I don’t remember anymore how I felt about leaving America for Russia. I would look for my journal and try to remember but a) it’s packed at the bottom of a box of letters and stuff that is going to cost me a lot of money in overweight luggage and b) I’m fairly sure my journal entries are never true. Anyway, the point is, I can’t figure out how I feel about going home in two weeks (and two days), and I can’t remember my one applicable point of reference.
[assume a long period of time in which I stared alternately at the computer screen and my weird zodiac comforter-cover trying to thing of something appropriate to type]
This is lame-- I just lived for 9 months is a foreign country, saw history, culture, and humanity from new and unfamiliar perspectives, peeled countless carrots and potatoes, and I can’t think of anything at all to say whenever someone asks me things like what my impressions of Russia have been, what I’ve learned, what Russians are like in comparison to Americans, etc. It sort of kills conversations, and essays on final exams. You know that movie whose name I’ve forgotten, with the boxer? Raging Bull. Where the guy is a hopeless lump of inarticulateness and therefore leads a life of violence and eventually tragedy? I think I’ll skip the life of violence and tragedy part, but I am more and more annoyed at how unable I am to say what I want to, in any language or form. Being forced to speak a foreign language for 9 months-- well, like 12 if you count summer school—has brought my annoyance with the situation rather forcibly to my attention.
Here’s a translation of a nice Bunin poem, so I can take advantage of someone else’s artistic use of language by pretending to participate in it:
The flowers, the wasps, the grasses, the grain,
The azure, and the noonday swelter...
The time will come—God will ask the prodigal son:
“Were you happy in your earthly life?”
And I’ll forget everything—I’ll remember only these
paths in the fields between the grain and the grass—
and from sweet tears I won’t manage to answer,
fallen at the merciful Knees.
Ok, it seemed less corny in Russian. Also, anyone who can think of a way to avoid the internal rhyme in the third line, let me know. Mainly I like how the capitalization of ‘Knees’ brings out the funniness of that word. Also, I do sort of miss that sweltering summer feeling, when the heat is so far beyond uncomfortable that the discomfort isn’t worth noticing, and you’re just crushed between the heat from above and the humidity rising off the ground. I mean, I like it in the way you like the freezing cold—I’m glad it exists, to make the universe seem a little less under control and boring, but I don’t consciously decide to be out in it for more than seconds at a time.
Saturday, May 17, 2008
Post Written Some Time Ago
There’s a Morse code for Cyrillic. Of course there would have to be, but it never occured to me.
Victory Day was really cool. I’ve never seen so many people in Square Kirova, and they all had balloons or flowers or ice cream. The weather was nice, and the parade was jolly, and the military salute was fairly cool (the announcer-person would say, “Comrade pilots! I congratulate you on the 63rd anniversary of the glorious victory in the Great Patriotic War!” and the pilots would say “oorah!” in a gruff chorus, and then the military jeep would carry the announcer on to the corrections officers, or the navy (why is the navy even in Irkutsk? There’s not really anyone to fight on Baikal), or one of the other numerous uniformed groups), and the veterans all had lots and lots of metals, such that there was barely room for shirt, and the crowd pushing to put their flowers around the eternal flame was more courteous than your typical pushing crowd, and overall the impression was of great civic festivity. I like how in Russia you are considered a veteran not only if you served in the military during the war, but also if you worked in a factory, or were generally helpful in some other capacity (a “veteran of labor”). This means, as far as I can tell, that everyone who was of working age during World War II is a veteran, including women, and there was many a babushka proudly sporting her metal-covered dress jacket. The only detractions to the prideful but joyful solemnity were a) this weird, long performance by a special operations group of some kind at the end of the military salute, choreographed to “It’s the Final Countdown,” involving breaking beer bottles against their heads, pretending to shoot each other, pretending to kill each other with shovels, some slow shadow-boxing segments, jumping through burning hoops, etc., and b) the sort of retro, campy feel to some part imparted by all the communist symbols. I mean, it makes sense to have the communist symbols, as the war was after all fought by the USSR, and I’m really arguing that they be removed, but I’ve gotten pretty used to seeing that hammer and sickle on teenagers’ t-shirts, an alternate to rhinestone-covered Che Guevara’s, and it was sort of hard to take the same symbol seriously as a political and military rallying point.
Joseph has a pretty picture of the eternal flame with flowers all around it, but I think you will have to wait until we’re both back in America and I can steal it from wherever he posts it on the internet before you see it. Danya has a video of the beer bottles being broken on foreheads.
In the tail dive of my Russian experience, I have entered a period of being completely enamored with the country and everything in it. Before this, there was a brief period of being happy with everything I was doing and seeing but being fully aware that this happiness was tied to the fact that I was leaving in about a month. But now, while I am rationally aware of such a connection, I don’t really feel it.
I went with Valentina Petrovna and Nastya to Listvianka in the silly little red car today. I have long been curious about V.P.’s activities in Listvianka- she goes there all the time, and seems to like it a lot, but I’ve never been able to figure out what she finds to do there. Apparently the answer is that she drives around and drops in on all the eccentric artists who live there. So Nastya and I did that too, and it was pretty cool. I wish I were an eccentric artist. I think I could do the eccentric, but unfortunately, I think that for people to put up with you, you have to demonstrate actual artistic talent. But anyway, it was a sunny day on Baikal, and, what’s actually most important here: Baikal has turned back into a real lake, with water, at least at its southern tip. It was a pretty startling contrast from two weeks ago, when it was a vast expanse of mushy ice.
Other news: did you know that you can eat blini with lettuce and ketchup? You can. If you have lettuce, which is unlikely; I’d never seen it in our apartment until today.
I’m about to break my vow never to eat posi again. There’s a batch cooking in the kitchen in this odd device that V.P. got at the 40th anniversary concert as a present from the alumni; I’ve stalled as long as I could- running, showering- but I think I’m about to be summoned. Yep, there was the summon. It will be the sixth meal of the day.
Victory Day was really cool. I’ve never seen so many people in Square Kirova, and they all had balloons or flowers or ice cream. The weather was nice, and the parade was jolly, and the military salute was fairly cool (the announcer-person would say, “Comrade pilots! I congratulate you on the 63rd anniversary of the glorious victory in the Great Patriotic War!” and the pilots would say “oorah!” in a gruff chorus, and then the military jeep would carry the announcer on to the corrections officers, or the navy (why is the navy even in Irkutsk? There’s not really anyone to fight on Baikal), or one of the other numerous uniformed groups), and the veterans all had lots and lots of metals, such that there was barely room for shirt, and the crowd pushing to put their flowers around the eternal flame was more courteous than your typical pushing crowd, and overall the impression was of great civic festivity. I like how in Russia you are considered a veteran not only if you served in the military during the war, but also if you worked in a factory, or were generally helpful in some other capacity (a “veteran of labor”). This means, as far as I can tell, that everyone who was of working age during World War II is a veteran, including women, and there was many a babushka proudly sporting her metal-covered dress jacket. The only detractions to the prideful but joyful solemnity were a) this weird, long performance by a special operations group of some kind at the end of the military salute, choreographed to “It’s the Final Countdown,” involving breaking beer bottles against their heads, pretending to shoot each other, pretending to kill each other with shovels, some slow shadow-boxing segments, jumping through burning hoops, etc., and b) the sort of retro, campy feel to some part imparted by all the communist symbols. I mean, it makes sense to have the communist symbols, as the war was after all fought by the USSR, and I’m really arguing that they be removed, but I’ve gotten pretty used to seeing that hammer and sickle on teenagers’ t-shirts, an alternate to rhinestone-covered Che Guevara’s, and it was sort of hard to take the same symbol seriously as a political and military rallying point.
Joseph has a pretty picture of the eternal flame with flowers all around it, but I think you will have to wait until we’re both back in America and I can steal it from wherever he posts it on the internet before you see it. Danya has a video of the beer bottles being broken on foreheads.
In the tail dive of my Russian experience, I have entered a period of being completely enamored with the country and everything in it. Before this, there was a brief period of being happy with everything I was doing and seeing but being fully aware that this happiness was tied to the fact that I was leaving in about a month. But now, while I am rationally aware of such a connection, I don’t really feel it.
I went with Valentina Petrovna and Nastya to Listvianka in the silly little red car today. I have long been curious about V.P.’s activities in Listvianka- she goes there all the time, and seems to like it a lot, but I’ve never been able to figure out what she finds to do there. Apparently the answer is that she drives around and drops in on all the eccentric artists who live there. So Nastya and I did that too, and it was pretty cool. I wish I were an eccentric artist. I think I could do the eccentric, but unfortunately, I think that for people to put up with you, you have to demonstrate actual artistic talent. But anyway, it was a sunny day on Baikal, and, what’s actually most important here: Baikal has turned back into a real lake, with water, at least at its southern tip. It was a pretty startling contrast from two weeks ago, when it was a vast expanse of mushy ice.
Other news: did you know that you can eat blini with lettuce and ketchup? You can. If you have lettuce, which is unlikely; I’d never seen it in our apartment until today.
I’m about to break my vow never to eat posi again. There’s a batch cooking in the kitchen in this odd device that V.P. got at the 40th anniversary concert as a present from the alumni; I’ve stalled as long as I could- running, showering- but I think I’m about to be summoned. Yep, there was the summon. It will be the sixth meal of the day.
Monday, May 12, 2008
Patience is a Virtue
I'm not posting any more blogs or pictures until I get home. I need all my money to mail my books to America. You can contact me by carrier pigeon.
Friday, May 9, 2008
Leaving woes
Yesterday I used the can-opener in our apartment correctly for the first time ever. And I'm only here for another three weeks. I may never be called upon to open another can.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
Update
In case you are concerned, I think I am over the food poisoining. Even my period of caution was ended this morning: Katya was too proud of having made blini for me to refuse to eat them.
without title
A week ago the Orthodox Church celebrated Easter. I went to the midnight service in the church near the train station. I would give you further information, but it doesn’t seem very respectful to make flippant comments about what for everyone there was the highest religious event of the year, and I’m not very good at non-flippancy. There were many candles involved, and standing for many hours. It was sort of odd to celebrate Easter twice, actually. My favorite part of the day was how instead of saying “Happy Easter,” people greet each other on Easter by saying “Christ is risen!” to which the other person responds “He is risen indeed!” After reading this in my first-year Russian textbook, I had been waiting to get to be involved in this exchange ever since. Even people I didn’t know who called the house informed me that Christ was risen, not to mention the persons from whom I bought groceries. I bought an Easter cake at the bread kiosk and Adrienne and I ate it here at the Shulga compound.
The next day, Monday, was the big 40-th anniversary concert of my host family’s choir. This concert, held in the big Dram-Teatr, had been looming over the household for at least the past month. It all went off successfully, as far as I could tell. Only one choir member fainted on stage, the small children from the youngest choir who ran about the theater did so with as little noise as could be expected, the congratulatory speeches were much shorter than they could have been, and everyone got lots of flowers. It was all very grand and sequin-covered. Katya and some dignified older gentleman very theatrically led the ceremonies, complete with poems written for the occasion, solemn introductions, and those earnest assurances to the audience of the undying love of the performers that for some reason so fill Russian theaters and concert halls, and Katya’s gown (blue) had more sequins than anyone’s. Nastya directed the younger choir, sang with a choir of graduates, and gave her always-stellar performance of “O Happy Day.” Valentina Petrovna, oh course, was the big star, with costume changes, congratulations via video-clip from professors of local universities, celebration in the aforementioned poems, etc. I wondered more than ever how I ended up in this house. I feel like my presence is bringin down the house-hold glamour factor several points.
May 1 is Labor Day here. Nothing interesting happened. Apparently in the socialist past this was a huge deal and everyone went to big demonstrations and waved flags and yelled cool slogans, but no more. It was, however, a day off school and work, and since it was a Thursday, the school and work that would have been on Friday was moved to Sunday (can we do things like that in America, on a national level? I am impressed.). On Thursday night Sara, Julia, Ben, Joseph, and I left on the train for Ulan Ude, and we arrived at 6 in the morning after a very small amount of sleep. Heroically ignoring our exhaustion, we headed straight for the Giant Head of Lenin, tied with Baikal as the most important object in Siberia. In case you are unaware of this wonder of the modern world, the Giant Head of Lenin is a giant head of Lenin. It is the largest metal head in the world. The location of the corresponding body is unknown. This giant bald head rules over a giant, fairly empty square in the middle of Ulan Ude, and its grandeur and beauty are beyond description. Other activities of the day were a long quest to find these Buddhist temples several miles from the city, walking around said Buddhist temples, eating posi in the Central Market (in a cafe chosen on the basic of asking a passer-by where her favorite posi were), and going to the coolest concert ever in the world. It was called “Nomads,” and I think it was organized as a celebration of Buryat nationalism. Well not nationalism in a political sense, but pride in nation. Aside from the five of us, I think there were 3 other non-Buryats in the big, way-over-seating-capacity theater. We had bought the last 5 tickets early that morning, standing-room-only (we actually sat in the aisle in chairs taken from the cafe), and immediately after buying them the phone in the ticket office rang three times with people begging for tickets. I felt a little bad that we had taken tickets from actual dedicated fans of the performing artists, actually; these were truly dedicated fans. The first half of the concert was all traditional music, with an orchestra of folk instruments, throat singing, awesome clothing, etc. The enthusiastic, beaming little announcer would say things between all the songs like “I’m sure this music returns you to your childhood, and makes you and to get on a horse and ride far out across the plain and just listen, listen, listen to the steppe.” There were a bunch of visiting musicians from Mongolia. Though the announcer generally spoke Russian, he spoke Mongolian when speaking to the Mongolians, and the musicians always spoke Buryat or Mongolian to the audience, which seemed to understand the three languages equally. In the second half the orchestra of folk instruments had been removed, and it all came to resemble an odd karaoke bar. It was still pretty cool though. Mixed with Mongolian pop, a tango, a belly-dance, and lots of flute-playing was a rendition of “the American folk song” Amazing Grace on various traditional instruments and accompanied by ballet dancers. The announcer said that the melody made you want to fly out over the plain, over the steppe, across wide expanses, toward the mountains.” He has clearly never heard it played on an organ. There was a fairly long period of stirring speeches on the part of various representatives of various organizations on the subject of the conservation of Buryat culture and the celebration of the talent of all nations of the Mongolian language family, thanking the organizers of the concert, etc. In one of my favorite parts of Buryat/Mongolian culture, instead of flowers they would give silk scarves in one of the five colors of Tibetan Buddhism. When we were in Ulan Batar we were told that people usually gave blue there, as the national color of Mongolia, the nation of the sky; at this concert mainly white was given, and some yellow. One of the speech-givers, who cried with emotion, wished us all that our children would not forget their native language of Buryat, and that they would always propagandize Buryat culture. I think any future children of mine might have trouble with especially the first of those directives.
The only obstacle to my complete enjoyment of the concert was a rapidly-developing case of food-poisoning. Joseph and I were the only ones to get sick; we still haven’t figured out anything that we ate that everyone else didn’t. Lots of food was eaten that day. The obvious culprit is the posi; even if it was not, in fact, the posi, I am never eating posi again. The results were simply too miserable. We had to check out of our hotel at 7:00 am the next morning, and our train wasn’t until 2:40. We spent the intervening 7 and a half hours sitting still in various places. Luckily, it was a sunny day, and we were able to spend a lot of time sitting on bench in the main square, gazing at the Head.
The train ride home, on the express electrichka, was very pretty. The first few hours were through the forest-steppe, with wooden villages and goats and things out the window. Then we spent several hours along Baikal, on which the ice is breaking up very picturesquely. Luckily, all the tickets had been sold out except for first class, we we had a fairly comfortable place for sitting still in our sickness. Joseph and I were both better enough by dinnertime to eat yoghurt and bread.
I’m glad we went back to Ulan Ude, despite its merciless attack of my digestive system. It’s a nice little city, with snow-covered mountains visible, and a big head of Lenin, and lots of wooden houses, and just a general pleasant atmosphere. The cars stop for pedestrians. We never did get over that. I’m trying to think of more reasons why I liked Ulan Ude so much, but I can’t come up with anything better than pretty and pleasant. And even if I still don’t remember why anyone would ever want to eat food other than white bread, I’ve had my share of ice-cream and cookies in this life
The next day, Monday, was the big 40-th anniversary concert of my host family’s choir. This concert, held in the big Dram-Teatr, had been looming over the household for at least the past month. It all went off successfully, as far as I could tell. Only one choir member fainted on stage, the small children from the youngest choir who ran about the theater did so with as little noise as could be expected, the congratulatory speeches were much shorter than they could have been, and everyone got lots of flowers. It was all very grand and sequin-covered. Katya and some dignified older gentleman very theatrically led the ceremonies, complete with poems written for the occasion, solemn introductions, and those earnest assurances to the audience of the undying love of the performers that for some reason so fill Russian theaters and concert halls, and Katya’s gown (blue) had more sequins than anyone’s. Nastya directed the younger choir, sang with a choir of graduates, and gave her always-stellar performance of “O Happy Day.” Valentina Petrovna, oh course, was the big star, with costume changes, congratulations via video-clip from professors of local universities, celebration in the aforementioned poems, etc. I wondered more than ever how I ended up in this house. I feel like my presence is bringin down the house-hold glamour factor several points.
May 1 is Labor Day here. Nothing interesting happened. Apparently in the socialist past this was a huge deal and everyone went to big demonstrations and waved flags and yelled cool slogans, but no more. It was, however, a day off school and work, and since it was a Thursday, the school and work that would have been on Friday was moved to Sunday (can we do things like that in America, on a national level? I am impressed.). On Thursday night Sara, Julia, Ben, Joseph, and I left on the train for Ulan Ude, and we arrived at 6 in the morning after a very small amount of sleep. Heroically ignoring our exhaustion, we headed straight for the Giant Head of Lenin, tied with Baikal as the most important object in Siberia. In case you are unaware of this wonder of the modern world, the Giant Head of Lenin is a giant head of Lenin. It is the largest metal head in the world. The location of the corresponding body is unknown. This giant bald head rules over a giant, fairly empty square in the middle of Ulan Ude, and its grandeur and beauty are beyond description. Other activities of the day were a long quest to find these Buddhist temples several miles from the city, walking around said Buddhist temples, eating posi in the Central Market (in a cafe chosen on the basic of asking a passer-by where her favorite posi were), and going to the coolest concert ever in the world. It was called “Nomads,” and I think it was organized as a celebration of Buryat nationalism. Well not nationalism in a political sense, but pride in nation. Aside from the five of us, I think there were 3 other non-Buryats in the big, way-over-seating-capacity theater. We had bought the last 5 tickets early that morning, standing-room-only (we actually sat in the aisle in chairs taken from the cafe), and immediately after buying them the phone in the ticket office rang three times with people begging for tickets. I felt a little bad that we had taken tickets from actual dedicated fans of the performing artists, actually; these were truly dedicated fans. The first half of the concert was all traditional music, with an orchestra of folk instruments, throat singing, awesome clothing, etc. The enthusiastic, beaming little announcer would say things between all the songs like “I’m sure this music returns you to your childhood, and makes you and to get on a horse and ride far out across the plain and just listen, listen, listen to the steppe.” There were a bunch of visiting musicians from Mongolia. Though the announcer generally spoke Russian, he spoke Mongolian when speaking to the Mongolians, and the musicians always spoke Buryat or Mongolian to the audience, which seemed to understand the three languages equally. In the second half the orchestra of folk instruments had been removed, and it all came to resemble an odd karaoke bar. It was still pretty cool though. Mixed with Mongolian pop, a tango, a belly-dance, and lots of flute-playing was a rendition of “the American folk song” Amazing Grace on various traditional instruments and accompanied by ballet dancers. The announcer said that the melody made you want to fly out over the plain, over the steppe, across wide expanses, toward the mountains.” He has clearly never heard it played on an organ. There was a fairly long period of stirring speeches on the part of various representatives of various organizations on the subject of the conservation of Buryat culture and the celebration of the talent of all nations of the Mongolian language family, thanking the organizers of the concert, etc. In one of my favorite parts of Buryat/Mongolian culture, instead of flowers they would give silk scarves in one of the five colors of Tibetan Buddhism. When we were in Ulan Batar we were told that people usually gave blue there, as the national color of Mongolia, the nation of the sky; at this concert mainly white was given, and some yellow. One of the speech-givers, who cried with emotion, wished us all that our children would not forget their native language of Buryat, and that they would always propagandize Buryat culture. I think any future children of mine might have trouble with especially the first of those directives.
The only obstacle to my complete enjoyment of the concert was a rapidly-developing case of food-poisoning. Joseph and I were the only ones to get sick; we still haven’t figured out anything that we ate that everyone else didn’t. Lots of food was eaten that day. The obvious culprit is the posi; even if it was not, in fact, the posi, I am never eating posi again. The results were simply too miserable. We had to check out of our hotel at 7:00 am the next morning, and our train wasn’t until 2:40. We spent the intervening 7 and a half hours sitting still in various places. Luckily, it was a sunny day, and we were able to spend a lot of time sitting on bench in the main square, gazing at the Head.
The train ride home, on the express electrichka, was very pretty. The first few hours were through the forest-steppe, with wooden villages and goats and things out the window. Then we spent several hours along Baikal, on which the ice is breaking up very picturesquely. Luckily, all the tickets had been sold out except for first class, we we had a fairly comfortable place for sitting still in our sickness. Joseph and I were both better enough by dinnertime to eat yoghurt and bread.
I’m glad we went back to Ulan Ude, despite its merciless attack of my digestive system. It’s a nice little city, with snow-covered mountains visible, and a big head of Lenin, and lots of wooden houses, and just a general pleasant atmosphere. The cars stop for pedestrians. We never did get over that. I’m trying to think of more reasons why I liked Ulan Ude so much, but I can’t come up with anything better than pretty and pleasant. And even if I still don’t remember why anyone would ever want to eat food other than white bread, I’ve had my share of ice-cream and cookies in this life
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