"NATION SHOULD MAKE VISITORS WELCOME"
Travel and Tourism A Win-Win For Ukraine
By E. Morgan Williams

The Kyiv Post Kyiv, Ukraine Thursday, July 17, 2002

Realizing how much potential Ukraine has, it is frustrating to see how painfully slow the country has been to tap its vast resources for its own benefit and for the benefit of its people. One wonders when Ukraine will finally wake up, throw off the bonds and lies of the past, open its economic system and move into the future with a sense of vision and hope.

Travel and tourism is a win?win situation any way one looks at it. The decision to develop a genuine travel and tourism industry could quickly return huge dividends. This large, beautiful country possesses many outstanding historic, cultural and scenic sites. With so much to see and do, it is time to promote Ukraine. That won’t be easy, though, since promotion is not a skill found in most of the nation, especially in government organizations.

Ukraine is an exciting place waiting to be discovered by the world. Most of the world’s millions of yearly travelers and tourists have never been to Ukraine. As part of the Soviet Union, it was until eleven years ago basically a closed country, not really open and not allowed to have its own identity and share it with the rest of the world. Unfortunately, Ukraine still does not have its own tangible identity separate from Russia, and what identity it does have most times is not very positive. But all this should and can change over time if there is a concerted effort and a new vision by the public and private sectors to develop and promote the best Ukraine has to offer. Ukraine is still not really an open country.

There is still far too much closed in Ukraine, still too much like Soviet times. Ukraine really needs to open itself up to the world, tell the story of its long history, culture, art, music and sports in a new way. It needs to invite the whole world to come to visit, to tour, to buy, to do business, to study and learn, to invest and to enjoy. It is still far too difficult to travel and tour in Ukraine. I have gotten over being surprised and shocked at the difficulties one encounters trying to spend money to travel, see and enjoy what Ukraine already has to offer.

Most of Ukraine’s museums and other tourist sites are very poorly managed, promoted, maintained, developed and are not user friendly. One does not know if they will be open; the displays are far too run down, outdated and Soviet; the materials are old; most of the lights are not on or do not work. I have visited outstanding places where the roofs leak, plaster is falling off the walls, there is little heating, no water, no working bathrooms, no air conditioning, every room has it own lock, and the display rooms are opened only when one really insists. Wonderful places are out of resources, have no concept of marketing and thus are out of business.

The people who work at these places are not customer oriented, and the gift shops, if they exist and are open, are not stocked well and do not present the best art and crafts Ukraine has to offer. I made a trip to Taras Shevchenko’s grave and museum in Kaniv in May of this year for the anniversary of his death with the outstanding Ukrainian Bandurist Chorus. The location, the monument and the entire area should be on every tourist’s itinerary. The event and trip should have been satisfying and rewarding. I should have come back a “walking billboard” about the event, the monument and the museum. But I found that the materials, brochures, photographs and souvenirs at the site mostly dated from Soviet times. They were terrible and ugly. It was very easy for us visitors to keep our money in our pockets and not spend it. Only one?third of the lights in the museum were on. The people in the museum looked at you like they just wanted you to leave.

At such places throughout Ukraine, one never knows if one can take photographs or not or if one has to pay extra. Parts of the beautiful stained glass windows were covered up with a painting and some signs. The displays were very bland and not creative. It was not possible to buy any real outstanding Ukrainian crafts, art, or folk art. There were just a few vendors allowed to set up outside at the bottom of the steps. The crowd on that special Sunday in May honoring Taras Shevchenko was only one?fifth of what one would expect and what it should have been. The Bandurist Chorus played an outstanding concert before a small audience. In short, it was not a good strategy to do business and promote Ukraine on the part of the people responsible for that wonderful location. All in all it was very depressing, especially when one thinks what the place could be and indeed should be. The whole place was dead when it should have been alive, vibrant and exciting. This is typical of what tourists find in most places throughout Ukraine.

The city of Lviv, for example, should be considered a must?visit for any of the millions of tourists who flock to Budapest, Vienna, Prague or Warsaw. Unfortunately the city is not yet on most tourist lists. To get there Lviv must take it upon itself to promote itself better. The opportunity is there for the taking. It is time for the public and private sectors in Ukraine to invest real money into modernizing the travel and tourism industry, into promoting Ukraine’s culture and history to the world. Such an investment will come back quickly many times over.

It is time for Ukraine to really open its doors and hang out the “Welcome to Ukraine” sign. The rewards to Ukraine will be amazing if only Ukraine right now wakes up, invests, cleans up, opens up, and shares itself with the rest of the world. The world will come. Everyone will win.

E. Morgan Williams is a business, government and public affairs consultant who divides his time between Washington, D.C. and Kyiv. He publishes a Web site, ArtUkraine.com, which promotes Ukrainian culture, history, art and tourism.

The Kyiv Post, July 11, 2002, Kyiv, Ukriane
http://www.kpnews.com/main/11447/