So this girl Sveta I talked about last time who co-leads with me and Dina, I thought she was harmless, but she apparently has it out for me for some reason. I was prepared to ignore things like always getting the plate with the most food for herself even if it happened to fall at my place, and her constant whine-yelling at the kids, while irritating, doesn't seem to get to them, so I try not to worry about it either. She and Dina are always working out between themselves when they'll take a day off from the beach, and I end up going every time, but the beach isn't so bad. And one day Joslin and I had a much-needed day off that we'd arranged days in advance, and it turned out Dina was taking the same day off, and Sveta panicked and tried to con me into staying and helping her. I told her firmly that I had worked it out days ago and it wasn't my problem ("It's not my problem" and "It's not my duty" are things they love to say to us). She really wanted me to give up my day off to make things easier for her, when all she had to do was ask and she'd get a substitute counselor to help her out. And yesterday I was feeling sick and sitting on the bus back from the beach when a local boy hitched a ride with us. Sveta made me sit half-off the seat so he could come sit by her and she could flirt in her affected way. But then he ended up talking to me the whole time, asking me to translate Eminem song names for him and stuff like that, so her bad feelings only increased.
One morning after beach time, the kids noticed a moth and a bee clenched in an epic battle by the sidewalk. We watched it raptly until a kid started to step on them, but I held him back and we kept watching, wondering how it would turn out. Then a spike-heeled foot came out of nowhere and stomped on and killed both bee and moth, ending the battle and the spectacle for good. I looked up, and sure enough it's Sveta with a triumphant look on her face telling us to hurry up because we had to go hang around at the dorms until lunch. I hope she knows this means war.
I learned recently that most of the counselors here are Belarussian students who are bound by a contract with their university to come here, and some are missing exciting study abroad opportunities to come to a camp that is far too big for its own good, pays nothing, has few activities besides sitting on the beach, and is full of resentful counselors. Joslin and I aren't the only foreigners here, we're just the foreigners who aren't Belarussian. Poor Joslin lives with a girl who is missing a summer in Manchester, England, and knows enough English to be mean. Joslin feels like the unwanted stepsister, always called upon to do extra work and still not valued as much because she doesn't speak Russian. Galina, her roommate, once spilled water on some of Joslin's drawings and ruined them, and didn't bother to mention it or apologize until Joslin brought it up.
Dina, my roommate, only knows cute textbookish English, and I speak to her in textbookish Russian and we help each other sound more natural, so it's not bad for me. It's just frustrating when I'm having a conversation with someone and they get comfortable enough to slip into slangy Russian or just switch to a topic of conversation I don't have the vocab for and then I have to steer things back toward what I know or be useless. There's a lot I'd like to talk about that I can't yet, but I'm working on it.
When we came here no one seemed to know what to do with us really, and no one ever told us any of the rules. I find them out by breaking them one by one. For a while I was shy of talking to the counselors who speak decent English because invariably the conversation ended with, "By the way, the administration told me to tell you that it is forbidden to..." fill in the blanks. And once almost my whole otread' went to an Aquapark nearby and I wasn't told, much less invited. It ended up working out well because the three kids who were left behind for some reason were three of my favorites, and we all talked and hung out and played frisbee and basketball and soccer and had a great time. Since then my frisbee (they call it my tarelka, or plate) has become a big hit.
As much time as we spend on the beach, some of the kids look like, well, victims of radiation burn. They are forced to go to the "doktor" about four times a week to do god knows what, and I wouldn't be surprised if the whole thing is an experiment in the effects of prolongued radiation on children. There's a military training camp right next door, we can literally watch them marching around in circles from the top row of the bleachers, and I think there's some weird partnership with them as well.
When we were finally brought in front of the camp administrator so he could see how we were doing, we weren't given a translator, and his office was dark and smoke-filled. When he blew his smoke toward the ceiling and asked in Russian, "So how is everything, everything is good?" I felt like it was the Godfather asking me how I liked my new Family. I would not be surprised if he were a KGB agent who fell out of favor and was given a lesser position or something. Even if I knew enough Russian to complain effectively, I didn't think it would come to any good, so I didn't bother.
So we're still making the best of things, and I think we're doing a pretty good job. There is a lot that's brilliant about this place: good hiking, great kids, lovely sunsets, green hills, the sea has been still as a lake lately, making for some decent snorkeling. I swim every day and run and play sports every night. Joslin and I hike on some of our afternoons off, most recently in the hills overlooking the beach and then back into the forest until it dead-ended at a mine. We spend 2-3 hours in the morning and 2-3 hour each afternoon on the beach, and I'm taking a lot of sun precautions but still getting browner than I've been since I was a little kid.
Sveta taking my food means I won't eat as many empty carbohydrates, and I'll laugh as her bikini fills out a little more each day. Joslin and I are set to go on a 13-hour excursion on Wednesday to a national park near Sochi where we're told we can swim under waterfalls, and if we like that excursion we'll probably go on more. We'll meet at 6:30 a.m. at the excursion bureau on the corner of Ulitsa Mira and Ulitsa Lenina (Peace St. and Lenin St.), and the whole day trip costs 330 rubles. That seemed like a lot until we did the conversion and it's $11. We also plan to visit Krasnodar before long, and we still have Novomikhailovsky's river to hike. And with fewer privileges comes fewer responsibilities, so it's not what we wanted or expected, but it's not bad at all.
I brought some good goggles that I can use to chase little fish around and watch crabs out past where people tread. The only problem with this part of the sea is all the dead jellyfish. You seriously can't swim but a few strokes and there's another one up in your face. It's like navigating an asteroid field. They don't sting and the biggest ones aren't as big as dinner plates, but I have a hyperventilating heart pounding phobia of them, I scream underwater sometimes, but I guess now is as good a time as any to face up to it.
The kids are allowed ten minutes to kupatsa (bathe) at a time, and they have about three such sessions during three hours on the beach, and otherwise they sit around breaking rocks, laying out, playing cards, etc. And if they start having too much fun, Santa Claus in Speedos and the fizruks (Captain Bringdown and the Buzzkillers) whistle and yell at them until they simmer down. The fizruks are a funny bunch, another resentful group of overqualified employees. They are physical specimens for sure, and one of them is a volleyballist for Belarus, and I think their purpose is to encourage health and physical activity among the kids. But mostly they strut around like surly Greek statues in baggy Speedos blowing their whistles and commanding the respect of ten-year-olds. It was a lovely moment when one tried to intimidate Roaring Twenties (Rita, a girl about as big as a doll who has a bobbed haircut and a sparkly drapey red dress she wears to discoes making her look like a little flapper), and she looked straight up at him and yelled back like he was an idiot. I asked another fizruk for some advice about my workout schedule, and he said, "I don't think it is important for women to be strong. There is no need." I said, "Oh, well, that settles it. No more sports for me." No ya prosto smeyus, konechno.
Today at the beach I got a picture with the three male Zhenyas: Zhenya 1 (aka Futbolist), Zhenya 2 (aka Army Boy), and Zhenya 3 (aka Pretty Boy). We couldn't find girl Zhenya (aka Showboat). I'll get all four of them together before long.
Oh yeah, and Joslin and I visited Tuapse (Too-awp-SEH), the county seat, last Wednesday, and I finally mastered the art of ordering a bottle of water. I never could manage to get what I wanted on the first try, but I figured out the five words that never fail: "Malenkaya kholodnaya negazirovannaya mineralnaya voda." If you leave "malenkaya" out, you'll get a two-liter jug. If you leave "Kholodnaya" out, you'll get it room temperature. If you leave "negazirovannaya" out, 9 times out of 10 it'll be fizzy water. And if you leave "mineralnaya" out, they'll head for the tap. Other than that we walked around in circles and visited some rynoks (open air markets) and saw a white statue of Lenin in a town square, and then had a nice dinner with peach nectar, halfway decent coffee, chicken and mushrooms, and blini with jam and chocolate.
And now for greatest hits from the last few concerts. The kids here are too cute for words, but this girl who's even cuter than usual dressed up like a little cat and was dance-walking and holding hands with a little boy cat until another little boy cat came and beat up the first boy cat, and then the girl started dance-walking and holding hands with the new boy. Then both boy cats called in their gangs, who fought for a while, until the girl cat came up with a solution: they'd all three hold hands and dance-walk together! If only it worked out that way in real life.
Another skit involved a tall skinny drag queen, Santa Claus in a blue satin robe, and a gangsta rapper, and somehow Santa and the drag queen ended up together, but I don't think anyone quite understood that little love triangle. (The theme of this particular concert, by the way, was star-crossed love.) By far my favorite act was two skinny, sinewy 15-year-old boys dressed up like lesbians with their hair gelled and spiked, tasteful make-up and jewelry and punk-femme clothing on, and cool geometric phantasmagoric tattoos drawn all over themselves, interpretive dancing around to the TaTu song, "All the Things She Said," and being surprisingly emotive and expressive. Wow.
The Fourth of July was nostalgic as usual. Joslin made a hula skirt with the South African flag colors in it and wore some jewelry from home, and I made a skirt out of colored tissue paper that looked like the US flag and used the fake tattoo pen to draw America in Cyrillic down one arm and a peace sign, dollar sign, and anarchy symbol on my other arm. The kids all thought the peace sign was the Mercedes symbol, and when they asked why I put a sign for Anarkhiya on my arm, I didn't know how to explain that putting the three symbols together was kind of a joke. I just said, "Byez Boosha budet luchshye." (Without Bush, it would be better.)
I brought a big American flag to fly during this holiday and gave it to the administration the day before. I thought they'd take down their Russian flags and fly mine alone for a day, but they just sloppily tied it up under the Russian national flag, the Krasnodarsky Krai flag, the Tuapsinsky Raion flag, and the Zolotoi Kolos flag. In light of recent US foreign policy, I'm not sure I'm currently the most patriotic American out there. But seeing the Stars and Stripes saggily tangling up under the shabby baby blue flag of Camp Golden Shaft woke up a certain feeling of indignance and pride in me that I'd never felt before.
To those who've written me notes, thanks so much, it really makes my day. Can't wait to see you all again.
Pam
P.S. I never explained the black and blue sea part of my last email--it's because when the surf is big and you stand right in the crashingest part, it kicks up rocks and hurls them in every direction with a great deal of force. If you're not careful, you come out tenderized.