lairdandjonelle

It took from 9:30 to about 2:45 to mail two boxes of stuff home!  First, we went to the neighborhood post office and LITERALLY waited in line for over one and one-half hours — just to be told that we had to go to the main post office downtown!  So, Laird was really cranky, I was trying to jolly him along by saying, “oh, it’ll be an adventure. . .”  Just to be sure we’d have enough money, we changed some more, walked to the tram to go downtown.  Once there, we actually got off right near the PO.  Luckily, Galina had mentioned that international mail was in the back, and also luckily, Laird asked someone where it was when we got around to the side.  We were pretty much near where we had to be, went in, Laird got forms from a helpful woman (in Russian) and then had to figure out what was wanted.  His frustration level kept rising, but he did a great job, really, getting it figured out.  BUT, there’s always a BUT, when we went back to the woman, it was almost time for her break.  She DID let us leave the boxes with her, thank god, and we went off to find a restaurant.  By this time, both of us were hurting pretty badly — backs and feet do NOT like it when we stand around on them doing nothing but waiting, waiting, waiting and then having to travel somewhere else to wait, wait, wait.  The only thing we saw was a burger king.  Yikes.  Yep, we ate at burger king and while I was sitting waiting for our order, I noticed, across the street, the Fork and Spoon (in Russian), a restaurant that we’ve eaten at several times in our neighborhood.  Oh well.  BUT BURGER KING HAS CLEAN RESTROOMS THAT ACTUALLY HAVE TOILET PAPER!  SOAP!  A WAY TO DRY YOUR HANDS!  I was gobsmacked!  I was thrilled!  I was not having paranoid fantasies about diseases and bacteria and viruses, or having to wipe footprints off the toilet.  Claudia, you cannot travel to Russia — you’d never make it — particularly the footprints.  Remember, many people in the Urals and Siberia are used to Eastern-style squat toilets, so. . . .  After that wonderful end to lunchtime we went back to the PO and our lovely lady had taped up our boxes and had everything ready to go, just had to pay her — 4,740 rubles, less than shipping the other direction.  Back to tram, back to apartment, exhausted.  Dealing with any post office, anywhere will do that to you.  Laird went on a packing frenzy, got his stuff all done.  Off to our very last class, where we were presented with several “testimonials” of how much the students enjoyed having us here — these today are the fourth years — and how they hope we will come back.  We hope so too.  Now we’re sitting here at 7:00 p.m., all packed and ready to go (well, last minute stuff in a.m.).  Amazing, underweight, room for Istanbul souvenirs — or so I hope.  I NEED more Evil Eyes.

Readily yours, jm — or maybe more appropriate, postally yours, jm & lg

We have our last class at 4:00 and we’re done.  We’ve given our thank you presents to folks at the university and got some in return.  A beautiful, beautiful “landscape” of Jasper from our dearest friend Galina — one of many from her all along the way — and a Urals Federal University mug from the head of the department.  As y’all know, I love advertising mugs.  What a swell time we’ve had, though we’ve done nothing much in terms of sightseeing or going out at night — our friend Igor drove us around the city center the other night after that wonderful dinner at Leonid’s and Natasha’s, lots of colored lights on the buildings, quite beautiful at night.  The snow made it lovely and sparkly, but I could have done without that.  Maybe next time, we’ll come back in fall, when it will be pleasant weather to wander around — before daylight savings time goes away, of course.  Speaking of snow, when the big snow storm hit, many drivers had already taken off their winter tires and put on summer ones.  One of our students said there had been over 500 accidents!

Yea!  We’re meeting our friend Pinar in Istanbul!  We’re quite excited to see her, it’s been a long time.  I’ve used her in class to show how successful one can be as an interpreter/translator.  I wish she’d come visit us in NM — everyone would love her, I know.  Did I mention how beautiful and poised she is?

Marita and Noekie, we’re making that transition in our minds from Yekat to Pretoria and YOU — we’re like puppies at the door, our tails are wagging in such anticipation of seeing you!

Galina and all our friends here, we’re also so sad to be leaving you — thank you, thank you for such a successful trip!  Please, please, invite us back!

Now we have to go to the post office, see if we are successful in sending boxes back home.  Dona, be on the lookout for three boxes, please — possible we will be home by the time they come, but the box I sent to Galina I think took two-three weeks, a reasonable time it seems to me.

Sadly-happily yours, jm

We just had a great lunch in an “Old Russia” restaurant — like dining in the summer house at the dacha — more like manor house or small palace.  We had been in the building through one door the other day and it was a cafeteria, OK food, nothing special.  But I saw this other door today and went in it — wow what a difference!  Interior started out similar, walls that looked like a log cabin, but after giving our coats to the cloak room and going down these very dark, kinda steep stairs, through the bar, we stepped into a lovely room that looked quite elegant, maybe like a smoking room in said manor house or palace.  The hostess asked if we wanted nonsmoking, we  said yes, so she gestured into another room and a hall that looked like the way to the WC, but, yea, we went the other direction, through another little anteroom, into these private rooms that look liked porches or gazeboes  — you get the idea.  Wallpaper murals on the walls of our cubicle were of birch trees, another giant, many-limbed tree that we didn’t recognize — maybe an oak? — and the manor/palace just behind.  Laird sat on the satin settee and I sat in a chair, silver candelabra on the table.  And so it began.  Daniel, you would have loved it:  5 pages of appetizers and hors d’ oeurves (not sure why those aren’t synonyms, but you foodies probably know), cold and hot; then  a page of soups; a page of fish dishes; four pages of game and other meats; two pages of dessert.  Laird had salad Madam (with orange and grapefruit), cream of mushroom soup and beef stroganoff.  Our breads were the best I’ve had here.  I had Russian salad (which turns out to be American salad — green salad with veggies), cream of spinach soup and cutlet of roe deer and wild boar with wild cranberry sauce.  YUUUMMMMM!  Served on fine china.  I also had a glass of wine along with tea.  To start, when the waitress, dressed in a long, old-fashioned dress, brought the bread she also brought us each a small glass of some kind of berry wine, just a little sweet and nice.  Alas, Laird did not have his camera so no pictures.  As you can imagine, we were too stuffed to even think of dessert.  It was  lovely, leisurely lunch — so fun.  And the best part was that my credit card worked.  When we went shopping the other day, I think the woman didn’t know how to use non-smart-chip-American-not-European-credit-cards — the message that came back was “account closed”.  Same thing happened with Laird’s card.  Needless to say we were a little freaked thinking that our cards didn’t work, since we have a month to go on vacation.  Laird had to go get money, but for some reason his card wouldn’t work in the bank either.  So then he had to come back to the store, get cash from me, back to bank, oops, they didn’t like one of the $100 bills, so back to me to exchange, back to bank, back finally for final time with cash in hand to liberate our souvenirs.  Luckily the bank was in the same building and on the same floor as the souvenir shop.

Renee, speaking of that vertical mall or whatever it is, if I knew your shoe size and had money I would have bought you a pair of shoes.  One whole floor of this place is filled with shoes — we couldn’t tell if it was one shoe store or many, but I saw so many shoes you would have liked!  I want to know how even young women can walk on ice in high heel shoes — and when I say high heels, I mean stilettos.  It’s freezing cold and ice or slush is everywhere and here come these women in stilettos, very short skirts and sometimes fur jackets or some other fashionable outerwear.  Women here are extremely fashion conscious.  You have never seen such fashionable women! One woman in one of our classes has a sweater with one whole shoulder of fur — it looks real, but what do I know?  Of course, I only saw it once because you cannot be seen wearing the same thing more than once — well, maybe in a couple of weeks and to different classes, or on a date going somewhere you will not meet anyone who might have seen you in the same outfit.  Oh, and the fingernails, manicured and painted with designs.  The women are beautiful, well groomed and slender — oh I remember youth (though not with so much fashion, ever)! 

We were going back downtown for a couple of things — we had a successful run to the post office this morning and now have boxes to pack stuff in to ship — but poor Laird’s foot is hurting way too much, so we came home so he could take aspirin and ice it.  Maybe later.  I felt so sorry for him, though, limping to university, then limping much worse  home.  To top it off, carrying his computer bag hurt his hip and he was afraid to let me carry it walking on ice — he decided hurting was better than having to pick me up off the sidewalk, I guess.  I cudda done it; I know I cudda!  Anyway, I sure hope the aspirin and ice do the trick — I know from vast experience  that hurting and traveling don’t go well together.  Luckily, I’ve had pretty good luck, my back is not terrible — though sitting on hard student seating for three hours straight for three days was pretty tough on the old periformis or whatever the hell it is that hurts on me.  I’ve gotten very good at walking up five flights of stairs, then down partway, then up again, then down two floors, up one, find the bathroom floor up or down, down for lunch, up for tea, many times a day.  You get the idea.  But I’m pretty sure that all that walking hasn’t done anything to mitigate the mayonnaise!

Fashion backwardly yours, jm

Yesterday was chilly, but sunny, melting snow on Lenina st made for very deep and wide mud puddles, but IT’S SNOWING AGAIN!  Hell with professionalism, I’m wearing jeans to work today — not to mention that I don’t want to have to put on one of the same damn outfits I’ve already worn upteen times.  We have already had more snow than Yeketerinburg has had in April in 124 years — it’s time to stop!  Once the record has been broken, what’s the point of more?  Crankily yours, jm

We finished exams, each group had a party afterwards in the classroom, with food and drink and great high spirits, and champagne for the first two groups — they still have to take their second language exams, French or German.  Have I said how much we have enjoyed our students?  They were all great, even the few who wouldn’t talk at the beginning — and I think at the end, even they talked to us.  Friday was another bitterly cold, windy, snowy day, as was Saturday.  Did I already discuss how it is that when the weather is like this, no matter what direction you are walking in, the snow and wind are ALWAYS in your face — how does that happen????  We got up and took the tram downtown for souvenir shopping.  We found a lovely gift for Galina, hope she agrees, and the perfect souvenir shop.  Home for a brief rest before going to dinner at Leonid and Natasha’s house.  Another spectacular feast!  Daniel you would have so loved everything — you too, Judyth, everything was soooo gooood.  Natasha is a really great cook and hostess. Vodka for toasts and, of course, just because.  We were there for almost six hours, most of the time eating.

Today, I was so very happy to sleep late.  Leisurely day until our friends Sergei and Lilia came to say goodbye, they are off to Abu Dhabi for 10 days.  At 2:00 we went to a class — actually more like a conversation club — for our friend Elena, the doctor and medical translator/interpreter.  Yet another fun group of Russians, most of them doctors or medical students — three pediatric neurologists among them — and so young they looked!  We had a great good time with them and afterwards off to Elena’s house for dinner.  Her husband had made excellent plof.  I do so love Russian food and as I think I have explained every single woman in Russia can cut food into little tiny pieces — and we had my favorite salad: corn, cucumber, fake crab, sometimes tomato or some other veggie, with a bit of mayo.  Their two girls, Leesa (6) and Sonia (4), came home and were a bit shy with us at first, but by the end they were showing off their in-line skates, bikes and scooter — the apartment has a very large hall and an open living room/kitchen so lots of room for two small girls to skate and ride around.  Now we’re home and damn if it isn’t already almost 9:00.  We got the last of the clothes out of the washing machine — read bathtub — and so we’ll be starting the week with clean clothes, always a good thing.

May you all have a great week — ours is only through Wednesday as Thurs morning we fly off to Istanbul and then to you, MARITA and NOEKIE!  We sure hope we see our friend Pinar in Istanbul.

Best wishingly yours, jm 

Man, this sucks — it’s been snowing all day long and it is freezing cold.  I am so over all the clothes I brought and was looking forward to wearing my new linen blend pants and now this.  Shit! 

Second day of 5th year exams, then first year students at 2:15, finally the referent-translators (I still don’t know what that means).  Done at 7:00 and waiting for a taxi in the snow, a cold, wet snow, we decided not to go to see the girls jazz choir rehearsal, so a cold, wet (did I mention the snow???) walk home.  Too yukky to go to the grocery store, so we have decided to blow off dinner.  Just as well, we got yet another box of chocolates today — this time for Laird’s remarks at the intellectual property conference.  We now have three boxes of chocolates and two giant candy bars — we have to be VERY CAREFUL not to eat it all.

Tomorrow the last day of exams, then maybe stop off at our neighbor Igor’s class, then we must do some shopping and some clothes washing.  I hate the thought.  Yea, Igor is going to check and see about shipping winter clothes home before heading for South Africa.  I don’t want to carry all the weight and I want to buy souvenirs — I need that space my dress up clothes were taking up in my suitcase.

Well, it’s already bedtime if I expect to get up early to be at school by 9:00.  Snoozingly yours, jm  

I don’t even remember yesterday.  We had a wonderful lupper — or linner — with Leonid, Natasha, Igor and Katerina on Sunday at a really nice restaurant.  Leonid and I had gins and tonic and Long Island Iced Tea (he’s pretty sure there was no liquor, just coke with lemon), which made me happy.  I just adore Leonid!  He laughs so big and happily and everything seems to delight him.

Yesterday we only had one class, but after a few days of lovely weather it turned bitterly cold walking to and from the university — snow blowing in our faces coming home.  We stopped at a neighborhood restaurant for lunch — I haven’t a CLUE what I had for lunch.  Maybe it was ham, but it was fairly unidentifiable — but it had tomato, mayonnaise and maybe some cheese melted on top.  Then trudged home.  We had expected to go shopping for souvenirs after our one class, but it was so cold we gave that idea up pretty quickly.  We came home, read and then all of a sudden it was 10:00 p.m.  I REALLY have to go to bed early tonight, we have to get up EARLY tomorrow for exams.

The conference we went to today was quite swell — professional papers in English, French and German (we judged the English ones) and winners got one of our grammar t-shirts we had sent ahead of us.  Since they weren’t linguists, they may not have gotten the jokes, but oh well.  After class, luckily, we remembered we had been invited to Armenian Day, so before we got too far out the door, we went back and listened to the concert — everything was either in Russian or Armenian, but it was fun to watch the folk dancing and the singing WOULD HAVE been good if they had not cranked the dial on the stereo AND the microphone to 12 plus.  OMG, it was so loud.  I had one ear closed and it was painful, I don’t have any idea how Laird stood it with his hearing aids in — I would have yanked them out of my ears so fast if they were mine!  Afterwards, we met Ike, our Armenian student who was the main “puter oner” of the event — he made sure we got to cut in line at the food table.  Delicious!  The pictures of Armenia have us lusting after a visit there — I wonder if they want English teachers?!?  We’ll have to remember to ask Ike.

Our students are just so wonderful — all of you would like them so much!  I helped one, Maria, work on her paper for presentation today, and she brought me a Easter bread/cake that her mother made — there is no English word and I can’t remember the Russian word.  I think it is made only around Easter.  Dona, don’t the Greeks make a special bread at Easter?  Daniel, you’re our international food expert — do you know?

I have my voice back finally, but I CANNOT get my nose to stop running — very annoying.  So now I will go blow it on tissues that feel like the toilet paper, not so soft.  Poor nose.  Drippingly yours, jm

We went to our friend Galina’s church today for Easter.  We didn’t understand anything, but it brought back lots of memories of going to church, southern Baptist, when I was a kid, with a new outfit on for easter, finally bright colors and the change of shoes from black to white — unless memorial day was too far away, in which case white shoes only for Sunday.  But some new starched, bright springy dress, new white shoes, white socks with ruffles.  My mother had the three of us wear the same hairdo — length just below the ears, top hair parted on side and pulled over into a ponytail like thing on the side of our head, with the rest of our hair hanging down.  Then a bow tied around the rubber band.  You can all imagine how cute we were!  Carol and Sandy got out of that style much earlier than me — it always seemed to pay to be the older rather than the baby.  After church, there would be easter egg hunts on the church grounds.  Galina, with her magic purse, pulled out easter presents for us,along with a colored egg.  After church today, we went downstairs and had a small meal in their kitchen, with ham that Galina had brought, special easter cake, a birthday cake for Laird, and from her magic purse, two more easter eggs to go with the ham, because one must have eggs for easter.  And then, the magic purse held yet another present for another American who was visiting also.  At the university, Galina’s purse holds tea bags, snacks and other assorted necessary items for gracious living.  That purse is amazing!

The party last night was as I suspected, pretty lame.  As I said, most people were busy, but we did get to see Laird’s old friend Boris (pronounced more like Borees) Shulgin,a very famous Russian scientist in physics; our friends Sergei and Lilia; and Laird’s old student Elena (pronounced Yeelana).  Lilia is an engineer and teaches French and is the head of the French something institute somewhere; Sergei is also an engineer and has several jobs as faculty, department head or vice rector of a couple of schools and also consults with a private firm.  Elena is a medical doctor who is a medical translator instead of practicing.  Her husband is a former surgeon who now practices as a radiological oncologist, and is the only doctor in Yekaterinburg to do some specialized treatment regimen that means the patient only spends three days in the hospital instead of a month and a half.  We didn’t understand perfectly what it is he does.  But as you can see, we are surrounded by a very select group of folks.  Laird got some great gifts, too:  a beautiful pen and pencil set and a yassma stone card case; some haclama — of course, none of these words are really how you spell them, just phonetic — a beautiful bowl and spoon and a covered jar.  Boris brought two stone candlesticks, a box of candy, a bottle of cognac, chocolate bars to eat with the cognac, chanel perfume for me, and a couple of books.  Sergei and Lilia also brought me a stone figurine of flowers in a vase, sunstone they call it.  Our guacamole and salsa worked out well and we had salads and cheeses, also.  And a cake.  I mostly just sat back and listened — though I have to say, towards the end, I was ready to just lie back on my bed and go to sleep; I was already sitting on it.  Next Sunday we agreed to go talk to one of  Elana’s groups and then have dinner at her house.  I will try to remember to get him to take his camera, Daniel, so you will have pictures of another Russian dinner.  Yes, you haven’t seen pictures of the others, but I think Laird has them; he just has to give them to me and I’ll post them.  Also need to take pictures of our apartment to post.

For some reason, Laird is not carrying his camera and/or not taking pictures.  Weird.  I think carrying his camera on his belt hurts his hip; I don’t know why, like in Istanbul when he did carry it he didn’t use it.  Our smart phones don’t work here, but I wonder if we can still take pictures?  I could do it then.  We need to show you Urals Federal university and our students.

OK, naptime before going out to dinner with Leonid and Natasha, Igor and Yekaterina.

p.s., Sergei and I drank vodka and tonic, Lilia and Elena had wine and Boris drank the cognac he brought.  Nobody had Big Doctor, but Sergei said it was popular a few years ago, mixed with vodka.  Maybe I will try it before we leave.    Arisenly yours, jm