Snowstorms in May

Sorry everyone, but the internet has been so bad lately that I can't even load photos onto the blog website, so you'll just have to wait for me to get back! J

This past weekend we had our last horah with our Russian friends from the university and took a weekend trip to Baikalsk, a small village about 4 hours north of Irkutsk and the place where we had gone skiing 2 ½ months ago. Unfortnately, on the day we were supposed to leave we missed our train and had to order a marshrutka, which meant we have to splurge a whole 150 rubles ($5.50) instead of paying only 40 rubles (less than $1.50). I think I'm really going to miss cheap public transportation when I'm back in the US and I have to pay $60 to get from New Haven to Harrisburg on Amtrak. All 30 of us stayed in this odd gymnasium-school-hostel that our friend Olegue knew about (he grew up in Baikalsk), and ate in a school cafeteria for 50 rubles (which was truly the most rotten food I think I've ever eaten). When we got back from lunch, two of my friends from England started a football (soccer) match with all of the guys. When I joined in, I think they weren't really expecting anything from me, mainly because I'm a girl and the standard mentality here towards women is that they can't do things (especially sports) nearly as well as men. It turned out that I held my own pretty well in front of my rather good-looking European guy friends and even scored 3 goals! Given that I haven't played soccer in probably about 8 years and that I haven't managed to work out regularly within the past 3 months, I could barely move the next day because my muscles were so sore.

We spent the evening utilizing the banya and toasting to friendship, international relations, and several other things as the evening proceeded. We spent the next day and a half doing pretty much the same things: kicking a soccer ball around, banya-ing, and having a vecherinka (party). All in all, it was great for everyone to spend the whole weekend together before the end of the semester and the beginning of exam week.

Now, when I say "exam week," I don't mean the type of exam week that I had last semester when I didn't leave my room for a whole week and lived off of crackers and coffee. When I say "exam week," I mean that the teachers threaten about an exam all semester and then end up giving you an "avtomat," which means that you get an "automatic" 5 (A) because you did your homework and showed up for class. I only actually took one real exam, and for one of my classes the conversation with regard to by grade proceeded as such: teacher—"Do you agree with a 4 [B]?" Me—"Um, ok." Teacher—"Do you strongly want a 5?" Me—"Well, yes." Teacher—"Well ok then, 5!" If only things worked this way at Wesleyan!

Right now I'm sitting in Studio Coffee looking out the window at the May blizzard that fell upon Irkutsk late this morning. I'm waiting for my Greek salad and americano to arrive while watching the wealthy Irkutsk businessmen come and go, braving the weather in their sharp suits and Russian-style pointed-toe men's shoes. I'm thinking back to my first trip to Studio Coffee back in February when all of my friends had taken a trip to Ylan-Yde and I was stuck in Irkutsk by myself feeling homesick and lonely, looking for any semblance of American culture that I could experience. Even though by looking out the window alone you can't tell that much time has passed, I feel like that was a lifetime ago and that everything has changed since then (except maybe, the precipitation). Back then I orded a cappucino because it was the only thing on the menu that I could recognize and I remember looking up how to say, "waitress, can I have the check?" Now, I'm capable of ordering a marshrutka by phone and understand even the most weathered drivers (every one here seems to agree that marshrutka drivers have their own sub-culture and speak their own version of Russian which is nearly unintelligable even to native Russians). I feel like the gloomy skies are indicative of my current mood, mainly because all of my American and international friends will be leaving within the next week and my time in Irkutsk and in Russia is coming to an end. It's hard for me to imagine returning to the US because I've really made a life for myself here in this bustiling Siberian city. I've made a few good Russian friends, become extremely close with my dormmates, manged to finally crack the code of the local transporation system, located all of the good cafes in the city (even the ones that have coffee "to go"!), and finally gotten a handle on conversational Russian. I've seen the lake change from solid ice that you can drive on to a (nearly) liquid state and I can finally see buds on the trees. I've braved what locals have dubbed "the coldest winter in recent memory" and exeprienced the most awkward experience that I'll (hopefully) ever have when I accidentally brought up gay marriage at a Russian non-profit (it still makes me angry thinking about it). The truth is, I've really changed as a person and have become more patient, thankful, and have gained some very important new perspectives, not to mention a completely new tolerance for cold. The city is a completely different place in the spring and I feel completely different about Irkutsk and Russia in general than when I arrived. Nonetheless, I so excited to spend my last three weeks living on Olkhon and reflecting upon this amazing, awful, boring, exciting, ridiculous experience!