Ostap is a Ukrainian boy. He lives in the town of Salomalo. He has a father, a mother and a sister. They live in a big house in Petlura Street. Their house is in the centre of the city, just near the monument to Bàndera. There are three rooms in their flat: a living-room, a dining-room and a bedroom. There is also a small kitchen with big cockroaches.
Ostap’s father Taras is a big boss. He has a lot of friends, they are all racketeers. They always sit in the kitchen, talk business, play cards and feed the cockroaches with pizza.
The biggest cockroach’s name is Gosha-Moscal. He has 6 legs and 7 wives. His youngest wife is Zulfia, his eldest one is already dead. Their children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren live in many flats upstairs and downstairs. Sometimes they visit their parents and have a good time together. Ostap’s family go out then because they have a really bad time when there are lots of fat and merry cockroaches everywhere.
In the evenings the Prikhodkos usually sit in the living-room. Ostap doesn’t like to watch TV, he likes videos better. As a rule, he watches American comedies or horror films. His mother likes long and silly Latin American soap operas. His sister is fond of sitting in the dining-room with her new boy-friend. Normally, the father is in the kitchen busy with his friends: they either print green portraits of some ugly old men or write a letter to the Turkish Prime-Minister.
From time to time Ostap’s grandma comes to their place. Then she washes the dishes and cooks dinner and supper. Nobody really knows how old she is. She is a vegetarian, but her favourite vegetable is lard. She went to school with Klara Zetkin. She wrote romantic letters to Petlura but he never answered. Deceiver! But she never thought much of Makhno because he brushed his teeth very seldom. But now it’s all in the past...
Sometimes Ostap’s father and his cool friends sing folk-songs. Then Ostap can’t watch his films and his sister’s friend runs back home. Everybody is afraid of Ostap’s father and especially of his old friends. The poor cockroaches crawl upstairs and downstairs to their children. But not for good...
After ten or fifteen songs Taras and his friends go out. They usually go to the monument to Bendera. There they take off their caps, coats and guns and dance gopak all night long. They don’t like to see passers-by with unhappy faces, that’s why they ask them to dance gopak too.
Only their dog Mumu doesn’t dance (he is in trance), because he knows what happens in the morning. Don’t you know about that? Very strange. But that’s quite another story.