Blogs

I went twice to a renowned local restaurant “Call of the Wild”. Its most recent claim to fame: “Putin and Angela Merkel ate here.”  On the menu, among the regular fare including filet mignon and shashliks: rain deer steak (chewy; a good tenderizing would perhaps make it edible), bear stew with veggies (excellent!) and ground bear meat cutlets (good)… good food to accompany a few shots of – yes, you guessed – vodka, Skol! …or rather: “na zdorove!”

No – I did not freeze here in Siberia. Late January and the early February is exam season here, I have been swamped with work and hence the gap in my blogs. The temps usually oscillate between -5 and -25, but without any wind it is not bad. Most of the days are beautifully sunny and intensely bright because of the high reflection from the snow. The lowest temperature this year so far was -36 degrees Fahrenheit (no wind chill factored in). But, life goes on as usual; no schools are closing; no classes are cancelled; people are leading their normal lives as if it would be a balmy 70 degrees (only they wear more clothes here). Most beguiling are the preschool kids running in their snow-suits with plastic or traditional sleds, with no regard for their red-pinched cheeks and noses; young Moms pushing their tots’ crib-carts with sleds attached to the regular wheels. No one is huddling at home because of cold or snow. Even the old folks do not forgo their daily walk in the park, or discussion amongst them of the world affairs while sitting on the park benches swept of snow. Here you begin to understand the resiliency of the people of Siberia.

Strangely, there is no frenzy about the Olympic Games in Sochi. There are plenty of “propaganda” posters on the streets, but I haven’t heard yet the students discussing the Games. In bars and cafeterias TV is running regular newscasts or… National Geographic Series. No ESPN-type channel here.

Street traffic never slows down. Everyone rides with snow-tires, of course. Public transportation: electric trams and trolleys, buses and minibuses, including many run on compressed natural gas (CNG) of red canisters brightly painted red and stowed on the roof-rack. Right about one-third of the minibuses here are running on CNG.