ProBargainHunter.com

This kind of posts are rare in between but once in a while I do try to show how grateful I am to the people and companies who support me and my blog. Today I would like to thank two website that have been sponsoring ProBargainHunter for quite a while.

CouponWinner

Aydin, the President and CEO, renewed sponsorship earlier this month and with the renewal email tipped me to a new feature they launched recently. It is called CouponScout. Here is how it works.

Let’s say you are looking for a digital camera and you know that BestBuy and CircuitCity have the camera you like at similar prices. You go to CouponWinner and click on Electronics and select “Digital Cameras” category. Look for the CouponScout icon to the left. Select BestBuy and CircuitCity and click “Compare”. You will see a view like this:

The two lists show the coupons available for each merchant and you can compare the deals side by side to find the best offer on digital cameras.

Financial Web

FinancialWeb is an independent financial portal full of personal finance related educational resources. The kind of information you will find there varies from mortgage to taxes and from insurance to credit cards. FinancialWeb has been sponsoring ProBargainHunter for almost a year now and today they renewed the contract for 3 more months. Give them a visit at FinWeb.com and if you happen to drop them a note say “hi” from Yan at ProBargainHunter!

This will be the last post from my Ukraine series. Overall I spent in Ukraine around 5 weeks and visited 4 cities. The last place we went to was Zaparozhye, a city with population of around 1 million people stretching for several miles along Dniepr - the longest river in Ukraine. During our visit we stayed at my cousin who lives and works in the city.

Zaporozhye is famous for its power plant - DneproGES. It is a huge dam connecting two parts of the city and supplying electricity to the numerous plants nesting along the river bank. It was built in 1932 and is the largest hydroelectric power plant in Ukraine.

We took a walk across it and I should say it was quite a nervous adventure. The bridge above the dam swings with each passing truck and you literally have to hold the railings to be able to stay straight.

Somewhere in the middle my cousin commented that the bridge is long overdue for repairs and then I really regretted I allowed him to get me out over there. I truly felt relieved when we were finally over on the other side. By the way, the dam was named after Lenin and still holds that title (you can read it on the sign, in Russian of course).

The entertainment industry in Zaporozhye is not nearly as developed as in Kiev. There is just one bowling club in the city. We did find what to do however.

We went to the historical museum which is located on the Khortisa island just down the river from the dam. There is a popular belief that in the XIV-XV centuries Khortitsa served as a camp for kozaks, free people who fled from landlords and made a military camp on the island. The museum guide however rebuffed the idea and claimed that archaeological surveys prove that there has never been a camp on the island itself, although there were quite a few kozak camps in other places along the river.

In 18th century Russian queen Ekaterina II abolished kozaks military organization - the Sitch. Part of the kozaks who fled Russian troops settled on the banks of Dnepr river founding the city of Zaporozhye.

Today the city government with support from private businesses is building a reduced size model of a camp on the island which among other things will have VIP accommodations for important guests. Part of the financing comes from entertainment industry. I was told they use the camp to film some scenes from a future movie about Ukrainian kozaks.

Now this is a bonus shot from the city of Zaporozhye. I captured the scene close to my cousin’s apartment. This may mean nothing to you but the image does revive some memories from my childhood. The lady by the wall (click on the image to enlarge) collects empty bottles for recycling. My dad not once used to send me to such a place to exchange for money the empty bottles we collected over the week. I didn’t mind much since the profit was usually all mine to keep.

As I already mentioned, this will be the last post from my Ukraine series however I will be happy to answer any of your questions in the comments. Ukraine is an interesting country which offers genuine history and amazing traditions. I hope this series of posts conveys this idea despite some dark bits here and there.