September 30, 2009 – Irkutsk, Siberia
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| Some meetings of the Great Baikal Trail Association took place outdoors and included soup for lunch cooked over a campfire. |
I have packing to do before leaving Siberia tomorrow morning, but I wanted to report on a good evening with our Russian friends. We finished our GBT meetings today, then went shopping with Natasha Luzhkova for a few last things to bring to dinner at her parents' home.
The neighborhood grocery store had a good assortment of vegetables, some fruits, and lots of staples, bread, cheese, and yogurt. I picked out a big watermelon and we chose a couple of bottles of wine. The clerk in the checkout line rang up the purchases and then turned the display on the cash register so we could read the tally.
The apartment of Natasha's parents is on the top floor of an apartment building near Irkutsk State Technical University where her mother is a professor. By the time we got there, many familiar faces from the Great Baikal Trail Association had arrived and were helping arrange slices of sausage and cheese on platters.
Soon we were all tightly packed around a low table covered with plates of salad, meat balls, olives, and the meat and cheese. There was lots of talk about the experiences we'd all shared on the trails and in the cities of Irkutsk and Ulan-Ude.
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| Natasha Luzhkova gets ready to start her chain saw during a project of the Great Baikal Trail Association. |
The young GBT members talked about their futures. Several are heading for America for cultural exchanges and internships. A couple more will be going to Germany to work for several months. All of them seemed enthused about finding ways to travel the world and still be back in Siberia in time to help lead crews working next summer on the Great Baikal Trail.
I continue to find it remarkable how many languages the Russians can understand. The GBT has attracted many students from the foreign language department of Irkutsk University. Nonetheless, their ease with English, German, and sometimes Italian and French is both admirable and humbling.
Volodya, in particular, loves to play with words. I asked him to tell me again his favorite Russian joke and in his dry way, he agreed. "Two men are in hotel room twenty-two," Volodya said. "They want tea so they call room service and say, 'Two tea for two-two!'" He cracked himself up laughing. There were some heartfelt toasts and sharing of small gifts, and as the dinner came to a close we felt the warmth of the fellowship with people we'd come to admire very much.
"You must come back next year," they told us as we were lacing up our shoes and getting ready to go. "Or come in the winter when the lake is frozen and we can travel on the ice."
Returning next year is certainly a possibility. I feel very connected with this place, these people, and what they are attempting to accomplish. As for the ice, I'm beginning to think that might be a good idea, too, though it's going to require some serious insulated socks.