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Published: January 2nd 2010
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Bed Holiday
Sveta's enjoying her New Year's Day Holiday in bed. Actually, in this picture she might not be enjoying things so well. Note the trash can nearby -- evidence of stomach flu. Unlike many of her compatriots, however, Sveta doesn't drink. She just got unlucky Jan 2. Nick Hogan once asked me, "How's Perm? Brutal enough for you?" I replied that overall life was good, and Perm not at all brutal. This was well before the two -40 days of mid-December and the week in which the temperature bounced between -20 and -30. Up till then, when asked by grinning Russians "so, how do you like Russian winter?" I understood what they wanted me to say. I would reply, however, that, in truth, Russian winter is not so different from Nebraska winter. No colder, just a little bit longer. My Russian questioners would stop grinning. Sveta even claimed my dismissal of Russian winter offended her. "I always knew it was colder," she told me recently. People here are proud of their ability to endure all calamities. Not long ago, Medvedev in a speech repeated a well-worn assumption: that the difficulty of life and historical tragedies in Russia had molded the national character. If the most famous Russian difficulty could be reduced to Nebraska-level reality, it would strike not only at Russian pride but even the famed Russian soul. Still, it wasn't very cold last year. Souls or not.
The cold came the night of my birthday. The
My boots
Best boots are woolen boots. My feet never got cold. Though the cat appears to want to get in the boot, this is in fact not true. Sveta and I tried to put Rosie in the boot and she didn't appreciate it. Rosie likes the warm radiator and probably wants to knock the boots down off of it. Recently, Rosie attempted to poison us by destroying a mercury thermometer. temperature dropped around 30 degrees and within a few hours a new reality settled in on the city. When it was dark, a solid mist hung in the air. People appeared from within the mist and disappeared back into it. And everything was so still. On those nights, Sveta and I would return home from work and unfold the bed. No books, no movies, no TV and only the quickest of meals -- usually pelmeyni (Russian ravioli) that we'd throw into boiling water and eat five minutes later with extra mayo. I sympathized with the bears. Upon founding a warm place, a primal urge compelled me to dig in and sleep it through. Hibernate.
But Russians don't hibernate. They go to work. And reluctantly so did I. And, as with everything, you can adjust. I didn't get used to to the cold, but I wore woolen boots. I borrowed a warmer hat (the famous ushanka). I kept my scarf on indoors (the University never could fully heat up on those days).
The day after the cold came, I was walking back from the bus to my building looking to get some hot food before my night lesson. As
I came over the hill and began the descent to my door, a dog began to scream. "Was he freezing to death," I wondered? Then I heard other dogs barking and snarling, followed by the screaming dog. I couldn't see, but it seemed clear to me that the barking and snarling dogs were killing the screaming one. As I reached the door, a pack of maybe ten street dogs brushed past me. I was invisible to them as they hurried with a purpose toward the the horrible sounds of that dying dog. So now I tell anyone who asks, Russian winter is unique.
But street dogs aside, the cold was not a major problem. Much more serious was the tragic the night club fire that killed over 150 people. Permians often call their city of over 1 million a big village and talk about how everyone here is connected in overlapping networks. So even if they didn't know someone who had died in the fire, most Permians know others who did know someone.
Before the fire, a particularly ghoulish murder had shocked everyone. Two men attacked another with knives and hammers. After killing their victim, they ate part
Fuzzy ushanka
This fuzzy ushanka belongs to Elena Sergeevna, who kindly lent it to me when it got really cold a couple weeks ago of his body, and then sold the rest to a local "sharuma" shop (basically a Russian hot dog stand). It's unknown if any of the meat was used by the shop. Add to this the mad bus, summer bank robberies, and last year's plane crash and you get a string of bad luck and tragedy that has taken a heavy toll on the city.
Perm was ready for the holidays. New Year's is the big one here. All Russians get the first 10 days of January off. Sveta and have declared it a "bed" holiday because so many Russians spend it there. A friend and I talked about snowboarding the New Year in, but the weather once again turned cold and so, like everyone else, I took to my bed. Sveta and I spent New Year's Eve with our neighbors and mutual friend Serge. It was great night. I think I slept 20 hours the next day.
Before all that, Sveta and I judged the American Corner Christmas pageant. Unlike last year, we did not sing. We did, however, get on one of the local morning news broadcasts.
I got to talk about small fir trees and Russian rock. The same fuzzy ushanka that keeps my head warm,
Christmas pageant
"malenkiy" yolochka but, as you can see from the video (click on the link and scroll down for the clip), also gives me a greasy-haired look. I don't remember being asked about Russian winter. Students from around the area showed up and made the pageant and the subsequent conversation club really cool.
As a foreigner, I have my own holidays to celebrate. December 25 isn't Christmas here (blame the Julian Calendar). But, as luck would have it, I got Christmas off from work. I decided to use my time off productively and do a little cleaning before wrapping the gifts and trying to locate the tree before Sveta got home that evening. Rosie our cat had no interest in this and instead hunted high and low for her toys, which I had hid up on top of the wardrobe. Also hidden up there was a mercury thermometer, which, in the course of chasing the cat came crashing to the floor, scattering beads of mercury across the linoleum. Around 4 am the next morning and unable to sleep, I googled "mercury spills" and learned just how dangerous that stuff really is (among other body parts, mercury destroys the brain, bones, and lungs). Helpfully, all the sites contained easy-to-follow rules for how to clean up and dispose of mercury. To my horror, I learned that I had broken almost every one of them. It was never my intention to give poisonous vapors for Christmas. My next course of action was to destroy the carpet (beads in the fibers!) and then, after giving in to Sveta's pleas for mercy, rolled it up instead and put it on the balcony. Next, following a feverish inspection I found some stray beads on the linoleum, and with repeated exhortations of "IT'S NOT WORKING!" assisted Sveta as she cleaned them up using the proper eye-dropper method. Sveta remained serenely unconcerned, even after I explained the terrifying truth about mercury. You see, all of us have mercury inside us -- we get it from the polluted air we breath and the fact that Earth, well, has mercury on its surface. But our body has no use for the stuff -- there's no "normal" level of mercury -- it's all bad. And if we suck in a little mercury here and then some there, we run the risk of passing our own personal mercury threshold. You could be breathing in vapors for years and never notice a thing, and then you pass your own personal mercury threshold and suddenly you got crumbling bones and a broken brain. There's no way to know how much of this stuff we have in us. Just as it's impossible to know our own mercury personal threshold. We are at great risk, and I have no idea what clown decided to make thermometers, which always break and which are often conveniently in our mouths (if not other even more vulnerable places) out of mercury.
Also unconcerned with the dangers of mercury it seems is anyone over 60. According to my parents and aunt, the 1950s were a golden time for quick silver. Physicians and dentists kept secret globs of the stuff at the ready in case curious kids needed something to keep them occupied. They could roll it into balls, throw it up into the air and shatter the glob into little beans and then gather them up again. Great fun, and they're all doing fine, personal threshold or not. Of course also during this time shoe stores used X-ray machines to measure children's growing feet.
Sveta and I send our best New Year's wishes to all -- hope you have a great holiday and get a chance for some rejuvenating, bear-like slumber.
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christie rasmussen
non-member comment
Wonderful Reading!
Hey Chris, Loved your Blog. You provided your old Mom some great giggles followed by frequent belly laughs. I continue to maintain your calling is writing comedy (books or newspaper columns), writing for TV comedy shows, etc. You are great! Love you, Mom