisivut.com drew the majority of the Finnish poker community. It is mind boggling how such a small country has produced so many quality players.

Well, I’m off to Monaco tomorrow for some birthday fun , then off to Barcelona for the EPT.