Spring In My Step

It is Spring! As I touch every piece of wood in sight, I can announce that most of the snow has gone.  It’s been a long time coming, but it seems that the seasons are changing...and that was definitely vitamin D I felt coming through my curtains this morning.  Ohhhh yes. The sweet smell of fresh warm air and the sunlight beaming off the yellow church outside my window has brought a new energy to April and I feel that the only way is up. (baby).

So I’ll begin by saying how different it is to walk around Perekop now.  Strangely enough, without the snow the place feels quite empty.  I popped out this afternoon for a walk and even though I could tell it was sunny, I still took my coat because I could see all the babushkas pretty much dressed up as bears from my window and also I don’t trust that sunlight means warmth here.  I took a dramatic step in my year abroad and put a pair of shoes on today though.  By the time I’d walked to the end of the street I was boiling and it was so muggy out.  I couldn’t believe it.  However, I don’t want too get to cocky yet by going out with just a jumper.  There were children playing outside and actually rollerblading on dry ground. Crazy times.

I have nothing exciting to write in this blog, because as per usual I’ve not done anything particularly out of the ordinary.  I’m just going to note down some moments which have made me laugh over the past week or so. 

As you may or may not know, I do have a pet hate here.  It’s one of our cats (sorry about the pun).  He’s called ‘Darcy’ and even as a cat lover, I hate him with a passion.  I’m pretty sure he’s brain damaged because he chases shadows all hours of the day, tries to throw himself out of windows and against doors, poos in the bath, takes packets out of the bin and eats soup. He's the most annoying animal ever. Lately, he’s been especially badly behaved, so Natasha has decided to punish him by shutting him in the bathroom.  The other day she was rummaging in her cupboard and pulled out a little pot with the words ‘Sound of Switzerland’ written on the side.  I realised that it’s one of those things that you tip upside down and it makes a cow noise.  So she chased the cat around with a mooing pot for about 10 minutes, which terrified him.  He’s no less annoying now though.  Darcy the cat pretty much hates everybody and will bite you if you try and stroke him.  He does, however, love our neighbour Ludmila and goes all angelic when she is around.  Ludmila is slightly insane sometimes though, and likes to prod Darcy and continue to prod him despite his protests.  Unfortunately, she’s asking to get hurt, and the other day he did indeed scratch her hand very slightly.  In response, Natasha dropped everything she was doing and ran into the kitchen, bringing back a bottle of iodine and she spread it liberally over Ludmila’s hand. 

Natasha has been on form the past week or so.  A few days ago, I came home from school and she said she’d made me some ‘Pelmeni’, my favourite meal.  She then asked, ‘would you like Champagne with that?” So I hesitantly agreed.  She then invited Ludmila up and poured us out a big glass each and announced that she had bought Champagne because she felt tired and her tooth hurt.  So we sat there having a drink and toasting to various things, such as ‘to girls’, ‘to students’, ‘to success’. We had a lovely conversation about peculiar things and it really just went on and on like that.

Irrelevant photograph of 'Mr Proper' bathroom cleaner.  Why not?

The following day, I found Natasha and Ludmila preparing to dye eachothers hair.  They’re both blonde birds, but this time Natasha has gone for ‘platinum blonde’ and Ludmila ‘Silver blonde’.  Natasha really does seem quite slapdash with it all, but was mixing the dye on a dinner plate and slapping it onto Ludmila’s head.  She then offered to do mine the same colour, which in hindsight I don’t think was actually a joke.  Then they swapped, and as Ludmila was painting dye onto the back of Natasha’s hair, Natasha took it upon herself to dye the front of her hair with a toothbrush.  All the while I sat there with my cup of tea spectating and loving the fact that this is all so normal.

Yesterday Charlotte and I were on the bus home from the town centre where we’d been working and cafe hopping.  We got some seats and then to our delight, the two greasiest men came and sat next to us.  We decided that they smelt like butter and chicken.  They looked like they’d actually got a big mac and wiped it around their mouths.  It was a bit of a stomach churning ride home.

Yes, this post has pretty much all been about Natasha and her antics, but I love her really.  My next one will probably be when I get back from St. Petersburg at the beginning of May, because I’m sure I will have lots of good stories to tell from that trip.  Until then, I’ll try and keep my tan under control.

Doctor, Doctor ... I'm in Russia.

What a week.  Unfortunately I’ve been a bit ill these past few days.  What I keep realising though, is that in dear Russia, one cannot simply be slightly under the weather.  You’re either made of steel or on death's door, with no middle ground.  Some of you may recall me chatting about several of Natasha’s trusted remedies for various ailments.  Just to refresh, here is the latest round-up of...

Natasha’s Medical Miracles (last reviewed April 2012)

Case #1 – The common cold: drink vodka mixed with pepper, followed by a mug of sugary tea.  Lie under the duvet until you sweat out your cold.

Case #2 – Diarrhoea: eat a bowl of blueberry jam.

Case #3- Nausea: Take grass tablets and eats as much as possible.

Case #4 – Toothache: drink champagne and eat chocolate.  Possible cause, having a cold foot.

Case #5 – Headache: drink very sugary tea and a shot of cognac.  Follow with ice-cream.

Case #6 – High blood pressure: Take antispasmodic drugs.  Fill a plastic bottle with hot water and put on your legs.

Case #7- Blocked nose: Fill the nose with garlic.

Case #8 – Sore throat: Drink hot milk, mixed with Dutch aniseed tablets and honey.

So naturally, over the past two days I’ve had Natasha fussing over me a lot.  I’d been feeling unwell for the whole week but taking into account the aforementioned list of previous healthcare advice I had received, I decided to hide it for as long as possible.  When I came home yesterday feeling really rough, I knew I’d blown my cover.  Natasha finds out I’m not feeling well and immediately phones up Valera, her boyfriend in St Petersburg.  He is a doctor, so is of course very qualified to give people health advice.  But with all due respect, he doesn’t know my medical history or...who I am in general.  So Natasha is nattering on the phone to him, not listening to anything I’m saying to her.  She comes off the phone with a decisive look on her concerned face and says: “Take this tablet. You have to.”  I answer: “What is it?” To be reassured with “It is called ‘No-Shpa’, it is known by the whole world.  It is Indian.”  After a lot of doubt from my side and having to bite my tongue in order not to get into an argument, I reluctantly swallowed the tablet under Natasha’s watchful eye.  She said, “It stops spasms”.  She then took my blood pressure three times and established that  it was high and that I was in danger.   She told me to go and lie down for an hour and then we’d reassess my blood pressure.  Sure enough, after an hour nothing had changed whatsoever.  Just to add, my symptoms were a headache and feeling sick.  How we got to this stage in Natasha’s medical assessment, I do not know.  I, in the meantime, decided to google the tablet I had just taken.  I might be wrong, but from what Wikipedia tells me, this is indeed an antispasmodic drug..but one that is used to assist in cervical dilation in labour and is sometimes used with sufferers of Irritable Bowels Syndrome. 

I have been having some very frustrating conversations with Natasha about medication.  Basically,  I’m taking a nightly migrane preventative and it’s not the kind of medicine you can stop taking immediately.  I was trying to tell her, that I have to be careful what other medicines I take because of what I am already prescribed.  Natasha categorically said that I must stop taking these immediately because they are giving me heart problems.  I quote: “These tablets are not prescribed in Russia.  If they were, it would be a scandal. Your doctor in England is wrong.”  So sitting there, nauseously, in quite possibly one of the most scandalous countries there is, I found the courage to nod and smile and finally sloped off into my room.  The next thing I hear, is that she has informed our neighbour Ludmila of my situation, who comes up to have her say in the matter.  I thought things had got ridiculous enough, but Natasha has found her own solution to my ‘problem’.  She wants to send me to have a cardiogram.  I wanted to laugh, cry and run away all at the same moment.  I literally have never heard someone blow a headache so out of proportion.  Yes, I did feel pretty ill...but I can’t help it if I’m not as much of a hypochondriac as the rest of Russia! When I got home from school today, she told me that if I continue to take my prescribed tablets, my veins will snap.  I think that just about sums up my year abroad really.  When I went to school, I heard Natasha had rung our teacher Anna, to share the story. Anna informs me that I’m likely to have a stroke.

So just to sum up, I’m very grateful that Natasha is worried about me and I know she thinks she has my best interests at heart.  But I couldn’t help but notice the irony in her panicking about my blood pressure, saying that I’m too stressed....whilst telling me she’s going to take me to get my heart checked at the hospital and that I’m putting myself in grave danger. 

Something seems fishy

So here I am, on the brighter side of whatever Russian lurg I’ve had this week, feeling happier and a bit more like my usual self.  I just had some 5-day old spaghetti and I'm loving life.  I’m not going to descend into food rants today, so don’t fear.  I’m just going to include a cheeky little pic of this week’s fish soup. I think most of you will appreciate the algae style layer on top.  I’ll say no more- I think a picture speaks a thousand words.

Anyway, the big event on Saturday was me and Emily going to Yaroslavl central station to buy various train tickets we need for the coming months.  We had both carefully written down every detail about our journeys so that we could hand the information to the lady at the desk.  As usual though, nothing is ever has straightforward as it seems.  We took such a long time, that they had to open a new ticket window for all the grunting Russians queuing behind us.  However, we came away with tickets in our hands.  We’re pretty sure we’re going to the necessary destinations, but the type of train and type of seat you book isn’t always apparent until you turn up. Fingers crossed!

A ticket to St Petersburg.

Right now, despite the persistent ice and fur hats, the sun is shining beautifully and the sky is blue so I can’t complain about that.  To lift my spirits even more, it’s April! At the end of next month, I will officially be able to say that I’ve done my year abroad.  Mental.  But in the here and now, what have we learnt this week?  If you find yourself needing a drug to assist with cervical dilation, ask your doctor for ‘No-shpa’.  If you realise that this medical sensation hasn’t quite made it from India to England yet, I’ll take orders.  Good old Russia, always at the medical foreground.

Laters!