The greatest cough medicine ever

So, I have a cold in Russia (so I have no news to report, I've been sleeping at home).  As if it's not scary enough having a cold in a foreign country where you can't read the labels on the medicine, my Russian mama Tanya decided I needed a home remedy.

I was coughing so badly today that I had tears running down my face, and simply couldn't stop.  I probably coughed for 45 minutes straight, which is a lot of coughing.  It was really miserable.  Finally Tanya had had enough and told Masha to call Grandma and ask for the recipe for the "medicine".

As Masha called, she started listing ingredients (milk, honey, onion) and my blood pressure began to rise.  Fortunately the milk-and-onion recipe is for a different malady that I plan to never ever have, but what I had was awful none the less.  However, it really worked, and I mean instantly.  It's some pretty amazing stuff.  Since I took it this morning, I've coughed maybe twice.  I just took it again a few minutes ago, and before I drift off to dreamland, here's the recipe.

Babushka's Secret Cough Syrup

2 Tbsp. honey
2 Tbsp. mineral water
1 Tbsp. red wine
1 Tbsp. "spirits" (stronger than vodka, so maybe rubbing alcohol?)
1 Tbsp. butter
1 Tbsp. fat (like bacon fat)
1 Tsp. baking soda

Heat the fat over the stove in a little sauce pan, then add the honey and butter and stir.  Add the wine and vodka, then the mineral water.  Heat that up for a bit, then add the baking soda.  When the mixture turns black, it's done.  When the mixture turns black?  Yes, when the mixture turns black.

Drink it hot.  I would highly recommend having something nearby to eat immediately after drinking it to stifle the taste.  I like a spoonful of jam or honey, myself.  Bottoms up!

It looks terrifying and tastes terrifying, but Nyquil has nothing on this stuff.  I don't know why, but it really did the trick.  Tanya, who suffered from pretty bad asthma, swears by the stuff.

So there you go, a little Russian homeopathy for the ailing Westerner.  Good night guys!

Пока ребята, Russian Jane

More news from camp

Well, it won't take too long to update y'all on my everyday life, because so far, I've been at home the whole time.  Yes, I've come down with a cold.  I spent yesterday sleeping and taking weird Russian pills.  Masha and her family have been taking very good care of me; I've had more tea than can be found in China, and have like three kinds of weird lozenges.  I even had to do some kind of horrible throat gargle.  But actually, I feel better today.  Tomorrow, I should be able to start work at the English Studio.

And now, more from camp.

Пока ребята!  Russian Jane

PS Пеееееерец!

DAY TWO: THEY ARRIVE

Pre-arrival: I'm sitting on my top bunk in our room in the precious little free-time I have before the campers arrive.  I'm also hungry, just as a note.  I always eat a lot abroad.

This morning, we started with a short meeting as a team and finished our counselor's training.  The theme keeps getting cooler.  They've set up a big fake customs for the kids to check into, and Dannah and I, the only native English speakers, are customs officials.  It should be fun. 

Before my precious free time, we made a short movie.  There's a pretty big emphasis on video at this camp, and at the end they make a pretty nifty DVD.  Every day they make a video and try to make sure each kid is seen, and then they show it at the evening meeting.  This video involved all of us climbing into (ok, crouching behind) a suitcase that the leader Andree carried around camp and to the main hall.  It should be a really fun intro to the camp.  I hope I can get the video up when I have it.

Other than that, it's a lot of goofing around with the other counselors, who are all quite swell.  A lot of them already know each other from camp, so I've been feeling a little like the odd-man-out, but I think that feeling will go away.

Well, now I have to wait until after lunch when the hoodlums arrive!

Post-arrival: I have a hard time believing that it's only been one day so far because of the amount of things that I've done today.  To spare a lot of space, I'll just do a short list.

-       Worked at “customs” with Dannah checking documents, which was actually just asking the kids a few questions to ascertain their English level. A lot of this went like, “oh, what’s your name?”  “….I’m fine.” This took two and a half hours.

-       I helped make “parachutes”, which were big plastic bags with a rip-cord made of thread and a mini-bagel

-       Played capture the flag

-       Moved AGAIN; we had another girl come so there was no room for me in our cabin, but now I’m living with Anna and a girl named Serafima, which is actually great

-       Had a big meeting with singing, dancing, etc.  The parachutes came into play because we were on an airplane (duh) and the kids had to jump out, which involved them running to the front door of our meeting hall, climbing on a table, and jumping on a mattress

-       Played Snipers; our girls had to guard Varvara and I from a sniper with a red laser pointer as we tried to make it to the soccer field for our evening snack

-       Helped our girls choreograph a dance to be presented later, to show of the talents of the Super Stars (that’s us!)

The girls are all sweethearts, as I expected.  Our cabin, “Oslo” (every cabin has a different name) can earn points for being punctual, and there’s one girl, Anya, who always has a little watch and is our official timekeeper.  She alerts us at fifteen till and five till whatever we’re doing.  Another girl, Katya who wants to be called Kate, is a real sassy-pants, and of course I like that.  Then there’s little Alina, who’s just as sweet as can be and always wants to hold my hand.  She’s been upset today because she won’t be able to talk to her mom for two days, and I understand the feeling; I really miss talking to my family.

Ok, my new room is fine, except there’s some kid shrieking bloody murder down the hall, and it’s 11:30pm.  Stop kid, stop.

There you have it, day two!  I suspect the descriptions will get shorter as the week progresses, but there you go! Now, I’m going to bed before I expire.

Pics from camp

Out little cabin (well, the girls' little cabin)

Me and Varya, ready to take on the world

My little chicky-poos

Dinner time!

Look at them peacefully playing...how deceptive

A glimpse of our evening meetings

Hi everyone!  Here are a few photos from the first days of camp.  More to come later!

Пока ребята, Russian Jane

I survived camp! No internet even!

Holy wow am I ready to never see a child again.  100 little kids who all wanted to speak English and run around like "total wackos" (as one of our text books put it).  I'm dog tired, but it was actually an excellent 10 days.

Right now, I'm back in town (in Novorossyisk) at Masha's house.  She's a wonderful girl who was a counselor at camp, and we became fast friends.  I'll be staying with her the rest of the summer.

While at camp I was without internet, but I kept a camp journal.  You'll notice the entries get shorter and shorter as time goes on and I get more and more exhausted.  I'll give you a few entries at a time so it's not overwhelming.  Photos later!

Happy to be "home", and happy to be back online!  Also, it's my birthday, and it's already shaping up to be the best birthday ever.

Пока ребята, Russian Jane

The Camp Diaries

Hey guys!  I’m without Internet access here at Mountain Springs, so I’m keeping a camp journal instead!  I’ll put it all up when I get back to civilization.

DAY ONE: THEY MADE US DANCE

Dannah and I arrived at the camp around noon, and went to work right away putting together journals for the campers (the ones that almost killed us the other day) while everyone else worked on other campy projects, like hanging banners and making nametags for the campers.

The theme of the 10-day English camp is “Route 66: Lost and Found”.  All the vocab has to do with time, directions, etc.  The topics look like they’re going to be excellent conversation starters for deeper things.  The last day even has a section about finding direction in your life.  It should be pretty fun.

Our camp schedule is going to rigorous to say the least.   Our day starts at 8am and ends at 11pm.  Thank goodness, there’s a quiet hour in the middle (тихий час, I think that sounds really cute) explicitly for napping.  Our days are filled with meetings, lessons, games, and a whole lot of together time.  I think I'm going to be totally exhausted by the time this camp it over, but it's going to be a blast, I already know.

My co-counselor is Varvara, a fireball from Sibieria.  We've become fast friends, and I'm excited to share this adventure with her.

In the evening, we had a little party for us councelors and workers at the camp.  And by little, I mean huge.  There weren't that many people, maybe 50, but they did it up right.  We met in the soccer field where there were two rows of plastic chairs.  We were instructed to all stand in the middle, boys on one side girls on the other.  Then, Varvara and another bloke Peter taught us a country dance that turned into giggling bedlam pretty quickly, but it was really fun.  They taught us another dance after that, and everyone participated.  Initially it sounded exactly like the kind of thing I would hate, but it was really fun.

After that, the camp leader Andree gave a speech and we all prayed together.  Alyssia did the same, and the lit a big bonfire to signify the start of camp.  After that, we did something really neat.  They gave us about three big flat ribbons that we tore into little strips.  We then went around to everyone and tied a ribbon on their wrist while giving them a blessing.  It was really touching, and by the end of it my wrists were full of ribbons. 

After the party, a group of us went down to the rocky beach and sat on the shore for a bit in the starlight.  We were all pretty exhausted, but it was a beautiful night and in that light, the sea really did look black.  On a side note, in the background were Russian screaming and cheering because Greece was playing Russia in Eurocup.  They love soccer here.

We walked back and I collapsed into bed, pretty satisfied with my day of work.

First I was in Moscow! Now I'm not!

I went to Moscow!  Then I went to Novorossiysk!

Well guys, I’ve finally arrived in Novorossiysk, my ultimate destination.  Tomorrow, I’m going to pack up and head to the camp.  Kiddos arrive on Sunday!  In the time since my arrival, I’ve…

VISITED MOSCOW

I spent two days in Moscow with Tom's family before heading down South, mostly to get used to the time change but also to see the sites.  The first day, as you now, I got poured on, and as for what else I did it’s not important because I was such a jet-lag zombie that I hardly remember myself.

On the second day, I got out and saw the town.  Lucky for me, my buddy Dalen, with whom I studied and palled around with at the University of Montana, works in a suburb of Moscow teaching English.  He came into town to show me around.  He’s such a sweetheart, he found out the night before we met up that his mom died.  He has to head back to America as soon as he can, but he still showed up to give me a tour.  He’s a real friend and a real trooper.

The famous Bolshoi Theater

St. Basil’s, Russia’s most famous landmark

Me with this….well-known thing….

The original church of Christ the Savior was destroyed during the Soviet Union.  They wanted to build a big tower in its place so they dug a foundation, but that fell through so they turned it into the world’s largest swimming pool.  After the Soviet Union collapsed, they closed the pool and rebuild the church.  No joke.

In Moscow, Dalen and I saw the famous Tretyakov Gallery, Red Square, and famous Arbat Street.  Tretyakov was amazing, because they had almost all of the famous paintings that I learned about in school.  I was like a really geeky kid in a candy store.

A massive painting by Ivanov, “Christ Ascending to the People”

A portrait of the composer  Modest-Mussorsky (the scary demon thing on the mountain in Disney’s Fantasia?  That’s his work)

My favorite Russian painting, depicting Ivan the Terrible right after he murdered his son and only heir to the throne

After an action-packed day in Moscow, the next morning I…

FLEW TO NOVOROSSYISK

I arrived in Novorossiysk around noon, and it was hotter than blazes (which seems to be a pattern for me; when I was in Russia in 2010, it was the hottest summer in some 1000 years).  I waited for my ride and for another American coming to help at the camp, named Danna (rhymes with Hannah).  She’s from California and works full-time at a camp; the Russian’s who run the camp I’m going to, Anya and Alyssia, went to her camp to get some training a couple years ago, so they know her quite well.  She’s a peach, I can tell already.  Plus, she’s very close to obtaining her helicopter pilot’s license!  How cool is that?

In hot Novorossyisk we drove to the Vasilyev home, to stay with Natasha and Oleg and their two kids Sveta and Andree.  Andree just got his PhD in engineering (very Russian) and helps at the camp every year; Sveta is still in high school.  They have the most beautiful house, with the most beautiful garden you’ve ever seen.  I’ve already had a couple home grown cucumbers. 

Andree drove us around town and took us to the beautiful boardwalk on the bay; Novorossyisk is a beautiful city.  During WWII, it was occupied by the Nazis and practically leveled, so most of the city was build in the early fifties.  It’s a pity that so many beautiful old buildings were lost, but things now are in very good condition. We had a wonderful day all in all.

Yesterday the real work began.  After a trip to the Russian market (which is totally crazy and unlike anything that we have in America; they literally sell the kitchen sink there) a hike up a beautiful (though trash-ridden) canyon, and lunch, we went to Anya’s apartment to help her assemble work books for the campers.  As these kinds of projects often are, it was far more complex than it first appeared.  We were making all kinds of frustrated noises and pulling our hair out, and it still isn’t done.  Today, however, we’re going to get it finished and head up to the camp.

            Andree and the beautiful house

 

The fairy-tale garden

My canyon-hiking hat.  I’m a trendsetter.

Anya and Danna, losing their minds over our project.

So far, I’ve really enjoyed my time.  Except for the heat, things are comfortable here, and I really like Novorossyisk. 

Oh, and for whoever cares, the place is crawling with lizards.  They are absolutely everywhere.  These totally adorable kids ran up to us on our hike today with fists full of lizards and a jar of them to boot.  They were the cutest lizard hunters of all.

Alright, here comes camp week! 

Пока ребята, Russian Jane

Ok Moscow, you win

Just thought I'd share with you people how my little walk around Moscow went this afternoon.

It rained.  Suddenly.  And apocalyptically.  And I was soaked to the bone, forced to hide in a pharmacy and then slough through puddles.

Every middle-aged Russian woman thought I was going to die of rain, and every Russian boy wanted to take me home.

The end.

Moscow, you best get yourself ready

I've arrived!  Seventeen hours, three flights, and two bags later, I'm finally in Moscow.

As I write, I'm sitting in a beautiful apartment belonging to a contact named Tom's family; Tom was kind enough to let me stay with him and his family while I'm in Moscow the next couple of days.

I'm already encountering a familiar and unpleasant sensation here in Russia: I have next to no idea what people are saying at any given moment.  It'll only take a couple weeks for me to be back into the swing of things, but it's frustrating for the time being. Tom just helped my buy a cell phone (which cost me a grand total of $30 to buy the phone and get the service, America is a rip-off, and I'd also like to add that my $20 phone comes with a little flashlight on top AND FM radio), and without him I would have been a lamb among wolves.  Literally.  It was all 20-something Russian dudes.  I'd have been toast.

Today I'm going to roam around the hood and explore, maybe buy some nail polish.  I'm incredibly tired, but I'm not going to allow myself to sleep until 9pm tonight.  I'm very much in the rip-the-band aid-off camp of overcoming jet lag.  But right now the whole room is bobbing up and down, so we'll see.

Tomorrow, my buddy Dalen is coming in from one of the suburbs and we're going to see the sights of Moscow.  He and I studied together at the University of Montana, and it will be fun to pal around and see Lenin.

Well, the guest room where I'm staying looks like a war zone, so I'd better organize before I fall asleep!

Пока ребята, Russian Jane

One week! THE FINAL COUNTDOWN!

Cue the music, people, it's the Final Countdown!  In one week (at 6am) I'll be hopping on a flight to Russia.  "Thrilled" does not begin to describe it.

This week is all about the final preparations.  Gathering all my supplies, writing "thank yous" to the generous people making this dream possible, seeing all my buddies one last time, and on Sunday, the big event: packing.  I have an itemized packing list with every item listed.  We're not talking a bullet point for "shorts", we're talking three bullet points under the heading "shorts" for each individual...short.  It's intense.

How is the fundraising going, you ask?  As far as I know, I'm about 1/3 of the way there, but God is good!  There's room for more!  He's already bringing people in from all sides. 

Ok guys, I'll keep you posted about what's happening!  Soon my friends, very soon!

Пока ребята!  Russian Jane