So the more that I speak with friends, clients and family back in Western Europe and North
America do I appreciate how relatively free the last year has been for me here in Ukraine
so in today's Tip Thursday with me, Conor Clyne, I'm going to dive into the
three life lessons about freedom that I've learned by living in Ukraine for the last year.
Поехали!
Let me start by explaining the actual situation that we had here in Ukraine in 2020 and 2021 with
the covid restrictions now back when it started so early spring 2020 there was about two or three
weeks if I remember correctly the length of time where there were some lockdown measures basically
you could only get take out here in Ukraine I was in Odesa that was quite restrictive for me personally
because I like to eat out basically three times a day occasionally I cook or someone cooks for me at
home and you have to wear masks to go into places and by and large those rules were respected now
after that period well first of all they opened everything up and then they tried to reintroduce
restrictions in general after that period even when there have been restrictions here in Ukraine
more or less been ignored to a large extent so for example they had a general lockdown
in theory a couple of months ago when it was the orthodox new year and
most of my favorite places in Odesa were actually opened secretly so you could go in so it was a
little bit annoying that obviously you have to know the places which in my case it was not a problem
so if you come as a tourist you might not have known where to go but besides that there
wasn't really any great difference compared to normal life and that's because rule of law is
pretty weak here in Ukraine interestingly when we compare Ukraine to neighboring Belarus
Belarus they have very strict rule of law but the government there has not introduced widespread
lockdown measures so the reason why that country was more relatively free and you could go to bars
and shops and clubs and whatnot is because the government just didn't introduce a full lockdown
but they have introduced some measures about wearing masks in Belarus for example you do have
to wear a mask in a lot more places than you do in here in Ukraine at the moment in reality and if
Lukashenka were to decide tomorrow that suddenly everything needs to be locked down believe me
everything will be locked down and you won't be able to go into secret places so easily like you
can in Ukraine so that is something to bear in mind if you want to escape to Belarus because
if there is a change in policy it will be very very strictly enforced so that is basically
you know the lesson I learned is about rule of law and you know normally it's a good thing but
when the government takes away your freedom then obviously living a country without so strict
law becomes a lot more attractive This is to celebrate
the end of the coronavirus lockdown and having some nice parties this summer in Odesa Mama
So the second lesson that I've learned in the last year kind of been reinforced I guess to me
I had learned it in the past is the fickleness of our freedoms our relative freedoms because
this is one you're going to relate to obviously we went from a situation where we could walk around
and meet people hug them not have to wear masks or sit at home for weeks on end and order take out
or go just to you know or cook at home because we have to go to the supermarket we don't have
any options to go out and socialize and that disappeared extremely quickly and a lot of
parts of West it hasn't been returned 100 now here I wasn't disturbed by too much as I said
lost it for a couple of weeks really and then gradually we started to regain it so what has
reinforced more to me is the memories of obviously what happened here in 2014 during the EuroMaidan
Revolution also known as the Revolution of Dignity here in Ukraine where obviously there was a change
in power and very quickly afterwards Russia annexed Crimea and then a war started in Donbas
and you know I used to go to Crimea every summer and I took that for granted because we
had visa-free here in Ukraine as a European or as a Westerner and then suddenly going to Crimea for
example Russia says it's theirs they de-facto control it they say I need a Russian visa to
go there and they created all these barriers so that freedom just to go to Crimea also Donbas obviously
the war started in 2014 and I cannot go to the city of Donetsk without taking huge personal risk
and you know I went to Donetsk a few times not gonna say it was my favorite city in Ukraine but
I still had a good time and I have good memories of being there and you know can't do that anymore and
it's a shell and more than figuratively of what it used to be I remember flying into
that airport the one that's been completely destroyed it was a new airport at the time so
if you'd asked most people here in Ukraine back in the summer of 2013
you know will it be a war between Russia and Ukraine they say you're you're crazy
why would there be war between brother countries now obviously people who understood
the dynamics geopolitical dynamics could perceive that there was potential for some conflict but
just so quickly it all turned and you probably can relate to that quite a bit
with these covid restrictions so the fickleness of freedom
is something that you know innately we don't appreciate it until we've lost it
So the third and final life lesson that this year in Ukraine has taught me is about political
correctness and the value in terms of freedom of freedom of speech because that is something that
we've seen severely curtailed in the West whether it happens to be here on youtube
but having an open and intellectual debate around the value of the covid restrictions how dangerous
covid is what the government should be doing and obviously a lot of people have been cancelled that
extends further it has been a trend in the West in general now the opposite side to that is people say a lot of
speech that is unpleasant to hear and can be also hateful but here you have definitely a more open
active debate and I'm not going to say that Ukraine doesn't have any sort of cancel
culture and the president basically had some pro-Russian supposedly pro-Russian tv stations and
media banned here basically had their licenses withdrawn recently so it does happen but that's
not going to affect you and I think that's the real message I want to communicate is that for
you as a foreigner coming here to Ukraine you can definitely have more freedom of expression
ironically than what's most likely back in your home country that's something I really value
So there you've gotten my musings on what is freedom here in Ukraine compared to Western countries
especially in the times of the covid restrictions 2020/2021.
Now you've watched to the end of this video so probably a move to Ukraine is something that is tempting you
to rediscover that sense of freedom that relative freedom that I've been enjoying here in Ukraine
and you're going to need to have a plan in place if you want to do that it doesn't mean you have
to move the entire year I had a consulting client on the phone the other day and he was considering
coming here for say the summer months you know you need a plan in place to stay longer not visa
free 90 days and best way to do that is through my Slavic Utopia Secrets: Ukraine high level
consultation group down below there is a link to it it's on demand you can join that group
what we're going to go into is designing the optimal visa strategy for you so that you can
stay here for as long as you want in Ukraine once you get in how to take advantage of the massive
massive opportunities in the real estate market and dive deep deep into the local real estate
market because it is pretty amazing here what you can get in terms of value for money so it could be
the dream Kyiv penthouse overlooking the river Dnipro can actually also be here in Dnipro because
obviously river runs through here as well hence the name could be further south in Ukraine on the
shores of Black Sea that Odesa villa looking out over the sea whatever it happens to be we're going
to have that done in depth to give you a direction about where to go and how the whole process works
here also going to cover and overcome the language barrier how to take advantage of the big business
opportunities as well because a lot of things that have been done and validated in the West have not
quite arrived here in Ukraine there definitely are some big business opportunities for you and
you also need to know what to do in the case of a medical emergency and actually there are a lot of
really attractive prices here it's actually gets a lot of medical tourism nowadays as well in Ukraine
because you can get medical procedures done for a fraction of the cost of the West but of course you
also need to have a plan in place in case you have an emergency because you are in a foreign country
and you do have that language barrier as well as a different institutional framework and how the
medical system is set up anyways it's all down below you can go take a look at that in addition
you should be on if you're not already on my free mailing list that's where I communicate with my
most loyal fans I release my new programs my new premium programs to them first I don't do it here
on youtube so if you get notified of those you need to be on the mailing list if you haven't done
that there's a free gift below going to give you the Tsar's hot spots to Odesa, Kyiv and Minsk
in neighboring Belarus it's completely free go and type in your email address down below and then you
confirm your email you get that guide as a free gift from me and then in the future you also will
receive the notifications and emails from me about my new premium products and I'm actually
probably going to be developing one I've been developing it for basic Russian that's obviously
going to be a big help for guys who want to move to Eastern Europe in general or travel around here
and overcome that language barrier oh someone has decided to make some noise so I'll leave it there
trust you've enjoyed this more philosophical video I think a little bit about the sense of
freedom that I've been enjoying for the last year here in Ukraine to you and your freedom
До свидания! До побачення from Dnipro in the center of free Ukraine!