So I have 1 full free day in Listvyanka. It’s a balmy -10C out today, snowing heavily and constantly. The lake is not yet frozen, which I was expecting to see. It freezes completely clear and colorless but has mushroom-looking bubbles from natural gas release while the water is freezing.
Breakfast
I started my day with breakfast from Nikolai, my ever-smiling host. I am in a guest house with perhaps 4 rooms, only mine is occupied. So we agreed on a time for breakfast, 8:30, and I meet him downstairs at 8:30. He is slightly disappointed that I showed up right on time and didn’t wait for him to ring his dinner bell. I’ll be sure to give him that one tomorrow. He prepared a beautiful spread for me, one that rivals even my own. There were cookies and sausages and cheeses and ham and eggs and juice and coffee and tea and toast and jam. It was a great start to the morning. After breakfast, I collected my things for the day, packing extra layers I might need for dog sledding. As I was leaving the house, I asked my host about finding a banya, a Russky Banya. I had emailed one hotel that has a banya, but theirs was a Finnish sauna, not what I was looking for. He said there is one right next to the house and to meet him here at 6 tonight. We discussed price and time, and I was off into the morning breeze.
Walking
I had thought my plan was to be at the dog sledding place at 10, but it was actually set for 11. So instead of getting a cab, I walked the 45 minutes. It was snowing and the walk was on a road that had not been cleaned. So it was quite a trudge. I had also expected at least a couple of cafes, restaurants, shops on the way, but there were none. Those are only on the main road. So I hiked up the hill, stopping to admire the beautiful blanket of new snow on the pine trees, the mountains, the terrifying roving packs of giant stray dogs. It took almost an hour to get there, but I was still early, having planned to stop for coffee or something on the way. But the hostess was already there, opened the door for me before I had time to ponder walking back down the hill a bit. She invited me in and made a fire and a pot of tea. It was a very interesting tea with leaves and twigs and flowers in it. She put on a DVD of dog sledding (in Russian) then left the room and let me sit for the 30 minutes until our class began. I sat and stared out the window at the snow, pondering the red flowers growing in pots by the window, the two birds chirping in their cage next to the fire place. It was so cozy. Possibly the most relaxed I have been so far, drinking tea alone, watching the snow fall.
Pottery Class
I had forgotten that, in one of the emails, I had asked about another thing they offer: pottery classes. They also offer blacksmithing, but only once a week. So as I am sitting there, a big gruff man comes in and I am comforted by watching him and realizing no one takes off snow boots gracefully. He goes into the next room and grabs a bag of clay and begins working it with his hands, warming it up, getting it ready. He signals for me to come over and we don aprons and get to work. He starts by demonstrating, taking a lump of clay and showing me the process of converting it into a little vase. He shapes the bottom, shows me how to hold my hands to make a little buldge, then how to narrow the neck. Then he takes a wire and slices it in half, to show me how thick the clay is in different parts: thicker around the bottom and thinner in the neck, but not too thin. Then it’s my turn. I sit at the pottery wheel with a lump of clay and get my hands dirty. It is far more challenging than it looks. My nails, which are not ideal for this activity, keep catching a bit of the clay and making it wobbly and uneven. For my friends who are always so “ugh, you’re so good at everything”, my vase was an abject failure. It didn’t fully collapse, but it looked nothing like what I was trying to replicate or what I envisioned.
Dog Sledding
We wrapped up the class and washed our hands. He handed me a finished pot, as a souvenir. Then he crushes my sad little vase and puts all the clay back in a bag. The woman comes back in and selects a pair of snow overalls for me to wear sledding. As I’m trying to figure out how to get them on over my boots, the guy comes back in and says ‘The dogs are ready for you’. I snag a quick mirror-selfie of myself looking like a total dork in camouflage snowveralls and follow him outside. We walk around to the back of the house, where 3 other guys are there, and the dogs are hooked up to the sled and already trying to go. They hurry me to get on the sled, where the food and supplies would normal go for long-distance treks, and a guy stands behind me on the skis. And suddenly, we’re off!
The dogs are fast, running full speed. The website says to book early mornings if you want to go faster because the dogs wake up wanting to run. So here we are going down a set of very well-worn snow paths on our dog sled. It’s an hour long ride and I think I spent the first 10-15 minutes just going OMG I’m in Siberia on a dog sled! Just… wow. After the initial shock of it wore off, I finally had the presense of mind to look up. I had been watching the dogs the whole time. Now I looked up as we went through the frozen wilderness. Nothing but mountain and trees as far as you can see. There was one camp with a couple of guys in a tent. The guide is yelling commands at the dogs. When we come to forks in the road, he yells ‘left’ or ‘right’ in Russian. He tells them good, and faster and stop, all in Russian. I am proud of myself that I know as much Russian as the dogs. It was fun, peaceful more than exhillerating. I held on to the sled as I watched the world go by. We even caught air a few times on the undulating hills. Whee. Then we get to the farthest point of the trip and he stops the dogs. He asks if I want to drive, and OF COURSE I DO!
So he is standing on the brake, which is only a little claw that jams into the snow. The dogs are still pulling, and the sled is still moving but slowly. He explains that I have to step on the brake as soon as he moves his foot so the dogs to run away with the sled. Ok. Got it. So I step on the brake and he jogs alongside the sled and jumps on before telling me to let off the brake. Whoooooosh! He says the dogs always go faster on the way back because they know the way home. Again we go, over the undulating hills, me at the helm, keeping my knees bent. He explains as we’re going how to steer the sled, keeping it properly behind the dogs. He helps a bit by putting his feet in the snow, but I’ve got this. Forget what I said about not being good at everything. I was born for this. I’m totally on top of it, leaning side to side, keeping us on track, literally. We come upon a truck broken down in the middle of the path and he yells at the dogs and me to go left to get around it. I guide our sled left… left enough to catch a bit of a snow drift and now his lap is full of snow. He laughs as he dumps it off the sled. We didn’t hit the truck, so still a win in my book. Now it’s exhillerating, freeing, fun. And we’re in a place where my bright, rosy cheeks don’t automatically mark me as an outsider. Perhaps only one of the people we passed on our adventure thought ‘Oh, look at that nice lady giving that guy a ride on her sled’. I mean, it’s a small town and they probably all know each other, so probably not. But you know, it could happen. We arrive back at the house, and he says that I have to brake — hard — when he says stop. There is a gauntlet of 3 men waiting for us when the guy yells “stop!” The men immediately each grab a dog and start disconnecting them from the harnesses, weakening them enough that the brake will actually hold the others in place. I ask him to take a few photos before I depart.
I go back to the house and wait. Another woman from the village arrives with her child. The kid just stares at me. I’ve already made my way out of the snowveralls and am wearing normal clothes, so I dunno what his problem was, but this toddler was giving me the stink-eye. The village woman pulls out a large glass jar and hands it to the hostess, who disappears with it for some time before returning with it full of white liquid…milk… sheep? goat? cow? No clue. They exchange cash for the milk and the village woman leaves. This is so cool. Then the hostess says I can pay her now and gives me some books about their sled dogs and asks me to put a pin in the map for my home town. Holy cow, that was so unreal. It’s hard to even believe it just happened.
Lunch
I make my way back down the hill, thinking I will take a different route. There are only 2 roads, so what’s the big deal? I soon find out that there are 2 official roads, but tons of paths in the snow where people have just driven their cars. I keep moving generally down the hill, but I’m never sure if I’m on the real road or about to go on someone’s private property. A woman who is walking by, yells out at me that my coat is beautiful (in Russian, obvs). Moya krasivaya krasnaya schubka e schapka. – My beautiful red coat and hat. As I continue walking, I suddenly reach a point where the snow is shallow enough to show that there is actually a layer of ice underneath, not solid ground. There’s a little creek and I can’t figure out how to cross it. I don’t want to try to walk on the ice. That looks like a terrible idea. I try taking a path to the left, but it just goes into someone’s garage. Sorry, person. To the right is crossing the creek. Finally I see a little bridge up ahead. It is covered in ice and snow and pretty treacherous as a wooden bridge, and I nearly fall a couple of times, but at least I am not in the creek. Finally on the other side, I stay on the main road to get back to town. Amazingly the road leads me exactly where I was trying to go: the other recommended restaurant, the Listvyanka club. I go inside and 2 women enjoying coffee and cakes stare at me as I take off my bright red coat and hang it on the rack. I am seated and order a beer, which is described only as local beer on draft. No clue what it was, but I had that with some beef stroganoff and bread. I sat next to the fire place and enjoyed the quiet after the surreal morning. Siberian BanyaSelf-flagellation as a means of wellness…
Getting there
I walked the rest of the town, this time in the daylight. I wandered until I found the fish market and souvenir market. I was the only person there to shop, so it was a pretty high-pressure shopping experience. I bought a little stuffed nerpa for Pooka. The nerpinary was closed, which is probably for the best. Nerpas are adorable little seals that live in the lake here. They are apparently the only fresh-water seals in the world. I walked down to the water’s edge, where it gets markedly colder and windier. The line where the water washes over the rocky shore is now icy, a new thin layer of ice applied every time the water splashes ashore. I had to scope out a safe spot with no ice, as I didn’t want to go for a full swim. But I did find a spot, and slid down to touch my hands in the water. Mission success. Though I took a photo standing slightly away from the edge of the water, I didn’t want my giant red sleeves to get wet or to embarrassingly die while trying to take a selfie next to the frigid lake. I stopped at a cafe and had some coffee and blinis with honey and pine nuts. As I was walking back to my hotel, I met several people. First, I was just walking, minding my own biz, when an older Japanese couple begins photographing me. Which is adorable. I’m in my very Russian looking coat, walking through the snow like it’s no big thing, so maybe they thought I was being awesome. They had giant SLR cameras with giant knit cozies for them cameras. Next a guy comes up to me and starts speaking Russian. I have no idea what he’s saying…I say “I don’t understand” in Russsian and he asks if I speak English. He asks me where the restaurants are in this town. I tell him what I know. Then another guy slows down his car and asks me something from the window. No idea. Some ladies yell “Happy New Year” in Russian at me, which I return. Then I’m walking and 2 little girls start following me. One says zdravstvoitya, then hello. I say each of them back to her. She asks me if I am Russian. I tell her, no, I’m American. She and the other, more bashful girl, giggle, oooh an American. So she continues asking me questiosn while the other girl also whispers questions to her to ask me. She is asking me things in English and I am trying to answer in Russian. We had a fun time. “Do you know what that is?” she is testing me and teaching me words I don’t know. She points to many things, some I can guess, Shkola, Sneg. Others she tells me. She asks how old I am and tells me she is 10. She sees my snowflake nails and shows me her pink glittery nails and takes my hands into hers to look at the details. It was painfully adorable. Then we got to the building where they were going so they said goodbye. Finally, a car pulled alongside me and a Russian woman is telling me to get in, they will drive me to my guest house. I say no thank you, and she insists and tries to speak English with me. I get in their car. There is a man driving and a woman, named Olga, in the front seat and another woman with me in the back seat. I tell them where my hotel is and they drive me there. Olga is trying to insist that I come to her house and have tea with them, but I have a banya appointment waiting for me. I’m also getting ready to bail if they don’t make the right turn to my hotel because who the hell gets in a car with strangers?? This is far outside my comfort zone, but they are very nice and drop me off without incident. Again, reading this after the fact, you already know that. No suspense for you guys.
Banya time!
I went back to my room, sweaty and smelling of dogs. It’s unbearable indoors. I decide to take a shower before the banya appointment. I put on my swimsuit and a sweater dress. It’s only 5, and my appointment isn’t until 6. At 5:30, my host rings the bell to summon me. I came down and he asked if I wanted to just do it now. So we head through some passageways to the banya. This shit is about to get real.
He asks if I’m wearing a suit (kostum), and I say yes, so he leads me to the foyer and strips down to his speedo. When in Rome… I hang up my clothes by the door and he instructs me to pick a wool hat. He gives me a little wood mat. We go into a dry sauna that is 120 C. We sit for 10 minutes, then back into the still very warm resting area. Then back into the dry sauna. 2 or 3 times until I am sufficiently sweaty.
The next time we enter the dry sauna room, he puts out a large mat for me to lay on. He instructs me to lay face-down. I do. Then I hear him take out the birch branch, put it in the water, then put it in the fire, then bang it dramatically a few time on the wall. It’s a loud noise and I’m certain he’s about to start beating me with this branch and I am also pretty sure it’s going to hurt. A lot. Then he begins hitting me with the branches. 2 things: he didn’t hit me hard, just light taps, so it wasn’t super painful; the water on the branches is hot, not cold as I had expected. So it’s a million degrees and he’s hitting me with these branches. Then he tells me to sit up and hands me the branches to hit myself on the front side. He leaves the room and instructs me to continue for 5 more minutes.
Then he comes back in and says: “Sneg”. So he leads me outsid where he has shoveled a giant pile of snow for me to dive into. I do it. Don’t think, just do. Then, apparently I didn’t do it right because he demanded I put snow on my face. So I grab an armful of snow and shove it up into my face. Then we run back inside to the little waiting/resting area. As we sit there, my entire body itches. My legs sting, my arms feel prickly. My pores are so confused. I’m not cold or hot, or I’m cold and hot at the same time. I don’t know. Nothing matters anymore. Maybe I’m a bit lightheaded.
There’s a whole process here. 5-10 minutes each step. So back into the dry sauna we go, and back to the beatings. At this point, I’m at sensory overload. I just don’t even know. This is the last round, so when it comes time to go outside, I give him my camera and ask him to take photos. The transition from hot to cold fogs up the lens, so the snow photos aren’t great, but you get the idea. Then we go back inside and he does a few posed shots of me hitting myself with the birch branches.
Finally we are at the end of the ceremony, and it’s time for ‘scrub’. I assumed he would hand me the sponge and close the door, giving me privacy to scrub off all the birch leaves. But no. He instructs me to lean forward and put my arms on the wall as he takes the most abrasive sponge ever created and scrubs my back and legs. Then he gives it to me to do my front side. It is painful, by far the most painful part of the process. I’m not feeling it. Then he instructs me to take the large bucket of hot water and pour it over my head to rinse. Make sure you get the front and the back. Ok, I’m doing it, pouring warm water over my head and face and back and legs. My eyes still closed from the water, as I put the bucket down, he dumps an unexpected bucket of cold water over my head all at once. I yelp. He laughs. Thus concludes the Russian Banya.
Dinner
After all of that, I am hungry and thirsty. I put on my dress and boots and tights, not even bothering with under-layers or thermals or socks. I walk down the hill to the nearest restaurant, the one in the lighthouse hotel. I am radiating heat. Snow is falling hard and none of it reaches my face. It feels like a nice 60 degree Bay Area day. Slightly chilly, but not cold. My thermometer is not functioning properly. I finally arrive at the restaurant and the guy who had asked me about restaurants was here, and he said hi and told them that I was the person who told him about this restaurant. lol. I ordered a well-deserved beer: a dark kursovice, and some fried pelmeni and cabbage wraps. And the bird milk cake. Now it’s time to get a cab home. I am so tired.
