When a Rooster Wakes You Up

When a rooster's cock-a-doodle-doos wake you up at 6am you know you're in the country.

The entire point of my trip to Russia was for the side trip to Belarus. And it was so worth it.

I got to the train station in Pinsk (after a way to long train ride), and held up my little sign, "C.C. Босщук" No one responded. I wasn't terribly surprised not to find her there. Though I had sent a letter, she never called me in Moscow, so I figured she had no idea what time I was arriving. I wouldn't spend the day in the train station either... I had her family's address in Parache - and knew that I'd never find her in Pinsk (even though it's not that big of city - ok, barely a city - the only thing I knew was Sveta "lived in a dorm." That wouldn't get me very far. So it was off to Parache. I exchanged money (Russian rubles to Belarussian ones - that was fun!), and made my way to the bus station next store - figuring I could ask my way to Parache. Sure enough, a bus was going there in an hour. So I wait. The bus ride itself was about an hour. Every fifteen minutes or so, we'd pass through a small village. And by small village, I mean small. A post office, a church, about 15 wooden houses and a dirt road. But beautiful. I asked the person next to me to let me know when we got to Parache - and quickly the entire bus figured out that I was a non-Bela/Russian speaker. I think I was probably the first non-Russian speaker on that bus. The bus (as a whole) told me when to get off, and a man on the street pointed me to Sveta's house. Knock on the door. There she is. Ten years older.

I met her sister, Luda, her mother (also Luda), and her "second father" Pavel. I'll let picutres do the talking about appearences (and I will get these posted quickly, promise).

The house is bigger than I thought it'd be. A winter and summer kitchen, a largeish pantry (used for storing food through winter), a bedroom for the girls, a living room, and a room for mom and dad. It's well appointend, somwhere between my St. Pete house and my Moscow one. That said, there's no running water (there's a well outside), and the toilet is in the barn - summer and winter. Showers are in the kitchen with a bucket in the winter and in the river in the summer. Out back is Dasha the cow (from whom comes milk (butter, sour cream, and other uniquely Russian milk products are made), two pigs (one to be eaten this winter, one the next), roosters (alarm clocks?), egg laying chickens, a beautiful garden (1% flowers, 99% food: corn, cabbage, lettuce, carrots, potatoes, peppers, tomatoes, blueberry like plants, raspberries, cherry-like plants (2 types) - and probably others that weren't in season yet. Most of the morning is spent working in the garden.

Sunday night we went out to the discotheque, which is more like a block party. Dancing in the street with a boombox - but is was fun. Svet's a fabulous dancer (we also discovered that we're still much alike in many many ways - our attitudes towards men and marriage (she's got massive pressure from parents to get married. she's 20 and will soon be an "old maid"), hobbies (she, according to her sister always has her nose stuck in a book - or is dancing), sense of humor, just all around we still click - It's amazing how much we've changed, but how it also seemed like it was just yesterday we were at Shrine Mont.

We spent a lot of time just reminising - "Do you remember this? Do you ever think of that?" And looking at photographs. She's got all the photos I sent her in an album and I feel slightly guilty for often being lazy and not sending more.

In other quick observations, because I'm running out of time, traces of her time in the States is all over the house. The Barbie dolls and other toys are in places of honor around the living room. There's an English puzzle and tape cassettes (I translated a whole slew of songs for them... :)), she's still wearing the socks, underwear and pajamas we gave her 10 years ago. Pants that no longer fit have been turned into pillows (I recognized the fabric...). Was really glad to be there.

Here's a picture of the other Luda - Bakhur

Time's up--- ahhh

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congrats HMB4 on the APs!

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To be continued...