15:29:48 - 11.03.2010

Home Travel & Tourism Night Kiev
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At night, city life in Kyiv almost comes to a standstill – except, of course, night clubs and taxis that roam the streets when no other public transport ation can be found. But Kyiv, it turns out, has many more businesses admitting visitors and providing services round the clock. Among them are restaurants, supermarkets, pharmacies, saunas, pawn shops and computer clubs – in other words, everything one needs on a sleepless night.

Late night meals

You won’t find 24/7 restaurants on every corner of Kyiv, but there are still quite a few of them. For instance, if you happen to be on Khreshchatyk after midnight and don’t want to go to a noisy disco or live music club, one of the few choices you have for a casual drink is Chateau Slavutych – a brewery and restaurant that offers four kinds of home-made Slavutych beer on tap (from Hr 16.50 per 0.3 liter) and German cuisine to go with it.

Just a few blocks away you can find Fellini, located door-to-door with Ukraina movie theater on Horodetskoho Street. This proper restaurant offers fancy food at high prices and walls adorned with photos of movie stars. But even if all you want is a cup of coffee to stay awake at 3 a.m., you will still be welcome.

Other fancy and centrally-located hangouts include Richelieu restaurant and Safe bar. They share the same location next to Lva Tolstoho metro station.

Being a light and healthy food, sushi is a popular nighttime snack. So, its no surprise that round-the-clock sushi bars are real hot spots. Yakitoriya, SushiYa and Murakami chains, each have restaurants that always stay open. I recommend SushiYa for it's quality-to-price ratio. Yakitoria, however, offers a good discount to late night diners. Also, the only 24-restaurant in the Murakami chain, floating peacefully on the waves a few steps from Dnipro metro station, can be a great place to watch dawn.

Fans of Ukrainian cuisine can satisfy their late night hunger at Varenychna No.1. Like Murakami, this restaurant is a part of the Kozyrnaya Karta chain of venues, so remember to take your discount card when you’re visiting.

Also and unsurprisingly, several Kyiv coffee chains have a part of their outfits working 24 hours. They include Coffee House, Double Coffee and Shokoladnitsa.

Finally, if you’re looking for a really casual quick and cheap snack, head to Mr. Snack on Shevchenko Boulevard. It offers sandwiches with a selection of fillings of your choice (Hr 25 per sandwich on average), French fries, fried sausages, juices, and beer.

Another way to get a meal after dark is through delivery services.

In Kyiv the most popular food to order is pizza and sushi. Many delivery services carry both. Some also deliver 24-hours a day.

My personal favorite and one of the most popular pizza chains in Kyiv is MamaMia (www.mamamia.ua, 222-5-222). Its pizza (priced Hr 100 on average) are juicy, delicious and big considering the cost and size competitors offer. They deliver to most parts of the city for free.

Trattoria pizzeria (trattoria.com.ua, 246-6918) offers free delivery for orders over Hr 100. But, if you live far out of downtown Kyiv, your order will have to be at least Hr 150 to qualify for a free delivery.

Papa John (www.papajohn.com.ua, 234-8484) delivers pizza, sushi, pancakes, sandwiches, pies and salads. Orders worth Hr 100 and more get a five percent discount.

Capo Di Monte (www.capo.com.ua, 599-0101) makes 40 kinds of Italian-style pizza, including “Margarita” (Hr 49) and “Stephano” (Hr 109) with shrimp and caviar; as well as sushi, including “Dragon Roll” (Hr 77) and salmon sushi (Hr 11).

Also, there is Pizza Empire (www.imperiapizza.com.ua, 499-1929) and Sushi Empire (www.imperiasushi.com.ua, 499-1919). Their delivery is also free if you make the minimum order worth Hr 70, but all prices go up some 15 percent from 10 p.m. till 8 a.m.

Wasabi House (www.wasabihouse.com.ua, 503-0700) offers a selection of moderately priced sushi: salmon sushi for Hr 10, California rolls for Hr 55.


Night shopping

When my friend from Hamburg needs to buy some booze and snacks late at night, he has to drive for 15 minutes to the nearest gas station. I also remember looking for a place to buy food in Paris after 10 p.m. It was almost impossible. Your choices are not vast in Kyiv, but there are a few places open all night.

Supermarket chains Silpo, Furshet and Velyka Kyshenya keep some of their stores open non-stop. Silpo has 32 supermarkets in the capital, 25 of them open around the clock. The range of foods in different Slipo stores may vary, but all of them have popular products and other basics – stationary, pantyhose, socks, tableware, household products and cosmetics. Silpo even has its own brand (Premiya) of frozen pelmeni and varenyks, smoked salmon, frozen pancakes, tinned food and a great many more things that are modestly priced and of reasonable quality.

The Velyka Kyshenya chain has 17 stores in Kyiv. The majority of them stay open 24 hours. Furshet has only three 24-hour supermarkets in Kyiv, best known of them being Furshet Gurman located in the basement of Mandarin Plaza. For residents of Kyiv’s central streets, it is the main food outlet open at any hour. Apart from regular Ukrainian brands, it carries some exclusive imported foods including cheese, olives, spices, sauces and seasonings.

A supermarket can sell you most of the basics, but they don’t offer medicines. If you find yourself in need of them late in the evening, your only option is 24-hour pharmacies, or “aptekas,” as they are called in Ukrainian.

Pharmacy chains TAS (www.tas-apteka.com.ua) and Vitalux (www.vitalux.ua) have several 24-hour pharmacies. Also, there is Farm-Soyuz in Holosiyivksy area, Eksimed by metro Kharkivska and Lekfarm in Chokolivka.

You can get all the meds you need without ever leaving the house at www.e-apteka.com.ua. You can place an order by phone or via their website. It should be delivered within four hours, but you have to order at least Hr 50 worth of medicine. If your order runs up to Hr 50-100, you will be charged Hr 10 for delivery. If the order exceeds Hr 100, it will be delivered for free.


Saunas, loan sharks and gambling in night Kiev

Saunas are perfect for relaxation, and relaxation seems even more suitable for night than daytime. Therefore, it’s not surprising that you can find saunas ready to admit clients any time.

The Ban-TU chain (www.bantu.kiev.ua, 331-4141) has 10 saunas scattered around the city. All are open 24-hours. However, their prices are different. The one in Lukyanivka will cost you Hr 250 per hour from 2 p.m. till 7 a.m. The one in Obolon costs Hr 175 per hour. The one in Borschahivka is Hr 150 per hour. Ban-TU VIP by metro Pecherska is the priciest – Hr 700 per hour. You can also rent towels and sheets for Hr 7 per piece, and purchase disposable shoes and sauna hats for the same price.

If you find yourself in a desperate need of money late at night, you can get your cash at a nighttime pawn shop.

Skarbnytsya pawn shop chain (skarb.com.ua) has eight shops working non-stop. At Skarbnytsya, you can get loans against gold, diamonds, platinum, electronics and silverware. Your passport is needed.

Universal Lombard (www.ulombard.com.ua) has four outfits in Kyiv offering loans against jewelry, diamonds and electronics.

It’s not just the clubbers and insomniacs who stay up till dawn – gamers do, too. Of course, you can play as much as you want in the comfort of your own home. But playing in a room full of gamers is more exciting.

Thus Kyiv’s gaming community likes to gather in computer clubs instead. And even if you aren’t a gamer, but urgently need to use the computer or access the Internet, such clubs can be your salvation. They are open 24-hours.

Many former casinos have been turned into “Internet clubs,” but for my list I have picked only those that have been computer clubs long before last summer’s gambling ban in Ukraine.

Samsung C-Club and Vault are located inside Metrograd underground shopping center and inside Kyiv cinema, respectively.

Samsung C-Club charges Hr 15 per hour at night (11 p.m. till 8 a.m.) and Hr 20 on weekends.
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