Life on the Road

Hello from Moscow!

I am writing this blog as I near the end of my January journey. In the past month, I have traveled all over the Western half of Russia with some of my oldest and closest friends. When the trip ends upon my arrival into Ekaterinburg on February 4th, I will have spent a total of 165 hours [yes, an entire week] on the train! It has been a long month and there is still a little bit left to go, but all in all, it has been the trip of a lifetime. After trying to figure out how to best convey all of the amazing and hilarious events of the past month, I decided to put up some excerpts from my journaling on the road.


December 30, 2006 (Moscow)

I can't wait for the new year! I am in Moscow, staying at Marina's with Jen and Laura Erceg, and very quickly falling in love with the city. It is great to be around Laura and it is great to be in a big city again. I didn't realize how much I has missed that until I heard the sound of the cars rushing by and smelled the air in the subway and felt oddly comforted.

Today we went to a DVD/electronics market with an entire floor of bootleg movies and music. Jen and I went crazy with finding American movies to bring back to our "village." I have gotten used to seeing bootleg movies sold all over the streets here, but it was strange to find an entire mall of them...

Jan 2, 2007

Holy god! I just got done skating on Red Square. It was awesome! I actually thought I was in heaven and dreaming when I looked up and (in between dodging all the people stumbling around on skates) I saw St. Basil's Cathedral and the Kremlin. I don't know what happened in my life such that I am spending New Years in Moscow and skating on Red Square, but I am grateful that it took these turns.

New Year's was also amazing. It is cool to celebrate the holiday outside of the United States, because instead of focusing on alcohol and kissing someone at midnight, it is a family holiday and a strangely patriotic holiday. We had an amazing dinner with Marina's family and a group of American friends. The table was FULL of salads and other foods. We had champagne and Marina's parents shared mini-shots of vodka with each other--so cute! When the clock struck midnight, we all popped a grape into our mouths at each strike of the clock and made a wish each time (12 wishes, as it turns out, is a lot--Marina makes a list every year beforehand in case she chokes under the pressure of the moment). Then we, along with the television and presumably most of the country, sang the Russian national anthem and toasted to each other. It was so great to celebrate such a special holiday in this culture for the first time.

Afterwards there were fireworks going off everywhere. You'd look out the window and see them shooting off in every direction in the distance and coming right at your face from the courtyard. I am pretty sure that the hospitals were full of patients burned by them the next day :)

January 7, 2007

I am back on the train, this time with Laura Eaton! We are headed to Ekaterinburg and have about 26 hours to go.

There was no snow in Moscow and here (somewhere approaching the Urals) the forest is covered with it. It looks like a fantasy world--Laura said it looks like Narnia.

January 15, 2007 (on the train to Petersburg)

My body feels more at ease just as I feel myself getting closer to Petersburg. It is 8:40 am Moscow time and I am listening to the Piter FM soundtrack in excitement. Laura Eaton and I are traveling first class in the most pimped out Russian train ever. There is a serious sea-green theme going on in our compartment. There is also a full tea set, including a teapot with "Ekaterinburg-St. Petersburg" written on it. I am trying my hardest not to steal it.

Laura and I had a good run in Ekat. She, too, fell in love with Midori. It is hard to remember what we did, because for the most part we just chilled and relaxed. On Wednesday, we went to the geological museum, which was hilarious from start to finish. I knew roughly where it was, but couldn't quite find it. So, according to Russian habit, I started asking people where it was. After interrupting three different conversations and getting "I don't know!", I settled on a man who was standing on the sidewalk reading a poster on a wall. As I found out, if you ever see a grown man doing that 10:00 am in Russia, there's a pretty good chance he's drunk. The man first told us about a geology museum that was "through the forest and by a church" that existed 50 years ago. Then he remembered where the one we wanted was and proceeded to walk us into the museum. Once inside the museum, he turned to me and said "maybe we can get together sometime and you can teach me english." I responded by saying "but I only speak russian." He then asked me for a piece of paper and/or pen to write down my number on and when I said I didn't have any, he angrily said "Oh, okay. I see how it is. That's how it's gonna be," and stormed out of the museum, leaving the old women who work there staring wide-eyed at me and Laura. All for a geological museum!

On Saturday we headed out to Kalinovo for a 24-hour tour. It was probably the highlight of the trip so far. Almost all the relatives were there, so Laura got to meet the whole crew in style. It was hilarious! She and I did the banya together. Then she and the men (Sergei, Dima, and Rashad) started taking vodka shots together (this started when Laura and I didn't believe that they used to drink cocktails of vodka and beer, which, not surprisingly, Sergei decided to prove to us by drinking one down--ew!). There were many memorable moments, including Laura chasing a shot with a liver pie.

From here on out, the journaling falls off--the stories of Petersburg, Moscow, Samara, and the Fulbright mid-session conference in Moscow will come soon.