Don't have time to write much, but we spent the 32 hours in the train with a lovely young Russian woman with two boyfriends, one in Moscow and one on the Black Sea, and her giant slobbery dog Baks. We arrived in Tuapse and then were driven down to Novomikhailovsky where my camp is (Zolotoy Kolos, which means golden... like the bunchy thing at the top of a wheat stalk where the seeds are. It was translated to me as "Golden Shaft" and I like to think of it that way.)
What can I say, somewhere in my mind I had this image of sitting on a white sand beach next to gentle aquamarine waves while the kids and the monkey butlers brought me Mai Tais and shirtless Russian boys rubbed my feet. I didn't believe it, but the image was there. Needless to say, this is not the case. The beach is cold and rocky, the camp is massively structured and rather boring, and all the counselors are from Belarus and therefore cannot tell me much new and interesting about Russia. None of them speak much English, so it is hard to get to know them in a meaningful way when all we can get across are short simple sentences. The food is not much more than variations on meat and potato soup with a side of meat and potatoes, and occasionally we get a vegetable side of a thin slice of cucumber or a tomato wedge. We eat five times a day, and it seems sometimes like the kids spend half the day eating and half the day waiting around. It's like an inefficient amusement factory. Even when we go to the beach, we go there and just sit on the rocks and maybe throw some rocks into the water, and that's about it. It's too cold to swim.
But the kids are absolutely brilliant and lots of fun, friendly and direct and confident and talented and curious, mostly from Nizhny Novgorod and the secret city of Sarova. The best times are spent answering their questions and playing sports with them and asking them questions and letting them correct my Russian and showing off the dollar bills and other American things I brought and dispelling myths and whatnot. I feel kind of bad saying I don't like McDonald's and Disneyland is vaguely depressing and I don't know any movie stars and I've never seen a Britney Spears concert, but that's how it is. The kids seem to think things are better in Russia than in America anyway.
Soccer and basketball and volleyball are universal languages, the hills around the place are green and gorgeous, the clouds are cool, and if nothing else I'm studying Russian harder than I ever have before (brought my textbook and a dictionary) and working out and getting a tan, so it is not bad at all, just not quite monkey butlers and Mai Tais. And hey, me and the South African chick can engage in that favorite of American pastimes, complaining together. And then we make the best of things.
We had a rare day off between groups of kids coming on Sunday and spent most of it getting to and from Sochi, but we also had a little time there. We took a tour and were driven up to a tower where we could see an astounding view of the valley and the Caucausus mountains beyond. Had some spicy Georgian food and bought some postcards, it was pretty fun. I look forward to my Russian getting better. It's already much better than it was. Dina, my co-leader, said I could teach the kids some Jujitsu, so that should be fun. OK, gotta go, meal number four (between lunch and dinner) is about to start.
Much love, Pam