Friday 17 April 2009

I had a date with the nig..ICE FISHING??1/11


As the title no doubt reveals, I have been ice-fishing. Recently. In fact, perhaps only several days ago as a matter of fact. The guy Nat lives with took us all out on to the lake (which is now melting very rapidly) about 100-200 metres and we made a hole with a special ice-drill, and then fished for a bit. We didn't catch anything but it was still really cool to be standing out on the lake, with all the other ice-fisherpeople in the distance like little black dots, felt very Russian and very cliched but I don't care.

We then celebrated Easter by having yorkshire puddings served with ice cream (don't ask), which was very pleasant and it was all very civilised etc.
The Friday/Saturday of last week was also a bit of an event as our Italian friend, Michaela, moved into her new flat. It's really, really posh and isn't too far from the lake and I'm incredibly jealous. So there was 2-day party type thing and met some new people and it was pretty cool.

However, the main event of the week was Denis' birthday, he's the 22-year old student/part-time university security guard who studies in the Forestry department. And yes, if you hadn't already guessed the Forestry Dept. is essentially the Sport Science of degrees, except infintely cooler because the name for it in Russian is literally 'wood-engineering'. And in fact, we have been to known to call them wood-engineers because it's just that funny.

So I came back from football on Wednesday night, and was promptly invited to join the usual drinking and eating festival that constitutes any family or national event here at 104 Chapaeva St. I was very much intending to 'take it easy' but that notion was quickly dispelled as soon as it became clear that I was going to be drinking alot of vodka instead of having a 'few beers' as I had planned. So like always we all got ridiculously pissed and I went to bed about 3. They continued to drink until around 6 in the morning and when I got out Denis and his mate (who's actually from Vladivostok) were passed out on the sofa, hugging the family dog Hilla (named after Hilary Clinton, actually).
I got up, ate some spicy carrots and drank some cranberry juice. I was then sick ALOT. This was reported to Denis and Vlad, who congratulated me by giving me a glass of beer. Denis then decided it would be hilarious to pretend to finger the cat, which he did. We then finished the beer and went to the shop to get more beer, which we drank. By which time it was half 3 and I had to go out. Thank god.

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