Unhappy holidays.

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I walked into the kitchen this morning to find a huge icicle hanging outside the window. It looks like a giant glass octopus, that has wrapped itself around the top of the building and is trying to climb inside, away from the cold.

Today is a public holiday - day of the protectors of the fatherland - so classes have stopped until sunday. I hadn't yet had a chance to see much of Tver so I took my camera for a walk this afternoon. The sky was light grey, the same colour as the snow that has been pushed to the side of every street, often in heaps four feet high.

Tver is charmingly run-down. The paint is peeling from the walls of the buildings, cars are old and rusty. The streets are busy with couples in thick grey or brown overcoats and fur hats doing grocery shopping, or pulling their toddlers through the snow in mini-toboggans.

I walked past a market on ulitsa Trekhsvyatskaya, with babushki selling everything from socks to oil paintings. Flowers have been placed around the statue of Lenin to mark the holiday, and soldiers are all wearing smart knee-length black coats.

A little boy in a bright red jump suit slid on his bum down the river embankment, and much to his parents' relief gave them a thumbs up when he made it to the bottom unhurt.

A man was skiing along the middle of the Volga, walking in long strides and propelling himself with a stick in each hand.

Tver is a quieter place than Yaroslavl. It reminds me of the Soviet silent film 'Girl with the Hat Box' from the 1920s. There seems to be less of the passive-aggressiveness too, although the women behind counters in shops still have their moments.

The confusion of the last week caught up with me when I got back to the obshezhitie, and I started to feel very low. I had sat in a dingy underground internet café on ulitsa Zhelyabova for two hours and failed to and describe either the meeting of languages in the hostel or the atmosphere of the town. There has been a lot to take in lately and my self confidence comes in patches. There was a gathering in Yenu's flat but I only stayed for half an hour, sulking over my gin and tonic.

Anya, a student from the university, was in a bad mood too so while the others went clubbing at 'Zerkalo' we went for a stroll and chatted in English. We took a diagonal path across the Volga, where the snow was ankle-deep on top of the ice. The air was still, almost silent, and even at minus 5 it felt chilly rather than cold.

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Photos

The River Volga.
The fisherman is on the far side of the river, before the bridge. Like him it is my favourite place to clear my head and enjoy the peace and quiet.