Thursday, August 31, 2006

Siberia




Dear Readers,
I have just returned from my trip to Siberia, which was delightful, in a low-key, tree-hugging kind of way. First, it takes us 2 hours to actually get to the airport. Moscow traffic is atrocious and rapidly worsening. Because Siberia is 5 time zones away from Moscow (+13 from New York), most flights take off at night and land in the morning. Russian airports are a phenomenom to be experienced to be believed. First we were uncermoniously shooed out of one registration line because it was "business class only" even though the sign said in English economy class registration. Boy was I dumb to read the sign to determine what to do, when clearly the better policy was to wait in the wrong line until the devyshka told me that I had, in fact, waited in the wrong line. Anyway, made it through the check-in process only to encounter the security gate and a full body pat down. After that experience, I think the security guard and I are dating, or at least she owns me a dinner.

On to the gate, where things get really fun. So its 10:25, boarding ends at 10:55 (no start time noted), there are two bored attendants at the gate and an open door behind them. In front of them is a packed waiting area. Through the open door is a bus packed full of people. Occasionally a person will disappear through the open door and get on the bus. Huh? So I disappear through the open door and get on the bus, which promptly pulls off and takes me to the airplane. Again, huh? Why didn't anyone say anything? Who is running this show? So we get to the plane, the bus drops us off on the tarmac, in the rainy, windy, cold night weather where we...you guessed it, wait to get on the plane. Why, huh? We wait a bit more, just for good measure, then they graciously allow us to board the plane via wet, slippery, steep, rickety aluminum steps. I love this country. In the interest of full disclosure, the flight attendance who prevented us from boarding the plane, was also waiting in the cold, night rain, so I am not sure who she pissed off.

So we finally get on the plane. I am in row 32, the last row of seats before the lavatories, AKA the pee-pee row. It is amazing how the smell of urine can be so strong but concentrated. At row 31, nothing, all normal. At row 32, the smell jumps ups and grabs you by the nostrils. All I can do is just "try to find a happy place".
The flight itself is uneventful, thank God. However, during our approach to Irkutsk, I notice for the first time that condensation is leaking from the window in our row. This means that somewhere a seal is broken or not properly affixed. Since the inside of the plane is pressurized and the outside is not, improper seals are a bad, bad thing.

Looking at the fat water droplets squeezing through the windowpane and falling onto the oh-so-clean carpet while the plane is in a 15 degree dive, was comforting in a way that words cannot describe. I just went back to my "happy place", which is located on the River Denial.

We arrive safely, but emotionally scarred at Irkutsk airport. We deboard the plane to a bus, which delivers us to a little building. We are very heartily welcomed into the little building and just as promptly escorted out of into the waiting area cum parking lot.


Our bags show up about 40 minutes later (maybe they were on another flight). By this time our tour guide and our very comfy bus have arrived to pick us up and transport us, via the scenic route, to our hotel in Irkutsk. Its much more chilly in Irkutsk than in Moscow, but a light jacket is more than sufficient. The Angara river flows through the town, there are some beautiful churches and interesting wooden houses, but it is overall not an impressive city. It is small and not very well preserved.



The hotel looked surprisingly modern, but my room was extremely small. The bed was so small that I could not roll over, I had to resort to the bounce and flip. And even that technique had to be used with extreme caution. I also had some lovely colored water. Clear water is so common and overrated, sort of like diamonds. Yellow is a much more rare, and hence, more prized color.


We had some professional meetings in Irkutsk on Thursday and Friday. Saturday morning, we were off to Listvyanka on the banks of Lake Baikal. Listvanyka is a quaint little hamlet. I believe it is too small to be a village. It came with the requisite cows walking along the (unpaved) roads and the hamleters (to be a villager, one must live in a village) who though the tall, black American man was, of course, Eddie Murphy. Seriously, no kidding. At this point, it is a little annoying.


Baikal has 20% (by volume) of the worlds fresh water. It is so big, it could fit 8 Lake Superiors in it and still have room left over. So much for the "great" in the "Great Lakes". All I could think about was when and by whom will all that water become a weapon. The lake is also the deepest and clearest lake in the entire world.

Allegedly you can drink right from the lake and swimming in it is supposed to be very healthy. It is supposed extend your live. However, since living in Moscow actually dramatically shortens your life, I am just hoping to net out even.

Anyway, I went into the lake. I had been told that the lake water was really, really cold. But I figured, the banya has a cold water pool, I'm a banya veteran (I've been a total of twice) so I am prepared. I wasn't. I couldn't stay in for more than 1 minute. I did dunk my head under, so I hope the gods of Baikal (and anything that big has to have some gods attached) count that as "swimming".


Baikal is actually quite beautiful. There is a wonderful legend about Baikal that explains its unusual features. Baikal has over 300 rivers feeding into it, but only one, the Angara, flows out of it. At the point of effluence, there is a huge rock. The Angara goes onto to join with another river. The legend is this, Father Baikal had 300 sons and one beautiful daughter, Angara. One day Angara saw a handsome man and fell deeply in love with him. She asked her father for permission to marry the man. Baikal said no. Angara, upon hearing her father's rejection of her true love, ran off to be with him, throwing a stone in his way to prevent her father from catching up to her. Angara met up with her true love and married him. The end.
This is a picture at dusk of the "Kamen" or rock that Angara threw to impede her father's pursuit.

We took a boat tour of the Lake. The captain took us further up the shore and then docked so we could explore that part of the forest. Two of our fellows (who shall remain nameless) got it in their minds to skinny-dip in Baikal. God Bless them and Death to Shrinkage.

Hope the plethora of pictures makes up for the untimeliness of my posts. Next Post: I may be a movie star.

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