20. Where’s the booze? │Part I
Everywhere. Because, war or no war, occasionally an Odesite wants to sit down, catch up with friends, and have a few beers from time to time. Or horilka. Or wine. Maybe even sparkling wine.
For example, at Italia & More in the City Garden, one can get prosecco at a flat rate on Saturdays: drink as much as you want for 450 hryvnias. True, only six months ago the price was only 399. But given the good service, the decent cuisine, the pleasant atmosphere, and the opportunity to drink a lot, even A LOT of prosecco, for around 10 euros, it is perhaps not too expensive. Passing by the restaurant at the weekend, one can certainly see that there are still enough people interested. But, of course, Odesa’s city center offers plenty of alternatives for the more price-sensitive customer, or simply for the thirsty person who doesn’t care for prosecco.
Consider Tyulka on Koblevska Street, a place worth visiting even for non-seafood enthusiasts. Here, you’ll find inexpensive beer, a menu filled with delightful hors d’oeuvres, and a restroom adorned with mirrors that is an attraction in itself. During the summer, sitting outside, enjoying a cold beer, and observing the local cats and Odesites soaking up the sun is a pleasant experience. The snacks, particularly the sandwiches, are highly recommended, although simply enjoying a beer is also a valid choice.
Buterbrodnaya – that’s the name of the place, as I’ll find out later by googling, as there’s no sign anywhere to be seen – offers not the cheapest beer in the city center (we will get to that later), but it might very well be second-cheapest. In the summertime, the tables under the trees and overhangs are buzzing, the clientele is mainly men, older men. At a neighboring table, a small decanter gleams mischievously in the sun, surrounded by little shot glasses, swarming the decanter like kittens to the mother. At the other table, however, a gentleman, already properly inebriated, staggers up to me and my friend, and we have not the heart to shoo the unwanted guest away. So we learn from Mr. Odesa’s tirade that everything was better in the olden days when there was no war and everyone was friends with each other. My friend is tempted to take a picture of the gentleman and send it to an SBU agent he knows, but on my suggestion, he leaves it be. After all, we can see that instead of a provocateur or a foreign agent, we are dealing with a representative of an older generation who has been well and truly snubbed by life and who is not crying over the unbreakable union of nations but over his own inescapably bygone youth.
However, things are getting a bit tedious, and despite the overhangs, it is scorching hot to sit in front of Buterbrodnaya, so after a couple of beers, we decide to move on to the Passage, where the Odesa branch of the nice port wine chain simply called Port is located. It’s a bar mainly popular with students, offering a wide range of drinks that I can never figure out if they’re really port or just fortified house wines. The bar itself claims the beverages to be port, but it’s pretty clear that one can’t compare these drinks to a nut-flavored Portuguese Tawny or a nice full-bodied Ruby.
There are many options. After all, the Passage is in the middle of the city. One option is to walk back to Preobrazhenska Street, walk a little way towards the sea and pop into Pub Tolstyak – Fatman –, across the street, which has a modest look and feel. For a very good reason, as Tolstyak is the place offering the cheapest beer in the city center. At 35 hryvnias (less than a euro), it’s a bargain not only for the holidaying tourist but also for the ordinary Odesite. And these are exactly the people one will find here.
Just before Christmas, for example, a group of middle-aged ladies, by the look of them, office workers, is gathered around a table, obviously celebrating the start of the festive season. Another time, however, two regulars, one blue-collar-looking middle-aged man and one older gentleman in a slightly worn-out but still decent-looking suit, start a brawl at the counter. The ladies behind the counter intervene swiftly and decisively. To my surprise, no one is thrown out, and neither is refused service (even though both are quite plastered), they are simply told to fight on the street, not inside.
But for the most part, the tavern is filled with proper, mostly single gentlemen, who are primarily drawn to Tolstyak for its central allure - the 35-hryvnia Chernihivske beer. Occasionally, the gentlemen chat with each other over the tables, but generally, everyone goes about their own business, and the impression is that people come here after work to quickly quench their thirst and then move on.
Often around seven in the evening, the crowd changes, with the early shift leaving and more earnest drinkers arriving or remaining. This is the crowd that also sometimes orders something more substantial alongside their beer – horilka or one of the truly awful yet very cheap Ukrainian brandies like Zakarpatsky, Desna, or Uzhgorod.
At some point, the German Stammtisch also moves to Tolstyak. It’s not that it was bad at Natalya’s bar; it’s just that Natalya decides to set aside sentimentality and close the shop – in anticipation of better times. Wartime Odesa is simply not an innkeeper’s paradise. The only survivors are those who can keep their tables full at all times – like Tolstyak – or have some other business to prop them up.
Mick O’Neills in Derybasivska, next door to the Frapolli Hotel, which belongs to the same owner, is certainly one of the latter ones. The bar, known to friends simply as “the Irish pub,” is the main gathering place for foreigners in Odesa. One always finds Americans, Germans, and Italians here, and the local young Arab men often gather on the verandah by the entrance to sip coffee and make business plans. The Irish Pub is the place where those foreigners who know everyone come, as well as those who don’t know anyone but would like to get acquainted. The menu is extensive, offering everything from a long selection of snacks to special dishes showcasing Odesa’s colorful flavors – forshmak, fried tyulka, chicken liver pâté, borsch, etc. – and the drink menu is equally extensive.
The main thing, let’s be honest, is beer. Beer, the price of which was raised once during the war, but then the mistake was realized and the price was lowered again. I suppose it’s been raised a bit again now, but 64 hryvnias for half a liter almost at the corner of Europe (formerly Katerynynska) and Derybasivska is not much to ask. That’s just the fare to get into the epicenter of events.
Mick O'Neills is certainly a place with a strong regular crowd, but it’s also generally one of the liveliest and friendliest hangouts in the city. It hosts pool tournaments, live music on weekends, theme nights, and all sorts of parties. Mick O'Neills also loves to broadcast various sporting events, which can be a bit of a nuisance on some nights for those less interested in sports. However, with its two floors and multiple rooms, it generally still offers a place to hide away, enjoy a beer, and forget the cares of the world.
The Irish pub is appreciated by foreigners, especially those who have just arrived in the city because there is always electricity and internet, so one can also work here even if the rest of the city is paralyzed by a power cut. In this way, O'Neills acts as a life-saving island, appreciated and loved by a loyal audience.
Of course, in the summer, it is also possible to sit on the outdoor terrace in front of the tavern under the old linden trees and feel that, whether there is electricity or not, whether there are air alarms or the Shaheds flying above the head – it’s the little things in life that count.
A similar thing can be said of the Prince, in faraway Arcadia, lost between all the rather expensive and luxurious restaurants and glamorous nightclubs. Prince is a modest bar, located in a Soviet-style shack. I am pretty certain it offers the cheapest beer in Arcadia, as well as a very reasonable meal deal – order two identical pizzas and you only pay for one. Yes, these pizzas are not good, the base is terribly thick and doughy, and they use frozen peas and carrots as topping, but the cheapness kills any criticism.
Sitting in front of the Prince on a nice summer’s day, sipping on a reasonably priced beer – Zakarpatske is around 50 hryvnias – and munching on a grease-dripping pizza costing around 100 grivna (two for one, don’t forget!) is the smartest thing to do in the overpriced and often overcrowded Arcadia.
Adding spice to the Prince are the karaoke evenings. Already tipsy housewives then discover a long-forgotten yearning for the stage in their soul, and one Ukrainian party hit after another will ring out. Often wrongly and loudly, but as we all know – it is passion, what counts in karaoke.
In the winter, of course, the Prince offers a very different, perhaps even poignant experience, being one of the few open eateries in Arcadia, but especially during the war months, even this amusement mecca is not operating at full capacity: the room is unheated, not everything on the menu is actually available, and the lazily spinning disco ball in the ceiling of the badly lit shack makes one just want to cry. Sad but beautiful!
For example, at Italia & More in the City Garden, one can get prosecco at a flat rate on Saturdays: drink as much as you want for 450 hryvnias. True, only six months ago the price was only 399. But given the good service, the decent cuisine, the pleasant atmosphere, and the opportunity to drink a lot, even A LOT of prosecco, for around 10 euros, it is perhaps not too expensive. Passing by the restaurant at the weekend, one can certainly see that there are still enough people interested. But, of course, Odesa’s city center offers plenty of alternatives for the more price-sensitive customer, or simply for the thirsty person who doesn’t care for prosecco.
Consider Tyulka on Koblevska Street, a place worth visiting even for non-seafood enthusiasts. Here, you’ll find inexpensive beer, a menu filled with delightful hors d’oeuvres, and a restroom adorned with mirrors that is an attraction in itself. During the summer, sitting outside, enjoying a cold beer, and observing the local cats and Odesites soaking up the sun is a pleasant experience. The snacks, particularly the sandwiches, are highly recommended, although simply enjoying a beer is also a valid choice.
There’s also a bar just across the street, as I discover once sitting in front of Tyulka, and next time my friend and I decide to try it out. The decision turns out to be the right one – a large number of tables and chairs filling the pavement in the summer almost obscure the place itself, a tiny and stiflingly hot corner room in the summer, where a respectable-looking dame behind the counter pours both draft and bottled beers, and a decent selection of cheaper spirits is on sale, the bottles of wine, whose labeling has an unambiguously cautionary effect, are also striking, bringing with them memories of my university days and the sharp headaches of consuming a Bulgarian product that is clearly not intended for humans, but very affordable for students. But that’s that.
Buterbrodnaya – that’s the name of the place, as I’ll find out later by googling, as there’s no sign anywhere to be seen – offers not the cheapest beer in the city center (we will get to that later), but it might very well be second-cheapest. In the summertime, the tables under the trees and overhangs are buzzing, the clientele is mainly men, older men. At a neighboring table, a small decanter gleams mischievously in the sun, surrounded by little shot glasses, swarming the decanter like kittens to the mother. At the other table, however, a gentleman, already properly inebriated, staggers up to me and my friend, and we have not the heart to shoo the unwanted guest away. So we learn from Mr. Odesa’s tirade that everything was better in the olden days when there was no war and everyone was friends with each other. My friend is tempted to take a picture of the gentleman and send it to an SBU agent he knows, but on my suggestion, he leaves it be. After all, we can see that instead of a provocateur or a foreign agent, we are dealing with a representative of an older generation who has been well and truly snubbed by life and who is not crying over the unbreakable union of nations but over his own inescapably bygone youth.
However, things are getting a bit tedious, and despite the overhangs, it is scorching hot to sit in front of Buterbrodnaya, so after a couple of beers, we decide to move on to the Passage, where the Odesa branch of the nice port wine chain simply called Port is located. It’s a bar mainly popular with students, offering a wide range of drinks that I can never figure out if they’re really port or just fortified house wines. The bar itself claims the beverages to be port, but it’s pretty clear that one can’t compare these drinks to a nut-flavored Portuguese Tawny or a nice full-bodied Ruby.
Yet what Port otherwise lacks, it makes up for in price per glass, which ranges between 50 and 80 hryvnias, or one and a half to two euros. By the way, it is also possible to buy a bottle to go if one should wish to do so, but what’s the point, as the main attraction is the chance to enjoy the Passage with its impressive architecture. It is simply a fantastic environment to sit and enjoy a drink, whatever the time of year or time of day.
However, these drinks – well, let’s call them port – these port wines are of course damn strong. It is better not to have more than one or two of them if one wants to continue gallivanting through downtown Odesa. So, it’s time to move on. But where to?
However, these drinks – well, let’s call them port – these port wines are of course damn strong. It is better not to have more than one or two of them if one wants to continue gallivanting through downtown Odesa. So, it’s time to move on. But where to?
There are many options. After all, the Passage is in the middle of the city. One option is to walk back to Preobrazhenska Street, walk a little way towards the sea and pop into Pub Tolstyak – Fatman –, across the street, which has a modest look and feel. For a very good reason, as Tolstyak is the place offering the cheapest beer in the city center. At 35 hryvnias (less than a euro), it’s a bargain not only for the holidaying tourist but also for the ordinary Odesite. And these are exactly the people one will find here.
Just before Christmas, for example, a group of middle-aged ladies, by the look of them, office workers, is gathered around a table, obviously celebrating the start of the festive season. Another time, however, two regulars, one blue-collar-looking middle-aged man and one older gentleman in a slightly worn-out but still decent-looking suit, start a brawl at the counter. The ladies behind the counter intervene swiftly and decisively. To my surprise, no one is thrown out, and neither is refused service (even though both are quite plastered), they are simply told to fight on the street, not inside.
But for the most part, the tavern is filled with proper, mostly single gentlemen, who are primarily drawn to Tolstyak for its central allure - the 35-hryvnia Chernihivske beer. Occasionally, the gentlemen chat with each other over the tables, but generally, everyone goes about their own business, and the impression is that people come here after work to quickly quench their thirst and then move on.
Often around seven in the evening, the crowd changes, with the early shift leaving and more earnest drinkers arriving or remaining. This is the crowd that also sometimes orders something more substantial alongside their beer – horilka or one of the truly awful yet very cheap Ukrainian brandies like Zakarpatsky, Desna, or Uzhgorod.
At some point, the German Stammtisch also moves to Tolstyak. It’s not that it was bad at Natalya’s bar; it’s just that Natalya decides to set aside sentimentality and close the shop – in anticipation of better times. Wartime Odesa is simply not an innkeeper’s paradise. The only survivors are those who can keep their tables full at all times – like Tolstyak – or have some other business to prop them up.
Mick O’Neills in Derybasivska, next door to the Frapolli Hotel, which belongs to the same owner, is certainly one of the latter ones. The bar, known to friends simply as “the Irish pub,” is the main gathering place for foreigners in Odesa. One always finds Americans, Germans, and Italians here, and the local young Arab men often gather on the verandah by the entrance to sip coffee and make business plans. The Irish Pub is the place where those foreigners who know everyone come, as well as those who don’t know anyone but would like to get acquainted. The menu is extensive, offering everything from a long selection of snacks to special dishes showcasing Odesa’s colorful flavors – forshmak, fried tyulka, chicken liver pâté, borsch, etc. – and the drink menu is equally extensive.
The main thing, let’s be honest, is beer. Beer, the price of which was raised once during the war, but then the mistake was realized and the price was lowered again. I suppose it’s been raised a bit again now, but 64 hryvnias for half a liter almost at the corner of Europe (formerly Katerynynska) and Derybasivska is not much to ask. That’s just the fare to get into the epicenter of events.
Mick O'Neills is certainly a place with a strong regular crowd, but it’s also generally one of the liveliest and friendliest hangouts in the city. It hosts pool tournaments, live music on weekends, theme nights, and all sorts of parties. Mick O'Neills also loves to broadcast various sporting events, which can be a bit of a nuisance on some nights for those less interested in sports. However, with its two floors and multiple rooms, it generally still offers a place to hide away, enjoy a beer, and forget the cares of the world.
The Irish pub is appreciated by foreigners, especially those who have just arrived in the city because there is always electricity and internet, so one can also work here even if the rest of the city is paralyzed by a power cut. In this way, O'Neills acts as a life-saving island, appreciated and loved by a loyal audience.
Of course, in the summer, it is also possible to sit on the outdoor terrace in front of the tavern under the old linden trees and feel that, whether there is electricity or not, whether there are air alarms or the Shaheds flying above the head – it’s the little things in life that count.
A similar thing can be said of the Prince, in faraway Arcadia, lost between all the rather expensive and luxurious restaurants and glamorous nightclubs. Prince is a modest bar, located in a Soviet-style shack. I am pretty certain it offers the cheapest beer in Arcadia, as well as a very reasonable meal deal – order two identical pizzas and you only pay for one. Yes, these pizzas are not good, the base is terribly thick and doughy, and they use frozen peas and carrots as topping, but the cheapness kills any criticism.
Sitting in front of the Prince on a nice summer’s day, sipping on a reasonably priced beer – Zakarpatske is around 50 hryvnias – and munching on a grease-dripping pizza costing around 100 grivna (two for one, don’t forget!) is the smartest thing to do in the overpriced and often overcrowded Arcadia.
Adding spice to the Prince are the karaoke evenings. Already tipsy housewives then discover a long-forgotten yearning for the stage in their soul, and one Ukrainian party hit after another will ring out. Often wrongly and loudly, but as we all know – it is passion, what counts in karaoke.
In the winter, of course, the Prince offers a very different, perhaps even poignant experience, being one of the few open eateries in Arcadia, but especially during the war months, even this amusement mecca is not operating at full capacity: the room is unheated, not everything on the menu is actually available, and the lazily spinning disco ball in the ceiling of the badly lit shack makes one just want to cry. Sad but beautiful!
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