The Hambo Lama and Getting Sick

Several weeks ago, I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to go to the Ivolginsky Datsan during a Buddhist holiday to see the body of Hambo Lama Itigilov. Itigilov is quickly becoming one of the most important religious attractions in Buryatia, and for good reason. The Hambo Lama died in 1927, after beginning a death meditation. Prior to his death, he had asked some of the other lamas to exume his body after several years. In 1955 and 1973, his body was unburied, and the lamas of the datsan shocked to find that the Hambo Lama was not subject to macroscopic decay. The lamas were unwilling to divulge the existence of the body to the Soviet authorities and the body was largely unknown until 2002, when his body was moved to the Ivolginsky Datsan. Now, his body is revealed once a month, on Buddhist holidays.
I went with several friends to the datsan. Upon our arrival, we took the rice that we had brought with and walked around the datsan, spinning the prayer wheels and sprinkling rice at each wheel. It was a pretty cold day and my hands went numb very quickly. When we arrived at the main temple, we removed our hats and scarves and entered. At first, I didn't even notice the body of the Hambo Lama. It wasn't until I began to move about the temple that I saw that the Lama was placed near the far wall in the center. He was sitting in what looked like a refridgerator with a clear door that was open. He was draped with cloths and ribbons and when you walked by, a lama would offer you a cloth for you to place your forehead on. It is said that if you make a wish, it will come true. I'm not exactly sure what I was expecting, but it certainly wasn't what I saw. The body certainly did not look like it had been dead for most of a century, but it was still fairly indistinguishable. The face was mostly just plain skin, it looked almost like peach playdough. However, it cannot be denied that the temple had a very profound sense of importance, majesty, and peace. I kept trying to ask myself if being a tourist there was sacrilege, and I honestly never felt like too much of an outsider. Religious tourism is such a tricky subject.
Other than my visit to the Ivolginsky Datsan, my life has been rather bland recently. I fell ill and was accused pretty much everyday of not dressing warm enough, and I was given more suggestions on how to get well than I could possibly remember. Something worked, tho, and after about two weeks I was back to my usual self. I have also been on TV about 3 times in the last month. Once with the group in Kyakhta, another time just for being a foreigner at the university, and the other time at the opening of a clinic for invalid-children with the NGO that I translate for.
Now, I know the big news recently out of Russia is the elections. Honestly, in Buryatia it still feels like all of that is happening in a different country. I even have a few friends who worked as election monitors for various parties, such as the Communist Party, and they told me that they saw nothing fraudulent at all. While it would certainly be interesting to be in Moscow or St. Petersburg, it's nice being somewhere safe, where I don't have to worry about involvement in political events because there really aren't any.
As for the weather, well, it's cold. The sun is out for about 7 hours a day, maybe 8, but it doesn't rise until about 10 now. The forecast says that -35 windchills are in the near future. We've finally gotten some real snow, and it's beautiful outside. Today and yesterday have been in the 20s, and it's been great to be able to walk without gloves. Siberia is Siberia, however, and it will not be getting any warmer for 4 to 5 months. But part of why I chose to come is for the adventure of new places, new weather, and new temperatures, and I'm certainly getting what I came for.

Kyakhta

My last week has been a little more adventurous than the previous month. The highlight, as you can probably tell by the creative title of this post, was my trip to Kyakhta. Now, as I'm sure 95% of my readers will not know what exactly Kyakhta is, I'll give a brief history. Kyakhta is a settlement on the border between Russia and Mongolia, and when it was built, between Russia and China. As such, it was one of the most strategic trade towns on the planet during the 18th and 19th centuries. During the 1800s, Kyakhta was one of the wealthiest settlements in the world due to the massive tea trade that went from China and through Russia to the rest of the world (they preferred to transport tea by land, so it wouldn't get wet). Kyakhta has one of the most beautiful churches in Siberia (it had more, but they were destroyed), as well as a museum that many call the Siberian Hermitage. With the opening of the Trans-Siberian Railroad as well as other trade routes, trade began to slow down in Kyakhta in the late 19th and early 20th century. The Revolution sealed the deal. At present day, Kyakhta is not even a shadow of its former self, mostly serving as the border crossing point for those traveling to Mongolia by car.
I was invited to travel to Kyakhta by Rada Dambaevna, who was bringing a group of Russian journalists to meet a group of Mongolian and Chinese scholars and tour companies traveling the Tea Road. We left at 7am, which is well before sunrise at this time of year, and began making our way south. One pleasant surprise was how good the roads were, at least the first 150 km or so. When we arrived in Kyakhta, we had to wait for the Mongolian-Chinese delegation to cross the border. Once they got across, we went to the main museum in town. This museum is an incredibly good museum. It is small by American standards, but by Siberian standards it was huge. And the density of exhibits was something that I've rarely seen. Unfortunately, I didn't really have time to just wander and look at the exhibits as I pleased. The museum had prepared a tea drinking ceremony for our group, modeled after the ceremonies that merchants participated in a century ago. We sampled several interesting Chinese teas, but by far the most interesting part was how Buryat culture and Russian culture intermingled in these ceremonies. While I didn't see photographic evidence of this being the practice used 100 years ago, it is yet another example of the strength Buryat culture has in the area, particularly in tourism. I couldn't help but think that during the Boston Tea Party, the colonists dressed up as Indians for some reason or another, but it certainly wasn't out of respect for native culture (I think the only reason this popped into my head was tea). I am constantly (pleasantly) surprised by the attention to Buryat culture here. This continued during a presentation at the Decembrists museum in Novoselenginsk (a town just north of Kyakhta). Several of the school children in town put on skits or read monologues, many focusing on the partnership between Russians and Buryats centuries ago. It was both heartening to see kids in this near ghost town taking an active role in their museum, as well as to see the focus again on the cooperation between peoples. Is it propaganda? Perhaps, but unlikely. But it's still better than most places.
I'm also tutoring a local artist in English. His name is Zorikto Dorzhiev, and his art can be seen here. He is going to London in a few weeks to put on an art show, and Miami in about a month. He's extremely friendly and quite interesting. His art is technically very good, and I really enjoy his style that mixes traditional Buryat art with contemporary art.
Finally, I'm horseback riding more and more here in Buryatia. During the month of November, we ride without saddles, so I fell off a horse a few days ago. If you fall off a horse, it means you bring a cake next time to prevent yourself from falling in the future. While the stables provide an excellent opportunity to ride and relax a little, I also get to interact with several area children. Their questions are always entertaining. My favorite so far is how much ice cream costs in the US. When I told them that they could get a small ice cream cone for one dollar, they freaked out at how expensive it was. I hope I didn't ruin the American dream for them...

Random Thoughts and Excursions

I must once again apologize for the infrequency of updates. As I get more and more accustomed to life here, I find less and less blog-worthy. However, I think I can find some of the interesting tidbits and expound upon them.
The most interesting thing that I've done since my last update is travel to Moscow for Fulbright orientation. Although I have lived in Moscow, I had a very different perspective on Moscow this time because I've lived in the provinces for nearly 2 months now. After getting used to 5-story apartment blocks and very few new buildings, arriving in Moscow and taking the train to the city and seeing 30-story apartment blocks and new buildings everywhere felt like a new experience, even though I had seen this same route 2 months ago. I couldn't help but look at construction projects and think: they could take 1% of the money out of Moscow and send it to Buryatia and they could make an extremely good start at overhauling their roads. Or they could tax the countless Bentley, Ferrari, Maserati, and Porsche owners and achieve the same result. Our conference in the US Embassy and Carnegie Center did little to assuage my sentiments. A particularly disturbing fact was that much of the Russian elite owns large properties outside of Russia, so when the system begins to truly fall apart, they can just leave. I also have a much better idea of how Moscow prices compare to the rest of Russia, or better, how there is no comparison. In my 3 days, I spent more money on cheap, dinky meals than I would spend on two weeks of full meals here in Buryatia. On the other hand, customer service in Moscow has skyrocketed in the last few years (at least if you look ethnic Russian). This is a very heartening trend. I honestly couldn't say where I would rather live. I just feel guilty saying Moscow at this point (interesting how living in Buryatia has made Moscow a guilty pleasure). One huge difference between Moscow and Buryatia: in Moscow, I get on the metro and am surrounded by millions of frowning people. In Buryatia, I get into a taxi and have a long conversion about the Siberian soul. There's just something about the attitude people here have about their homeland that really speaks to me.
I've also gotten to attend two interesting cultural events, mostly thanks to the contacts that I've made. The first of these was an ethnic musical spectacle by the group Baikal. I got to go to this because one of my colleagues at the museum knows the director of the Buryat Opera and Ballet Theater personally, so I got to walk backstage and then sit in one of the box seats in the incredibly beautiful theater (made by Japanese POWs during WWII). It was a night of amazing music and very interesting folk dance. The other event was a ball held by the Orthodox Diocese in the area. I felt like I was in 19th century Russia. It was a very cool evening, even though I am a terrible waltzer.
One of my side projects now is helping a local NGO apply for a grant. Their purpose is to protect patients' rights in hospitals, particular those of disabled children. It's been getting me more and more interested as I work on it and I really hope that this group gets the funding. I'm just translating into English and helping with some of the more logistical parts of the application, but I am starting to feel part of this cause. In the US, it's hard to even imagine a doctor trying to extort a patient, but it's common here. Future Fulbright applicants: take note. This issue is growing in importance as more and more people realize that corruption doesn't have to be a fact of life.
I'm honestly not sure what else I have to report. Classes continue. Work at the museum goes on (they did want me to sell tickets to my friends, which I failed at. Not much of a salesmen, as my parents quickly learned doing school fundraisers). I continue to make new friends, and continue to be surprised by how everyone really does know everyone here. And more and more often, people tell me that they've heard of me but didn't know what I look like. I'll try not to let celebrity status get to my head. Weekends continue to be the same. Friends have birthday parties. I learned how to make buuzi (Buryat meat dumplings) last weekend with a bunch of European volunteers. I think my American buuzi were better than the French ones. I actually met a girl whose mother is a PhD candidate at KU; she's lived in Lawrence for five years and just graduated from Lawrence High. Sometimes this world is so small it's scary.
Ok I'm just rambling now. I promise I'll try to update more often.

A Day in the Life of Me

So, it's been a month, and I can tell that I'm starting to get settled in because time has been flying this week. Before too much more flies by, I figured that I ought to take a break and post about what a typical day in Ulan-Ude is like.
My day usually starts around 7 AM when the sun comes up and the dogs start barking. The absolute worst part about my apartment is the unbelievable number of dogs that live in and about the police holding station next door. The noise at dawn is unbelievable. Fortunately, I usually have a class at 8 or 9:30, so I rarely attempt to sleep through the ruckus. I climb out of bed, turn on my hot water heater, take a quick shower, get dressed, drink a cup of tea and eat some buderbrody (bread, cheese, and sausage), put on my coat and grab my hat and scarf, and head out the door. I live on the fourth floor of my building and my door has some awesome old-school locks; my keys look like they're from The Legend of Zelda. Another apartment building is located between my building and one of the main streets in town, so I walk around it to begin my walk to the University. It takes me about 15 minutes to get to class, including two nerve-wracking street crossings.
When I open the door to the classroom that I expect to have class in, I've found that I have about a 50 percent chance of actually having that class. You see, Buryat State University works on a biweekly system (or fortnight, as the professors like to explain in their lovely Queen's English). This means that every class occurs every other week, so I have a different schedule every week. For some reason, I've been having trouble getting used to this. I've also shown up to the correct classroom at the correct time, but the professor either forgot or decided not to attend class that day. This has happened several times. I've never attended a class to which the professor has actually shown up on time. Of course, when students show up after the professor, they are not allowed to enter the classroom.
Now, I attend two different types of classes at BSU. In an attempt to make friends, I volunteered to help out in the English department, so I have 3 classes every fortnight. One class is an American news media class, one is a literature class, and the other is a translation class. So far, my news class has been my favorite. Basically, I pick an article and then discuss it with the students. I also give them time to ask me questions, and it's been interesting to have debates about American and Russian foreign policy. I brought in an segment from the Daily Show the other day and the students had a blast. I also have a movie club that happens once every two weeks, so it'll be nice to have an excuse to pick and watch one of my favorite movies every fortnight. Of course, the best part is that while I have to speak English for 4.5 hours every two weeks with my students, outside of class we converse solely in Russian.
My real classes at BSU are a slightly different story. As I mentioned before, a good chunk of the time the professor doesn't attend and is always late. In addition, the classes are 100% lecture. No reaction, just note taking in fairly fast, scholarly Russian. I usually have a headache at the end of class. But, my notes have gotten better with each class and I have a book that I read to get an idea of the main themes before going in. I have a class on the history of ancient Buryatia, one on modern Buryatia, and one on the relations between subjects of the Russian federation. My peers are all extremely friendly and seem to find my notes fascinating. Frankly, I'm usually embarrassed to show them my notes because I pretty much write down everything that I understand, but they're usually impressed with how much I get.
I grab a bite to eat at either the cafeteria, Subway, or Apetite. Everything is located on or near Soviet Square (with Lenin's head). I never spend more than 5 dollars. After lunch, I either have one last class or work. My main research contact in Ulan-Ude is Rada Dambaevna, who is the director of a tour agency and generally knows everyone in Ulan-Ude. I've worked as a translator and advertisement narrator for her over the past several weeks. I will begin working as a translator at the Buryat History Museum soon, as well.
I usually go home for dinner and have pasta and some sort of meat dish or pelmeni. After dinner, I meet up with a group of friends on Soviet Square and we go to the Irish Pub or some other cafe. My friends are mostly 4th year students in the foreign language department, meaning that they're generally my age. Several of my friends are working on their second specialty, meaning that they've already gotten one degree and are essentially starting over. Some are aspiring hip-hop artists, some play guitar, some dance. The students that I have in class have taken it upon themselves to teach me to properly curse in Russian. They already know how to curse in English quite well. We either play foosball or just talk. Sometimes we walk around town.
I usually head home around 10. I check my internet, switch on the news. Occasionally I blog. And then I go to bed.

My First Forays into the World of Tourism

I must apologize for the length of time it's been since my last post. I've spent the last few weeks moving into my apartment and continuing to set up my class schedule, among other things. I'm including two diary entries in this post, the first about my excursion with the Baikal International Tourism Forum and the other about my trip to Baikal with the Baikal Amazons and a group of German journalist.

Baikal International Tourism Forum

On the day that I participated in the Baikal International Tourism Forum, it was more as a tag-along than as an actual participant. I was picked up from the center of the city early in the morning and a Russian journalist who is the chief editor for a tourism magazine invited me to sit next to him. This journalist spent nearly the entirety of the trip picking my brain and correcting my Russian and attempting to teach me new words.

Our first stop was at the Ivolginsky Datsan. It was odd returning to a place that I’ve recalled so often, but never truly expected to return to. In fact, it accentuated how strongly I miss the 13 other students from my Moscow Program two years of go, and of course my professor, Diane. Fortunately, I was busy enough this time to keep my mind from dwelling on the past. We repeated the same guided path we took 2 years ago, in addition to seeing a building that was built in the past year. I chatted with some Korean journalists about my research and about their interest in Buryatia. As I was preparing to walk away, a young woman with a microphone grabbed my arm and said something about an interview. Immediately flustered, all knowledge that I had of Russian flew from my mind. The appearance of a television camera did nothing to calm my nerves. The woman began asking me questions about Minnesota; I think my disconcertion was visibly obvious. As I began to calm down, the cameraman pointed the lens at me and I began my first TV interview ever... in Russian. I was only asked three or four questions, mostly revolving around my research and interest in Buryatia. My interviewer took my number and told me that she’d let me know when it was going to air (it aired later that evening), but the entirety would not be on the Internet. I was informed by friends who watched the interview that it went well and they aired my statements about the cultural aspect of tourism in Buryatia.

Once we all returned to the vehicle, we set out for the old-believer village that we went to two years ago. We stopped at the outcrop of rocks overlooking the Selenga and climbed around and took pictures. We were met by some of the Old Believers this time, bearing kvass and samogon. We then made our way to the museum and the church. The museum just opened up a second floor, so they had several new things that I didn’t see last time.

We then made our way to a house, a different family than last time, where a delicious lunch was waiting for us. And lots of samogon. I had been getting to know several of the others in my group, so when we got to eating and drinking I found my glass being filled and refilled over and over. After lunch, we watched a wedding ceremony that was absolutely as funny as two years ago, but again, I felt pangs of nostalgia for Tigan and Shane’s wedding. After that, we set off for home. I received more than my share of business cards for the day and all in all enjoyed re-experiencing that that tourism trip through Buryatia.

Barguzin

This weekend was one of the biggest and most momentous weekends that I’ve ever had. I was invited to travel to Barguzin (on Baikal) for the weekend with the Baikal Amazons and a group of German television reporters who were making a short documentary on the Amazons. I opted out of going with them to Ivolginsky and Tarbogatai because I had been there literally three days prior. I met up with the group in the center of Ulan-Ude and after addling perhaps a little too long, I set off in a small Toyota driven by Masha. The first 3 hours or so of the drive were awesome. The sun was still up and we were driving through the mountains of Buryatia and talking pretty much incessantly. Then it got dark and the road got real. While the majority of the road was paved up to entrance of the Baikal Special Economic Zone, once we got beyond it, the road was one stop above impassable. The asphalt changed levels abruptly and without warning. The road was covered in small molehills of asphalt that occasionally scraped against the underside of the car. And Masha was getting tired of driving. So with about an hour left to go, Masha decided that I should drive. The driver’s side was on the right side of the car (not the left). And it was a road in Siberia. And the last hour was definitely the worst stretch of the road that there was. Fortunately, I didn’t wreck the car and survived the trip. Upon our arrival at 12:30, we ate dinner at the hotel and quickly crashed.

We got up at 7 and ate breakfast. We then got on the road and met up with Alex and his wife, we would be escorting us and preparing food for us along the road. We crossed a river on a ferry pulled by a tugboat, and we were on our way through the Barguzin valley. I rode with Alex and the German reporters (who consisted of one German woman who was the Moscow correspondent for a German news agency and two Russian technicians). Alex and I talked about the growth of tourism in Barguzin, and I spoke with the German woman about her life in Moscow. Our first stop was at an orphanage in a small town in the valley. The orphanage was actually extremely nice, had a little museum that the children put together, and an extraordinarily nice shower. The children read us speeches that were prepared Pioneer style (the Soviet version of Scouts). I talked with the director of the orphanage and a few of the children. The director asked me one of my first hard questions here in Russia: “Why do Americans have to come to Russia to adopt children?” I honestly told him that I do not know, and he said that he’s never met anyone who could answer that question. The children I talked to wanted to be lawyers and drivers. Some things are universal.

Our next stop was a datsan a ways up the valley. A group of children at the datsan had raised money for one of the Amazons, whose son was struggling with cancer. The sum wasn’t high, but damn if those kids don’t have some initiative. They also gave us pioneer type speeches. On a side note, the Soviet Union hasn’t really left the Barguzin valley. The sign for entering the region still has a hammer and sickle, Lenin is still gesturing to the empty town squares of the valley, and people still refer to St. Petersburg as Leningrad. Returning to the story, we then made our way up a path through the woods. Apparently, this datsan is famous because it is near a stone that has a depiction of a Buddhist god in it. I can’t help but draw comparisons with Christians who see the Virgin Mary in a piece of toast. However, the area was completely beautiful and ribbons of all different colors embraced every tree and every stone in the area was part of a tower of stones. This is where we met Max, the American tourist who had been traveling from Karelia towards Ulan-Ude for almost four months. We invited him to tag along with us because he wanted to meet a shaman, and that was our plan for the next day.

We began making our way back out of the valley after the datsan. Alex stopped at all of the best views for the film crew, so I got some excellent pictures. We stopped near a stream for dinner. Alex is a fisherman and has a large garden, so he and his wife prepared one of the freshest meals that I’ve ever had. It was unbelievable. Then, Alex invited me to go along home with him to meet his son and go on a short hunt. I accepted.

As I drove back with Alex and his wife and sister, they told me that they were Russian Jews and had actually lived in Israel for a while. Upon our arrival at their home, they gave me some tea and geared me up for the hunt. I went with their son, Alyosha, and two of his friends. We hopped in the motor-boat and zoomed out towards Baikal. The sun was beginning to set and the view was, again, entirely breath-taking. We stopped in a march and set out. Alyosha was getting married soon. He also told me that he was rejected by the army because he was shot in the arm on a hunt when he was very young. As it began to get dark, we realized that we probably weren’t going to get anything because someone on the other side of the river was firing without stop. As I had never shot a gun before, Alyosha handed it to me and told me how. I fired it twice. As we were beginning to leave, a flock of ducks flew by and Alyosha managed to hit one. I got to carry it back.

When we got back to the house, Alex and his wife prepared dinner for me: eggs that were laid that very day and potatoes from the garden. They then drove me back to the hotel, insisting that I keep the duck. I had no idea what to do with it. I walked into the hotel dining room, where the rest of the group was, and was greeted like a returning war hero. They all thought that the duck was phenomenal, except for the German, who like me, was experiencing some moral qualms about the death of the duck. Alex and his wife finally agreed to take the duck off of my hands, and we all went to bed.

We got to sleep in a little bit, which was sorely needed after the previous day. We ate breakfast, and then the film crew spent about an hour taking video of the cars driving into the hotel. I talked politics with Max. We finally set off for Baikal, which was not far from the hotel by any means. We arrived and met with a shaman. The purpose of this meeting was to bless the mother with the ailing son. I was informed that this shaman specialized in stones, whereas other shamans specialize in other spheres of nature. The shaman’s assistant built a fire with aromatic wood and we presented the shaman with gifts. He placed several stones within the fire and filled a beaker with water from Baikal (I failed to mention that this all took place on a cliff overlooking Baikal, excellent choice of location). The ritual that the shaman would perform is as follows: The assistant would remove a stone from the fire with tongs. The shaman would call a member of the group to him, ask a question, lick the stone, take a swig of moonshine, and spit it in places that needed cleansing. Some of the women with back pain had him spit on their backs. He also unexpectedly spit down the pants of one of the men, and then the rest of the men requested the same treatment (the Amazons requested that I too take avail of the same treatment, but I declined. Samogon in the face was sufficient enough for me). The shaman would also whip those who requested lightly with a rope. He then blessed some ribbons and tied them to a tree (religion mixing at its finest). We then enjoyed another excellent meal, once again prepared by Alex and his wife.

After lunch, we drove down the beach (very unsuccessfully, but we made it) to find a spot with fewer rocks to go swimming. I donned my swimsuit and sprinted in and out of the lake. Max swam around for about ten minutes. Some people can just take the cold... I also saw my first mammal here in Siberia, I think it was an African black squirrel. When I first saw that it was black, I hoped that it was a sable, but no such luck.

After swimming, we hopped back in the cars and got on the road. Fall was in full swing on the drive home. It’s strange: half of the trees here have changed, the others haven’t (not including evergreens). When we got back to Ulan-Ude, we bid farewell to the journalists and I went home. It was a weekend to remember.

I also learned a lot about the potentials for tourism in the area that I will expand upon next time. For now, I think my experiences and first impressions will suffice.

The Russian Dacha

While in Moscow, I never had the opportunity to go to a dacha, which was an experience that I sorely regretted. Fortunately, I was invited to go to a dacha my first weekend in Ulan-Ude. I was gathered from the dormitory at 9am, and then we visited a local super-market to obtain the food and supplies we would need for the day. Then, we hit the road, which wound through the mountains of Buryatia. If we had stayed on the road for about 6 hours, we would have ended up in Irkutsk. However, the dacha was only about half an hour outside of Ulan-Ude. We left the main highway, drove through some back roads, honked the horn, and the gate to the dacha slowly opened.

It was wonderful. The dacha itself was a small, two story cottage with an oven inside and a primitive connection to electricity. Our water was obtained from a well with an electric pump. Surrounding the dacha, however, was one of the most magnificent gardens that I’ve ever seen. Potatoes, flowers, and all sorts of berries were to be found in the grounds of the dacha. I was immediately put to work digging up potatoes and picking berries. In particular, there were orange berries that were absolutely delicious. After gathering potatoes and vegetables, I prepared shish-kabobs from pork, onions, and peppers. In the middle of the afternoon, we sat down to a feast of fish, shish-kabobs, bread, cheese, potatoes, tea, wine, and I’m not sure what all else.

After stuffing ourselves, I went for a stroll down the banks of the Selenga. The Selenga is one of the rivers that flow through Ulan-Ude, the other being the Uda. The dacha was nestled in a valley between mountains, at the very bottom of which flowed the Selenga. There were some fisherman and a true Russian man who went for a swim in a tiny Speedo. When he emerged from the water, we asked him how the water was and he told us, “Hot!” It wasn’t. The weather was unbelievable. I’d guess that the temperature was between 65 and 70 all day and it was sunny with a few stray fluffy clouds in the sky.

After kicking a soccer ball around some, we went back to work at the dacha, this time painting the railing of the balcony. From the balcony, the Trans-Siberian Railway was visible and several trains passed by while I worked. As the sun started to set, it was finally the men’s turn in the banya.

Real Russian men like the banya hot. By the end, I could scarcely breath from the steam, heat, and of course, branches that are used to cleanse the skin. The shock of the freezing cold water that is used between sessions did nothing to help. The conversation was pleasant and afterwards, I felt the most relaxed I’ve felt since, well, the last time I was in a banya. By the time we were done in the banya, it was time to gather everything and set of for home.

While we were driving home from the dacha, I saw one of the most beautiful sights I’ve ever seen. The road to Ulan-Ude winds around with the Selenga. The moon was veiled behind thin clouds. The Selenga glowed more brightly than the night sky. Then, slowly, the bright windows of the Trans-Siberian Train appeared one by one from around a bend in the river. The bend was located at the very base of a tall range of mountains. There is something incredibly peaceful about the sight of a train traveling at night, and if it happens to be at the base of the mountains on the Selenga, it is absolutely breath taking.

I arrived back at the dormitory late, but I brought a cup filled with berries, my body relaxed from the banya, and my mind was completely at ease following a day filled with friendship and beauty.

My Desire to Return to Buryatia is Confirmed

I don’t think words can describe how amazing these last two days have been. The unbelievable level of friendship and hospitality that I’ve encountered in Ulan-Ude is humbling and entirely without comparison. The friendships that I’ve been able to forge in the short time that I’ve been here make whatever small bureaucratic inconveniences I’ve had to endure seem petty.

So, starting from the beginning of Wednesday. I had thought that I had agreed with the history department to sit in a class on The History of Buryatia at 1:00pm. Well, I arrived early, found a seat, and waited. And waited. And waited. And no one showed up. This, of course, happens pretty often in Russia. So I went to the international office and met a few of the English students at BSU. The international office decided that we can figure out my history classes some other time, and now was as good a time as any to try to introduce me to the English department. My desire to help out in the English department has several motivators: First, I want to meet as many people as I can. Second, it will help cement a positive relationship with the university. And thirdly, many of the students in the foreign language department want to work in the tourism industry. As one of my main research questions is what motivates people to work in the tourism industry in Buryatia, I think I can learn a lot by meeting aspiring tour guides. Unfortunately, most of the professors were out, so I set a meeting with the deacon for 2:30 Thursday afternoon.

After that, I met with Masha and she helped me buy a SIM cart on BaikalVestCom, and then we visited several real estate agencies. The common story was that apartments are disappearing fast. After eating a small lunch/dinner with Masha (my meals here are hard to classify), I returned home.

The girl I met on the airplane, let’s call her Ira (again, for privacy and such), had invited me to a celebratory dinner Wednesday night. She told me that she’d pick me up around 8:30, and when I got into the car, I found out that it was her mother’s birthday celebration. Ira’s cousin drove Ira, her brother, and me to an Uzbek restaurant and when we walked in, I realized that the entire restaurant was filled with her family members. I sat close to her brother and cousin and across from an elderly gentleman who attempted to explain everything that was occurring to me throughout the evening. He also assumed the responsibility of getting me to drink as much as possible. He told me a story about how he had been in Cuba and decided to see who could drink more, a Cuban or a Russian. He said, “When I fell to the floor, and looked up the Cuban and said, ‘You!’ And then the Cuban said, ‘Although I can drink, I can’t drink as much as an American.’” The elderly gentleman looked at me expectantly, and then laughed. There were many toasts throughout the evening. Different branches of the family would stand up together, each would say something in honor of Ira’s mother, and then there would be a toast. The elderly gentleman informed me that one of the speakers was a 4-time world champion in boxing, and another was an archery champion. At the end, they asked me to give a toast in English, as Russian, Buryat, and few other languages had already been spoken. So I did my best. At the end, I rode back home with Ira’s cousin, who works in the tourism industry and was full of questions about America. He was extremely nice and lives nearby, so we’ll probably hang out sometime.

So on Thursday I woke up and went to a real estate agency again, where we found out that there was practically nothing left. So, we both had a few hours free so we got lunch together, I bought a new phone, and we took a tram to another part of town to walk around. At 2:30 I met with the deacon of the foreign language department, and talked about various ways that I can help out students.

After my meeting, I called my main contact here in Ulan-Ude, and she invited me to drop by her apartment. She almost immediately sent me to work translating for her. Next week, Ulan-Ude is hosting a huge international tourism forum. We’re trying to get me registered, but I will be helping out with a delegation from Korea, for whom my contact is organizing a few excursions. I translated the schedule of the forum for them today, and I am currently working on translating their program into Russian. It’s nice to finally feel useful. After finishing translating the program, we went to meet contact’s friend’s (let’s call her Sasha) former host son, who was arriving on a bus from Mongolia. After chatting for a while, Sasha invited me to help her with some volunteer work on Saturday, and then to her dacha on Sunday. I, of course, accepted. After watching the new fountain on Soviet Square, Sasha, who had invited me to come home with her and meet her youngest son for a little while, realized that she had mistakenly left her lights on and that her car battery was dead. Almost immediately after that, a group of young people asked Sasha for help. It turns out that they were a group of Mongolians who spoke a little Russian and a little English and hadn’t managed to catch a cab. Sasha found out where to take them, and while we waited for her son to come and jump-start the car, I chatted with the Mongolians to the extent that we were able to understand each other. They were going to catch a plane from Ulan-Ude to Turkey and were staying with a friend for the night. They let me try some of the food that they brought for the road. They had some dried fruits that were delicious, a crumbly bread-like substance that tasted like cheese, and an extremely hard substance that also tasted kind of like cheese. I rode along while Sasha drove the Mongolians to their friend’s apartment, and then she drove me to one of the highest points in the city. It was an absolutely fantastic view; the lights of the city were spread out in the valley, but didn’t drown out the stars. Afterwards she drove me home, and now here I am, writing. And the best part of all of this is: this is still just the very beginning...

Days 1 and 2

What a crazy few days. I have found it exceedingly difficult to find internet, but I found an Ириш Паб (Irish Pub) with wifi. So, here are the first two entries in my Fulbright journal.

Day 1

Well, I made it. As I write, I am sitting next to the window in my room in the Buryat State University dormitory. It’s a breezy, overcast day. My window is slightly opening, allowing the breeze clear passage through my room. My window will not often be open here, so I’m relishing the opportunity right now. My flight to Ulan-Ude left Moscow about an hour and a half later than scheduled, so I arrived at about 10 o’clock. My flight was extremely interesting and enjoyable, as I am learning to be the case as I travel more and more throughout Russia. I was seated between two young women, both apparently of Buryat descent, and as the flight began and I responded to questions such as, “Do you think we’ll take off soon?” etc., they asked me where I was from. This led to a revelation of perhaps the biggest coincidence I’ve experienced in Russia so far: the woman sitting to my right went to college at Missouri State University! Missouri State is not very far from my hometown of Wichita, KS, and is a popular site for young Wichitans to attend school. She was currently on the last year of her Master’s in accounting, but was taking a semester off to attend her sister’s wedding. We mostly conversed in English. About an hour or to into the flight, she decided that she had to sleep, as she had made the same journey as myself without the overnight stop in Moscow and was naturally completely exhausted. At that point, the woman sitting to my left, tired of not being able to understand our conversation, jumped in and started asking me questions in Russian. She was a dentist in Kiev, and was returning home to visit family for a few weeks. We talked late into the flight, covering topics that spanned life in Ulan-Ude, religion, social problems in Russia, America, and the Ukraine, and of course, tourism. I asked her what her initial thoughts of tourism in Buryatia were, and her first answer surprised me. She stated that tourism would lead to changes in the population genotype, as tourists and supposedly settlers would marry or have romantic encounters with the local population. Her next answer was genuinely more interesting, and a subject that I will need to explore more as I begin my research. Many cultures native to this area find some of the activities of tourists to be strange. For example, shamanists believe that many places around Baikal are holy, and don’t think that people should merely wander around them. This clashes directly with tourists who come to camp, hike, and climb the mountains around Lake Baikal. Another interesting example is that there is a native group that forbids eating fish, but many tourists come to the area to go fishing. However, many of the fish in this area are contaminated with bacteria and parasites, so many tourists end up getting sick.

Upon landing, I was met in the airport by a representative of the International Department at Buryat State University, who has so far been extraordinarily kind and helpful. After getting my checked luggage, we drove to the Buryat State University dorms, which are located in the center of the city, just about a block away from Lenin’s head (Ulan-Ude is the home to the largest statue of a head in the world). After sleeping for several hours, I woke up and braved the shower, which isn’t too bad, and then went to a Japanese/Mongolian restaurant with the BSU representative. He then drove me around the city, took me to a grocery store, and then dropped me off at the dorm. So here I am, sitting in my room, where I am definitely allergic to something. Or maybe there’s just a lot of dust. At some point I need to summon up the courage to use the toilet without a seat. I will definitely be finding an apartment... Probably next weekend. Tomorrow I’ll be free to wander the center of the city, and then Monday I’m going in to the International Office to complete my registration and figure out my classes.

Day 2

Today was very rainy. The weather, combined with the fact that I had nothing to do, only know 3 people in Ulan-Ude (1 of whom was busy and 2 of whom I met on the plane), and do not know my way around the city at all and have no map, led to today being a pretty dull day. I woke up early, at least by my standards, because I wanted to go and wander around some. Well, to my chagrin it was overcast and looked like rain. So I read and watched TV. I ate some pastries that I got at the grocery store (which were quite tasty), had an apple, and then had some bread and jam (terrible). It finally started raining, rained for a few hours, and then I decided that I could go for a walk. I grabbed a bite to eat at a small stolovaya, which is basically a restaurant that is very similar to a dining hall, and was happily surprised to see that my decently sized meal cost me less than five dollars. I may be able to pay more for an apartment than I originally intended. Exiting to a quick stream of consciousness: my wall has a hole in it, and I think it’s filled with asbestos. I’ve never seen the stuff, but that might be what it looks like. My bathroom light also burned out, making an unpleasant place even worse. I can’t wait to get my own apartment... The representative from BSU informed me that a simple apartment would likely cost me $300 a month. I think $600 a month should be my maximum, so I think I ought to be able to find a decent place. So breaking out of stream of consciousness: I then strolled around. I found a path that was built by some foundation whose name I’m shocked I can’t remember, given that I just walked past it. Oh well.

My 2 days here have already been more than enough to make me feel more confident about my choice of tourism in Ulan-Ude as a research topic. I have seen a banner about some sort of international tourism forum (which I would love to attend), advertisements for schools that specialize in tourism (including BSU), and general advertisements directed to tourists specifically. I should try to interview teachers at tourism schools, which until now I didn’t really know existed.

Another interesting thing that I’ve been told a few times is that the number of foreigners in Ulan-Ude is growing, not due to tourism, but due to missionary work. It has also become apart that these missionaries are, for the most part, not appreciated. This is extremely interesting, considering that I am living in the center of a society that generally believes in 3 conflicting religions, all at the same time. Shamanism, Buddhism, and Orthodox Christianity all have a strong foothold here, but Protestantism, Mormonism, and other various sects are largely ignored. One interesting opinion is that only the impoverished in the region are attracted to Protestants. This will be another topic to explore out of purely intellectual curiosity.

Well, enough for now. I guess I’ll watch TV and read until I pass out again. At least I’ll have something to do tomorrow.