So the sense of being in between is really baked in to Ukraine's identity.

And it's only about 900 miles, if you were to drive down to Sochi, where the Olympics are going on right now.

Let's talk about the makeup of this country, Max.

Yeah, it's about the size of Texas, and its 45 million people.

So, it's big.

OK. Now, why did all of this launch?

It really goes back to something that happened in November with the European Union.

Yeah. Ukraine was considering a deal for great economic integration with the European Union.

And a lot of Ukrainians like this because they thought it was a good deal, and they liked the idea of being a part of Europe, but they didn't get that.

They got a very different deal, indeed. What happened?

So, what happened is Ukraine's surprised everybody by taking a deal with Russia instead for about $15 billion in bailout in cheaper natural gas?

And so those who opposed it, who wanted the European Union deal, then turned their attention, even more so, on the president.

Yeah. President Viktor Yanukovych who's seen by a lot of Ukrainians as corrupt, he'd been ousted in protests in 2004 previously.

He's seen as very cozy with Russia.

It's actually-Russian is his native language.

So when he took this deal, people thought well, he's sold out our country to Moscow.

So, in many ways, what this comes down to, is a historic division.

And this has always been like two countries in one space and now it's coming to a hit.

Yeah, that's right.

So, if you look at this map, this purple western half, this actually mostly speaks Ukrainian.

That's where Kiev is, that's where most of the protests are.

The eastern half - people mostly speak Russian.

That's where Yanukovych is from.

People have a little more fondness for the old ties to Russia.

So, what you are seeing play out is this identity crisis Ukraine has had since its independence between are we a European country or are we facing more towards Russia.

And of course, there is a big poll from both sides from Europeans and from the United States and others saying you should be free to do what you want and from the Russian side,

because bear in mind: this was the region that went it was part of the Soviet Empire produced one quarter of all the agricultural products.

It is a huge trading partner to Russia.

Parents, children, brothers, sisters divided for more than 60 years.

It's like they've lived one state away from each other, but the line that separates them is between North and South Korea, countries whose governments have been in odd since the Korean War.

And people aren't able to travel freely between them.

Reunions between dozens of North and South Koreans are going ahead, even though North Korea had threatened to cancel them earlier this month.

================

中文翻译：

所以夹在其中的感觉是真正意义上涉及乌克兰的身份问题。

两地相隔只有大约900英里,如果你开车去索契,那里正在举行奥运会的赛事。

让我们谈谈这个国家的组成,马克斯。

是的,它就像德克萨斯州一样大小，人口4500万。

所以是个大国。

好吧。为什么一切是现在这个样子?

这要追溯到11月与欧盟发生的事情。

是的。乌克兰正考虑与欧盟经济一体化。

而且很多乌克兰人希望这能够实现,因为他们认为这是份很好的协议,而且他们喜欢成为欧洲的一部分,但他们最终没能如愿。

他们有了份截然不同的协议。发生了什么事?

令大家吃惊的是乌克兰接受与俄罗斯达成约150亿美元的天然气援助协议?

所以那些持反对意见,希望与欧盟达成协议的人,将注意力集中在总统身上。

是的。很多乌克兰人认为总统维克托·亚努科维奇腐败,他曾在2004年的抗议活动中被推翻。

他被视为与俄罗斯非常亲近。

实际上,俄语是他的母语。

所以当他接受这笔交易,人们认为,他将我们的国家出卖给了莫斯科。

因此,在许多方面,这可以归结为,是一种历史性的分歧。

这一直像是在一个空间的两国,现在终于有了交集。

是的,就是这样。

所以,如果你看看这张地图,紫色的西半部实际上主要是讲乌克兰语。

基辅在这里，大部分抗议就是在这里进行。

东半部人们大多讲俄语。

那是亚努科维奇的故乡。

人们更喜欢往日与俄罗斯的关系。

所以,你看到的是乌克兰独立以来一直面对的这一身份危机，我们是个欧洲国家还是我们面临更多的是俄罗斯。

当然, 从欧洲到美国再到其他国家都表示你应该自由去做任何想做的事情,

因为要记住的是:这个地区是曾经苏联帝国四分之一农产品的重要生产国。

对俄罗斯而言这是一个巨大的贸易伙伴。

父母、孩子、兄弟、姐妹分开60多年。

就像他们住一个彼此远离的州,但其分界线是朝鲜和韩国, 自从朝鲜战争以来两个国家的政府一直很奇怪。

而且两国人民不能自由旅行。

尽管本月早些时候朝鲜曾扬言取消，但数十名朝鲜和韩国人民团聚。

=============

词汇分析：

1.economic integration 经济一体化

Economic integration proceeded in uneven, stop-and-go steps.

欧洲的经济一体化进程走走停停，并非一路坦途。

None of this is the economic integration that federalists dreamed of.

以上没有一个是联邦制拥护者所向往的经济一体化。

2.play out 逐渐发生；展开；结束

Probably this pattern will play out again.

这样的剧情可能会再次上演。

It is too wet for the kids to play out today, they'll have to amuse themselves indoors.

冷天下雨孩子们不能在户外玩耍，只能在室内自己玩了。

3.free to do 自由的去做

But they should be free to do so if they wish.

不过如果他们喜欢的话，他们应该有选择的自由。

If he wants to visit the usa, he's free to do so on his own dime.

如果他想拜访美国，完全可以自己掏钱自由入境。