Гелен в Тамани.

Okroshka - although a British friend of ours had described this soup as "an ordeal," I still decided to try it. It was perfect in every way...except for the fact that it was fizzy. I have to say, one thing I never thought my tastebuds would experience in life is fizzy soup. The reason for this is that the soup is made from Kvas, which is a kind of non alcoholic beer soft drink. But it is actually a little bit alcoholic. But by Russian standards it is not alcoholic. So, our teacher took us on a trip to Taman, a southern Russian town immortalised by Lermontov in his book "Hero of our time." We ate fizzy soup, visited a kind of reconstructed Cossack village and swam in the sea of Azov.

Lermontov.

"Тамань — самый скверный городишко из всех приморских городов России." - М.Ю. Лермонтов (Taman - the nastiest little seaside town in all of Russia)

Cossack house.

Cossack husband and wife.

Cossack oven/bed. Slightly contradictory to the strict Russian rules which dictate that you shall never sit on stone. It is bad for your ovaries, you know.

Nice cossack garms, Sam.

Tasting of Kuban wine. Slightly contradictory also was the fact that our teacher presented us with ten glasses of wine in about 30 minutes after 4 months of having told us not to drink alcohol and praising our abstinence from alcohol...

We buy hair!

We buy hair! Highest prices! No shorter than 30cm. The longer the hair, the more we pay!

Cold Showers

I have recently been acquainting myself with the pleasure of cold showers. This is nothing to do with all the sexy Russian ladies, although I did have the unexpected experience this week of being in a bar where some Russian girls stripped to their underwear in order to obtain a free bottle of champagne. Anyway, every Summer the Russians switch off the hot water for 2 weeks. I acknowledged that this would be something of an inconvenience, but with my new toileting-success-inspired lust for life I felt quite optimistic about this situation. Brain freeze ensued. Apparently this is some kind of pagan ritual to welcome the Summer. Or to prepare the ground for the heat or something. 

In other shower related news, I managed to get locked in the shower the other day. Normally I wouldn't be too worried about shower suffocation, but the lack of speed with which Russians undertake any given action or task did make me slightly aware that I may need to make the air last for a few days. It is common for a trip to the post office to buy an envelope to take at least an hour, what with the lack of a defined queuing system, which entails people coming in, announcing that they are next and then leaving again. Also problematic is the legal right of Babushkas to push in front of you at all times.

This is only one of the ways in which the Russians are polar opposites of the Germans. Another is the Russian tendency of fearing that everything will be stolen if it is not fastened to something sturdy with somebody guarding it. Everything in the University is nailed down - except for photocopiers and benches, which seem to roam the corridors at regular intervals. As is the way in Russia to pay people to do jobs which essentially entail doing nothing at all, there is a lady whose sole purpose in life is to wheel the photocopier around the university and watch you making copies whilst taking your money. I recall being puzzled by a newspaper vending machine in Munich which in no way required you to pay before being able to extract the newspaper from it's drawer. My dad said that they just knew people would pay. The Russians would never trust their citizens like this.

My embarrassment at being locked in the shower was unfortunately outshone by the arrival of an American who got so drunk on his first night in Russia that he couldn't work out how to open his door from the inside and proceeded to kick a hole in it. This man is what we call a real ambassador of American intellect.

There are various strange things that I've seen the Russians doing recently. They've been painting everything - even the trees. I accepted that the logical reason for this was that the white paint keeps the parasites from eating the trees, but then i noticed that also painted white are the bottom sections of lampposts and pavements...

Krasnodar is home to an abundance of stray dogs and cats who laze around in the grass, on chairs and just generally look very contented whilst wandering the world. They're also suspiciously well groomed, like those well dressed beggars who you don't quite believe need your money. This may be due to the fact that Russian girls like to feed them and brush them. The dogs, I mean, not the beggars.

Having said this, I have also come across quite a few stray people, such as this man having a snooze next to the road.

The most mundane blog entry of all time.

Last week came the day which I have been fearing ever since my arrival in Russia. I have gone to great lengths to put this atrocious day off for the last two months and thought I may be able to avoid it forever. But, alas, suddenly I found it was upon me. Yesterday I was forced to use a squatting toilet. This is one of the moments when one thinks to oneself 'How did I get here? Is this really where I want to be in life?' Surely there are few things more shameful than squatting down savagely and relieving oneself into what is essentially a hole in the ground in a cubicle with no door. And to pay 10 Roubles for the pleasure no less.

I am aware that many of my friends and acquaintances in England see Russia as some kind of primitive wasteland full of gangsters who regularly engage in kidnapping/torture/organ selling/attempting to take over the world in Bond villain style. My mother was more concerned with whether I would be able to find a cash point in Krasnodar. Personally, I am inclined to roll my eyes at these views and thus far all of my organs are intact as far as I know, although I can't vouch for the rest of the population of Russia. I am also aware that most of my friends and acquaintances know that I am by no means an optimist. However, even I was crushed by the realisation that the toilets in the University, an establishment intertwined with development and improvement, were squatting toilets. Furthermore, Krasnodar airport also favours this unorthodox mode of commode. This is why I have been risking a urinary tract infection for the last 2 months in a bid to avoid these toilets at all costs. I am not naive, I know that Russia is no Utopia. But I did assume that I would be living in some kind of civilisation with 20th century toilet facilities. Maybe when Putin commented that Russia is 100 years behind the West, this is what he meant? I should emphasise that these toilets are significantly more sophisticated than just a hole in the ground. But that doesn't make it any easier to navigate ten kilos of luggage into the cubicle.

I suppose I should have expected something like this. I did have a similar albeit milder shock, or more accurately confusion, in St Petersburg. It is difficult for me to describe what I experienced there, so after some research I have discovered it is officially referred to as the "Reverse Bowl" or "Shelf Style." I am sure some of you are already familiar with this. The rest of you can use your powers of deduction. All I will say on this matter is that is particularly unpleasant when one shares such a toilet with 8 other people, one of whom lives on a diet of nuts, berries and red meat. Fortunately Tajik Sasha has left now, so at least we don't have any more of these pesky residue incidents.

They say you should do something which scares you every day. Mission accomplished - for a few days, at least. And according to Wikipedia squatting is beneficial and favoured in Japan. And we all know how civilised the Japanese are. Or at least they know it.

День Победы / Victory Day

The 9th of May is the anniversary of when the Soviet Union won World War II. Yes, that is correct, the Soviet Union won World War II. I don't know why nobody ever told us this at school. I was warned before I came to Russia not to tell Russians that the Allies won World War II, as it would cause great distress. But the Russians call it the Great Patriotic War and this war started in 1941, so perhaps we won this Second World War and they won this other, completely unrelated Patriotic War? This is clearly the only logical explanation.

Anyway, Victory Day is a day of celebration for all Russians and citizens of post-Soviet states. Parades and marches take place all across the Russian Federation and veterans are congratulated and thanked for their contribution. There is a much more distinct atmosphere of patriotism amongst young Russians in particular than in any European country I have visited, perhaps due to an initiative introduced by Putin in 2005 which encouraged youths to celebrate military victories as a means of restoring patriotism as the spiritual backbone of Russia. The celebrations in Krasnodar were perhaps slightly less elaborate than in Moscow, but the overwhelming sentiment of gratitude, remembrance and patriotic pride were in no way diminished by this. 

Photos courtesy of Paparazzo Sam, who has not quite given his permission for their use as of yet, but will surely be moved by my tribute to his photographic skills.

Various political parties marched down the main street after the main military parade - it was slightly surprising to see such an overwhelmingly large pro-Stalin Communist gathering, although it should be noted that not a single member of this group looked under 50 years of age.

The Happiest Babushka of All Time - we met her later in the day on the street. After Marina presented her with a flower, she proceeded to tell us that she was a nice Babka unlike all the other grumpy ones, that she knew that youths were nice and then sang us a song about victory day whilst cackling hysterically at regular intervals.

Lika's sister giving a flower to a veteran, as is custom. Lika's mum arrived with giant bunch of flowers in hand for us to present to them.

"Russian смог is like English smog over the Russian language"

Today’s instalment is a kind of tribute to our former teacher, the one of a kind Irina Alexandrovna. No, she didn’t perish due to my astounding inability to improve my Russian skills. We just have different classes now. 

To mark this occasion we all decided that we would buy a cake and present it to Irina during the last part of our class, unaware that it is forbidden to take cake into the university building. The guards informed us of this as we tried to enter with cake in hand.

Anyway, here is a collection of my favourite quotes from Irina Alexandrovna:

Explaining to us the seriousness of using the verb “смочь.” “Russian смог (smog) is like English smog over the Russian language...It is the biggest mistake in the Russian language...It's even in the dictionary...Lermontov didn't use it…but Tolstoy my dears, he was already making this mistake.” 

After reading out my dialogue which my Russian friends had written for me and which I clearly had not familiarised myself with in advance, I found this perilous verb escaping my lips, and in slow motion horror I lifted my eyes from the page to see a look of shock and disillusionment on her face. Following this, Irina announced that she had informed us of this fatal error, which not only affected the Russian language, but also society, culture and politics, and now we were free to “make the right decision.”

Producing a picture of her beloved Lermontov as we begin to butcher his work; “Мой дорогие, он смотрит нас. Очень красивый человек. Умный человек.”  (“My darlings, he is watching us – what a beautiful man, a CLEVER man.”)

Describing the year 2000: “It is a magical number my dears, because the “0”s are like windows, do you see, my dears…and then I saw the sun turning all the colours of the rainbow.”

Sam: “It’s a metaphor?”

Irina: “No, my dear, I saw it with my own eyes.”

“My dears, do you love to embrace the trees? It’s good for your health.”

“Do you love catching butterflies?”