Activities

Bessarabsky Market

Kreshchatyk main st

Kiev , Ukraine

To see how locals shop, there is Bessarabsky Market, in the city's center. Here, women in head scarves sell fruit, vegetables, caviar, fish, meat, sausage, honey, and flowers in a rotunda dating to 1912—the furious, and often loud, commercial activity monitored by a Lenin statue standing opposite. The shopping experience looks timeless, and yet what's being sold these days is a remarkable contrast to the sparse offerings during the Soviet era.