Tuesday 28 April 2009

April.


1) Last week I went to a series of lectures about Iceland. God I know so much about Iceland. It's literally bursting out of me. I go around boring people with facts, figures, trivia and the like. Literally I am an Icelandic machine.

For example did you know that due to the highly unstable geographical situation of Iceland, the roads that cross through the centre of it are only open during the summer?
Or, did you know that Iceland has been under the rule of Norway, Sweden and Denmark during the past 1000 years?

And better yet, that its isolation from the rest of Scandinavia has resulted in a strange language that is fairly unchanged from the Old Norse that they spoke there when they first arrived in 870 AD? (Although that original figure is now about to be revised to around 700-750AD, everyone agrees it'll just take a few more years for everyone to recognise it.)

2) My hair is really long. I went to a barber's the other day but I got scared and chickened out. So now my friend Michaela has said she'll do it. She claims that she can cut hair, I don't believe her. Especially the other night when she said 'No, I've never actually cut anybody's hair before.'

3) On Friday night I got so drunk I couldn't put my shoes on. Literally, they had to be put on for me. Also drank alot in the courtyard which is overlooked by the State Prison. Mistake.

4) We were on telly the other day. This is the latest in the series of recent press events which we've been having. My mate Tom lives with a television lady (she works on the telly) and she did a program about him (day in the life sort of). I was also there. But my clip consisted of me laughing outrageously as it was explained to me what was going on. Doesn't quite rival my appearance in the local newspaper (which everybody knows about now).

5) Overslept this morning, missed Old Church Slavonic at 8am. Oh dear.

6) Hopefully going to the Sauna this Friday. Am going to try and be sensible but I just can't help myself when I get dehydrated and drunk and go swimming.

7) Last week went for a few beers with a guy called 'Dzhek'/'Jack', we went and had a drink at his work which is essentially a Youth Centre with lots of computers. Quite cool. Picked up some new words (I won't type them they're too rude.)

8) Have just read Herzog by Saul Bellow. It was amazing. Sort of annoying in parts when the narrator's letters go into scholarly discussions of Nietzche and Romanticism and Kierkegaard and all that stuff I am not into at all. But at the same time that had the effect of bringing the protagonist's know-it-allness right into my mind. God Saul Bellow is amazing.

I got defeated by Bleak House. Very early on. To be fair, it's my own fault. I read Oliver Twist, Hard Times and Great Expectations. I overdid the Victorian prose and I ended up crashing and burning. Which is a shame because I need to read Bleak House for next year I think. Although it does look good. Maybe I'll just get the BBC adaptation instead.

Currently reading 'Life of Insects'/'Babylon' in Russian (I think it's called that in English) by Victor Pelevin. It's really good, and alot more satisfying/useful/easy than reading Gogol' in the original Russian (literally spirit-crushingly hard). I've been reading it for about 3 weeks, maybe a month and I've done 50 pages so far. I'm fairly proud of myself in that sense but also not so because I should really be able to read a book by now without taking 3 weeks to read 50 pages.

9) Two big holidays coming up this week or so - 1st of May (standard) and Victory Day (9th May). Victory Day is celebrated a day later in Russia than in Europe because of the time difference when they were signing the treaties. It's one of the most important holidays in Russia apparently.
10) Another postcard has been sent out. Who it's to? Not saying.
11) Back in 8 and a bit weeks.

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.

Monday 6 April 2009

we stand under it, but we don't understand it (night)

(petrozavodsk - 1950s, you can see the Finnish Embassy there)
Greetings.

Nothing much has been happening really since the last post but I'll try to conjure something out of nothing in the vain hope of entertaining you.

It was Sergei's birthday last Wednesday, he's the 22 year-old ex-Spetsnaz sniper who occupies the room next to mine. Needless to say when I came home on Wednesday night after football (more on that later) I was greeted by a strange reception by him and his mates, until I was told to 'proxodi na ctol / come to the table' at which point the vodka began to flow and the eating and drinking marathon started.

there were toasts, there were jokes and there was drink. I can honestly say that I did pretty well for 4 hours of solid drinking, but the surprising thing was that at 1 o'clock (one hour after I'd started my own drinking ramp up with this guy next to me) they all went out clubbing. yes that right, they went out. they were seriously, seriously fucked. I went to bed. I didn't go to uni. and I think I'm still feeling a little peaky after it 4-5 days later.

After football, and the communal shower with several middle-age men, I was asked by one man, Sergei, who has few teeth and a rocket of a right foot, if I believed in God (he actually asked me in English). To this I replied, actually, no, not as such, not really (trying best to be polite as possible since I had a faint suspicion that he did believe in God, like most Russians.)

This faint suspicion was immediately confirmed by an answer of 'yes' when I asked him the same question, when he said 'I am a pastor in the country'. Now I don't know why, but this immediately made me feel incredibly guilty, because he's such a nice bloke and for some reason I equated my saying no to his question of whether I believed in God to reflect badly on him, and his entire congregation. When, in actual fact, it has no bearing whatsoever.

I'd also like to point out that generally I don't understand a word the people say during football on Wednesdays, since it is a highly refined mix of slang and swear-words. It is one of my goals that by the end of my time here, I will at least understand 50% of what they say.

Also, as you probably won't know, its actually the 200th anniversary of Gogol's birth, and as he's a revered national literary figure of both Russia and Ukraine, there are festivities to be had. One such festivity includes the production of a feature film based on the story of Taras Bul'ba by Gogol by the state television network 'Rossiya'. Advertisements are subtle. In fact, they're actually subliminal. They flash the words 'TARAS BUL'BA' in between certain adverts.
Adverts for other televison shows are also fairly amusing, since on Channel 2 (Rossiya) they tend to at the end of the advert say ''Love as a motive', 10.20 on Channel 2, Russia!' Saying 'Russia' as both a statement of the channel and tv network but also saying it like, oh yeah, its in Russia (and therefore intrisincally better than stating any other possible country).

On another advert for 'Kamenskaya - The Real Colonel' (female detective gets involve in vaguely international scandals and/or murder mysteries, they've taken video clips of the actress saying stuff like '9o'clock on Channel 2, all Russia will be watching!' so that if you don't watch you are instantly set apart from the rest of Russia, marking you out as some kind of horrible individualist.