A letter home from study abroad
sunday the eighth of september, 1996
At about 10 this morning, my host mother popped her head into my
room and asked "You're coming to the dacha with me, right?" I stumbled
out of bed, pulled on a shirt and pants and went out onto the balcony to
see if any of my clothing had recovered from last night's downpour. Half
an hour later, I found myself getting out of a taxi[1] with her in front
of Byelorusski Vogzal (train station)
I'm sure that my host-mom told me that tomorrow's the younger
oleg's birthday and that's why we bought flowers. We waited around for
about 20 minutes before they posted the track for our "Electrichka"
(A local electric train) Once the train was underway, no less than two
newspaper vendors, two booksellers, one lady selling ice cream, three
sets of singing children asking for money and one accordian player
walked through our car.
The family's dacha is about a 10 minute walk from the
electrichka station, which is about 25 minutes from moscow. When we got
there, I was told to give the flowers to the babushka. It turns out
that today was _her_ birthday and not "melki's" (melki is the family's
nickname for the younger oleg. it's an adjective meaning little) Melki
invited me to play checkers...which he proceeded to teach me the rules
for. Then we started to play. He started to cheat horribly and to lie
about the rules. Because he was losing, he decided we'd switch sides.
After he "won," he wanted to play a game called "Auto" that's something
like bingo with a car race theme. He proceeded to eat the game pieces.
Then he told me we were going for a walk. "Why not?" i mused...after
all, he was the first member of the family that was really paying any
attention to me.
The walk was interesting...the dacha's in a really nice area of
the country...lots of green. While we were walking, I asked melki if
he remembered any of the other americans they'd hosted. He said that
he didn't remember any of them. When pressed, he admitted that he
remembered building a fort with one of them. I asked him if he'd
remember me after I left. He said no. On the way home, I started to
hum the theme to the pink panther, which he recognised and was able to
identify. When we got home, he showed me his chinese nintendo clone,
although he refused to let me play. Then he said that we were going to
play "war." War, as it turns out, is the same game most six year old
boys play with army figurines. Basically, we just hung out for the
afternoon. They fed me various pastries and tea. I watched some dubbed
mexican soap with the babushka. They fed me again. This time, it was
soup with mushrooms (called gribnoi soup and not soup s gribami. go
fig.) followed by tounge. Since the soup was homemade, I was able to
gain face by asking for a second bowl and had a perfect excues when they
wanted me to eat tounge....Sorry, it's just one of those things I don't
want to try. It didn't even look like cow tounge...it looked like
people tounge. After I explained that I had eaten too much soup to be
able to eat anything else for the third time, they left me alone and got
into a discussion about how americans have never experienced good
mushrooms and are always wowwed by them when they get to russia. The
babushka's friend who was visiting knew where boston is. It seems that
once, when she was in the states, Delta had misdirected her luggage
there. After dinner, the babushki sat around and told war stories.
(Literally! they talked about how there was no sugar at times during WW
II and how they compensated)
Oh, yeah, they're really big on feeding the dog and cat from the
table. The dog will actually sit at the table if there's an empty seat.
They throw _everything_ to the animals....even things with little bones.
I've seen dogs beg at the table before, but this is the first time I've
seen a _CAT_ sit by the table and beg for food.
They sent me and some other guy (the son of the babushka's
friend) out to pick the plums in their back yard. We probably got about
a bushel of plums from the two trees. (No, I don't know how big a
bushel is either, but if I did, we would have filled one) Melki had
just gotten a toy basketball set and wanted me to play with him.
Eventually, I gave in. He got very upset with me when I tried to play.
He explained the rules to me. His version of basketball is very
different from any I've ever heard of. The first thing that comes to
mind is that it's called baseball. The second is that play consists of
trying to rip the ball from your opponent's hands and then trying to get
the ball within a two foot radius of the hoop.
We got a ride back to the city from the son of the babushka's
friend. (he's called dimavanya) As we got into moscow, it started to
pour. So much for the clothes i'd left out to dry. I got home and saw
a note to call alyosha...I tried...his mom said he's out walking around
with some friends...It's pouring out...poor boy...I tried nadia...she's
at the dacha till tomorrow...I'm never gonna get a chance to see these
people :( ....my back hurts like hell...it has for most of the
evening...I must have pulled something swinging melki around. It was
better for a while after I took some advil. I think that brings y'all
about up to date.
stay tuned for the next exciting episode of
Moscow 119021
(yes, that really is our zipcode)
jesse
[1] In moscow, few taxis are "Taxis" per se, but ordinary drivers who
want to make a few extra dollars by going out of their way to drive
people places. I've been advised never to try to negotiate a taxi fair
myself.