A busy week, Part two: В больнице

Onwards and upwards.
Continuing from the last post, my busy week continued, or at least seemed very hectic. Thinking on it, I didn't really do a great deal but I did have a lot happen to me. 
I've mentioned with increasing frequency my unreliable state of health over my year abroad, and recently I think migraines have featured in most of my posts. Well, this one is going to focus on that because A. it is taking up a large chunk of my life at the moment and B. I get a lot of site views based on migraine and neuro search words. Plus it's therapeutic. Feel free to ignore the rest if you are healthy, it's likely to bore/depress the hell out of you.

My prediction of an approaching migraine on my return from Peterhof proved accurate. I think motion sickness is connected somehow and it took its opportunity to blast into action the moment I lay down, complete with obligatory 'scintillating scotoma'-flashing, moving blind spots and psychodelic zigzags and vibrations in vision. Who needs drugs?

It hurt, a lot. The next day the same thing happened. And the next. Each time the aura became more widespread and the pain would kick in quicker and stay longer and honest to God it was making me unstable. My sleep patterns were ruined and I felt constantly nauseous and exhausted, my eyes couldn't focus and I developed vertigo. The effects of a migraine, in my case, are generally felt up to a week before and a week after the actual episode, and they were just piling on top of eachother. I spent most of the week close to tears from the frustration of not even being able to lie still and the rest of it in tears from the bulldozers hammering around in my head. The heating in the flat was still on at this point despite it being close to 20 degrees outside and I couldn't keep the window open because Russia is noisy beyond belief, and every little sound was thundering through my head bringing me closer to being sick from the further rolling around in pain. I could only crawl, not walk, and my eyes were doing their own thing. Consequently when I did try to stand, I fell over and was left with a very swollen ankle which just added to the strain. In short, it was torture.
 It felt like eternity during episodes and I began to hate being in Russia with a passion. I was prewarned about the climate here being bad for those of us with neurological problems, and even the pressure changes in the most moderate of climates has a palpable effect on my joints and head. Ocassionally I can actually feel the change in the size of the vessels in my brain, which is commonly thought to be the key cause of migraines. But I wanted to come here so I shouldn't complain too much.

Speaking Russian became an even greater labour than normal. As a result of the mix of regular medications I take I suffer from varying degrees of aphasia-impairment of language and processing ability. Sometimes I simply have trouble with words 'on the tip of my tongue', often reading is a slog, other times I can't speak at all and occasionally I am unable to write. That's in english. I all but gave up attempting to communicate with Viktor and Larissa and only ventured out of my room in search of water (praying for lack of contact with a scantily clad Aleksey) when I was truly desperate.

Thursday came and I was just about stable enough to be able to listen to Harry Potter on my kindle. The Prisoner of Azkaban is not exactly the most taxing of literature, but it's sufficiently interesting to be a distraction when the pain dies down enough. In a moment of lapsed concentration, I rolled over on to my stomach and before I'd realised, raised my head ever so slightly. That was it, I could feel the pulsing in my head, hear the whooshing of blood constricted through my neck and the intense pressure. The scotoma started within 45 seconds, my vision was doubled and parts of my hands appeared to be missing. Alice in Wonderland symptoms made their entrance and everything started shrinking at an alarming rate, just to shoot up by giant proportions a few moments later. My arms were shrinking, I felt totally out of proportion and disoriented.

The head pain, when it hit, was unusally sudden and incredibly intense. The visual aura was spread across both eyes and was adding to the chaos of the pain. I lay there for hours digging my head in to the mattress in (futile) attempts to relieve the pain, writhing around and generally sobbing to myself, interspaced with brief tourettes-esque swearing episodes to vent the frustration. It took maybe 4 hours before the nausea passed enough to switch positions. Very, very long hours. The visual issues had all but disappeared, just leaving the drilling into my skull to contend with. I decided to get up to splash water on my face but as I lifted my head, the aura was back. I couldn't even process what was going on by this point, I just knew the pain had suddenly tripled.
I don't really remember a great deal past this point, although I am aware I was very much in what my doctors refer to as 'crisis'. Truth be told I had probably been hovering around it for the past week. It had by this point been around 10 hours in constant, extreme pain, which is definitely not normal. I usually have some let up or at least weakening of symptoms.
I hauled myself down the hallway to Viktor to request a doctor, and exceedingly kindly, he rang the hospital for me and Aleksey drove us there. Can't imagine Lyudmila or George doing that.

In one of my early posts, about a month after I arrived in Yaroslavl, I commented on the miracle that was me avoiding hospital for so long. Well, a week to go and it was clearly time to rectify the situation. Just about time to cram in a medical emergency before I left!

Some time within the next hour I had been practically carried through the hospital for assessment, to find my blood pressure was an alarming 175/130. Considering that it's usually on the low side of healthy, it was a little worrying, as was my temperature which was edging towards 39 (although in Russia, once it hits 37 there is a definite problem according to doctors). My eyes were showing uncontrollable independent movements and I lost my spacial awareness.  Essentially, my body was having a massive and slightly dangerous freak out.


Treatment at this hospital was, without doubt, outstanding, and I have been in a fair few hospitals. I have never been so happy for nurses to attack my poor veins with multiple cannulas. Unlike a previous experience in a Russian state hospital, which left me with nerve damage, they identified my difficult veins just by looking and an intensive care nurse was called to deal with the cannula. It did eventually have to be changed a couple of times, because my veins ruptured, but the initial IV medication was bliss and I now have a terrific bruise to admire as my badge of honour for a while.
I've had every single test possible run on me, nearly all I've had before but this time with a slant to identify meningitis, apparently. Had someone asked me if Id been vaccinated, I could probably have saved some time, but whatever.

The dopplerography, annoyingly, showed nothing wrong with the vessels in my neck, despite a previous showing there was. I'm not consistent enough, it's hugely frustrating when you're trying to prove a point to your doctor in your quest to recieve a definitive diagnosis. But the chiropractor, amazingly lovely woman that she is, after warning me not to try to get up from the bench because she'd 'heard about me' (randomly collapsed in the middle of a chest x ray, apparently a massive shock to all involved) explained that there is something wrong with my neck, and 'most likely, the rest of you, looking at the list of your injuries and fractures'. Oops. It can't be a good sign if someone used to dealing with injured people thinks you have too many to focus on.
The MRI showed a weird tangle of vessels on the side I get Trigeminal Neuralgia, which I already knew about and no sign of aneurysm, which I had expected. I've had so many scans that I'm very complacent about the results-it will come as a massive shock if anything does ever show up. I had to be transferred by ambulance to another hospital for these scans, and a nurse called Gleb accompanied me, setting Russia to rights on the way and telling me where to go for the best Russian book shops. Helpfully, he also told me not to be scared and not to faint, just before I went in for the scan. lols.


So, eventually, with mountains of medication, 'manual manipulation' to the neck and head, a few incredibly welcome visits from the outside world and a lot of the BBC news international channel (I swear I put it on one morning and Prince Charles was presenting the weather-can't confirm I wasn't hallucinating, but fairly sure I wasn't) , I finally got rid of the lingering pain and sickness.
Turns out that I have a curved top spine (kyphosis) and scoliosis, but I'm told that regular courses of chiropractitioner care will help significantly and hopefully help to reduce general body pain and fatigue. 



King of the Hill (царь горы- tsar gori) in Russian helped to whittle away the hours, despite
only understanding all of about 1/16th of it

Three days after being admitted I was let out, expecting to have a horrific bill placed in front of me. The hospital hadn't been clear about the insurance when I first got there-or at least, I was in no state to understand and didn't know what I'd signed-so it was a massive relief to find that the (estimated from prices online) £8k bill did not materialise. Private hospitals are lovely, and I definitely recovered far quicker in a private ensuite with personal nurse than I did in the 6 to a room the same size as my private one hospital a few years back, but oh.my.life. are they expensive. Also I have to observe that there is significantly less standing around in your underwear to be examined in other hospitals. Maybe there's just less time to get you undressed in state hospitals. Oh well. I honestly don't think I have a scrap of shame left anymore.
NHS, I love you.

And so off I went home, this time to actually sleep.
Nearly made it through my year abroad, so close! Whatever will my year abroad tutor say?! 'I told you so' springs to mind...

Going home early. Again.

It's 3am and I can't sleep. Faced with the option of watching a dvd or writing a blog post, the dvd seemed the more appealing of the two, however it then occurred to me that each of the almost daily migraines I've had in the last week have started during badly dubbed Russian films, so here I am being minutely more productive.
Clearly, I beat the odds and did not pop my clogs after swallowing my suspicious looking Russian chewing gum, so I suppose I am doing quite well, all things considered. Still getting bizarre visual migraines every time I lie on my front, giving me a 20 minute kaleidoscopic beauty of a show in my left eye before many hours of excruciating pain on the opposite side of my head. My neurologist at home, when first questioned about this, responded with the sage advice of 'well don't do it then' but I feel it's probably time to hassle him about it. Is my brain supposed to throw a tantrum every time I lie down and put my head up? Am I meant to almost black out when I get up from lying down? I'm going take a stab in the dark and say no. So it's just as well that my flight is now changed for me to leave early and get it looked at.
After the desperate hiding behind an escalator by the BMI office and the frantic attempts to figure out what we needed to say in Russian to get our flights changed in Moscow last year, I was a little more prepared this time round. I had a pre-prepared script to get me a pass for the security turnstiles and find the BA office, because my brain has a tendency to enter a rapid onset coma when it comes to recalling anything useful at the appropriate time. It being British Airways I wasn't overly worried about a language barrier but would have been able to cope, just about if there was. What I hadn't really anticipated was the 3 hour trek to find the place. Especially when the office was, in fact, only 20minutes walk away from my flat. I had looked it up on google maps and I'd written down detailed directions, but I clearly lack an internal compass, and got hopelessly lost. Story of my life. Someone needs to invent some kind of human gps gadget.

Fortunately for me, I did eventually find the BA office and in the space of 15 minutes I was on the flight leaving St Petersburg LED (the airport is still called Leningrad, strangely) on the 16th May. It's still a shame to leave early, but I am pretty eager to get back to somewhere I can communicate easily. I'm back to the stage where I'm seriously looking forward to wandering around decent sized supermarkets, picking up anything I want and knowing I'm not in for any nasty surprises. Cashiers won't bitch at me for not handing over the correct change, although I am infinitely better with numbers now (surprising difficult in Russian) and there are far fewer awkward silences at the tills these days.

It will also be quite nice to know that I won't be wandering down the hallway in the middle of the night for water to be greeted by the sight of a very drunk and very naked Aleksey, Viktor's youngest son who, on occasion, comes in a little the worse for wear after an evening of drinking and seems to lose his clothes and direction on the way to sitting in the bath under a cold shower for several hours to recover. There is always an awkward few seconds of averting eyes as we attempt to get past eachother but he doesn't seem to remember by the next day, which is just as well. It's funny but I've kind of had enough of living in someone else's flat now. Just what happens in homestays.

Lastly it will be great not to come or go from where I live in fear of what the cats are plotting. They silently sneak out on you from across the courtyard and jump down from windows into your path and just stare at you. There has to be at least 50 of them. It's creepy.

They dart out of holes in the wall and just hang around staring at you. It's unnatural.

 

Generic blog post title about stuff I've done recently

Spoke too soon about the weather. The rivers are all flowing still, but they're on the rise because it's been raining for the last three days. Lovely. The temperature has dropped a fair bit too, but now that I've been out without my polar gear, I refuse to go back. As such, I am getting death looks from the babushki and stares from the general Russian population for being under dressed. Thankfully, however, Victor is in Voronezh for two weeks, so I'm getting away with going out dressed normally without being told that I'll catch my death without a hat, scarf and boots.
I don't know why he's in Voronezh, but I'm enjoying the break. Victor is lovely, but I'm not used to being mothered and I'm getting a bit fed up of being told that I'm not eating when actually I am, and getting told off for sitting against a wall because my back will suffer. And, of course, I've now been entrusted to complete the lamp routine by myself. Naturally, this means I've been completely neglecting it.

The all powerful lamp

Victor means well. The problem is that he thinks everything can be solved with his bloody lamp. The scar healing technology he so worships originates in China (and I am suspicious over the reliability of their results) and his lamp is Russian. It has nothing to do with the medical 'technology' from China, and I'd happily put money on it being completely ineffectual, although I suspect there's an element of the placebo effect at work. My flatmate here has experienced the lamp, and agrees it's bull. Victor also likes to place a stone between his ribs every so often and smack down on it, because it 'makes him strong'...somehow. Like me, the strongest protest he's been able to summon is 'bolno, Victor....bolno' - ie, that hurts. The thing is, with me, it really really really hurts. When I tell Victor that maybe we should forget the 'Chinese face massage' because the neuralgia is playing up, he takes that as cue to get the lamp out and press into the side of my face afflicted with what is fondly known as 'the suicide disease'. It's not doing me any good, as attested by the dentist, who I visited for the 2nd time today.



The accordion trance which so accosted my ear when I rang for the original appointment was definitely not an indication of poor care. I went to the top private clinic in St Petersburg, opposite Kazan Cathedral in one direction and the Church on Spilled Blood in the other. Prime location. A little thrown by the claim of being an 'international clinic' when nobody seemed to speak English initially, the cleanliness of the place and the unusal friendliness of the staff calmed me down. We muddled through the actual examination in ruglish blend of languages and I was given medication and a wonderfully small bill. Today's appointment revealed that, surprise of surprises, I need to visit a neurologist. I don't really get what's going on with my body at the moment, but my feet are, well, vibrating- or it feels like they are, and I'm dropping everything and tripping all the time in addition to having weird sensations like water trickling down my arms and face. Declined the offer to make an appointment with the neuro there in the hope that my email to my own doctor will shed some light first. If I can actually make it through a term without ending up in hospital over something, it will be a miracle. My year abroad tutor will be so proud of me.

In lighter news, my friend had a birthday last week, and we all went to TGIs to celebrate. It was nommy. I had decided that it was completely necessary for him to receive a balloon on his 21st, and so earlier that day I wandered around looking for something appropriate.

Once I'd seen it, I knew it was perfect. Passed up the usual Happy Birthday round balloons for this beauty:

Introducing Jerry the Cow

I have previously talked about the need to blend in when in Russia. Carrying this around the city did not help. But I love him. Apparently, his name is Jerry.

Then, on Sunday, it was Russian Easter. I think this is just Orthodox Easter, because it's also when the Greeks celebrate, but whatever. Over here, there are no chocolate eggs. It's purely a religious holiday, rather than the Festival of Chocolate which it really is at home. Certain supermarkets in England, so I'm told from someone behind the scenes, have had chocolate eggs in since Boxing day, which is absurd in every way. Here, you wouldn't have known it was Easter other than the abundance of specially baked 'Kulich'- a type of cake with fruit in and some kind of topping. It's really pretty good, although I quite enjoy the packaging of Easter eggs at home...I'm easily taken in by advertising, clearly. Fortunately the supermarkets here play such intensely awful music, similar to that you'll hear on the sims, that I don't stick around long enough to be taken in by anything.

Easter cake - 'кулич'

It's staying light until almost 10pm at the moment, a sign that Summer is indeed coming, not that anyone really seems to believe me that it will get really hot, because the weather has shown zero sign that it's capable of anything over 15degrees. When I was here in first year it was at least 30 by 8am and the night just didn't come - it's strange, but something most people are excited to experience. I have 61 days left until I go home, and it's going much quicker than it did in Yaroslavl. Possibly because I'm not being reminded of how many days I have left by other people this time round, but also because it's just more enjoyable here. I should also seriously get on with my year abroad project, which is rapidly starting to induce 'The Fear' in me.
Where is the time going? Probably to the same place as Sir Rolf, my beloved koala, who is lost somewhere in Russia alone. Sad times.

On a final note, I have been drinking tea. A lot of tea. And it's still utterly disgusting. I don't know who came up with the idea that you grow to like a taste, but I can't say I agree. I even tried coffee, but to no avail.
I will never be the pretentious hipster type sitting in Starbucks with a mac and a tall froppamochalattechino now.
Kak zhal. 

Victor and his lamp

Not very good at updating this regularly, am I?

First thing's first: Today it hit DOUBLE figures. For the first time I went out without my down coat. Spring is here! :D
Still very happy with my new homestay, it's very clean and the bedding has already been changed twice (although they have Russian style covers, meaning the opening is right in the middle and consequently I wake up every morning trapped inside, which is a little disconcerting, and trying to get the duvet in in the first place is a task which has seen me swear and stamp my feet a fair amount) which is a marked improvement on Loony Lyudmila's place. Funnily enough, these people actually seem to care about me too, which is just a bit odd given that my experience of homestay tends to be one in which you are given your meals, exchange some niceties and then are left to do whatever the mood takes you.
Victor is a chiropractor. He likes alternative options. The family is also mormon, which is extremely unusual here and consequently have a lot of missionaries and the like to stay. The guest books which people write in after coming to visit are full of entries singing the praises of a family in whose home 'the holy spirit is felt throughout', both in Russian and English. I am somewhat sceptical of a religion which has so many different branches varying so wildly from one another, but they are nice enough people. It is a mix of this kind heartedness and the opportunity to have a live-in guinea pig to experiment on that I think makes Victor constantly check up on me.

He works for a Chinese medical company and is using their products to try to reduce the scars on my arm which I've had for about 7 years now (horse riding, incidentally, 3 operations later having had metal plates in and out and my arm probably looks a bit of a mess to most people I suppose.) He also has this lamp thing, I think it works with red light to break up scar tissue, so every morning and night we have this ritual where he chats away to me in Russian while treating the scars with cream and light.
Now, every so often I get this nasty red patch of irritation on the scar on the inside of my arm, right next to part of it which has healed perfectly and is barely noticeable. It's partly due to my neglecting the skin but always fades eventually. Victor, however, is taking it's disappearance as a sign of the miracle technological advances of his company. I'm not going to rain on his parade by saying that, actually, no I don't think it's amazing because any wound is going to improve in appearance with regular moisturising and massage. Every time he comes into my room with a bowl of fruit and jug of water (because apparently I don't eat and he's going to have to tell my mother if I don't start - a. I eat when I'm out and b. HA.) he takes a look at my arm. This is where it becomes extremely predictable.
His observations are as follows:
1. Oh ty! Mne OCHEN nravitsya! - translation: wow! I really like it!
2. Kak zdorovo!                                translation: how great!
3. I like it!                                         translation: um...yeah he speaks english
4. A zdes...pochti ne vidno!              translation: And here...almost can't see it! (that would be down to
                                                           the 7 years of healing...and that's the bit that was already healed)

5. Mne ochen ochen nravitsya!      ....you get the idea.

I'm a little peeved that the credit for this healing is being handed over to a sodding lamp, when in reality it's years of hard work by my body with a dodgy immune system, but whatever, it's amazing language practice. Plus now I seem to have been entrusted with the lamp by myself, which means that I don't always do it and get out on time in the mornings. Tellingly, Victor is still seeing progress in the scars despite the lack of treatment. Hmm.

So anyway, I currently am in less than great health and have been having migraines all over the place while my trigeminal neuralgia is conveniently changing its pattern, which is extremely bad news and difficult to manage over here. On top of that I've had serious pain in one of my teeth and the surrounding area plus eyes, neck and ears. My wisdom teeth never quite came through. But Victor doesn't seem to understand that I'm likely to need neurosurgery at some point which will include a bit of a stay in intensive care in order to deal with some of this, and he is insistent on using his lamp, which has actually made it worse because he uses a lot of pressure. My tooth has been screaming at me for this and tomorrow I am off to the dentist. Less than appealing prospect. But I did ring them up and book it in Russian! Ura for me! (after 10 minutes being put on hold and suffering the trauma of a uniquely Russian kind of 'on hold' music which can only be described as accordion trance. As if the dentist isn't bad enough.)

I should probably go to bed now. I am hoping next week will be more successful than this. I have broken my kindle and cover, iphone charger and had my debit card stopped because some nonce in Liverpool has used my details to buy a bunch of crap online. What a dipstick.

I promise to write something more interesting, less whingy and more happy next time.
Like, I just washed my hair and it's given itself a zigzag parting all by itself. What a clever head I have.

Spokoinoi Nochi.

The rise of the Babushki, a sprinkling of снег and 14 days left

2 weeks til I go hoooooome! I haven't been counting until now, because I haven't been particularly desperate to get home, but seriously, it's time.
I have spent most of the last two weeks in bed. Every so often my body goes into complete meltdown and refuses to work, (more so than usual) and so I have been passing the time in a blur of neuralgia, exhaustion, weird burning and numb patches and insomnia. One day, my doctors might figure out what is going on, but until then, Russia or not, I take regular breaks from functioning. Normally I just get on
with it, but Firdaus is being a bit...babish. That is, she's nagging and being annoying in the manner of a babushka. I've lost count of how many times she's been told I need to be left alone to sleep and that I'm fine, but she doesn't listen and continues to annoy Hannah asking about me and lying about how she's being phoned by uni every day to ask where I am. Weirdly, she then said I don't like her partner (or possibly that he doesn't like me, Hannah was confused with the grammar)...which is true either way, but it's definitely him scowling and refusing to speak to me which has led to me disliking him. He makes me feel distinctly uncomfortable. Noob. It's ok, soon I'll be in England, where I can understand everything and sleep in my own bed and eat food that isn't fried or covered in dill. Steamed brocolli. Parnsips. Chive cottage cheese. This is my current craving. Mm.

Dill. Ketchup for Russians.

                                                
On the subject of food, Firdaus is currently doing her head in over the fact I refuse to eat her's. The compromise she came up with was that she'd just cook lots of veg for me, but when I eat vegetables, I prefer them as the main component rather than as a side to 10 gallons of oil. There is nothing her frying pan can't tackle. Pancakes for breakfast one morning? Leftover gets made into blinochki s tvorogom (tvorog wrapped in blini) and refried the next morning! Whenever she proudly announces that something is 'tatarskii!' you know there's going to be something of an oil waterfall going on when you pick it up. Pizza for breakfast is an interesting one too, but I have yet to work out the reason for smearing mayo all over the base. There's been cake for breakfast too, but Russian cake often seems to be a block of cream with a few biscuity/spongey things poked in at random.
There is also a bizarre amount of corriander used in soup, especially in solyanka, which is a mix of every kind of meat you can fit in the pot, mixed with cabbage. Except that Firdaus uses 5 kinds of kolbasa and, according to my analysis of the wikipedia picture, about 10 times too much corriander. And then there is dill. If a meal is to be complete, there must be liberal sprinklings mountains of the stuff all over everything, and in everything. Who wouldn't be ecstatic to find secret dill pockets in their extra dill topped pizza base?! However we have found that the hypermarket Globus serves amazing spaghetti bolognaise, so long as you factor in the time spent de dilling it. Totes worth it though.


Ok I'll stop whinging about the food, RSD and health now.
On to Babushki!
Firstly, can I just make it abundantly clear that this should be pronounced babushki. Screw you Kate Bush for spending 10 weeks in the charts slaughtering the pronunciation for everyone.

An informative definition, including a lovely illustration
 for your comprehension benefit. Note that I
am referring to definition 2.

Russian Babushki are an interesting breed. Described as the 'Russian national treasure' by several Russians I know, they are simultaneously acknowledged to be terrors. These old women (the word Бабушка/babushka means grandmother) are a force to be reckoned with. I've had a few run ins with babushki, most revolving around public transport. Most recently one launched an attack on my arm because I refused to let go of the rail on the bus when she wanted to get through. Aside from the fact that you could have got a small herd of elephants through the gap at which she was protesting, I have a suspicion that the bus driver had bribed someone for his license, and I refuse to risk another Russian hospital visit because of broken limbs just to appease some insane bab. I would have let go when the bus stopped, it's not as if it the half a metre to the door which she had to traverse would have been overly taxing for her, but the swearing and attempts to de-arm me awoke my stubborn streak, so I just looked at her a little amused...or bemused..I'm not sure which it was. You are supposed to ask if people are getting off at the next stop on transport here (as the much younger woman did to me afterwards, well done her)so there's no pushing through, but babs are immune it seems.

I've observed them legging it down a road to catch the bus faster than I ever could, push their way through the crowd to get on first and on discovering all the seats to be full, develop some hyper onset crippling disease which severely limits their ability to walk or stand (someone should really look into this disease, I suspect a diagnosis of lyingcowovitis). Then they stand in front of you, staring as you feebly tighten your grip on whatever heavy shopping your visibly exhausted self has sitting on your lap, eyes desperately searching the ground to avoid theirs which you can feel boring their way into your brain, locating the bit responsible for guilt, and twisting it until you haul yourself up and squeeze past so they can take your seat. Lyingcowovitis is often characterised by a relay effect, in which the original affected bab gets off after only one stop and another gets on only to be immediately struck by the disease. Effects on those who surround the afflicted include extreme rage and expletive filled muttering whilst struggling to keep the smetana from being jolted out of the shopping as the bus/trolleybus/marshrutka collides through the streets.

Your typical babushka. I doubt I need to translate, but:
'Parasite, give babushka your seat!'
Note the emty seats all around
And the running shoes
And the grievous bodily harm.
Yeah, Babushki. -_-

I swear I'm not bitter.




And after that massive whinge...CНЕГ! 
I shall leave you with the snow. It's mild here (-4ish generally, sometimes drops but always seems to pick up again) and the snow hasn't really settled, but when it does, it is fun to play in it :)

Nice and calm, making footprints in fresh snow

Hannah, less calm, more yetti, also making footprints 

Being Masha, the Yaro Bear

One minute I was happily standing on my snow mountain

The next I was a bit stuck.





Москва (Moskva)

First of all: Apologies for whatever the hell I am actually writing, I don't check it. My new medication is making me a little...woozy. I am incapable of condensing anything also, excuse the length. My brain extends its sincere thanks to you for your understanding.

Whilst I can't be certain that my Russian is improving, my procrastination skills are surely of Masters level at least by now. The year abroad project is on my mind. 6000 words on Soviet cartoons seems kind of slightly impossible and scary at the moment, so I have been keeping busy doing anything to avoid it. Ill most of the week, I managed to legitimately sleep away most of the worry, but yesterday I needed to get a little more creative. So, I bought a Toy Story 3 drawing pad. And some felt tips. This is to accompany my Winnie the Pooh jigsaw puzzle and Sims 3. I actually bought the puzzle quite a while ago, but I forgot that being colour blind hinders me somewhat and it's proving a little difficult to get all the pieces with straight edges grouped...



 We also visited a church, mainly to get in from the cold, but it was pretty all the same. Lots of gold sparkly things. And a coffin. With somebody in it. Having seen the gold casket shaped thing with the lid open from the other side of the room, I probably should have known better than to go and look, but there you go. Was in such a rush to back off that I didn't even glance at the sign next to it to decipher who this poor person was. Unpleasant. Thankfully, you can swear without people understanding, so I wasn't kicked out for insulting the Russian Orthodoxy people. I'd made the effort to bundle my hair into my hat, even it made me resemble an egg, so I would have been a bit put out if I had been thrown out for being a bit taken aback by the corpse just chilling in the corner.

Looks more like a casket now...

The Assumption Cathedral (New)
Originally built in the 17th century, destroyed
by the Soviets in the 1930s (what noobs). Apparently
12 metres higher than the previous building.

Yaroslavl has felt much smaller since we got back from Moscow. Admittedly, the place is fairly gargantuan, everywhere feels massive regardless of where you are there, so it is a poor comparison, but the weekend of everything being so Western spoiled us.
This weekend was rather impromptu, due to a sudden doctor's appointment being needed at an American hospital there (thanks very much drug addicts of Russia for landing my medication on the illegal list) and the train I needed to get being the next day. Deciding to make an outing of it, Hannah joined me and Firdaus walked us to the bus stop to get to the station the next morning. Just after making a comment over me being the reason Hannah wasn't taking part in the competition (again), the bus came. Fortunate timing.

Boarded the train and found ourselves sitting in the same section as a lovely gentleman still in his pyjamas from the overnight journey, eating a hunk of tuna directly from the tin. With his hands.  Thank god it wasn't as hot as the train last year in Petersburg, would have been disgusting. He turned out to be quite nice, in fairness, and gave us both the bottom benches for the entire journey, while taking the upper for himself.

4 and a half hours of listening to small children singing the Krokodil Gena song 'Goloboy Vagon' later (not grating on the ears at all, in fact that one tone deaf boy's yelling really added to the pure torture cultural experience),  we found our way to the metro. This is massive (I think most things in Moscow are) and took some navigation thanks to the many perekhodi (like station interchanges you walk) but the stations are ornate, so the trip wasn't too bad. Needed a sleep but after a couple of hours in the hostel I dragged myself out with Hannah to meet up with our friend from uni who is currently in Moscow, who said she'd show us the big touristy spots in central Moscow.

Bolshoi Theatre. Before we realised what it was.

 We managed to accidentally find the Bolshoi Theatre on our quest to get to the right metro. Standing by a very big white building, I commented on the ticket office for the theatre. Then wondered aloud where the theatre could possibly be. Had Hannah take a picture of me outside the pretty white building. Saw the metro stop was 'Teatralnaya'. Realised I am quite blonde. Sad times.

Down the train wagon

We saw Stalin and Lenin and wandering around in the metro...

 Turns out that our friend doesn't know Moscow too well. But it was ok, detours only served as opportunities for weird Russians to ask for photos with her. Am quite sure that, in the eyes of Russians, all black people have just been washed up on their shores in their hollowed out canoes, ready to perform native tribal dances and be amazed at the advanced and great nation that is Russia. Drunks holding philosophical Dostoyevsky centred conversations with statues of clowns (I wish I'd taken a photo), electricity outside and even their own special form of democracy...ish-elections and all.

What happens when it rains?

She takes it very well. I don't know anybody else who would turn the semi racist attention into a lucrative business opportunity. Although apparently she hasn't been asked for photos since Petrozavodsk, when I spent much time dragging her away from abusive drunks, in the short time we were there, twice people approached asking for photos. And twice, she attempted to charge for them. Made somewhat less successful due to actually asking 'skolko stoit?', which actually means 'how much does it cost?', but did lead to entertainingly confused Russians. The gap in the market is most definitely there. 70 roubles per photo seemed a potentially extremely profitable gap, from last year's experience.
It's ok so long as the interest is genuine. Russians are curious people, asking more questions than perhaps would be deemed polite at home, but there is, without a doubt, much genuinely racist feeling here too, from observing people's reactions. Dear Russia, there are other countries in the world that are not you, with people who are foreign. Sometimes these foreigners are even quite educated. Go learn. I don't get abuse for walking down the road. Only when I open my mouth at the supermarket...   (Massive generalisation. ish. Most young people are pretty open to us being there...so long as you're skin tone matches theirs...)

Standard trip around GUM (Massive and very expensive shopping mall in Red Square), grumbling over the masses of scaffolding and barriers around the Kremlin and St Basils Cathedral which ruined photo opportunities. All this followe by a trip to Burger King. We're so cultured.
Slightly ironical that Lenin is lying by a rather extreme form of capitalism*, McDonalds, anyone? GUM had nothing in it during Soviet shortages. Doesn't have that issue now...

Just by the Kremlin

GUM

 



*He's still in his mausoleum...not like, just having a little lie down amongst the tourists on Red Square. Poor guy wanted to be buried next to his Mother. What a smack in the face.


It should maybe have seemed a little stranger that we were all meeting up in Russia after not seeing eachother for at least 6 weeks (and since the end of last term for me), but nope. Sat around discussing our respective hosts and their bizarre habits, felt grateful to Firdaus for not presenting me with a cheese sandwich and exactly 8 pieces of pelmeni every morning. It feels a bit like they're our pets our something.

We found ourselves wandering round looking for shampoo that night at about 11, and had to settle on an apteka (chemist) which, while open at night, required you to knock at the little hatch window and explain what you want. Pre-conversation briefing to figure out what to say naturally went to pot when the chemist asked something unexpected, but got the shampoo in the end. I have now conquered the scary windows. Success! And it meant I wasn't too manky for the hospital the next day. People who pay stupid money for an appointment do not have greasy hair.

Skimming over the apointment (which lasted over 2 hours, thanks very much extreme stress and initial blood pressure over 185/130-surely I should have been dead?), we went to Park Pobedy and found an awesome war museum which had free entry for students. Score. Totally recommend this place, the monument outside was huuuuuge, the park has to be beautiful in Summer (we were freezing so I'm not sure I appreciated it quite so much-first snow that day) and the museum is full of lovely old babs who actually want you to be there and don't bark at you when ask where the toilets are. (Don't use them though. I'm not entirely sure why they were asian style...).

Archway by park Pobedy

Museum of the Great Patriotic War

Hall of glory, with names of Russia's war heroes.

The usual eternally burning flame

We found an ad for an Indian restaurant in the Moscow Times. No metro stop info though, just a vague area and 'opposite the Belarussian embassy'. We wanted curry. Quite a lot. Therefore, we decided to just roll on up at Kitai-Gorod metro stop and wander around, in the dark, until we found it.
It took some time, but we got our curry.
Slightly bizarre being greeted in Russian and switching between English and Russian to order and speak to the waiters, but the food was amazing. Full of expats, very expensive, totally worth it.
I have considered that it might be a little wrong that an Indian restaurant can feel so much like England. But then I dismissed it, because I freaking LOVE curry.

There were a couple of blokes from Scotland behind us and
a table full of Americans and English to the right.
At least one token Russian family, too.

Oh, and they had real hot towels at the end. I needed a flannel. I normally 'borrow' a glass from restaurants. I borrowed the towel this time. Score.

Ura!!!

Kleptomaniac tendencies satisfied and it being the last day, we went to a shopping mall called MEGA. The name might give it away-it was big. And Western! M&S, anybody? We spent all day there - I will never buy leggings from anywhere but Berska, now; new discovery - until it was time to get the train back (where we were total celebrities just for being English), arrived back at Yaroslavl Glavniy Station, waited for a bus that never came and got a taxi home by midnight.


I should explain that I am not yearning to go home, at all (but I wouldn't say no to a Sunday Roast). However, Russia is very....Russian. And sometimes, it's nice to take a break from it. Which takes us right back to the start of this iliad of an entry. Moscow is great for a break, but I'm not sure what the value of the constant Westernisation would be to me. Waitresses tend to practise their English on us here in Yaro, but otherwise, nobody speaks it. We are forced into the culture. Moscow just seems too vast for me, I wouldn't know where to start with it and it would be oh so very easy to opt out of Russian entirely. The year abroad tutor likes Moscow a lot, but I'm glad I didn't listen to her. Yaroslavl was definitely the right choice for me.